The Limited Impact of Sarah Palin

The Observer asks a pertinent question about Sarah Palin:

But can she ever win the White House, or will she destroy the American right?

The answer is, of course, no to both. Palin can't win the White House. She simply isn't a credible candidate. She managed to do massive damage to the McCain campaign, has several skeletons half in her closet and half draped across every media outlet in the USA and - perhaps most crucially - she resigned as Governor of Alaska for no good reason. You can imagine what every opponent she ever comes across in the race to be Republican nominee and then President will ask: "so, former Governor Palin, if elected President, what guarantees do the American people have that you will actually serve out your full term as President? Because, y'know..." It is the sort of thing that hobbles any campaign. When you then add in the fact that the candidate would be the moronic, winking Sarah Palin then you have a campaign that is destined to sink without trace. To the very bottom of the Mariana Trench.

But Palin also won't be able to sink the American Right with any presidential bid. Hell, she probably can't destroy the Christian Coalition in the US. The American Right is so much more than one over-hyped and hyperactive former governor. In fact, I'd imagine many members of the American Right have very little time for Palin, and would love to see her fail in a Presidential bid and be forced from her embarrassingly high-profile on the US political stage.

Even if Palin does win the Republican nomination in 2012, her defeat the the General Election will not destroy the Republican party. It has put up dud candidates before - Bob Dole and Barry Goldwater spring to mind. And the Republican party also spent nearly 20 years out of the White House during the Roosevelt/Truman administrations that straddled the Second World War. Hell, the Republican party even managed to survive having the only President to resign in disgrace as a member. In the resolutely two party system of the US that has existed for centuries, it is going to take far more than Sarah Palin to destroy the Republican. Just as the utterly useless Iain Duncan Smith failed to bury the Tories in this country.

Sarah Palin is just one politician. Yes, she is a politician in over her head and hyped well beyond her talents. However, she remains just one politician. The party she is member of, and the American Right as a whole, is more than just Sarah Palin. They existed before she burst onto the national stage at the behest of John McCain, and they will exist after she had gone from that national stage. The choice facing the Republicans in the run-up to 2012 is whether they want to squander that election with Palin as their candidate, or whether they want to find a credible candidate who actually has a chance of beating Obama instead.

Quote of the Day - John Sergeant

Via Tory Bear, this comment from John Sergeant on Jacqui Smith and her inability to know where she actually lives has to be today's quote of the day - it is priceless:

"It is a puzzle to people, when you’re asked where your home was, and you were Home Secretary, and you didn’t seem to give the right answer", he said, provoking cheers from the audience.

He went on: "Was it a complicated question, that you therefore genuinely got wrong and took advice on? When someone says, ‘Where’s your home?’, I can answer that pretty quickly."

It reminds me of John McCain not knowing how many houses he has. Memo to politicians everywhere - most people only have one residence. The fact that you might have more than that isn't a problem, as long as you don't rub their faces in it by not knowing basic details. And really easy basic details to remember, like where you live and how many houses you actually have.

Could Brown have a better relationship with the US if McCain was President?

The fraught Brown/Obama relationship - which resembles the sort of awkward flirtation that occurs when someone just isn't interested in the person desperately trying to win them over - makes me wonder whether whether the "Right" "Honourable" Gordon Brown would actually have been better off with McCain winning last year's presidential election rather than Obama.

Sure, McCain and Brown are ideologically worlds apart. Yet the Brown-Obama relationship is testament to the fact that having similar ideas doesn't mean you will get on. Besides, McCain has carved out a niche for himself as a maverick who is happy to overcome ideological differences if the political situation demands it. Furthermore, both men are grizzled political survivors. They might have far more in common than between Obama and Brown. If all else failed, they could always talk about their mutual interest in courage; McCain could regale stories that Brown could use in his next book on that subject.

Yet this idea falls apart when faced with political reality. After all, in a classic example of someone hedging their bets, Cameron managed to position himself to appear to be supporting both McCain and Obama. In fact, he categorically threw his weight behind McCain in January of last year. This has to be contrasted with the effective radio silence from Brown towards McCain that is typical of Brown when he hasn't worked out whether someone can directly help him or not. Then there is the issue of the al Megrahi release: an act that has badly damaged US-UK relations. I doubt McCain would have been forgiving on this issue either; in fact, I'd almost imagine he would have been more angry than Obama. Perhaps a President McCain would be just as unhelpful to the desperate 'Make Brown a World Statesman' campaign as President Obama actually is.

Which just goes to show that the problem is the US President; it is Gordon Brown. He is an unpopular, unlikeable leader with an unhealthy streak of political cowardice running through him. He carries with him a heavy stench of failure. No first term President would want to too closely associated with a British Prime Minister who is perhaps the very definition of a loser.

What if... McCain had been elected President in 2000 rather than Bush?

Today is a remarkable day for a remarkable man: today, Barack Obama will become the first black President of the United States of America. But it is also an important day for another remarkable man – for today, after eight turbulent years in power, President John McCain is standing down and heading back to Arizona.

McCain is a man who has both powerfully and controversially dominated the political landscape of the USA for the best part of a decade. Despite governing resolutely from the centre ground, his out-spoken views and his professed desire to govern from both the head and the heart have meant that, for everyone lamenting the end of his time in the White House, there is another person celebrating – not least those in his own party.

And, lest we forget, it could all have been so different. Had McCain not won the South Carolina primary in 2000, then he would have struggled to win the Republican nomination from the favourite candidate, George W Bush. And winning that nomination enabled him to fight an energetic Presidential campaign later in 2000, and snatch victory from the heir apparent to the White House, Al Gore. History would be very different had Gore, or even Bush, become President.

