For the American liberal intelligentsia who have always revered European opinion, and taken its contempt for America as unimpeachable wisdom, this is going to be a problem. But not much of one. When it comes to a choice between foreign intellectuals and the president whom they believe to embody the moral regeneration of their own country, I can assure you there will be no contest. It is impossible to over-estimate the importance of Mr Obama's election to the presidency among enlightened liberal Americans: he is more than a hero. He is a vindication of all that they have believed (often in defiant hope) that their country stood for. He is living proof that America is the land of equality and opportunity that it was founded to be. And now they have seen him rebuffed by degenerate old Europe as if he were as if he were no better than his barbarian predecessor whom they had delighted in detesting in comradeship with the most sophisticated chatterers in the world.