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This may surprise many of my colleagues and friends in Seoul as Senator Obama is probably best known in Seoul for his early-campaign declaration that he would be willing to meet with Kim Jong -il and other similar foreign leaders viewed to be anti-American.

I am well aware of the presumption among some that it is the Republican Party that is most knowledgeable about Asia and most committed to U.S. alliance relationships in Asia;a view generated in part by President Carter’s effort to pull U.S. troops out of the peninsula in the 1970s. Recently Senator John McCain published an Op-Ed on Korea that was apparently intended to further that perception by contrasting Senator McCain’s vocal support of the U.S.-ROK alliance to what he characterized as a “naïve” willingness to unconditionally sit down with Kim Jong-il to “ask him what else he wants.” The McCain message implies that an Obama administration would be out of sync with Seoul.

While this is a mischaracterization of the “direct and tough diplomacy” that Senator Obama has called for with North Korea, the presumption of a divergence with our ally on this issue is worth examining further. The election late last year of the relatively conservative Administration of President Lee Myung-bak has caused some observers to wonder if the election of a Democrat in Washington might result in a renewed misalignment in U.S.-Korea relations.

Senator Obama has indeed repeatedly expressed a willingness to return to the time-tested policy of utilizing the full scope of U.S. influence by directly engaging in negotiations even with nations and leaders that don’t see eye to eye with the United States. This policy can hardly be characterized as a divergence from a South Korean government which continues to seek its own direct dialogue with the North and has strongly supported the current U.S. negotiations with North Korea and the six party talks. Despite its more pragmatic stance toward North Korea, the current government in Seoul has notably not called for the U.S. to return to the restrictive policies of the early years of the Bush Administration. In reality, the Lee Myung-bak Administration is itself far different than the Korean conservatives of Senator McCain’s generation, and it has furthermore experienced a humbling first 100 days dealing with a Korean public possessing a heightened sense of government accountability and which shows no willingness to return to a policy of confrontation with Pyongyang.

The foreign policy section of Senator Obama’s campaign website specifically calls for a “crack down on nuclear proliferation by strengthening the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty so that countries like North Korea and Iran that break the rules will automatically face strong international sanctions.” It is also my personal presumption that, given Senator Obama’s principled April 14 speech to steelworkers and union members in Pittsburg during the Pennsylvania primary arguing that America must embrace free trade, concerns over beef and autos will eventually be worked out and the KORUS-FTA passed. The truth is, however, despite my professional interests, I am not supporting Senator Obama because of his Korea policy. I support President Obama because of what I believe his presidency would mean for America.

When announcing his candidacy, Senator Obama repeated Abraham Lincoln’s call for a “divided house to stand together.” America’s division and distraction do not serve America well, nor do they serve America’s relations with its key allies such as Korea. Over the past few decades the poisonous environment in Washington has eroded the traditional notion that partisanship stops at our nation’s borders. Moreover, the increasing dysfunction of our politics has impeded our ability to engage the rest of the world in a strategic and sustainable manner. Not only do I believe that the election of Senator Obama has the potential to change the way the world views the United States; there can be few more compelling examples of the openness and opportunity that are the American dream; but even more importantly I believe an Obama Presidency would change the way the U.S. views, listens to, and works with the world.

In the longer term, the failure of the U.S. and its partners in the region to prevent North Korea from breaking out of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and testing a nuclear weapon will likely be one of the defining events of the Bush Administration. Regardless of who wins the White House, the North Korean nuclear crisis is a problem that will be waiting and unresolved on day one. As such, my support for Senator Obama is in part motivated by my belief that an America that has begun the processes of political healing and uniting at home will be far better prepared to seriously address in close cooperation with its allies the remaining and very real challenges on the Korean peninsula.

L. Gordon Flake is Executive Director of the Maureen and Mike Mansfield Foundation. The views expressed herein are his own.