Brexiters shouldn’t knock Obama too hard. Most Brits still like him

I suppose it’s inevitable that Brexiters will angrily reject Obama’s intervention, especially his line about Britain being left ‘at the back of the queue’ when it comes to trade. But if they let their annoyance spill over into a general criticism of the president, they will harm their own case. For most Brits still rate him very highly.

Tim Montgomerie accuses him of extreme arrogance, and widens the critique: the grand stirring rhetoric that won him the presidency not only failed to unite America; it fostered a more extreme and angry political culture.

Most popular

Nicholas Farrell

Elon Musk’s ‘Nazi salute’ – an expert’s view

I half-agree: Obama’s exceptional expression of liberal idealism scared his opponents, and provoked them to mobilise. Something similar happened in the sixties: Martin Luther King was in a sense responsible for the rise of the religious right – and Nixon. I think it’s a bit odd to blame someone for expressing a liberal vision with such force that it makes anti-liberals furious.