According to a new YouGov poll, conducted for the Daily Telegraph, If European voters were deciding the U.S. Presidential election, Senator Obama would defeat Senator McCain by a margin of 52 percent to 15 percent.

The margin is wider in France, Italy and Germany, where Obama attracted 65, 70 and 67 percent respectively. In Russia, the race tightens, with Obama attracting 31 percent to McCain’s 24 percent. In the UK, Obama scrapes just short of a majority, with 49 percent against McCain’s 14 percent.

What’s striking about these figures isn’t the outcome. Spend five minutes on the street in any part of Europe, and you’ll learn that liberalism and the welfare state are part of the political DNA. In that sense, most voters in Europe can’t conceive of electing a truly conservative politician. And given their animus towards our current President, the notion that America might elect another Republicans leaves Europeans mystified and fearful.

No, what’s striking about these figures is what lies beneath.

YouGov also asked Europeans whether “You think the United States is overall a force for good or force for evil in today’s world?”

Overall, 43 percent said the U.S. is a force for evil, while only 27 percent said force for good. 30 percent weren’t sure. Indeed, of the five nations surveyed, only Italy, by a margin of 49 percent to 27 percent, thought the U.S. is a force for good. A plurality of voters in the UK, France, Germany and Russia all thought the U.S. is a force for evil, by margins of 2, 12, and an astonishing 40 percentage points respectively.

Do Europeans think that Barrack Obama will help make the U.S. a force for good? We don’t know. If YouGov asked, they haven’t revealed the results.

But consider how far we’ve come in just seven years. On September 13, 2001, NATO — which includes all of the countries surveyed except Russia — invoked the mutual-defense provisions of its founding treaty for the only time in its history to support the U.S.

Today, nearly half of Europeans think that the U.S. is a force for evil. That’s a pretty sobering thought.

Now, when we Americans hear such things, we usually point the finger back at Europe, saying that it’s them who have gone soft, and we who are standing by our principles. Leadership is lonely sometimes, we like to think.

I have to admit that I’m not entirely sure where I come down on this. It’s abundantly clear that as a nation, we’ve made our share of mistakes over the last few years. Much has been written about squandered opportunities after 9/11. Personally, I think a better leader — a statesman in the mold of ages past — could have seized that opportunity and shaped a truly world-changing moment. That said, I’m not entirely sure that in 20 years, we won’t look back and celebrate the rise of democracy in the Middle East that resulted from the agony of the period we’re living through now. I am doubtful, but as ever, hopeful.

What is also clear is that Europe is changing as quickly as the U.S. Europeans used to have long memories. The well of gratitude for the U.S contributions to winning two world wars and the Cold War was deep. Now, it seems, that well is dry.

I attribute this to the passing of the generation that lived through World War II and met so many liberating GIs as they passed through towns and villages. I also point to the mass multi-culturization of Europe by immigrants from every corner of the globe. Those who have only recently arrived have no cause for gratitude. Nevertheless, it’s sad to see old friendships, wrought from the fires of conflict, wither as interests diverge.

Europeans don’t vote in the U.S. presidential election, but they are fixated to its happenings. Many think that Obama will win handily. When they ask me, I tell them that I don’t know what the outcome will be, but that they should expect a very close, hard-fought contest, and that the outcome may look a lot like it did on that long night in 2000.

They surprised, often incredulous looks I get in reply speak volumes in reply.

And as the next President, whoever he may be, begins to formulate his own foreign policy, the views of Europe towards the United States are something that he should, and must, consider.

NOTE: The raw data of the survey can be found here (.xls file).