McCain’s success in winning the Presidential Election in 2000 should not be under-estimated. Bush Junior had the firepower, the money, and the family name to win the nomination. Bush’s campaign also had no compunction about fighting dirty. Yet McCain, with his desire for “straight-talking” and his obvious relish for the underdog status, captured the public imagination, and with it, the Republican nomination.

Even then, his victory at the national polls looked far from assured. He trailed Gore in the polls, despite uniting the party by making George W Bush his running mate. However, his honest and enthusiastic manner, which undermined the cruel jibes about his age, meant he soon started to win over the nation as a whole. His real triumph came in the debates, when his warm, open speaking style brought into sharp relief the much more stilted and intellectual approach of Al Gore. It is one of the lasting debates surrounding the 2000 Presidential Election – whether McCain won it or whether Gore’s lacklustre campaign lost it. But the remarkable political rise of John McCain was completed on Election Night when Florida fell into his column and with it, the White House.

The First Term

Yet, once president-elect, McCain seemed to lose his way and with it his identity. He remained resolutely in the centre ground, leading many in his own party to comment that they seemed to have accidentally elected Al Gore rather than a Republican. His Inauguration speech in 2001 was poor, filled with truisms about more honest government delivered by a old man visibly shivering against the cold. During his first few months in power, the now President McCain seemed to be lost, offering few initiatives and appearing to treat water in the White House. Some wondered whether McCain was actually up to the job of President.

All this changed in September 11th, 2001. McCain’s angry, defiant call to arms after the planes hit the Twin Towers and the Pentagon, as well as the plane brought down by its own passengers, showed a confident leader rising to the challenge. Despite the advice of the Secret Service, and the danger involved in going into a disaster area, he was in New York City within hours of the atrocity – talking to survivors, and making sure that the rescue attempts and investigations were being co-ordinated effectively across the country.

After it became clear that Al-Qaeda was behind the attacks, McCain was quick to work on a response. Through diplomacy he was able to get troops on the ground in Pakistan – with the blessing of the government of Pakistan. However, the Taliban regime in Afghanistan proved to be more difficult, and as they refused to hand over bin Laden, McCain worked hard to bring together an international coalition to deal with the problem. With UN backing, McCain ordered the attack on Afghanistan.

The Afghan war is probably the most divisive part of McCain’s legacy. Whilst the out-going President remains defiant over his decision to invade, US troops are still fighting in Afghanistan, with no sign of bin Laden or an end to hostilities. For every patriot who praises McCain for his tough stance in Afghanistan, there is a peace lover calling for the return of US troops. McCain has gone on record as arguing that the death toll could have been worse, had he listened to the hawks in his administration. Nonetheless, the US occupation of Afghanistan remains a poisoned chalice for incoming President Obama.

McCain also showed himself to be a tough fighter when it came national politics as well. He was scathing of the failings of both the CIA and the FBI in the run up to 9/11, eventually replacing the directors of both. He also fought hard to introduce new accounting laws after the collapse of both Enron and Worldcom, controversially (in his own party) putting big business on warning that any fraudulent directors would be prosecuted to the full extent of the law.

Perhaps the most surprising, and interesting, aspects of McCain’s first term in power was the relationship he had with his Vice-President, George W Bush. Bush was a hawk within the administration, and on several occasions broke ranks with his President to call for a War on Terror on Iraq. McCain steadfastly refused to countenance such a step, arguing that whilst there was some evidence that Iraq was sponsoring terrorism and that a regime change would be a good thing, there was no real evidence that Iraq was connected with 9/11. As the first term went on, though, it became very clear that there was little love lost between President and Vice-President.

As the 2004 election drew near, few thought that there was any real danger of McCain not securing the nomination again. And, indeed, that proved to be the case. However, as soon as it became clear that he would not be opposed in running for the nomination, McCain announced that he would not be running again with George W Bush. The Bush camp was enraged, but it was too late for them to oppose McCain. However the move threatened to destroy Republican unity just before an election. Some speculated that McCain was about to announce he would run as an independent. However, the President had another trick up his sleeve. He announced Joe Lieberman, Gore’s Vice-Presidential candidate, as his running mate. The selection electrified the political seen as it was genuinely a cross-party ticket. It also proved to be a strong political move for the election, despite the problems it created in his second term. It stole all the glory from John Kerry’s campaign, and redefined the McCain administration as centre-of-the-road politically. Whilst McCain may have lost some votes from the Christian Right of the party, he gained them from the Democratic Party.

In the event, the 2004 election was something of an anti-climax. John Kerry never stopped training in the polls, and as one of his team pointed out, he was simply the wrong candidate in the wrong place at the wrong time: “We were running a Vietnam war hero against an even more heroic Vet, running an experienced Senator against an experienced Senator and President, running with a centrist candidate against a President who had taken on one of our own as his candidate.” In the end, the result was a foregone conclusion: McCain won in a landslide.

The Second Term

McCain won further plaudits after Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans. He put troops on the ground and ploughed money into the rescue efforts, leading some to claim that he saved hundreds of lives. His independent investigation into the disaster recommended millions should be ploughed into flood defences; something which McCain was happy to do. But despite his successes here, his Presidency was increasingly being undermined by his own party.

