Bob Dylan believes Barack Obama is redefining politics in the United States and could deliver change to a nation in upheaval, according to a British newspaper interview published on Saturday.
In an interview with the Times of London, the musician is quoted as saying that Obama has changed politics in the United States, though Dylan does not specifically endorse the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee.
”Well, you know right now America is in a state of upheaval. Poverty is demoralising. You can’t expect people to have the virtue of purity when they are poor,” Dylan is quoted as saying.
”But we’ve got this guy out there now who is redefining the nature of politics from the ground up … Barack Obama”.
”He’s redefining what a politician is, so we’ll have to see how things play out. Am I hopeful? Yes, I’m hopeful that things might change. Some things are going to have to.”
The newspaper said the interview took place in Denmark during Dylan’s current tour of Scandinavia.
”You should always take the best from the past, leave the worst back there and go forward into the future,” Dylan said, apparently referring to Obama’s campaign.
‘It would be good for the whole world’
Another endorsement came from the leader of Germany’s Social Democrats (SPD).
SPD chairperson Kurt Beck said the whole world would be better off with a President Obama instead of another Republican administration. By endorsing the Democrats, Beck broke a tacit rule to refrain from any intervention in foreign elections.
”I’d like to say very openly that I really do hope that he wins,” Beck told journalists after a speech in the eastern town of Erfurt on Saturday.
”It would be good for the whole world if there is an America that doesn’t close itself off to the environmental challenges we face, an America that doesn’t veto social and ecological programmes or does not support them.
”I’d be delighted if we would have an America like that, an America that wants to tackle those problems,” said Beck. – Reuters, AFP