But Gavin Sheridan Got It Right
02 January: In a piece entitled “Predictions for 2008”
I’m not going to make any, yet anyway. Dan Drezner does. The biggest surprise? Obama for president. I have a funny feeling he may be right.
Two days later:
Obama, I think, will be in the White House in 2009.
And then on 22 April:
My two cents: Obama will win the primary. He will then go on to win in November. I am considering going to Washington for the result. Though it will be an eventful night no matter who wins.
Well done, sir!
Gil Scott Heron Got It Wrong
In your lifetime, you see events unfold in the news that you know will be recorded as turning points when the history books are written. Some are horrific, such as the events of September 11, 2001. Others are joyful, like the release of Nelson Mandela from prison in 1990.
The events of 4/5 November 2008 will be remembered in the latter category. The USA has turned to Senator Barack Obama to repair America’s battered economy and society, and to restore her tarnished reputation in the wider world.
His task will not be easy. Promises are easily made on the stump, but implementing them may not be so easy. A phrase I heard more than once today on radio was “You campaign with poetry and you govern with prose.”
After 9/11, the USA had the goodwill of the rest of the world to count on as it tried to come to terms with what had happened and what it would do in response. President Bush and his neo-con goons ended up squandering that goodwill.
Messages of congratulation are pouring in to the US from all across the world, and this renewed goodwill for America’s new president will give all of us hope for the future.
President-Elect Barack Obama. Dammit, but those words sound good. They will sound better when the “-Elect” bit no longer applies.
How Wingnuts Interpret Polls
Look further down, and you’ll find that the margin of error is +/- 2%. So that means that in reality, Obama is no more than 1% ahead of McCain, which is in itself within the margin of error. And that’s before the Bradley Effect is taken into account. Go McCain!!
Believe it or not, Matt Drudge of The Drudge Report makes a living peddling this sort of crap.
It's The Economy, Stupid
Paddy Power have already paid out on Obama.
This may well be a bit early to call the whole thing. If a week is a long time in politics, three weeks is three times a long time. Anything can still happen. The Republicans will throw as much shit as possible at Obama in the hope that some of it will stick, and some of it just might. Osama bin Laden might appear in a new video wearing an “Osama 4 Obama ‘08” t-shirt.
The issue exercising Middle America these days is not that Obama once stood next to some former 60s radical in a mens’ room in Chicago, exchanging small talk while they both took a piss. People are afraid that they will lose their jobs, their homes and their savings, and will elect the guy most likely to assuage that fear. At the moment, that guy is Barack Obama, who has appeared the more presidential of the two candidates.
Eight years of President Stupidhead W. Idiot has left the USA in a terrible mess. Mired in two seemingly impossible wars, and with a failing economy and a huge budget deficit, it is a huge ask for any single person to sort it out. But can you imagine if a year into a McCain presidency, he becomes incapacitated and Hockey Mom has to take over? It doesn’t even bear thinking about.
Here’s an interesting snippet from the New York Times (Yes, I know. Part of the latte-sippin’, gun-controllin’, creationism-suppressin’, abortion-promotin’, troops-not-supportin’, tax-raisin’, terrorist-appeasin’ East-coast liberal media elite.) If you invested $10,000 in the S&P stock market index in the periods under either Democratic or Republican presidents exclusively since 1929, your investment would have been six times better off under Democrats than Republicans. And that excludes Hoover’s Depression presidency. If you include Hoover, you would have made nearly 30 times the gains under Democrat presidents. [Spotted at Daring Fireball, where John Gruber commented “Facts continue to hold a liberal bias.”]
Scary People
[via 23/6]
Also, read this from Bock
The Politics Of Personality
There is a great
quote from Bob Herbert in yesterday’s New York
Times regarding the
cult of personality that has grown around Sarah
Palin:
"For those who
haven't noticed, we're electing a president and
vice-president, not selecting a winner on 'American
Idol'."
Ever since she
burst into the world’s consciousness a fortnight
ago, Sarah Palin has done exactly what she was
supposed to do - keep the focus on the
personalities in the race, and away from the
issues.
The media love her, even the Eastern Media
Elite. Entire
forests have been consumed whole to supply the
newspapers full of the latest details about her
family, her dress sense, her love of guns, etc.
And as long as the media continues to
concentrate its focus on her, it means that
there is less time to talk about the issues
facing the USA. This is precisely what the
Republicans want to do, because when it comes to
policies, the GOP’s cupboard is bare. Up until
Palin made her debut, Barack Obama was all over
the media and making the poll numbers. He was
doing this without having to denigrate his
opponent. (Of course, there is a cult of
personality around Obama too, but it has almost
vanished in the last fortnight.)
During the week, Obama made use of the expression
“lipstick on a pig”. At the time, he was talking
about the policies of the Republican ticket, and
how little they differ from the failed policies of
George W Bush. The Reps immediately picked up the
“lipstick” reference and spun it as an insult to
Palin, thus bring the focus back from issues to
personalities - and in particular, that of Sarah
Palin - and thus back onto firmer ground for their
campaign.
With just under seven weeks to go until polling
day, Barack Obama and Joe Biden have a big fight on
their hands. Right now, the Republicans are winning
the media war hands down, and this all comes down
to Sarah Palin. The airtime and column inches she
is getting are keeping the Dems off the airwaves
and out of the papers, and brings to mind one
of Oscar Wilde’s famous
sayings:
“The only
thing worse that being talked about is not being
talked about.”