World reaction mixed to U.S. presidential debate

Naomi Westland, Louise Osborne, Sarah Lynch and Hani Yousuf, Special for USA TODAY | USATODAY

Commentators and people around the globe gave mixed opinions to the performances of Mitt Romney and President Obama in Tuesday's debate that focused largely on foreign policy.

"Obama (came out on top) but to an extent both tried to be the other," said Omar R. Quraishi in Karachi, editor of the editorial pages of the English-language Pakistani newspaper, Express Tribune, which is affiliated with the New York Times's global editions.

"Obama sounded firm and assertive, kind of like a Republican, and Romney tried to ensure that the female vote, which has apparently risen for him, doesn't go away, but tried not to sound like a war-mongering Republican."



German weekly magazine Der Spiegel, which is generally highly critical of U.S. conservatives, said that Obama had "clearly won the debate" but that Romney had "neutralized" the president's attacks on his record. A commentator in the magazine complained that neither candidate adequately addressed the most pressing challenges facing the "wobbly" global power - climate change.

But British commentators said that Romney had had the "best night."



"The final debate probably won't shift the opinion polls, but it saw a marked change in emphasis in Mr. Romney's foreign policy," said Mark Mardell, the BBC's North American editor.



"That is a danger for him in that it resurrects the old flip-flopping charge. But it also suggests a new confidence that he has to convince people he is safe enough to entrust with the presidency," he said.



But others said that any performance by Obama was going to stand out well following the first debate, in which the president himself said he did not do well.



"This whole series of debates is a little bit overshadowed by the extraordinarily poor performance of Obama in the initial debate," Ned Wiley, an American representative of Republicans Abroad, who has been living in Germany for 12 years and in Europe

for three decades.



The two contenders in the presidential race competed over policy in the Middle East in a year that has seen demonstrations flair up, increasing conflict in Syria, a renewed al-Qaeda presence and attacks, and Iran refusing to end its nuclear enrichment program.

Tim Stanley of The Telegraph, a right-of-center newspaper in the United Kingdom, said Romney won the debate by appearing more presidential than Obama. He said Obama "insulted, patronized and mocked his opponent rather than put across a constructive argument. His performance was rude and unpresidential."

Yossi Mekelberg, program director of international relations at Regent's College in London, did not see it that way.

"Romney accused Obama of not dong enough on the peace process but he didn't suggest any alternative," Mekelberg said. "I think Romney's speeches when he visited Israel didn't suggest that he would be the broker of peace between Israel and Palestine if he was elected… The Israeli-Palestinian peace process is in deep freeze right now, the question we all ask ourselves is whether a second-term Obama would assert himself and actually do the right things to promote the peace process."

Mekelberg said the debate was more about personalities than policies.



"In many ways both sides agreed," he said. "Obama presented himself as very presidential compared to Romney's inexperience in foreign affairs."



But what was clearly missing in the debate, said some, was any discussion over Europe and the continuing financial crisis that has led some countries to the brink of economic ruin.



"What will be done to maintain relations with important European trading partners wasn't even mentioned," Wiley said.



Analysts said it was unlikely that the debate would swing the vote this time round and that divisions had already been made.



"People who support the Egyptian revolution want Obama," said Said Sadek, a political sociologist in Cairo. "People against the Egyptian revolution and its result that led to the Muslim Brotherhood coming to power support Romney. This is the main division."



The Palestinian government was not pleased with the responses of both candidates.

Nabil Abu Rdeneh, a spokesman for Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, said "it should be clear" that without resolution, "there will be no success for American policy in the Middle East."

Writing in YnetNews.com in Israel, Yitzhak Benhorin said Obama mastered more facts but Romney wanted to drag Romney into a trap and present him as someone who is not qualified to serve as commander in chief and as someone who will get the USA involved in a third war in the Middle East.

"But Romney did not fall into this trap and even agreed with the president on some issues," he said.

Ruthie Blum, author of "To Hell in a Handbasket: Carter, Obama, and the 'Arab Spring,'" wrote in Israel Hayom that Romney was able to shine a light on Obama's past failures to stand up to Iran's leadership.

"Listening to the appeasement king of the West assert that he laid down the law to the mullahs from the get-go, that his sanctions have been working, and that he will never allow Tehran to proceed toward completing the bomb, one might

conceivably be lulled into forgetting what he has been up to," she said.

Dan Russell, a 50-year-old university lecturer in the United Kingdom said the election outcome would also have a global impact because "we're one big world".

"I hope Obama will win in the end," he said. "Obama isn't perfect though."

Russell said Obama has not delivered on a lot of things but claimed that's partly to do with the split Congress. However, Obama had a Democratic super-majority control of both the House and Senate in his first two years in office and techincally speaking could have passed any legislation he promoted without Republican votes, and sometimes did.

In China, on the booming micro-blog service Weibo, many Chinese Internet users offered comment. Some criticized the U.S. "America derived profit from China, but American people think they suffer injustice. American politicians pleased American people's prejudice," wrote Tao Yongyi, an independent economist, after the second debate.

Others reflected on what the debate revealed about China's closed, one party system, which will next month reveal new Communist Party leadership, after a thoroughly closed-door process. "How many Chinese leaders dare to debate in front of all the people in the world?" asked Cao Yexun, an online writer from Chengdu in southwest China.

The U.S. Presidential debate was all over China's state-run CCTV Television, but it reflects China's "sorrow", wrote Lin Mingdao, a business in Dongguan, a southern manufacturing hub. "How does our election proceed? If it's decided internally, can it still be called an election?"

China's state news agency advised both candidates to tone down the "get-tough-on-China rhetoric made along the campaign trail" and deal realistically with "China's inevitable rise."

Contributing: Charles McPhedran and Ruby Russell from Berlin; Calum MacLeod from Beijing. Westland reported from London, Osborne from Berlin, Lynch from Cairo and Yousuf from Karachi.



