经济学人下载:回家的路还长着呢

Mr Obama can now claim to be such a man. It may have been mere luck that the CIA at last found its quarry on his watch. But his cool supervision of what followed, and his brave decision to send men in helicopters rather than bombs from afar, have made a nonsense of the much-repeated Republican refrain that he is soft on terrorism or—a favourite aspersion—“in over his head” on national security. As a result, his ratings have surged. A poll this week by the Pew Research Centre and the Washington Post found that 56% of Americans approved of the way he was handling his job, up from 47% in April. His ratings for dealing with the war in Afghanistan and the threat of terrorism have improved dramatically—by 16 points and 14 points respectively since January. More than seven out of ten Americans say they feel relieved that Mr bin Laden is dead and six out of ten feel proud.

奥巴马可以称得上是这样一个领袖了。中央情报局能掌握本拉登的踪迹或许只是好运，他能沉着预料接下来会发生的事，做出大胆的决定：派遣炸弹，而不是让直升机从远方输送部队。此举让那些喋喋不休的共和党人闭住了嘴巴——他们看来，奥巴马对打击恐怖主义并不热心，保卫国家安全是个老大难问题。如今，总统的评级显著上升。皮优研究中心和华盛顿邮报本周的调查显示，56%的美国人对其工作满意，相比于四月的47%略有上升。一月起，针对阿富汗战争和防止恐怖主义威胁的评级指数分别上升了16和14个点。本拉登的死讯令超过七成的国民感到解脱，60%的美国人更感自豪。

It is a sweet moment for the president. But the moment will pass. Had the raid happened 17 months hence, it might have been an “October surprise”, like Richard Nixon’s Vietnam peace breakthrough on the eve of the presidential election of 1972. As it is, both polling and precedent suggest that the killing of Mr bin Laden will turn out to have little impact on Mr Obama’s prospects for re-election in November 2012. Pew’s data show that 55% of Americans still disapprove of his handling of the economy. Precedent suggests that voters unhappy about the economy will dump successful war leaders. The first George Bush’s triumph in the first Gulf war did not win him a second term. British voters turfed out Winston Churchill two months after his victory against Hitler. And Mr Obama has not “won” the war against al-Qaeda. Killing Mr bin Laden has scotched the snake, not killed it.

对于奥巴马来说这真是个美好的时刻，然而美好的时刻转瞬即逝。袭击17个月后，也就是2012年大选之时，很可能再爆发一次“十月惊奇”。如同1972年总统大选前夕，尼克松利用“越南和平在即”来帮助自己连任。从现实和历史来看，本拉登之死，并不会对奥巴马2012年11月的连任有什么推动力。皮尔调查数据显示，55%的美国人，依旧不赞同其经济处理方案。预计，选民对经济状况的不满将掩盖这位战争领袖的光芒。海湾战争的胜利并没帮助老布什赢得连任，丘吉尔战胜希特勒两个月之后，也被英国人抛弃了。奥巴马没有完全胜利，杀死拉登只是对抗基地组织的一小部分，并没有彻底消灭他们。

For most Americans, the significance of Abbottabad is anyway not about its possible impact on electoral politics. Nor, apart from a handful of raucous gatherings when the news first broke, has there been much jingoism. There is natural pride in the performance of the armed forces, so different from the debacle of Jimmy Carter’s hostage-rescue mission in 1980 and Bill Clinton’s Black Hawk Down moment in Mogadishu in 1993. But the overall mood this week has been quiet satisfaction rather than boastfulness. By tracking down and killing the man who ordered the felling of the twin towers, America feels it has righted a wrong: “Justice has been done,” said Mr Obama. There is catharsis, too. A few of the relatives of the nearly 3,000 Americans killed on September 11th 2001 say they feel at least some sense of “closure”.

对于大多数的美国人来说，阿伯塔巴德的死，对于大选不会有什么作用。但也并不完全，消息公布后，各种聚集庆贺，还有那些持沙文主义的人，都不在少数。对战场的胜利美国人有一种自然的骄傲，这可不同于1980年卡特时期的人质解救行动，以及1993年克林顿时期，摩加迪沙的黑鹰坠落事件。本周总体气氛平静，民众表示的满意取代了政府原本的夜郎自大。追捕并刺杀了这个袭击双子塔的大魔头之后，美国感到解决了个大祸害——奥巴马说：“正义得到了伸张”。对世界也是个净化。911事件中丧生的接近3000美国人的亲属谈到，他们感到这个事，多少总算告了个段落。