mccain

Tempers are flaring in Minnesota, a state that has long prided itself on what its residents call 'Minnesota nice' (for an amusing portrayal of this style of behaviour, look no further than Fargo, perhaps the best film the Coen brothers have made to date). The pyrogen is the still unsettled Senate race between incumbent Norm Coleman and his Democratic challenger, Al Franken. As of today, Coleman is only 215 votes in the lead. Yesterday, Nate Silver of fivethirtyeight.com projected - with startlingly confident precision - that Franken would manage to push 27 votes into the lead by the end of the recount.

With the margins that small, the one thing we can be sure of is that the eventual victor - whoever he may be - will have a hard time convincing his opponents that he won fair and square. For a taster of what is to come, take a look at politico.com's latest article on the subject. It is an extremely biased piece of work entitled 'Sloppy Dems may spell Franken advantage' (the title alone cries out for the attention of an editor). It relies heavily on the opinions of a "veteran Minnesota election law attorney" named Robert Hentges, who has this to say:

“Democrats are [thought to be] more creative, free-spirited, so the idea is that they’re more likely to make a mistake that the optical scan won’t pick up. But when they recount the hard copy, those votes will be counted for Franken. If you talk to Republicans, they say it will be Franken’s advantage, because Democrats are stupid and will screw up ballots more often.”

Since the Politico reporter seems to take Hentges' suggestions at face value, it's a fair bet that this meme will have legs. Of course, many Minnesota Democrats are poorer than the average citizen, and so often have to deal with longer lines to vote, and less reliable equipment when they do. But that was also true in Florida eight years ago, and didn't stop Republicans from labelling Al Gore's supporters as undereducated African-Americans and senile old fools. The suggestion was, of course, that these voters didn't really deserve their votes in the first place. Expect to hear more of that if Franken manages a victory.

Update: It turns out that the headline of the Politico piece genuinely was in need of some editing. I e-mailed the author, Daniel Libit, with my concerns, and he agreed that the piece's title - which he didn't choose - was inappropriate. It has now changed to 'Franken hopes may turn on absentee issue', which is decidedly more neutral.

In the sixth part of his exchange with KA Dilday, Anthony Barnett realises that Obama's victory was hardly as comprehensive as it seemed. Catch up with part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4, and part 5. 

Dear Kay,

You are right to mull it over. There are big issues to be addressed, from celebrity to Afghanistan not to speak of the recession. But not immediately. I had a shock about 36 hours afterwards. I'd known - I'd put it as strongly as that - since January that Barack Obama could win and that in his case his race would not prevent this. I suppose I must have been too confident that he would. It was only afterwards that I suddenly saw how close it was. Obama needed Lehman Brothers to turn all the "palling around with terrorists" junk into froth.

One American in three did not vote at all! Most Americans did not vote for Obama. He got 66 million to McCain's 58 million votes. Nearly a quarter of the US's 300 million plus population are under 18, still leaving over 230 million of which less than 130 million voted. Obama got the actual votes of barely more than one in four American adults. He and his supporters must do something about the extent of what remains, in effect, a form of disenfanchisement in the USA.

While the world celebrates Barack Obama's historic victory over John McCain, many ballot measures on the state level also deserve our attention (overview). Most controversial among them were the decisions on same-sex marriage and abortion that were up in several states.

With almost all states called, we have a pretty good picture of the electoral map. It looks like this:

Though not quite the stuff of Democrats' wildest fantasies (which featured Georgia and even Montana), this is about as good as they could have hoped for. It is already being called a "landslide" by the often restrained New York Times. Nonetheless, it looks somewhat less impressive than this:

Or this:

However,  those sorts of landslides look to be things of the past. America is now much more evenly split, with both parties calibrating their message so as to win 51% of the electorate. The Democrats in particular have moved to the centre ever since Bill Clinton, scarred by the experience of the 1984 and 1988 elections depicted above, in which their candidates were widely seen as too liberal. Of course, some commentators, like John Judis of the New Republic, are already interpreting this election as part of a leftward shift in the nation. They may well be right, and I am sure we shall be discussing this at openUSA over the coming weeks. But there is no missing the fact that many of the new congressmen the Democrats have gained are more conservative than their old colleagues. This is the result of a deliberate and apparently highly successful strategy of recruiting candidates in tune with their districts. It will help keep the Democrats close to the centre, and perhaps even mark the return of a South in which both parties are competitive. Perhaps then we may see an electoral map which is more uniformly blue.

In the first segment of a multi-part exchange, KA Dilday reminds Anthony Barnett of how Barack Obama's rise is very un-European. Read on: part II, part III, and part IV. 

Dear Anthony:

It's been several months since I told you that Barack Obama's nomination as the presidential candidate for a major political party, could only happen in America . But even as I said that, I also insisted that he would never be elected president because of his race, particularly since he was running against a patrician white man. Now, and I say this with a cautious optimism, it seems that on the night of 4 November (EST of course) I may be eating a dish of crow, and relishing every bite.

