<TABLE cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=0 width="100%" border=0><TBODY><TR>President Obama: Hope for America and the world
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<!-- START OF : div id="storytext"--><!-- more than 4 paragraphs -->BRAVO to Mr Barack Obama, and to Americans for selecting him as their next President.
Having followed the hustings since the primaries, with keener interest than in past US elections, I must say the better candidate won. So why my keener interest now?
I am not Joe the Plumber, just Clinton the Global Citizen. What happens in America affects me, my family and just about everyone, globally. Like it or not, we're all in this together.
With the ability of great leaders who can, like magnets below a sheet of paper, invisibly align iron filings into a new pattern of their making, President-elect Obama offers much hope to reignite the US as the superpower it is, to mobilise international action on pressing global challenges.
It used to be that when the US sneezed, the world caught a cold. With the recent financial tsunami, precipitated by the subprime mortgage crisis, the US developed pneumonia. It instantly sent the rest of the world spinning into the intensive care unit, with a scrambled palliative to hold the fort.
When the real tsunami devastated Asia, I pointed out, in a letter in the Forum in January 2006, that 'globalising' 11 countries in less than 24 hours taught the world two key lessons - 'how small and inter-connected our 'global village' is and the power of globalisation'.
It appears the world has yet to learn to manage the good, the bad and the ugly of globalisation.
There are enough resources in the world to meet everyone's needs, not everyone's greed. In an increasingly multi-polar world, new global financial and freer trade systems must be found, among other things, to harness Planet Earth's resources for everyone's benefit.
The Obama administration, I hope, will avoid the mistakes of past ones - that of promoting a one-size-fits-all Washington-style democracy, which does not work as US experiences in Vietnam and Iraq have shown.
With due respect, I suggest members of the Obama administration read Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew's memoirs, From Third World To First, to obtain insights of how Singapore, in its own democratic way, developed from a city riven with industrial strife, 50 years ago, to be slum-free now and rated seventh of 60 cities - by Washington-based magazine, Foreign Policy - that radiate influence, wealth and sophistication. This is just one Singapore contribution to a better world... we're all in this together. Clinton Lim
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<!-- START OF : div id="storytext"--><!-- more than 4 paragraphs -->BRAVO to Mr Barack Obama, and to Americans for selecting him as their next President.
Having followed the hustings since the primaries, with keener interest than in past US elections, I must say the better candidate won. So why my keener interest now?
I am not Joe the Plumber, just Clinton the Global Citizen. What happens in America affects me, my family and just about everyone, globally. Like it or not, we're all in this together.
With the ability of great leaders who can, like magnets below a sheet of paper, invisibly align iron filings into a new pattern of their making, President-elect Obama offers much hope to reignite the US as the superpower it is, to mobilise international action on pressing global challenges.
It used to be that when the US sneezed, the world caught a cold. With the recent financial tsunami, precipitated by the subprime mortgage crisis, the US developed pneumonia. It instantly sent the rest of the world spinning into the intensive care unit, with a scrambled palliative to hold the fort.
When the real tsunami devastated Asia, I pointed out, in a letter in the Forum in January 2006, that 'globalising' 11 countries in less than 24 hours taught the world two key lessons - 'how small and inter-connected our 'global village' is and the power of globalisation'.
It appears the world has yet to learn to manage the good, the bad and the ugly of globalisation.
There are enough resources in the world to meet everyone's needs, not everyone's greed. In an increasingly multi-polar world, new global financial and freer trade systems must be found, among other things, to harness Planet Earth's resources for everyone's benefit.
The Obama administration, I hope, will avoid the mistakes of past ones - that of promoting a one-size-fits-all Washington-style democracy, which does not work as US experiences in Vietnam and Iraq have shown.
With due respect, I suggest members of the Obama administration read Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew's memoirs, From Third World To First, to obtain insights of how Singapore, in its own democratic way, developed from a city riven with industrial strife, 50 years ago, to be slum-free now and rated seventh of 60 cities - by Washington-based magazine, Foreign Policy - that radiate influence, wealth and sophistication. This is just one Singapore contribution to a better world... we're all in this together. Clinton Lim
