Like clockwork, McCain’s campaign is responding to Obama’s Berlin speech in almost exactly the way I expected they would:

While Barack Obama took a premature victory lap today in the heart of Berlin, proclaiming himself a ‘citizen of the world,’ John McCain continued to make his case to the American citizens who will decide this election [bold mine-DL].  Barack Obama offered eloquent praise for this country, but the contrast is clear. John McCain has dedicated his life to serving, improving and protecting America. Barack Obama spent an afternoon talking about it.

Also, they are hitting Obama for his cancellation of the “inappropriate” visit to Landstuhl, which is an inexplicable blunder by Obama.  If he was not speaking to the Berliners as a presidential candidate (not credible, but that’s the official line), how can he then invoke his candidacy as a reason to not go to visit an American military base in Germany?   

P.S.  The line about being a “fellow citizen of the world” was just the most prominent example of how Obama blundered in this speech.  Obama misjudges the public mood here in the U.S. quite badly if he thinks that “this is the moment” when Americans are interested in tearing down walls and embracing globalisation.  The policy implications of this laundry list of trouble spots are serious:

Will we extend our hand to the people in the forgotten corners of this world who yearn for lives marked by dignity and opportunity; by security and justice? Will we lift the child in Bangladesh from poverty, shelter the refugee in Chad, and banish the scourge of AIDS in our time?

Will we stand for the human rights of the dissident in Burma, the blogger in Iran, or the voter in Zimbabwe? Will we give meaning to the words “never again” in Darfur?  

If voters think that electing Obama President will mean doing a lot of heavy-lifting with foreign aid, sheltering refugees in Africa and protecting Burmese dissidents and the Zimbabwean opposition party, they will not be terribly interested in putting him in that office.  I would have thought that he would have understood the public’s weariness with the Iraq adventure better than this.  Does he not understand that one important source of discontent with the war is its costliness and the diversion of resources to Iraq rather than having them used and invested here at home? 

Update: As James notes, besides being grating the claim to be a citizen of the world is also meaningless.

Second Update: In James’ defense, and to answer to the generic response that “Kennedy and Reagan said it, too!” I would just add that the phrase “citizen of the world” is meaningless no matter how many former Presidents and famous people have said it.  Worse than suggesting some “post-nationalist” attitude, the phrase is simply false: no one is a “citizen of the world,” so what can it mean to claim to be one? 

There may be critics of Obama’s speech who object to this line simply because Obama said it, but I can say that James and I aren’t among them.  I have previously objected to conservative uses of Tom Paine-isms, and will continue to do so, because I consider Tom Paine to be a dreadful source of inspiration who was frequently wrong about fundamental things.  It is also not a vindication of the phrase that the idea of being a kosmopolitis can be traced back to certain Hellenistic philosophical schools, particularly the Stoics, in an era of absolute monarchies and empires–that just drives home how undesirable and how at odds with republican liberty the idea of being a “citizen of the world” is.  Claiming to be a kosmopolitis became fashionable when active citizenship and meaningful political participation were on the wane; world “citizenship” is typically the foe of engaged citizenship in one’s own community.