Guy Aitchison

Tom Griffin (London, Green Ribbon): The Labour Party has suffered a fair amount of ridicule over its position on a Scottish independence referendum in recent days. Guido Fawkes is offering a prize to anyone who can explain the current policy in less than fifty words. More sober commentators don't sound much more impressed.
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Kanishk Tharoor

A fair amount of debate is kicking up over Obama's decision to accept McCain's offer of "unmoderated debates" between the two in the months leading up to the election. Noam Scheiber, writing in The New Republic's "The Stump", thinks this bodes ill for Obama.

McCain has several big disadvantages vis-a-vis Obama. He faces a massive enthusiasm gap and will have trouble attracting large crowds. He's in all likelihood going to be massively outraised and outspent, making it hard to get his message out. And, possibly as a result of the previous problem, he'll be cast as a right-winger determined to continue George Bush's policies.

The unmoderated debates would help him overcome all three problems. They'll draw big crowds and generate lots of buzz. They'll help him get his message out for free. And, just by virtue of appearing frequently at Obama's side and having a civil debate, they'll make him look much more moderate than the Obama campaign wants him to look.

Couldn't this work the other way around? Obama is faulted for his supposed inexperience and lack of substance. These debates would afford him the opportunity to add steely pragmatism to his oratory, precisely because they will be focused on issues and not flag lapel pins. McCain would look foolish and petty if he raised bogeymen like Jeremiah Wright and Bill Ayers in such fora. Debates - as public, visual spectacles - play to Obama's strengths: his charisma, his eloquence, his youth, his smarts.

If Obama does well and truly believe in casting aside the "old politics", he cannot refuse this offer. Some quarters of Team McCain were probably wishing in secret that Obama would follow Scheiber's reasoning and distance himself from the debate. It would have discredited Obama's rhetorical commitment to his vague "new politics" of inclusiveness and engagement. These unmoderated debates could be a space in which Obama's politics become more real. By agreeing to the debates, Obama can return the poisoned chalice to McCain.

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Guy Aitchison

Paul Kingsnorth (Oxford, author Real England): Peter Facey of Unlock Democracy has posed an interesting personal question. He feels the issues of identity but draws back for fear of having to embrace the bad with the good and asks isn't nationalism always going to be about airing grievances? An interesting question. I have only recently begun to refer to myself as an 'English nationalist', and not without some reservations. When I see idiots like the English Democrats doing their anti-Scottish thing, or engage in blog arguments with bigots from both England and Scotland who seem to think that the purpose of their nationalism is to allow them to each blame the other for their political plights, or engage in personal attacks, it makes me want to give up and go home.
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openUSA

Dana Milbank tears Hillary Clinton apart in his "Washington Sketch". Amidst a revealing description of Clinton's itinerary (including her photo-op waving to non-existent audiences) in West Virginia yesterday, Milbank interweaves the dialogue of Monty Python's famous "dead parrot" sketch (video below). The Clinton campaign may insist that victory in West Virginia is a sign of life yet, but the American press know a dead parrot when they see one.

Zombie-like, the Clinton campaign lurches on to Kentucky, invoking the ghosts of race and class in the Faulknerian gloom. Never accuse us of stretching the undead analogy too far.

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Guy Aitchison

Guy Aitchison (London, OK): The PM has just announced the Government's Draft Legislative Programme to the Commons. We hope to have more coverage on this and PMQs later but on first glance there seems little sign of the bold "new constitutional settlement" Brown called for last July. It appears the Bill of Rights and the citizens summit on the Statement of Values have both been put on hold. The only reference to these I can find is a vague promise to hold consultations on the Bill of Rights which will "give people in the UK a clear idea of what we can expect from public authorities and from each other, and a framework for giving effect to our common values." And expect yet another White Paper on the Lords.
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Helen Coskeran

The attention of the international media to the Tibetan issue is set to continue for some time. But a part of the Chinese media and internet community has been sidetracked by a 21-year-old philosophy student in Hong Kong whom they have christened “Tibet Independence Girl”. Tibet Independence Girl (aka Christina Han Chau-man) was one of nine protestors arrested in China for wrapping a Tibetan flag around herself during the Olympic torch relay and has now sprung to internet fame – for all the wrong reasons.
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Kanishk Tharoor

Bob Herbert in the NYT picks up on the growing number of studies and surveys done about the political orientation of young people in the United States. This generation - dubbed the "Millennials" - between their late teens and early 30s face a far bleaker economic landscape than their parents did. Indicators of the economic decline include a difficult job market, growing student debt, a drop in health insurance coverage and a rise in the percentage of income young people spend on rent.