I've lived in three countries in Europe - France, The Netherlands and now the United Kingdom - and despite the western European belief, particularly in France, that their countries are more liberal and tolerant than the United States, none of them have ever voted someone from an ethnic minority to a major position in national government. France, despite having a Muslim population (mostly of north and sub-Saharan African descent) of nearly ten percent, has never elected any Muslims to their National Assembly, the directly-elected body of their bi-cameral parliament.

In a way I'm embarrassed that my excitement is based on a politics of identity - Obama's black, I'm black, hooray for the race! - because as a thoughtful person, I've always tried to base my decisions on a candidate's ideas and policies. And despite that I've always been registered as a political independent, unaffiliated with either major party, I didn't vote for another black man, Jesse Jackson, when he ran as an independent candidate for president in 1988. But I can't deny the thrill I felt when I colored in the dot next to Barack Obama's name on the absentee ballot that I scoured the mail for each day until it finally came last Monday. I'm still expecting an unpleasant surprise. I don't think the exposure of Obama's aunt as an illegal alien will derail him, but who knows what the Republican's dirty tricks strategists will throw up. They're fiendishly clever and unabashedly dissolute when it comes to winning elections. But could it be? A black man, president of the United States! Who would have thought it in my lifetime?

Optimistically yours,

Kay

KA Dilday was recently a France-based fellow of the Institute of Current World Affairs. She covered integration and immigration in France and traveled frequently to North Africa. She has written and edited for many American publications. She was an editor for the New York Times opinion page. 

The networks are calling crucial state after crucial state for Obama, and Nate Silver at fivethirtyeight.com has just called the whole race. Upsets can always happen, but I think we can rely on his judgement. There will be more on this historic result tomorrow at openUSA.

If the Presidential race provides insufficient drama tonight, watch out for the results of the Senate races also taking place. There look likely to be some real nail-biters. Foremost among these is the match-up in Georgia between incumbent Republican Saxby Chambliss and Democrat Jim Martin. The race looks so close that it may end up in a December runoff, prolonging the election season yet further. Another close race is in Minnesota, with comedian Al Franken challenging Republican Senator Norm Coleman. This should have been a solid Democratic gain this year, but Franken has proved to be a less than ideal candidate, with the race essentially tied in the polls.

The outcome of these races should interest us all, even if we are not Minnesotans or Georgians. The workings of the Senate mean that a minority of over 40 can effectively stall any legislation, so the Democrats are desperately hoping they can reach 60 seats. It looks unlikely at the moment, but if this is truly a landslide for Obama, he may have sufficiently long coat-tails to get his party there. Amid all the excitement and triumphalism that would surround an Obama victory, we should not forget that he may have a difficult time bringing about the change he has promised.

Update: The Democrats have managed to win Elizabeth Dole's seat in North Carolina, a pleasing result for them...

The Huffington Post is carrying an intriguing story regarding a survey conducted exactly two years ago by polling company SurveyNow, gauging the balance of voter support across the country in the event of a hypothetical Barack Obama-John McCain presidential showdown in 2008.

Interviewing 600 voters in each state, SurveyUSA was able to extrapolate that an Obama candidacy would take Illinois, Hawaii and the District of Columbia-and that's it. This would have left him with a grand total of 28 total electoral votes, and culminated in a landslide victory for John McCain.

If Howard Wilson was right in his assertion that a week is a long time in politics, then this should prove ample evidence that two years is a very very long time indeed.

In the fourth part of his exchange with KA Dilday, Anthony Barnett argues that Obama sees the US as part of the world, not apart from it. Catch up with part 1, part 2, and part 3.  

Dear Kay,

Senator Obama - and I SO hope by tomorrow morning it will be "President-elect" Obama - agrees with you. In an otherwise masterful opinion piece in the Wall Street Journal, he writes, 

I'll finally finish the fight against bin Laden and the al Qaeda terrorists who attacked us on 9/11, build new partnerships to defeat the threats of the 21st century, and restore our moral standing so that America remains the last, best hope of Earth.

Right up to the implication of your last clause I agree with you that 

What Obama has demonstrated goes beyond the example that, no matter how far-fetched it seems, one can achieve one's dreams. He has shown people that there are many different ways to be black; that one can be comfortable and at home with people of all races and religions; that intellectualism is valuable to anyone of any race; and that America has done it again.

I'd say he has done more in that he has shown people of all colours, including white, that there are many different ways of being themselves, that their skin and background is not their fate. (And intellectualism is valuable - hurray! Have you tried to say that here in Britain?)

