A lot of people have already cast doubt on the idea that european feeling will impact the election, and I have to agree, it's not checkmate. On the other hand, I think people underestimate how popular Obama is in Europe, and that Kerry was preferred in Europe, not popular. Obama is more comparable to Kennedy than Kerry.

However, I'll do you one better: there's an early hint that Obama will win in November that the pundits haven't spotted, mark my words:

Remember how in 2004 the Kerry campaign was supported by the Anybody But Bush movement? How Kerry didn't really have a natural base of his own? People voted for him because he was the Democratic Nominee, not because he was John Kerry. Conversely, people voted FOR GW Bush: evangelicals, war-lovers, nationalist zombies, etc. Bush was the focus of the election, the election could be reduced to "Bush or Other" - which means Kerry had no political gravity of his own. In retrospect, Kerry is lucky he did not get handed a Mondale-like thrashing. Only Bush's clear idiocy and Cheney's transparent malevolence prevented that from happening.

Fast forward to 2008. What do you notice about the general election so far, in terms of basic trends?

Check this out:

The right wing movement is not a pro-McCain movement. Its an anti-Obama movement. As in 2004, Obama is already the axis around which the election revolves.

Bush-fatigue, war-fatigue, Katrina, gas prices, all these things are killing conservative enthusiasm and increasing the favorability of a Democratic president. All these things helped put Obama in the center of the election. All the negative crap the conservatives are forced to throw at Obama only sends McCain and the Republicans further and further into the background, just as Bush in 04, being president and at the center of controversy got him all that free advertising day in and day out in the media.

But what will put Obama over the top is that there exists a huge, genuine PRO-Obama movement - hence the high level of anti-Obama rhetoric. And there is no pro-McCain movement to challenge him, in fact, influential conservatives have been turning away from him at a surprising rate. This in itself is poetic justice, since it was McCain's decision to refuse Kerry's VP offer that probably sealed Kerry's fate and put us all through an additional four years of Bush crimes.