Like Europe's Leaders, Obama Is Both Outsider and Insider.(International Edition; HEADS OF STATE)(Barack Obama)

Byline: Christopher Dickey and Tracy Mcnicoll; with William Underhill

When Barack Obama visited Paris on a tour of Europe last summer, he may have been surprised to discover that he and French President Nicolas Sarkozy had much in common, especially their status as outsiders. Sarkozy made a big deal out of it: "In Europe," he said to Obama, "there are many people who come from different backgrounds and who have many different histories and who are not altogether 'classic' French. Not everyone here is called 'Sarkozy'," said the son of a Hungarian immigrant. "And I'm well aware that not everybody in the United States is called Obama."

The most skilled and successful politicians in Europe--and now in America too--manage to be insiders and outsiders at the same time. Thus we have British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, who spent a decade as chancellor of the exchequer, but remains a Scot in the middle of a political system dominated by the English. And there's Angela Merkel, the first woman to be chancellor of Germany and the first from the impoverished East. Every head of the seven most industrialized nations has been labeled--or has claimed to be--an outsider: Roman Catholic Japanese Prime Minister Taro Aso, despite his family's wealth and influence; Stephen Harper, Canada's rare Protestant, non-Quebecer, non-Liberal leader; even billionaire Silvio Berlusconi, a onetime lounge singer who claims to be from ...