Here is the main point: America is special, yes. It is different. It is unique in its own way. But so too in their ways are all other countries. America is especially special because it is so powerful. But this is not inspiring - look what it has done with its power, from Vietnam to Iraq. Yes, Obama represents another America from Bush. The immense importance of his campaign is that it means one cannot say about George W Bush's Guantanamo-USA, "That's it folks - there is no other America".

In the third portion of her exchange with Anthony Barnett, KA Dilday argues that majority-minority dynamics in the US would make an Obama presidency unique and incomparable to the rise of Lula, Bachelet and Morales in South America. Previous letters: part I and part II. Read on: part IV.   

Dear Anthony:

It's the day of reckoning and I am taut with nervousness, so I'm pleased to be distracted by our discussion.

You question whether Barack Obama's success makes American exceptional. I still believe that it does. But I do acknowledge several of your points: blacks in America have a much longer history than the dominant ethnic minorities in the United Kingdom or in France or in most of Western Europe for that matter. And I agree that the US is woefully behind in matters of gender. Just witness the "taming" of Michelle Obama and Hillary (then Rodham, forced to change her name to) Clinton, both of whom had to downplay their own intelligence and accomplishments to fit into Americans' notion of a potential first lady.

So why does Obama's success make the United States exceptional?

There's been much talk this year of the Bradley Effect, or the Wilder Effect, or whatever name you want to give to the phenomenon of polls overstating a black candidate's support. It is bound to be one of the things which keeps anxious Democrats up tonight. But, as Harvard's David Hopkins has shown, there is no convincing evidence that this effect still exists.

So, for those left-leaning readers looking for another reason to worry, I submit the Shy Tory Factor. British readers will remember that the pollsters badly overestimated Labour support in the 1992 general election. Even the exit polls got the result wrong: this strongly suggested that Tory voters were either failing to speak to pollsters or lying about their choice. The most widely-accepted explanation for this was that the Conservatives had become 'politically incorrect'.

This is simply my own speculation, backed up by a handful of anecdotes, but it is possible that the same thing is going on in America today. In many (though certainly not all) parts of the country, Barack Obama is the 'politically correct' choice, for a variety of reasons - not just race, but also Bush's abysmal approval ratings and the cultural image of the Republican party. This is certainly something to bear in mind if the exit polls show an Obama lead. They also had Kerry ahead in 2004, and we all know how that turned out.

International viewers of the US elections will be hoping that the outcome is decided soon. If it is not, some of us will lose any chance of sleep as we suffer for our time zones. With that in mind, I have compiled a list of early-voting states which may foreshadow the eventual results.

The polls close first (11pm GMT) in Indiana and Kentucky. Both states have historically been Republican, but if Indiana seems close, that will at least be an indication that Obama's support in the polls has not been misleading - something many Democrats are fretting about right now. If John McCain loses Indiana, that may be the first fall in a landslide.

Next come Florida, Georgia, New Hampshire, South Carolina, Vermont and Virginia, with polls closing at 12am GMT. Unfortunately, many of these states may be too close for the networks to call any time soon. Victories in Virginia or Florida would give Barack Obama an almost impregnable lead in the electoral college. Success in New Hampshire would give John McCain cause for cheer - the state has voted for the eventual victor in every election since 1964, with the exception of the last one.

Then, at 12:30am GMT, the polls close in North Carolina, Ohio and West Virginia. This is where it gets interesting: any of these states could flip, and a flip in any one of them would be telling. If North Carolina votes Democratic for the first time since 1976, Obama will have made deep inroads into the South. If he loses Ohio and West Virginia, he will have failed to close the deal with the Clinton Democrats he needs.

By 1am GMT, enough votes should have been cast to settle the race, with 18 states closing their polling stations. That does not mean that we will know the outcome yet - although the earlier results may have given us a pretty good idea. If not, this will be the time that for us to hang onto our sofas as the election workers tally the votes in Pennsylvania - a crucial 'swing' state, and one of McCain's few paths to the White House.

Here's hoping all readers have an enjoyable election night - and return to openUSA well-rested in the morning, for analysis of what the outcome means, and what lies in America's future.

In the second part of an exchange with KA Dilday, Anthony Barnett argues that the novelty of Obama's candidacy places the Democratic nominee in the company of leaders across the Americas. Kay's first letter can be read here, as well as part III, and part IV.

Dear Kay,

I well remember our conversation. I also recall how I first started to listen to and read Obama in January and thought, "Damn, he really means to win and can." It was because of his deliberate appeal to conservatism. It meant he was genuinely serious about the presidency - and not in running as a radical, let alone as a "black" (as Jessie Jackson, at least in part, did). So here is to your dish of crow! May I garnish it in just two evenings time! 

