ABSTRACT
On his extensive tour of Asia in November 2009, Barack Obama called himself “America’s first Pacific president” (White House 2009). In the eyes of many Europeans, that statement bespoke the president’s neglect of Europe that they had felt since Barack Obama had taken office in January of that year. That perception may be attributed to a large degree to Europeans’ disenchantment with a president who they hoped would attach the highest importance to consulting with his European partners on a wide range of policy issues, but who turned out to define America’s interests just as independently as his largely unpopular predecessor George W. Bush had done.
