Hot on the heels of the visit by HM The Queen, Canberra played host to US President Obama this week. I attended a dinner at the Parliament and a key note speech he gave to a joint session of both houses of Parliament. By chance I found myself sitting next to PM Gillard’s partner Tim Mathieson at the barbers that lunchtime, as we both spruced up for the big occasion.
This was a very important visit. Obama’s speech was a major statement of US policy on Asia Pacific. He described a shift of US attention towards the region, and said that he had made a “deliberate and strategic decision” that the “US will play a larger and long-term role in shaping this region and its future”. He added that “in the Asia Pacific in the 21st century, the USA is all in”. Earlier he had, together with PM Julia Gillard, announced plans for an enhancement of US/Australia military cooperation. This will see a significant rotation of US marines in Northern Australia for training and exercises and increased rotations of US aircraft. Naturally we welcome even greater ties between two of our very closest allies.
Even above and beyond the prestige which attaches to his great office, Obama is an extraordinarily charismatic figure and impressive orator. He was almost mobbed by the eminent dinner guests as they vied to shake his hand. He clearly thrives on personal contact and had a ready smile for all. His gesture in including a number of Australianisms in his remarks went down very well. Some were purely Australian, “no worries, she’ll be right”, others were words which, though novel to an American ear, would be familiar to both British and Australian speakers of our great shared language. As Opposition leader Tony Abbott put it in his welcoming remarks at the dinner “Our citizens are not strangers to each other. English-speaking peoples never really are.” President Obama did not, however, attempt an Australian accent. A video of Prime Minister David Cameron doing just that, as he gave a good humoured account of his recent visit to Australia in his Mansion House speech earlier this week, has gone viral on the internet here. Most people I’ve spoken to think it’s great fun.