The other day I had a conversation with a Beijing friend and I mentioned that Barack Obama was leading in the presidential race:
 前幾天，我和北京一友人聊天，我提及歐巴馬在選戰中領先：
    She: Obama? But he's the black man, isn't he?
 她：歐巴馬？但他不是黑人嗎？
    Me: Yes, exactly.
 我：對，沒錯。
   She: But surely a black man couldn't become president of the U-nited States?
 她：但黑人怎麼可能當上美國總統？
    Me: It looks as if he'll be elected.
 我：看來他會當選。
    She: But president? That's such an important job! In America, I thought blacks were janitors and laborers.
 她：但當總統？這是非常重要的工作！在美國，我以為黑人都在當大樓管理員和藍領勞工階級。
   Me: No, blacks have all kinds of jobs.
 我：不，黑人也從事各行各業。
    She: What do white people think about that, about getting a black president? Are they upset? Are they angry?
 她：白人對這件事有什麼想法，對選出黑人總統有何看法？他們不會憂心忡忡，心煩意亂？難道他們不生氣？
    Me: No, of course not! If Obama is elected, it'll be because white people voted for him.
 我：不，當然不會！如果歐巴馬當選，那是因為白人也把票投給他。
    She: Really? Unbelievable! What an amazing country!
 她：真的嗎？實在令人費解！真是個了不起的國家！

   We're beginning to get a sense of how Barack Obama's political success could change global perceptions of the United States, redefining the American "brand" to be less about Guantanamo and more about equality. This change in perceptions would help rebuild American political capital in the way that the Marshall Plan did in the 1950s or that John Kennedy's presidency did in the early 1960s.
 我們開始感受到歐巴馬在這次選戰成功，將如何改變全球對美國的觀感，重新界定美國「品牌」，其中（關押凱達和神學士嫌犯）古巴關達納摩灣的比重減少，種族平等增多。這種觀感的改變，將有助於以1950年代「馬歇爾計畫」重建美國或依1960年代初約翰‧甘迺迪總統的藍圖重建美國這個政治首都。

   In his endorsement of Obama, Colin Powell noted that "the new president is going to have to fix the reputation that we've left with the rest of the world." That's not because we crave admiration, but because cooperation is essential to address 21st-century challenges; you can't fire cruise missiles at the global fi-nancial crisis.
 （同為非洲裔的前美國共和黨國務卿）鮑爾在表態支持歐巴馬時指出，「新總統勢必修正我們留給世上其他人的汙名。」那並不是因為我們一心渴望贏得世人認同和讚美，而是因為在解決21世紀的挑戰上，合作攸關重要。你總不能對全球金融海嘯發射巡戈飛彈吧。

   In his endorsement, Powell added that an Obama election "will also not only electrify our country, I think it'll electrify the world."  A 22-nation survey by the BBC found that voters abroad preferred Obama to McCain in every single country—by four to one over all. Nearly half of those in the BBC poll said that the election of Obama, an African-American, would "fundamentally change" their percep-tions of the United States.

 在為歐巴馬背書時，鮑爾也強調，歐巴馬當選「不只可以瞬間強化我們的國家，我認為這也能為世界注入強心針。」BBC針對22國所進行的調查發現，大體而言，幾乎在每個國家，海外選民以4比1的比例，寧可選歐巴馬、棄馬侃。在BBC民調中，近半受訪者表示，選出歐巴馬這位非洲裔美國人，可以「根本上改變」他們對美國的觀感。

   Europe is particularly intoxicated by the possibility of restoring amity with America in an Obama presidency. As The Economist put it: "Across the Continent, Bush hatred has been re-placed by Obama-mania."
 歐洲對歐巴馬總統治下的美國可望恢復親善友好的關係，尤其興奮莫名。誠如《經濟學人》雜誌所說：「整個歐陸，仇恨布希已經被歐巴馬狂熱取代。」

   Steven Kull, director of the Pro-gram on International Policy Attitudes, which conducted the BBC poll, said that at a recent international confer-ence he attended in Malaysia, many Muslims voiced astonishment at Obama's rise because it was so much at odds with their assumptions about the United States. Remember that the one thing countless millions of people around the world "know" about the United States is that it is controlled by a cabal of white bankers and Jews who use police with fire hoses to re-press blacks. To them, Obama's rise triggers severe cognitive dissonance. "It's an anomaly, so contrary to their expectation that it makes them re-ceptive to a new paradigm for the U.S.," Kull said. 

 負責BBC民調的「國際政策態度計畫」主任庫爾說，他最近到馬來西亞出席一項國際會議，很多穆斯林對歐巴馬聲勢崛起，異口同聲表示驚異，因為這和他們對美國的傳統認知相去太遠。全球千百萬人對美國記憶最深的一件事是：美國是由一群白人銀行家和猶太人的陰謀集團所把持，他們利用警察手拿水龍鎮壓黑人。對他們而言，歐巴馬聲勢看漲，引發嚴重的認知矛盾。「這是一種反常的現象，完全違背他們的預期，而促使他們願意接納美國的新典範，」庫爾說。

   Europeans like to mock the vapidity of American politics, but they also acknowledge that it would be difficult to imagine a brown or black person leading France or Germany. As for Africa, Obama's Kenyan father was of the Luo tribe, a minority that has long suffered brutal discrimination in both Kenya and in Uganda. The bitter joke in East Africa is that a Luo has more of a chance of becoming president in the United States than in Kenya.

 歐洲人常嘲諷美國政治無聊乏味，但他們也不得不承認，無法想像由黃種人或黑人領導法國或德國。至於非洲，歐巴馬肯亞籍的父親屬於洛族，長久以來在肯亞和烏干達一直是飽受嚴重歧視的少數族裔。現在東非流傳一則挖苦的笑話，洛族在美國當總統的機會還比在肯亞大。

   While in the western industrialized world, full of university graduates and marinated in principles of egalitarian-ism, the idea of electing a member of a racial minority to the highest office seems an astonishing breakthrough. But Jamaica's 95 percent black popu-lation elected a white man as its prime minister in 1980, and kept him in of-fice throughout that decade. Likewise, the African nation of Mauritius has elected a white prime minister of French origin.  

 儘管在西方工業國，滿街都是飽讀詩書的大學畢業生，他們浸淫於平等主義原則，選出一個少數族裔來出任國家最高元首，似乎是個驚人的突破。但牙買加黑人占總人口95%，他們卻早在1980年就選出白人當總理，而且整整當了10年之久。同樣的，非洲國家模里西斯選出法國裔的白人總理。

   Obama's skin color is a bad reason to vote for him or against him. Sub-stance should always trump symbolism. Yet if this election goes as the polls suggest, we may find a path to restore America's global influence—and thus to achieve some of our international objectives—in part because the world is concluding that Americans can see beyond a person’s epidermis, and that we're every bit as open-minded about racial minorities as Jamaicans already were a quarter-century ago.
歐巴馬的膚色並非決定是否投票給他的理由，實質勝過象徵意義，但這次選舉如果果如民調所顯示的（歐巴馬當選），我們可能可以找到一條修復美國全球影響力的路，進而達成我們某些國際目標。這部分歸功於世人得到結論，美國人可以不在乎一個人的膚色，而美國人對少數族裔心胸寬大，一如牙買加在四分之一個世紀前就已經做到的那樣。（取材自紐約時報紀思道Nicholas D. Kristof專欄）