In its report - "The Progressive Generation" - on the economic views of the Millennials, the left-of-centre think-tank the Center for American Progress suggests that this generation of young people is far more "progressive" than its predecessors, including the grunge-era depressives of "Generation X." That's because the Millennials have their backs to the wall. It is in government - and not in the eternal, self-healing logic of the market - that they seek answers.

As the CAP report outlines, a "majority of 18- to 29-year-olds believe that the government can be a force for good in the economy, and that increased investments in healthcare, education, and other areas are necessary to ensure strong and sustainable economic growth."

Herbert, one of the Times' more liberal columnists, finds cause for hope in the attitudes of the Millennials: "there is very little doubt that over the next several years they are capable of loosening the tremendous grip that conservatives have had on the levers of American power." So too must the Obama campaign be encouraged by the CAP report; Obama has aggressively courted the support of young voters, on whom he may have to rely in November to help overcome the staid pensioners unconvinced by his appeal to "change".  Read the rest of this post...

Helen Coskeran

I have to agree with the BBC’s Kevin Connolly that Hillary Clinton’s ‘die-hard battling’ in West Virginia is something you can’t help but admire. However, I disagree with his speculations on the source of Clinton’s determination to stay in a race she is apparently losing. He offers three reasons for this hardcore campaigning where many would have given up long ago. A quick comment on each of these suggests there must be something more to it.
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Guy Aitchison

Claire O'Brien (Florence, EUI): Brown will not come back from this. £120 cashback or not, his premiership appears to draw closer to twilight with every passing day. The one thing that could resurrect it would be to set a fresh progressive course for Labour and for Britain in tomorrow's draft Queen's speech. It seems inconceivable this will happen. Which means a new leader, from a new generation, who can articulate that agenda is essential. It is clear by now that if Labour does not offer a new direction, the Tories will.
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OurKingdom

Peter Facey (London, Unlock Democracy): There has been lots of discussion on this blog about nationalism, patriotism, identity and even how the centre left should become more nationalist.

I have always been interested in identity, nations and nationalism. I have a strong personal identity and am attracted to the way nation or community identity can bind people together across economic and religious divides.
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Tan Copsey

John McCain today set out his plan for tackling climate change, proposing to cut US greenhouse gas emissions 60% by 2050. McCain asserted his independence from the President Bush’s legacy of inaction and suggested that he would reclaim a position of leadership for the United States.

Most strikingly, he stated that:

"If the efforts to negotiate an international solution that includes China and India do not succeed, we still have an obligation to act."

This is a bold move by a Republican presidential candidate – Bush has for the last eight years made US participation in international efforts to reduce emissions contingent on the involvement of these countries. Obama and Clinton both propose larger cuts, as do Senators Warner and Lieberman, but it is striking that there is a firming cross-party consensus on the importance of acting on climate change.

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Guy Aitchison

Guy Aitchison (London, OK): Neal Lawson, chair of Compass, has an article in today's Independent calling on Brown to step down and return to the Treasury. He offers an analysis not dissimilar to Anthony's in Why Brown is Doomed, blaming the PM's plummeting popularity on his failure to make a decisive break from Blairism:
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Anthony Barnett

Recently, I was talking with Kay Dilday – a contributing editor of openUSA – about the rise of Barack Obama. She said she still could not believe that he would make it. I said I thought he could and in part because he was an expression of the normalisation of America in the aftermath of its shaping control over globalisation. Now, it was becoming a country – still a very considerable one of course – like others. It was joining the world. Kay objected that on the contrary, no other country could make someone like Obama its leader. Implicitly, she was suggesting that were he to make it, it would be evidence of American exceptionalism.