Many were unhappy with his decision to dump Bush and take on a Democrat; this was not helped by several on-the-record, scathing remarks about various Republicans suffering corruption scandals. Events reached a head when a group of Republicans attempted to have McCain expelled from the Republican party. McCain laughed off the attempts and they came to nothing. Nonetheless, McCain appeared increasingly isolated from his own party, and declined to do too much active campaigning for his own party in the 2006 mid-terms. The loss of the control of Congress to the Democrats hurt McCain, and he became increasingly reliant on his Vice-President to liase with the Congress.

He was also hurt as the economy began to freefall. In contrast to his prompt action in the face of both 9/11 and Hurricane Katrina, McCain seemed to struggle to find a path to deal with the economy. He was also hurt by Lieberman’s decision not to stand, and watched with mounting horror as the Republican party fell into a bitter fight between the moderates under Mitt Romney and the Republican Christian Right under Mike Huckabee. In the end, the moderates won through, with Romney as the Republican candidate and little-known Alaskan governor Sarah Palin as his running mate. But as the economy collapsed, and leading a party torn apart by infighting, a resurgent Democratic Party, headed by Barack Obama, won the election comfortably.

In his most recent interview, McCain candidly described his years in the White House as “six of the most challenging, and rewarding years you could ever hope for, followed by two of the most challenging and depressing you could ever dream of.” He appears now as a tired man, looking forward to retirement. Time will tell how his time as President is truly judged; but he leaves behind a mixed legacy and has lead the USA through a roller coaster eight years.

The Future of the Republicans

From an old edition of The Economist, just before the last US election:

"Conservative America also needs to recover its vim. Somehow Ronald Reagan's party of western individualism and limited government has ended up not just increasing the size of the state but turning it into a tool of southern-friend moralism."

Couldn't agree more. And if the Republican party really wants to get back on its feet, then it needs to look for a genuine, reforming character within its ranks to energise both moderate and devoted Republicans. The likes of Palin and Huckabee simply won't cut it. They will appeal only to the loony Christian elements of the party, and those sort of candidates will alienate as many centrist voters as they will energise the Christian fundamentalists so well deployed by Karl Rove.

A genuine, reforming Republican leader is required - someone who wants to strip back the state, cut taxes, and instincively follow the limited government model followed by some Republicans. Rather than pandering to the limited outlooks of the Christian Right.

The Republicans tried Christian fundamentalism in the form of George W Bush. It broke the party, helped to destroy the candidacy of the far more moderate John McCain and did substantial damage to the country. The last thing they need to do is go further down the root of fundamentalism. The Republican future lies in pursuing a very different agenda.

John McCain: Why He Failed

Amidst all the jubilation of the Democrats and, in particular, the Obama campaign, spare a thought for an old man. An old man on his last hurrah who has had his hopes dashed. An old man who has given a great deal for his country, yet was beaten in the final analysis by a much younger and less experienced man. Although a younger guy with better hair. Yes, spare a thought for John McCain. Regardless of whether he thought he could sneak a victory in at the last minute or not, the past 24 hours have been shitty for Senator McCain. And the disappointment won’t be going away any time soon.

Make no mistake about it, this was the last chance saloon for McCain. Pretty much all the other candidates in this election could have another go for the Presidents – Clinton, Palin (*shivers*), Huckabee (*retches*), Romney, Biden (possibly), maybe even Edwards (if people can get over his inability to keep his pants zipped up outside of his marriage) – these people could all have another shot at the Presidency. Had Obama lost, he certainly could have done (and, I reckon, would have done). But for McCain, the game is up. He’s 72 now; the next time the Presidential Election circus comes to town, he’ll be 76. He’s not running again. His White House dream died at 4am this morning.

But I’m not going to spend too much time wailing on behalf of John McCain. His real time – the moment when he should have won the nomination and then the presidency – was eight years ago, but he lost it to Bush. This time he looked more than ever like a man in the wrong place at the wrong time. But he really didn’t help himself, and his defeat has as much to do with his own actions as with the man he was up against.

There are some things that McCain just could not help. He is in the same party as a deeply unpopular, and also hated, President. That party has also developed political schizophrenia, torn between fiscal conservatives and rabid, Christian fundamentalist loonies. And McCain worked hard to distance himself from his President and from his party. But ultimately he is Republican, and this year was perhaps the worst year to run as Republican since 1976.

Events also seemed to conspire against Senator McCain, and it never helps when the economy tanks and you are representing the incumbent party. Yet here, there is more McCain could have done. Yes, events are unpredictable, but politicians have complete control over how they respond to them. And as the US economy slipped into a critical state, McCain’s choice of at first denying there was a problem, then noticing the issue before suspending his campaign to look presidential looks in the cold light of day like a not just a strategic blunder, but actually a campaign calamity.

He also dropped the ball by going very negative on Obama at a late stage in the campaign. Whilst he stopped short of doing the cut throat character assassination himself, all the talk of Obama being a pal of terrorists, and the rumours about Obama not being Christian or being a Muslim were not just untrue, but also showed the level of debate that McCain was aiming at. Yeah, Obama’s lofty sentiments about change were (and are) completely intangible, but at least they sounded positive. To attack an opponent during depressing economic times adds to the sum total of misery within a country, which is never going to go down to well.

But for me, the real blunder was the choice of Vice-President. At first, Governor Palin really seemed to help the McCain campaign. However, in the final analysis the only real ways in which she gathered praise was by being female, and being able to read from an autocue at a national convention. As soon as the razor thin Palin façade was scratched, it became clear that America was being asked to put an out and out, fundamentalist winker a heart beat away from the Presidency. After eight years of having a out and out, fundamentalist wanker as President. And given his health problems and age, McCain’s choice of vice-presidential candidate took on an even more urgent and important tone.

