U.K. leader’s mission: ‘Global New Deal’

British Prime Minister Gordon Brown arrives in Washington
this week to press for a “global New Deal” to rescue the world from recession.

Brown will be the first European leader to meet with
President Obama when he sits down for talks with Obama on Tuesday morning. Brown then
addresses a joint session of Congress on Wednesday.

{mosads}The embattled prime minister arrives at a delicate moment in
Anglo-American relations, amid speculation that the “special relationship”
between the two countries might be downgraded.

Brown gave a preview of what he will say to Obama in an
editorial for The Sunday Times, where he laid out a sweeping vision for America
and Britain to use their relationship to take the lead in stopping the global
financial nosedive and lifting all nations by the bootstraps.

“I believe there
is no challenge so great or so difficult that it cannot be overcome by America,
Britain and the world working together,” Brown wrote. “That is why President
Obama and I will discuss this week a global New Deal, whose impact can stretch
from the villages of Africa to reforming the financial institutions of London
and New York — and giving security to the hard-working families in every
country.”

Brown’s plan focuses on containing the financial crisis, giving a
“kick-start” to lending, shunning protectionism, tightening regulation and
oversight of financial institutions, and approaching recovery efforts with a
global frame of mind.

“It is a global new deal that will lay the foundations not
just for a sustainable economic recovery but for a genuinely new era of
international partnership in which all countries have a part to play,” Brown
wrote.

While Brown may find support for his broad initiatives in
Washington, where Obama’s $787 billion stimulus package was passed with other
promised reforms for healthcare and education on the way, his global
gather-’round-the-campfire approach to stemming recession may not find a warm
reception elsewhere.

European Union leaders, most prominently German Chancellor
Angela Merkel, rejected a multibillion-euro bailout for struggling eastern
European nations on Sunday, even as Hungary warned that the lack of rescue was
simply going to erect a new, financial Iron Curtain dividing Europe.

But this week’s meeting and invitation to embark on Brown’s
ambitious plan also mark a crossroads for U.S. policy, as Obama starts his term
by recalibrating bilateral relations — whether vowing to engage in sustained
diplomacy with Iran and Syria, moving forward with a Mideast peace process as
Israel still lacks a firm ruling coalition, or weighing just how special the
relationship between the U.S. and Britain will be in his administration.

After moving into the Oval Office, Obama returned a Winston
Churchill bust that had been loaned to the U.S. as a sign of solidarity after
the 9/11 terrorist attacks, refusing an offer from British officials to keep
Churchill for another four years. The British press leapt on the eviction as a
snub to the “special partnership,” as the White House coined the relationship
in a statement announcing Brown’s visit.

The question also remains whether Brown and Obama would even
have much time to forge a partnership and bring about global economic renewal together.
While Obama is still enjoying high popularity just weeks after being sworn in,
Brown’s footing is shakier at home. According to a Guardian/ICM poll last week,
63 percent of respondents felt the Labour Party would fare better at elections
if Brown wasn’t at the helm, while the Tories hold steady with a 12-point lead
over Labour in terms of public support.

So while Obama may sit down and plan global economic change
with Brown, he could find himself next year attempting to continue that effort
with Conservative Party leader David Cameron. The two leaders have campaigned
on markedly different ideas of change, and after a July meeting with Cameron on
the European campaign trail, Obama reportedly called the Tory leader a
“lightweight.”

Obama met last week with Japanese Prime Minister Taro Aso,
who suffers from about 80 percent voter disapproval and will also likely be
replaced in a September election or earlier, if snap elections are called. “The
two leaders agreed to work closely and urgently, as the world’s leading
economies, to stimulate demand at home and abroad, to help other countries
respond to the global crisis, to unfreeze credit markets, and to seek concrete
results from the April London Economic Summit and through the G-8,” read a
White House statement released after last week’s meeting. “They agreed
fully on the need to resist protectionism.”

On March 24, Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd will
visit the White House to discuss the global financial crisis.

These meetings, especially the chat with Brown this week, lay
the groundwork for the G-20 economic summit in London on April 2. Clearly
seizing the opportunity to take a leadership role in the recession as his
country hosts the roundtable, Brown has further detailed his “global New Deal”
in “The Road to the London Summit” report released last month. His appearances
this week in D.C. could determine how much of a partner the U.S. will be on
that journey.