LONDON – Offering reassurance and resolve, President Barack Obama
stood in the historic grandeur of Westminster Hall and served notice to
England and the world that the growing influence of countries like
China, India and Brazil in no way dictates a diminished global role for
America and its European allies.
“The time for our leadership is now,” Obama declared
to members of Parliament, who for the first time gave an American
president the honor of addressing them from the 900-year-old hall where
great and gruesome moments in British history have played out.
“If we fail to meet that responsibility, who would
take our place, and what kind of world would we pass on?” the president
asked.
Tracing an arc from the allied soldiers who fought on
the beaches of Normandy to the NATO-backed rebels now fighting in
Benghazi, Libya, Obama argued that only the Western allies have the
might and fortitude to promote and defend democracy around the globe.
Obama’s message that U.S. and Europe remain vital on
the world stage is one he is sure to carry with him as he heads next to
Deauville, France, for a two-day summit of the world’s top industrial
nations. In addition to pressing economic matters, leaders will focus
there, too, on how to support democracy in the Middle East and North
Africa in a time of upheaval and economic strains… >>>