And it wasn’t just the person who was the issue with McCain’s choice of Vice-President. After all, Biden is a twice failed Presidential candidate and Kinnock plagiarist. He also has a tendency to have what you might call foot-in-mouth disease. But Biden was a dull choice, uninspired, but safe. Palin was a gamble – a massive, scary gamble. And McCain has made it clear for everyone – when you gamble, things can go wrong as well as right. Ultimately, though, he should have known just how much of a risk Palin was. He should have done the leg work, he should have met with her more than twice, he should have her had her properly vetted. And had he done all that, he might have seen that Palin would end up as a millstone round his neck rather than the life jacket he so desperately needed.

McCain comes across as someone who has fought his whole life. The sad truth for him is that he lost his final battle. And when you look at it, the failure was down to him as much as it was down to anyone else.

Obama's Victory

Well, he won.

There’s lots to write about today, and there will be websites and column inches filled with hyperbole and a combination of both wonderful analysis and mindless rhetoric. This blog will be no exception. And expect to see the word “history” banded around a lot this morning. After all, things become even more important if you stick the tag “historical” on them. But fuck me, Obama’s victory probably warrants that tag like few other events do.

Before I go into the business of autopsying the McCain campaign and looking into my crystal ball to see what Obama’s presidency may be like, let’s just stop for a moment, and look at what Obama has actually achieved. Regardless of whether you think that Obama is a combination of Jesus Christ, John F Kennedy and Luke Skywalker all rolled into one great package, or whether you think that Obama is an evil lefty ally of evil terrorists everywhere, you have to concede that he has achieved a great deal. A year ago, he was a candidate on the periphery of the Democratic primary season. 4 years ago, he was elected as the junior Senator for Illinois. 8 years ago, no-one had heard of him. Now, he is President-elect of the United States.

And in his brief time in American politics, he has managed not just to climb to the top of the tree, he has also managed to build up a formidable election machine. An election machine that manage to slowly wear down the might of the Clintons, and destroy the widely held assumption that Hillary Clinton would be the Democratic nominee. And he also managed to comprehensively beat the Republican election machine that has seen off, in the past eight years, a Vice-President and a highly experienced and (in some circles) respected Senator. This time last year, the Obama candidacy looked like he was placing a marker down for future Presidential elections. Now, he is president-elect. It is pretty good going, all told.

Also, Obama has managed to do all this without really committing to anything other than supporting change.

But not is not the time for casual snipes about Obama – they’ll be enough time for that over the next four to eight years. And whilst I am far from sold on Obama, I don’t think I will be alone in admiring what the man has achieved. Circumstances and the actions of his opponents played their part in his victory, but a lot of the credit has to lie with Obama.

Put simply, the boy done good.

Election 2008: Vote Against Bush

So, it is Election Day over the pond today. And millions of people are going to chose which man is going to lead the free world from January. Well, lead the free world and attack any country who messes with his nation.

I think a lot of people will be wanting not so much to vote for McCain or Obama as vote against George W Bush. After all, Bush’s time in the White House has come to resemble not so much a political administration as a series of biblical plagues that has befallen the United States over the past eight years. Seriously, America in 2000 was a prosperous nation with a budget surplus, largely united at home and respected abroad. In 2008, the economy has sunk beneath the waves of a crippling recession, the nation is fighting two increasingly unwinnable wars and the nation seems deeply divided between large liberal enclaves and great swathes of hysterical, Christian fundamentalists. When the flood waters hit New Orleans a few years ago, they didn’t just wreak havoc on that city and its citizens, it also washed away any residual respect and confidence that the majority of the USA had in its leaders.

So yeah, people would be well within their rights to want to vote against W. And if Dubya was running, pretty much any candidate could not so much beat his sorry ass, as bury it in an absolute avalanche of an electoral landslide.

The problem is Bush isn’t running.

In fact, both of the main candidates have made a point of not being George W Bush. Obama’s campaign is pretty much based solely around not being W. If I had to summarise Obama’s campaign, it would be with the Senator standing next to two posters, one saying “Change”, and the other depicting George W Bush. Obama would then alternate, between pointing at the poster saying “change” whilst nodding and smiling, and then pointing at the poster of Bush and shaking his head whilst looking sad. You can praise his campaign as much as you like, but when you truly break it down, it isn’t much more complicated or innovative than that summary.

McCain has also pushed himself away from being associated with George W Bush in anyway. That is no mean feat, since he tends to vote with Bush and is in the same party as the incumbent President. However, he has still managed to treat W as a radioactive lump of crap. His strategy towards Bush has been simple – he wouldn’t touch George Junior with a shitty stick.

So what is the Bush hater to do? Who can they vote against, if they want to voice their strident disapproval of the inbred, slack-jawed shaved chimp of a redneck who has being running their country for the past eight years?

The best plan is to vote against McCain. Not because of who McCain is, or what he stands for. But rather because of his choice of Vice-President.

Make no mistake, Palin represents an extension of George W Bush. A more feminine and slightly more eloquent version, to be sure, but still just an extension of W. She is the same type Christian fundamentalist, gun toting, hunting, creationist, anti-abortion redneck moron as the incumbent President. She is George W Bush’s monster; a cliché of a Republican, born of years of suckling at the teat of the Christian Right. It has nothing to do with gender, and everything to do with her world view. She shares the same mindlessly simplistic outlook on the world as the person who has run the US since 2001. Frankly, she makes Dan Quayle looking like Abraham fucking Lincoln.