I’m not holding Kay to her argument. I’m reproducing it because I guess lots of people think on these lines and it made me question why I think differently.

Of course, it is true that no other white country would make a black man its leader at the moment. But what other white democracies countries have had such significant numbers of blacks as part of their historic population? Isn’t the exception that the US had slavery and then Jim Crow? When its Nobel Laureate for literature and finest living writer is a black woman (Toni Morrison), its Secretary of State is black (Condoleezza Rice), and its previous Secretary of State (Colin Powell) was not only black, he had also been a hugely admired head of the armed forces – then what are we seeing??

I’m not trying to diminish the importance of an Obama presidency, or even his selection as the Democratic candidate. I’m trying to look at whether it means the US is out on a limb or getting closer to the trunk of humanity.  Read the rest of this post...

Jared Malsin

I was drinking beer with my friend Baha' the other night when the US presidential election came up. Baha' is an educated, left-wing Palestinian guy who lived in the US for a while. Like a lot of Palestinians, he is sympathetic to Barack Obama, preferring him over Hilary Clinton, but is puzzled about Obama's views on the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.

If Obama is supposed to represent "Change", Baha' asked me, why doesn't he stand up to the Israel lobby? Why not make a complete break with the old politics?

It's a fair question, and a complex one. It's also a question that's been underlined in the last few days with Obama's repeated statements about the 60th anniversary of the founding of Israel.

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Anthony Barnett

Anthony Barnett (London, OK): On Friday after the local election results and before London had been announced I wrote an analysis of why Gordon Brown could not lead his party to a recovery (First thoughts on Labour's Debacle). Contemplating the ruins now after a sunny weekend in Dorset both a deeper analysis and superficial gossip confirm the diagnosis.
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Guy Aitchison

Guy Aitchison (London, OK): There was something of a stir in the blogosphere this weekend over Labour’s campaign material in the Crewe and Nantwich by-election and in particular the fourth question on a leaflet purporting to be a Tory Candidate Application Form:

“Do you oppose making foreign nationals carry an ID card?”

Anthony emailed me this story with the Subject line “gross and outrageous”. I agree.
This propaganda only serves to confirm two things: the willingness of Labour to adopt inflammatory, possibly xenophobic, language to win votes and the intellectual bankruptcy of the Government’s position on ID cards.

Lib Dem Voice, Guido and Conservative Home were united in their condemnation of the ad – as good a sign as any that they'd strayed beyond the pale. To be fair Labour supporters themselves have now started voicing their displeasure, with one poster on LabourHome saying “Central should be putting their foot down on this; I would rather the seat be lost - than win on the back of a campaign based on fear.”

Time to withdraw the ad perhaps?

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Guy Aitchison

Catherine Reilly (Dublin, Metro Eireann): Just days before he left office on 7th of May, former Taoiseach (Irish prime minister) Bertie Ahern told an audience at Harvard University that rejecting the Lisbon Treaty would be an “act of lunacy” by the Irish people.

For a man lauded for his so-called common touch, and ear to the ground, it was an odd choice of expression. Irish people don’t like being told what to do. Irish people don’t like being tagged potential lunatics. This sense of being patronised was, I believe, a factor in Ireland’s initial rejection of the Nice Treaty in 2001, quite aside from concerns over neutrality. 

Interestingly, new Justice Minister Dermot Ahern TD - who was promoted from his foreign affairs brief in last week’s cabinet reshuffle - has constantly played down the implications of a No vote, adopting a stoical ‘life would go on’ message (this, despite the fact that he resoundingly supports a Yes vote). Just like the dad who tells his teenage daughter that she can go to Friday night’s disco, but he won’t be paying for it, it has been a clever tactic.

Taoiseach Brian Cowen TD has been similarly circumspect. Since taking office, he has placed full emphasis on the benefits that EU membership has wrought for Ireland, linking a Yes vote as a fitting return from a self-confident, modern Ireland. He has also played on Ireland’s current sense of economic uncertainty, as the country begins to come to terms with the fact that the boom is no more. “It is very important that we get a Yes vote,” Cowen said last Saturday. “It is critically important to our strategic interest and to our national interest.” Read the rest of this post...

