The United States of America has rejected President Barack Obama's worldview, by delivering the House of Representatives and most of the state-level offices to the Republicans in the mid-term elections held last week. The electoral fight was essentially domestic in nature with healthcare, budgetary deficits and joblessness as the principal grist for a contentious electoral campaign.
In the House, the Republicans have returned with huge majority, in fact unprecedented in more than half a century, and therefore will control most of the committees. In the Senate, they missed the majority position by a slim margin, boosting their hope to get it next time.
In the states, the Republicans have captured most of the governorships and legislative chambers - a victory that gives them the authority to rearrange Congressional Districts which are so much critical to the race to Washington. But this turnaround in political America is not of any significant interest to the outside world, even to the Europeans, for the mid-terms were fought on domestic issues with foreign policy matters figuring only marginally.
Humbled by the electoral defeat President Obama has conceded failure of his policies. He is expected to revisit them particularly his healthcare take-over which had emerged as the biggest issue of confrontation between the Republicans and the Democrats.
His desire "to find common ground, move the country forward and get things done for the American people" conveyed to incoming House speaker, Congressman Boehner, and Senator McConnell soon after results were out amply suggests that President Obama has come to accept the reality of deep-seated American conservatism that led Republicans to victory on the bandwagon of the ultra-conservative Tea Party movement.
From now on the Democrats are expected to look inward on domestic political scene, reducing their focus on international issues, and prepare for the 2012 presidential race. Though diluted somewhat later on, the gut reaction of the victorious Republicans, in the words of Senator McConnell, was that "the target now is the White House... The single most important thing we want to achieve is for President Obama to be a one-term president". Indeed, for Barack Obama, an almost idealist in the real world, his dreams stand shattered, and with that of many others in and out of the United States.
With arch conservative Congressman Buck McKeon now slated to become chairman of the House Armed Services Committee the United States' military presence around the world is likely to acquire greater clout and clobber - something we in this region would know rather early in the day. McKeon is known to have always held that the US forces in Afghanistan should have the time 'to achieve their goals'.
Obviously, pressure will be built on the Obama administration to drop the July-2011 deadline to start troop withdrawal from Afghanistan. One must not forget that the so-called 'Obama Wars' in Iraq and Afghanistan are essentially the Bush legacy, and therefore there is every reason that the Republican-dominated House of Representatives would insist that war in Afghanistan is won - and not lost as a consequence of a 'hurried' pullout.
With General Petraeus, who President Obama has inherited as his predecessor's gift from Baghdad, on ground in Afghanistan the withdrawal deadline may not hold. Paraphrased, with Republicans having acquired political ascendancy on the Capitol Hill more war in the region cannot be ruled out.
Moreover, Obama's mid-term loss could give the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, more incentive to resist pressure from a weakened US President for concessions in Middle East peace negotiations as members of Netanyahu's inner circles were cheered by the blow dealt to a Democratic President who is sharply at odds with the right-wing prime minister over Jewish Settlements in the occupied West Bank.
As to how the emerging political equation in American will impact Pakistan there is a fair amount of uncertainty. That the change will have no effect and the ongoing US policy would continue is not without an historical logic, eloquently elaborated by the Heritage Foundation's South Asia analyst Lisa Curtis. Says she: "I doubt we'll see any changes to the (US) strategy toward Pakistan. I think Republicans generally understand the idea of partnering with Pakistan". But, that's not what General Talat Masood (Retd) thinks, who believes that while the American civil and military assistance will come under greater scrutiny the pressure to 'do more' will increase, starting with raised Congressional voices for immediate military operation in North Waziristan.
However, an average Pakistani, who is by now fully disappointed with Obama's so-called Islamic credentials, would like to see reversal of the trend of increasing American tilt for India. Not only are the Democrats seen here as pro-India, the Pakistanis of late are severely critical of the way the US President is trying to build India into a regional policeman. We hope the Republicans' victory will help restore strategic balance in South Asia, mainly by supporting Pakistan's cause for non-discriminatory treatment so that the Pak-US bilateralism recovers its multidimensional quality.