Americans will go to the polls today and cast their votes based on a whole host of different factors; the economy, the War on Terror, the characters of the candidates vying to be President and so on. But for anyone wishing to absolutely reject the Bush years, then I urge you to vote for Senator Obama. By rejecting McCain, you will also be rejecting a campaign that feels it is appropriate to put an ignorant, narrow minded idiot within grasping distance of the Presidency as a sop to the Christian Right. Palin represents an extension of the Bush administrations – and surely to Christ 8 years of Bush-esque leadership is enough.

Post of the Day #2

From the Moai (who is e-mailing me from a public library, as a useless aside) I give you this appraisal of Sarah "In No Way Am I Compellingly Loopy" Palin. Made me laugh out loud, if only for this quote:

It takes gumption and spunk and other made-up words that hearken back to another time - a realer time - a whiter time - back when men were men and women were men and great big hairy-chested frontiersmen of the plains wrestled oxen and caribou and the savage Injun Man in their mighty conquest of the West before succumbing to explosive amoebic dysentery! And with the help of God and millions of dollars in energy industry donations, Sarah Palin will give us that dysentery again!

You know, I reckon a vote for McCain/Palin is a vote for dysentery. So vote Republican if you like having the shits!

Yep, I'd vote for Obama

Of course, I don't have a vote in the US election. And I'd imagine that this blog has precisely zero influence on the US. But that doesn't stop me from having an opinion, and since this blog is pure (often unfiltered) opinion I'll give my opinion on who I would vote for if I had a vote in the Presidential election. And it would be for Obama rather than McCain.

Let me clarify my position. I don't like Obama, and I am far from being an Obama fan. His bellicose talk about US troops in Pakistan was idiotic, and I am distrustful of both his inexperience and his complete lack of any real policy proposals. His constant talk of the audacity of hope cannot make up for the paucity of policy. He has been described as the empty suit; I'd agree with that.

The problem is that there is very little to distinguish Obama from McCain. Obama would attack Pakistan; McCain would bomb bomb bomb bomb bomb Iran. McCain has been unable to come up with any real policies to distinguish himself from either Obama or from President Bush II. The only real distinction between Obama and McCain is that the latter is seriously lacking in charisma. That isn't the reason why I favour one over the other - I'm a fan of Michael Howard, and Lord knows he has about as much charisma as my right shoe - but McCain's presentational problems help to highlight that he is not really offering anything at all.

So it isn't policies or presentation that has made me plump for Obama. No, it is the choice of Vice Presidential candidate that worries me. Obama's choice of Biden is as uninspired as it is boring. However Palin is not just a bad choice from Vice-President - she is fucking terrifying. As Iain Dale (in a post also supporting Obama) writes:

And then there is Sarah Palin. As regular readers know, when she was chosen I said she would prove to be an inspired choice or a car crash. The initial evidence leant towards the former. Latterly, though, we have all seen too much evidence of the latter. I defended her against the appalling media onslaught against her, which I found sexist, insulting and worse. I simply could not bring myself to believe that a Republican presidential candidate could have chosen someone so ill-equipped for the job. But I was wrong, and I now accept that. McCain has not been a well man. He is 72 years old and has had cancer four times. His whole demeanour indicates that he might well not live through a whole four year term. Yet despite the intensity of the vetting process, he still chose Sarah Palin, a woman whose charisma temporarily masked her complete unsuitability to be one heartbeat away from the Presidency.

I'd go a bit further than Iain. I'd say that Palin is not just completely unsuitable, I'd say she is such a mentalist that she could compete with George W Bush in the "Who Is The Insanest Village Idiot?" competition. She is as mad as a rabid badger with a serious personality disorder. A gun toting, god bothering, self-styled pitbull in lipstick - she is pretty much the last person you would want in the White House after eight years of a cowboy boot wearing, god bothering shaved ape in a suit residing in that particular address. And, as Iain rightly points out, she really could end up in the White House if McCain is elected. Yes, the Veep is only a heartbeat away from the presidency at anyone time, but with McCain that heartbeat is far older and in a far more rundown body than any other President since Ronald Reagan retired. The choice of Vice-President is always important; for McCain it was more important than ever. It has become the deciding factor, as far as I am concerned, about whether McCain should win the keys to the White House or not.

And he fucked it right up.

So Obama gets my support - for what it is worth*. And he wins that support using the method that so many politicians now seem to rely on to get elected. His ticket is the least worst option. "The Audacity of Hope" my hairy arse - it is fear of the mad woman that gets my support and may yet see President Obama become a reality.

*As discussed, Senator Obama, my support is probably worth very little. But you're still welcome to it.

Election 2008: Let's all go debatin'

The second 2008 US Presidential debate happened. Actually, saying it "happened" makes it somehow sound much more dramatic than it actually was. So let me rephrase that - the second 2008 US Presidential debate kind of took place. I think.

Obama won - although he didn't have to do much more than turn up to secure his victory. Increasingly, and as the polls turn against him and his campaign, McCain resembles a grumpy, tetchy old man with chronic constipation. He seemed to treat the debate like he is treating his entire battle against Obama; as an inconvenience that shouldn't be happening to a Senator of his calibre.

