Obama, President of America?

One evening I was sitting outside with a delivery guy, waiting for my landlord to show up so we could load the materials into his stock room. I started chatting with the delivery guy, and the conversation quickly took the inevitable turn towards football (soccer), in this case the Americas Cup. After asking me what my favorite team was, and realizing that I know basically nothing about football, he asked me an interesting question. This question led to a conversation that lasted probably 10 minutes. Here is the abridged version:

Delivery Guy: So Obama, he is the president of all of america, right?

Me: No, just the United States. The other countries have their own presidents.

Delivery Guy: Each state has it's own president, but Obama is over all of them, right?

Me: Well, first of all you have to realize that, whereas in french one third of the world is lumped into a continent called "'l'amerique," anglophones divide that land mass into two parts, North America and South America. And there's generally understood to be a third subdivision known as Central America.

[the guy gives me a completely blank look]

Me: Ok, think of the top half of "america." [faint glimmer of recognition] Okay, just in that part of "america," there are three independent countries. Canada, Mexico, and the United States. Obama is the president of the United States, Canada and Mexico each have their own presidents.

Delivery Guy: But Obama is in charge of the others?

Me: No, they are independent

Delivery Guy: But aren't there 52 states in america, and then Obama is in charge of them all?

Me: Well, the problem is that people from the United States call themselves "Americans" rather than "United Statesians," so it makes Obama sound like the president of more than he really is. The United States is divided into 50 states, which are like our "regions" here, and each one has it's own governor just like the regions here have governors. Obama is over all of them.

Delivery Guy: So in the americas cup, all of those teams are from different states?

Me: No, they are all different countries, most of them from the south half of "america"

Delivery Guy: And Obama is in charge of all of them?

Me: No, they are all independent.

Delivery Guy: Different states?

Me: No, different countries

etc. etc. etc.

At the end of the conversation I think he still was not quite convinced that Obama is not the president of the entire western hemisphere! He is so celebrated here that they imagine him to rule half the world, if not all of it.

One quirk that contributes to this misunderstanding is the fact that here the president is often referred to as the "Chief of the State." Instead of the national government being called "the Federal Government," It is called "The State."  It is natural then for people here to confuse "state" with "country" and assume that if Obama rules 50 countries, he must be pretty powerful.