Tan Copsey

Forget Kentucky, Oregon and West Virginia. Say goodbye to primaries in Puerto Rico. A new poll has revealed that 47 per cent of New Zealand wants Obama! OK, the support of my countrymen and women is unlikely to shift those last few super-delegates Barack’s way. Still, it is oddly indicative of how popular he is around the world. He easily won the Democrats abroad caucus and his candidacy has inspired global excitement – from hard-steppin’ reggae to my quiet street in sunny north-London, where a number of houses are decorated with Obama 08 posters.

Of course, were global popularity to mean anything, I have a funny feeling that the US would have a different President right now. Doesn’t stop us singing though - altogether now – "we need Barack…".
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openUSA

Ebrahim Yazdi, a former Iranian foreign minister, writes an open letter to Hillary Clinton in response to her promise to "obliterate" Iran.

--------------------------------------------------------

Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton
US Presidential Candidate
c/o MSNBC.com

Your Excellency,

In one of your recent campaign interviews you stated that: "I want the Iranians to know that if I'm the president, we will attack Iran. . . . In the next 10 years, during which they might foolishly consider launching an attack on Israel, we would be able to totally obliterate them" (Interview with ABC).

This is not different from President Bush's stated policy towards Iran. The logic of threatening a total obliteration of Iran, possible only through a nuclear holocaust, is based on the "right of power", not the "power of the right".

As you may know, chapter I, article II of the United Nations Charter states that:

"All Members shall refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state, or in any other manner inconsistent with the Purposes of the United Nations."

Regardless of any hypothetical attack on Israel, the United States is legally bound not to threaten Iran or any other country. In addition to the UN Charter, the US constitution prohibits such threatening policies. Article IV Clause II states:

"This Constitution, and the laws of the United States which shall be made in pursuance thereof; and all treaties made, or which shall be made, under the authority of the United States, shall be the supreme law of the land; and the judges in every state shall be bound thereby, anything in the Constitution or laws of any State to the contrary notwithstanding."

As an Iranian, I feel compelled to ask you some questions. First, why are you threatening "the Iranians"? Second, if Israel attacks Iran and you are elected as president of the USA, what would then be your policy and position?

I do not agree with the rhetorical statements and foreign policies of Dr. Ahmadinejad, the President of Islamic Republic of Iran. However, while the military capability of Iran to attack Israel is questionable, Israel's capabilities concerning the conventional and non-conventional armaments to attack Iran is beyond any doubt.

With respect

Ebrahim Yazdi,
Secretary General, Freedom Movement of Iran and
Former Foreign Minister, Islamic Republic of Iran

Guy Aitchison

Guy Aitchison (London, OK): With all the hubbub surrounding Wendy Alexander’s U turn on a referendum last week I missed the Constitution Unit’s contribution to the debate, released in this press notice.

According to the Unit a “Yes” vote by the Scots in a referendum authorised by Holyrood would not be enough to secure independence. There would need to be two referendums. The first would be a “consultative referendum” authorised by Holyrood. It would deal with the “principle” of independence and permit the Scottish Parliament to enter into negotiations with Westminster which has the final say under the Scotland Act. The second referendum, authorised by Westminster, would deal with the terms and conditions of Scottish independence (including that Scotland should separate from the UK). Says the Unit’s Director, Robert Hazell: “People in Scotland might support independence in principle, but think again when confronted with the terms of independence. The terms will include not just issues like North Sea oil, but division of the national debt, ending all financial transfers from the UK government, and Scotland’s continued membership of the EU. The Scots are entitled to know the detailed terms of independence before making such a big decision”.

In his post on the Alex-Wendy debate last week, Anthony pointed out that “Labour has conceded an absolutely stunning constitutional principle: it has accepted that the Scottish parliament has the right to call a referendum that will decide on that country's independence.” If the Constitution Unit is right, however, Alexander’s call to Salmond to “bring it on” is of somewhat less significance. She is simply recognising Holyrood’s right to seek authority through referendum to enter into negotiations with Westminster: a requisite second referendum on the outcome of these negotiations might convince the Scots to change their minds.

 

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