Whilst Obama won, however, a lot of the coverage seems to be saying that he failed to deliver a "knockout blow". The closest he got was citing McCain singing "bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb bomb Iran" again. But then I got thinking about it. When do people ever really deliver a knockout blow at these sort of things? Most of the really famous debate moments are not so much one candidate kicking the other in the teeth, but rather one candidate saying or doing something immensely stupid. Take Jerry Ford claiming that Eastern Europe wasn't under Soviet domination in 1976. Or the reprehensible Jimmy Carter in 1980 claiming that his daughter was crucial to his decision making process about the bomb. Or there is my personal favourite - Michael Dukakis responding to a question in 1988 about the death penalty and a theoretical scenario about the rape and murder of his wife like a particularly emotionally cold replicant. None of these examples was really about what those candidates' opponents did - they are simply foot in mouth disease, through and through.

And where does this talk of "knockout blows" come from anyway? These are debates, not boxing matches. Talk of knockouts creates images that are far more exciting than the boring, tepid reality of a US Presidential debate. In fact, calling them debates is probably pushing it. They are far more polite, structured and meaningless that Prime Minister's Questions in this country. Watching a US Presidential Debate is effectively watching boring people, being boring, about boring things, at a boring venue somewhere. The talk of "knockout blows" and other associated hype comes from the media, who are so desperate for something other than endlessly repeated stump speeches that they make these debates into something far more exciting than they are or, indeed, ever could be.

However, the media hype means that these *debates* are important, and will help to decide the outcome of the election. And as it stands, Obama is winning both the debates and the election. Barring an October surprise or a real turnaround in the next debate, President Obama - once just a pipe dream of the more naive US Liberals - is rapidly becoming a reality.

An Observation

Back in the UK, but am jet-lagged and have about a million different things to do today. So blogging will be light.

But for anyone who is in the highly unlikely position of having missed this blog whilst I have been living the high life across the pond, I'll offer a quick observation. There are many differences between the US and the UK, and some similarities. One of the similarities is the state of our incumbent political leaders. The US has a gormless, redneck fucktard whooping around the White House, whilst we have a dour drip who increasingly resembles a septic sore on the face of the country in Downing Street. Let's face it, we both have morons for leaders.

However one of the key differences is that there is some hope for the US. Be it Obama, be it McCain - change is coming. And whilst neither one of those candidates would be anyone's dream President, they are both likely to be a fuck of a lot better than Bush Junior. Here in the UK, there is no hope on the immediate horizon. We have Brown until 2010 - despite his gross incompetence, there seems to be little chance of unseating the unelected social and political cripple for over a year.

And the cause of this difference between the UK and the US? Term limits and fixed dates for elections. I'm not an advocate for either; however Gordon is making me actively reconsider my position...

A New York Update

Here in New York, I'm struggling to find a Ron Paul badge. Probably because he dropped out of the race a long time ago. And I am struggling to find a McCain badge as well. So I have settled on two Obama ones, one of which claims he "rocks". For me, The Who rock, Obama - as a slightly dull politico - doesn't. That said, I am wearing my badge with pride, showing my reluctant support for a man I can't even vote for. Man, Obama should be grateful.

But here in the US they really know how to do elections - with petulant debates and angry campaign ads, through to shafting the nation's economy to score cheap political points. So much so that even the hardened election watcher in me is sick of the US election. Which means I am now off to do something far more productive with my time - look for Spiderman webslinging around the roof tops of NYC. 

Sarah Palin and the Media Limelight

It now appears that Sarah Palin, the newbie politician who has somehow wound up on the Republican ticket as Vice President, is now not only more popular that John McCain but is getting more popular than Barack Obama. Which is not bad going for a person who just weeks ago was a complete non-entity.

The question that screams out at me, though, is "why?" Why is there do much focus on Palin? Yes, she is photogenic (relative to the likes of McCain, most people are) and yes, she can make a half decent speech. But she has less experience that Obama, her political ideals are similar to those of the utterly reviled George W Bush. Reviewing her CV and politicial positions, she should be about as popular as a bout of explosive dysentry. Yet she is the darling of the US media. She is being treated like the Second Coming of... well, of Barack Obama.

So why all this attention? Well, the Palin story is an interesting story. Plucked from obscurity, pushed into the national limelight - it makes for damn good copy. But the reason why the Palin star is shining so brightly at the moment is also because, well, her story is new. And it is newer than the Obama story; that story is now a little bit old and tattered around the ages. This shows why politicians who were once media darlings are now languishing in the shadows or finding themselves being eclipsed by brighter, younger political types.

Think about Hillary Clinton. At the beginning of the decade, the story that the First Lady might become President was dynamite. It was exciting; more importantly, it was new. 8 years later, all the novelty has gone from that narrative. It is about as new and exciting as a Discman. And one of the reasons why she failed to win the Democratic nomination - ignoring her increasingly shrill and demented public image - was that her story was now less exciting that the Obama story. The former First Lady becoming President was old news; the charismatic, young black Senator fighting an underdog campaign to become president was far more novel.

Likewise, the reason why McCain was (until recently) languishing behind Obama in the polls was because his story is old hat now. Yes, McCain's history is simultaneously striking, heart-breaking and interesting - and he has achieved a lot more in his (albeit much longer) life than Obama. But we've been hearing stories about McCain since 1999/2000 (his first bid for the Presidency) - and there are only so many times that those stories can be rehashed. When you have the newer story of the charismatic, Kennedy-esque black Senator to write up, well, that story will always get the nod over the endlessly told McCain biography.

Which is why McCain's choice of Sarah Palin as Vice-Presidential candidate is a genius piece of media manipulation. She has removed the focus from Obama by having a newer story that the Obama tale. Obama's "journey" has now reached saturation point in the media. Palin is a breath of fresh air that the media is latching onto.

Now, you can shout against this mindset - Lord alone knows I want to, but that is something for a different post - but the simple fact is that the media is focussed on the newest story. At the moment, Palin is that story and Obama is suffering as a result.

