La Casa Blanca

Obama, favorito para repetir triunfo en las primarias de Maryland, Virginia y Columbia
--Headline on a Spanish news website

Ever since the New Hampshire primary in early January, I’ve been hearing all about the U.S. presidential candidates in the news, the Spanish news. When Hillary cried while answering a question in Portsmouth, the Spanish news reported on it; when Obama had a big win in South Carolina, the Spanish news reported on it; when Huckabee made some esoteric Biblical reference, well . . . you get the point.

I find it quite strange that Spaniards have ever even heard of the state of New Hampshire and that they know what a caucus is. I hardly know what a caucus is! Furthermore, how much has the American media covered the upcoming Spanish elections? Elections take place in Spain on March 9th! Before we moved to Spain, I hardly knew anything about Spain’s government, history, provinces or policies. (FYI, they have a monarchy, a President who governs the parliament – his/her party is elected, like in England – and the Spanish constitution is only about 25 years old.)

Zapatero, the President of the Spanish parliament

Watching the Spanish coverage of U.S. news and politics has made me consider how little the average gringo knows about world politics, and how great U.S. influence is in Spain. Obviously our influence is pretty strong all over the world – we’ve certainly brought some extra attention to ourselves in the past several years. It still surprises me how much the rest of the world knows about the U.S. Granted, there are many misconceptions. (For example, we went to a party last weekend and everyone was asked to bring a dish typical of their home country. The Spanish girl hosting the party told Brad and Rob, the two Americans, to bring hamburgers and fried chicken. That’s essentially what she thinks we all eat. Brad made "Chicken Bog" – only really eaten in the Pee Dee of South Carolina . . .)

Anyway, I am staying quite up to date on all the U.S. primaries, etc. by watching Spanish TV and selectively reading news online. It’s a refreshing break from watching U.S. political news coverage. By the way, we requested absentee ballots from the State of California, and they still haven’t arrived . . . We tried.