The Incredible Shrinking President

By Thomas Lifson

Barack Obama's global stature has taken a catastrophic fall, as evidenced by his latest trip overseas. Even the New York Times cannot avert its eyes from the disastrous decline in his (and therefore America's) influence: Obama's economic view is rejected on world stage:

President Barack Obama's hopes of emerging from his Asia trip with the twin victories of a free-trade agreement with South Korea and a unified approach to spurring global economic growth ran into resistance on all fronts Thursday, putting Obama at odds with his key allies and largest trading partners.

Germany (which has recovered nicely from the global financial meltdown by shunning stimulus spending) rejects him out of hand: "Germany rebuffs Obama on trade gap"

In one-on-one meetings with the heads of the U.S.'s biggest nemeses on trade issues at a Group of 20 economic powers meeting in Seoul, President Obama pressed his case for trying to curb ballooning trade deficits and surpluses to help prevent another financial collapse like the one that toppled the world economy in 2008.

But Mrs. Merkel shut the door on any concrete commitment from Europe's export engine to limit its large trade surpluses to 4 percent of economic output - a proposal floated by the U.S. in behind-the-scenes negotiations.

Foreign leaders have taken the measure of Barack Obama, and found him a lightweight, a head of state whose proposals can be dismissed as substance-free fantasies, unworthy of serious consideration. American voters should take note of this, for nobody understands a national leader better than his or her peers. Foreign leaders are also immune to the blather of the American propaganda media.

We have a serious problem when the leader of the free world carries no weight. America has two more dangerous years with this poseur, this dabbler of an ideologue at the helm.