Of course, this election is far from over and it is more than possible that Obama could still grab a sizable win. However, that isn't going to happen if he lingers on simply being Barack Obama. That is old news now. Likewise, he isn't going to turn it round by talking about pigs in lipstick. He needs a real, eye-catching headline grabbing moment to turn the tables and take the shine off Sarah Palin. He is more than capable of doing this if he realises that this is what he has to do.

Sarah Palin, Commander in Chief

The Economist on Sarah Palin:

"Inexperienced and Bush-level incurious. She has no record of interest in foreign policy, let alone expertise. She once told an Alaskan magazine: “I’ve been so focused on state government; I haven’t really focused much on the war in Iraq.” She obtained an American passport only last summer to visit Alaskan troops in Germany and Kuwait. This not only blunts Mr McCain’s most powerful criticism of Mr Obama. It also raises serious questions about the way he makes decisions."

Now the inital excitement about Sarah Palin's selection by McCain has died down, we can take a more objective look at what she represents. And it isn't good. Forget her gender, forget the fact that her daughter is pregnant. Look instead at the candidate. This inexperienced governor from a highly atypical US state whose views on the nation and the world make George W Bush's look expansive could end up just a heartbeat away from the Presidency. Yes, she is photogenic. Yes, she can make a rousing speech in a room full of friends. If she wasn't able to do either of these two things, then she would still be a nobody governor from a nowhere state. But the role she is running to shadow requires a great deal more that just those two things. Her lack of experience could be spun so she is presented as the Washington outsider; that spin is blunted when you realise that, ideologically speaking, she is very similar to the incumbent President. Change will only come to America if the candidates concerned actually want change. If you put Bush Jr and Palin next to each other, the only real differences are cosmetic - she looks a lot less dumb than him. Ideologically, they stand shoulder to shoulder.

Much has already been made in this election of the similarities between real life and The West Wing: Barack Obama as Matt Santos, John McCain as Arnold Vinick; you could even cast Joe Biden as Leo McGarry. But Palin's sudden elevation to the national political stage reminds me more of another US political series - the far inferior Commander In Chief. In that, a typical, right wing Republican President puts a photogenic, maverick independent female on his ticket. He dies in office, and that Vice-President becomes President. It is tempting to point out the similarities between the premise of the show and the situation for the Republicans. The truth is that McCain is far closer to being the maverick independent, whilst Palin is the dyed in the wool, carbon copy Bush era Republican. If McCain is elected, and then shuffles off this mortal coil, America and the world will not thank him for his choice of Vice-President when they realise she is the same as what has gone before.

McCain has done himself, and his campaign, few favours with his selection of Vice-President.

Vice-President Palin

Well, that was a genuine surprise.

On one hand, it would be a great choice. Palin is female, and likely to appeal to moderate Democrats who favoured Clinton for the Democratic nomination. She is also a Washington outsider; the only candidate on either of the main tickets who is not a Senator.

Yet... she is perhaps the only politician in the US who can make Obama look highly qualified. No-one in the US has really heard of her outside of Alaska. And she will be the one who is a heartbeat away from the presidency, serving under the oldest President in history who has already had serious health problems. Palin could become President if the McCain-Palin ticket wins in November - and are the American people really going to be willing to take the risk with an inexperienced governor of a small, remote state who could end up as President?

Whatever happens, this much is clear - McCain has take a massive gamble with his choice of Vice-Presidential candidate. It is a far bolder choice than Obama's, and I kind of admire that willingness to take a risk. Whether or not this choice will blow up in McCain's face, though, remains to be seen...

One house, 7 houses, it is all the same

John McCain on that difficult business of remembering how many properties he owns:

"I think ... I'll have my staff get to you"

Fair enough. I mean, it is a tough question and we all struggle to answer it from time to time. Think about it; how many properties do you own?

Oh… so you do know. Hang on, yes, it is easy to remember. Unless you are fabulously wealthy and own multiple properties.

Seriously, this could be really damaging for McCain. He has painted himself as the down to earth candidate – one of the people – unlike that elitist Obama. His general attitude and demeanour have helped him to build up a lot in common with the electorate. What will lose him that support from the man on the street is the revelation that McCain doesn’t know how many houses he owns. This revelation is even more damaging when you consider that, at the moment, people are struggling to keep their own single homes. Yes, McCain has a right to own as many homes as he likes and spend his fortune in any way he likes. But to not even know how many homes he has. That reeks of political incompetence and arrogance that undermines his claim to be a man of the people.

But, as it stands, this only *could* be damaging for McCain. Politicians have screwed up before in their quests for the White House and their campaigns have survived. Whether or not this really screws McCain up is down to the response of the Obama campaign. Early indications show that Obama is prepared to use it – but whether it becomes a millstone around McCain’s wrinkled neck comes down to whether Obama truly has a killer instinct

BarackBook

Ladies, Gentlemen, I give you BarackBook.

Now, I'm not one hundred percent convinced that it is as funny or as clever as it thinks it is, but it does at least represent the Republicans going with something approaching gentle satire. Rather than vicious, personal jibes. Although if you click into some of the *friends*, it does get quite near to the bone.

What does make me smile is the comment at the bottom:

Paid for by the Republican National Committee. Not Authorized By Any Candidate Or Candidate's Committee.http://www.gop.com/

Copyright 2008 Republican National Committee

BarackBook.com is a parody of Facebook.com

I'm pretty sure that John McCain genuinely didn't authorise this site. After all, given his knowledge of the internet, he probably doesn't know what Facebook is.

