This week, Global Pulse presents a special half-hour report on how the world covered Barack Obama’s historic victory, and what they showed Obama saying about the global issues he faces. As Gaza explodes, Iran contemplates a new election and Pakistan teeters on the edge of chaos, it is worth revisiting Obama’s words on these topics.

Sure, expectations are unreasonable -- a Google search for the phrase “Obama should” turned up about 1,500,000 web pages, presumably advising the President-elect on everything from nukes to nannies. Even the New York Times caught the fever, with 10,000+ uses of “Obama should” in the last 12 months. The Reuters website features hundreds of videos advising Obama. And there is a sort of international pro-Obama clearinghouse where you can find links to all manner of Obama-maniacs and bask in Obamaphilia from over 40 countries including Nepal and Sudan. It is named, of course, The World Wants Obama.

Finally there are the love letters -- see this post from E! online.

-Evelyn Messinger, Series Producer, Global Pulse

Gay sex in Iran can mean a government paid sex change. A rocky, and sometimes violent road in the struggle for justice and tolerance in Iran, East Europe, India and Singapore.

 
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- Global Pulse -

Now 34 days from retirement, President Bush this week narrowly avoided taking a shoe to the head. But in a period where the incoming Obama administration dominates the news, the incident inspires Global Pulse in our upcoming episode to take one more look at the legacy that our current president leaves behind.

In the blogosphere, a heavy dose of skepticism reigns. At the Washington Post, Dan Froomkin writes that this weekend, "one rebellious Iraqi reporter -- and two flying items of footwear -- punctured Bush's historical revisionism and offered a powerful metaphor for the counter-argument that the war was a disastrous mistake and is far from over." Adam Serwer at the American Prospect asks, "Can there be a president who has behaved more recklessly or disrespectfully in proportion to the sacrifice he asked of the men and women under his command?" Andrew Sullivan worries that Bush's shoe-throwing assailant could be tortured in US custody, "a public relations and military crisis -- one that manages to bring all the idiocy and dumb cruelty of the Bush-Cheney years together."

But how will Bush be remembered beyond Baghdad and Washington? We search for clues in this week's Global Pulse.

"A flashlight with an LED bulb for illumination or to signal for help; a hand-held water purifier in case the water isn’t potable; a portable radio; and a cellphone or a Blackberry with international service."

These are the essential items that the Association of Corporate Travel Executives advises business travelers to pack when they sojourn into global hot spots like post-attacks Mumbai. As The Practical Traveler reports for the New York Times, several guests trapped in the Taj hotel during last month's siege were able to relay word of their whereabouts to the Indian police via text message on a trusty mobile connection. Now, the international hotel industry is moving to reinforce guest security with stepped-up staff training and use of technology, like color-coded alerts at the Marriott line of hotels.

So who might stand to profit in the new South Asian security economy? The Wall Street Journal reports that the makers of door frame and hand-held metal detectors, high-speed armored sea vessels, smart cards, and providers of sniffer dogs and closed circuit televisions could be sitting pretty in the new year. Revenues from India's private security business alone could rise from 220 billion rupees this year to 500 billion rupees in 2012. Among those anxious to not miss out are security firms from the U.S., Europe, Japan, and South Korea, whose products are projected to enter India in large numbers in coming years.