Washington Times - E.U. no longer charmed by Obama: "European leaders are getting a dose of reality about the limits of President Obama's patience with their long-established diplomatic traditions, as his administration seeks to change nearly two decades of U.S.-European Union summit protocol.
Mr. Obama's disappointment with European allies during his first year in office, culminating in his decision to skip a long-planned May summit in Madrid, should not come as a surprise, diplomats and analysts said.
In spite of unusual enthusiasm on the Continent about his 2008 election, they said, Europeans have delivered much less than the new president expected on Afghanistan, climate change and other items high on Mr. Obama's agenda.
Many Europeans have had their own hopes dashed, officials on both sides of the Atlantic said. After eight often testy years dealing with President George W. Bush, they thought Mr. Obama would change the world to their liking, but now realize that any American president will act in his country's interests first.
'We are in a period of managing down some unrealistic expectations about what the administration was going to do,' said Heather A. Conley, director of the Europe Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies and deputy assistant secretary of state in the Bureau for European and Eurasian Affairs during Mr. Bush's first term."