Election 2008: Obama and the polls

So the polls are narrowing, and it looks as if the decrepit McCain is gaining on the empty Obama. And as far as I can see there is one clear reason for this - the Obama World Tour!

Yes, travelling the world like he had already become President won him a lot of plaudits. However, it won him a lot of plaudits outside of the US. And being a popular Democrat outside of the US in this day and age is not difficult - frankly we would support a dribbling, screaming infant for President as long as it claimed to be a Democrat rather than a Republican. And Obama's strategy becomes even more flawed when you consider he is courting support from non-US nationals - ie those who can't vote. In the meantime, people in the US will be understandably confused as to why one of the candidates for President is not trying to get their support, and instead is already behaving like he has won. If I was an ignorant redneck in a Mid-West state, I would be fucking enraged*.

The election is still months away, and the polls (that are generally still seeing a slight Obama lead) could shift again, and there is every reason to think that they might shift in Obama's favour as there is to think they might shift in McCain's favour. But there is one big problem that Obama faces - namely, that he is running as the candidate for *change*.

*Change*, as totally nebulous as it might be, is a great thing to be supporting - if you are running against a candidate of the status quo. The problem Obama has is that change will happen anyway come January 2008. McCain, should he win, will be (mercifully) different to Bush. Change is coming, regardless of whether people vote for Obama or not. Obama needs a clearer reason for people to vote for him - it can't simply be a case of change, because if McCain was canny enough, he could run as the candidate of change too.

Looking at the Obama campaign, it seems to me that they haven't quite twigged yet that they are not running against George W Bush. Yes, if Bush was standing for President again, they would be whuppin' his sorry ass! But he isn't. They are up against the far more moderate McCain. And the constant moves by Obama to the right are strategic misfires - he needs to be distinguishing himself from McCain, not making himself more like his rival.

This being a high-profile election means there will be no shortage of armchair pundits offering their half-baked advice on what Obama should so to guarantee his victory come November. And given that, I'll throw my half-baked opinion into the ring as well. World Tours may be nice boosts to the ego, but they are going to mean the square root of fuck all to a voter in Arkansas or Delaware, who has never been abroad and doesn't really approve of the idea of there being a world outside of the United States anyway. The Obama campaign would be far better served by having their candidate making the case for why he should be President, and what he can offer the voters. It sounds like a really basic piece of advice; yet it is one that the Obama campaign seems to be in need of.

*Of course, if I was an ignorant redneck from a Mid-West state I would be fucking enraged anyway - not least at God for making me an ignorant redneck.

Election 2008: Dead Time

From the outside looking in, this is the dull time in any US Presidential contest. The dead time. The nominees will need millions, if not billions, of dollars to call each other a slag on a national scale, and that money doesn’t just magically appear, you know. They’ll be doing the hard graft – fund-raising chicken dinners, delivering the same stump speech to self-important businessmen and local dignitaries across the US. Both McCain and Obama will be crawling up their potential donors’ arseholes in an attempt to raid the wallets, at the same time as secretly hating those donors with a passion. But from the outside, this fund raising dead time is just repetitive and boring.

And yet, this time in any presidential contest fascinates me. Because you can start to imagine what is happening behind the scenes.

Both sides will now be thinking exactly how they will fight the coming General Election. I imagine Team McCain are thinking about the best strategies to “take the fight to Obama”. I can see John McCain raging at his subordinates, demanding to know why they can’t smear Obama’s Vietnam record. And I can imagine those sub-ordinates explaining in a gentle, calm way that Obama was a toddler during the height of the Vietnam war, and no matter what McCain might think, people still don’t think toddlers should fight at the front line. And then Team Obama will be sat around, no doubt pondering whether they will actually be able to do the unthinkable, and run a presidential campaign without committed to any policies. At all. Ever.

What is even more fun is thinking about all those different politicians from the same parties who have been slating each other through an incredibly cannibalistic primary season making friends again. The BBC carries this story about Obama making friends again with Bill Clinton:

An Obama spokesman said the two had had a "terrific" conversation during a 20-minute telephone call.

Yes, and one can imagine that after that 20 minute phone call both men simultaneously got off the phone and muttered “fuck you very much”. They’re not friends. They hate each other. Any claims that they are friends are about as credible as the Cabinet here in the UK saying they support Gordon Brown – a big old bag of bollocks.

But the reason why they are suddenly friends is the final reason why this is such a fun time for the US Presidential Election. Because, behind the scenes, the negotiations, debates and arguments are happening about who should take the Vice-Presidential roles on the two tickets. No doubt Hillary Clinton is absolutely convinced that she will be the Veep for Obama – hence Bill trying to make friends with Obama again. And I am equally sure that the Obama HQ has regular moments of despair, as the wonder what the hell they are going to do with that “Hillary problem”. Over in the Republican camp, the mentalist Mike Huckabee is probably waiting for the call from McCain to ask him to become Vice-President – after all, in Huckabee’s demented little world, he is God’s own politician. In the meantime, any Republican politician who lives even slightly in the real world is wondering whether they will get the nod from the decrepit McCain. I mean, for the love of fuck, surely McCain won’t choose to run with the man who took a phone call from God at a fucking fund raiser?

These are the interesting times, people, if you picture the unreported conversations going on behind the scenes. I imagine it all as one of the more interesting episodes of The West Wing, albeit with less piety and more swearing. And it won’t last forever. Soon we’ll have the nominating conventions, and then the endless bitching of the actual Presidential campaign.