But will - or would - Obama's election mean that the US is exceptional? Or that it is the beacon for humankind? Or at least that it is more liberal or tolerant than western Europe as you suggest? Here also we argued. First things first. It was not even slavery in America that was so exceptional. It was the civil war. Without the civil war the South would surely have abandoned slavery of its own accord. Instead, it suffered its appalling devastation and long aftermath as revenge was administered on the coloured through Jim Crow. To overcome this is to become normal. 

Obama presents himself as a candidate who will heal division. Like all good doctors, he joins exceptional self-belief and a measure of modesty. The immediate division he seeks to heal is also the civil war of the Sixties - in a word, "Vietnam" - that echoed your original civil war. But I want to emphasise that this healing, if it happens, will make America more healthy and normal, not boost its exceptionalism.

In an open letter to the next occupant of the White House, Charles Grant, Director of the Centre for European Reform called for a change of American direction. Europe was concerned, he wrote, at US failure to boldly commit to climate change initiatives, and the lack of US support for the International Criminal Court. Grant also hoped for the more restrained use of hard power after attacks on Iraq and Afghanistan. In short the letter called for a leader who would heal transatlantic relations, widened by excessive US unilateralism. "Dear George Bush," the letter began, dated January 2001.

Europe must be suffering from an acute case of political déjà vu right now; eight years after the end of Clinton's presidency the message from the "Old Continent" is depressingly familiar. Europeans expect the next American president to reorient US foreign policy, engaging seriously with multilateral institutions and forging close partnerships with Europe on a range of important issues, from curbing greenhouse emissions to curbing Iran's nuclear ambitions.

Across the continent, excitement at the end of the Bush presidency is palpable. From inauguration countdowns on Facebook to the huge crowds Obama drew in Paris and Berlin, Europeans are looking forward to the next American presidency with relish. Implicit is the assumption that a change in American leadership equals a convergence of US and European policies. Optimists highlight Obama's lofty "citizen of the world" rhetoric or McCain's criticism of excessive "lone ranger" diplomacy. Yet the stark similarities between Charles Grants' letter and contemporary European criticism of the US should caution against such hopeful expectations.

Given that the barriers of race and gender have been progressively eroded throughout the prolonged campaign season, many people have argued that this year's general election is something extraordinary by most measures.

For Yale law professor Akhil Reed Amar, however, the 2008 election represents a potentially profound turning-point in American history.

As Richard Reeves reports, the New York Historical Society recently hosted a conference entitled "Do Elections Matter?" To kick-off the event, Amar put forth his thesis that the United States has experienced four "pivot point" elections in the 219 years since the founding fathers forged the country's constitution: 1800, 1860, 1932, and either 1968 or 1980.

In each case, Amar argued, socio-historical forces conspired to ensure that the outcome of each election shaped the direction of the country and the dynamics of its politics for generations to come.

For example, Democratic-Republican Thomas Jefferson defeated Federalist John Adams in 1800, and over the next six decades the foundations for the Democratic Party in its current form began to emerge; Abraham Lincoln's victory in 1860 marked the beginning of Republican dominance well into the next century; FDR and the socialist New Deal Democrats set the agenda for much of the post-War era; finally, Nixon's presidency (or Reagan's, depending on your personal perspective) coincided with a golden era for conservatives, which now appears to be steadily waning.

A crucial catalyst to these elections all having the impact on the direction of American society  that they did is that they all occured against a backdrop of three important trends: economic decline, over-reactive wars, or a climate of paranoia based on perceived enemies abroad which subsequently results in the repression of civil liberties at home.

As Amar points out, these very issues resonate as strongly in this year's election as the four pivot point elections that preceded it--given the recent economic meltdown in Wall Street and looming recession on Main Street, the high cost and unpopularity of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars amongst the general public, and the repeal of a number of civil liberties via legislative measures, deemed necessary as part of President Bush's ‘War on Terror'. Consequently, in years to come we may expect to see the 2008 presidential election prove as influential an electoral event as these aforementioned elections.

While Amar's thesis is intriguing--if perhaps a little too quick to dismiss victories from figures such as Wilson, Carter and Clinton as arberrations simply because they polled below the 50 percent threshold--it also reflects a belief increasingly expressed by members of the media and academia alike that this year's election will bring a pronounced and quite profound sea-change in the social and political landscape in American culture.

More significantly however, in contrast to what Democrats and many members of the media may say, Amar's thesis suggests that this seismic historical shift will not nescessarily be on the condition of an Obama victory on November 4th.

Heading into the last weekend before the election, here's a handy tool to keep all the polls and predictions in perspective. The Takeaway condenses the spectrum of political projections in this "prediction tracker" below.

...or rather, "I am Joe." The ad below also boasts a cameo by the McCain campaign's new puppet of the Protestant work ethic, "Tito the Builder".

The Obama campaign dominated the airwaves yesterday, using its considerable financial muscle to buy half an hour of prime time programming on most of the major networks (as well as specialty channels like Black Entertainment Television - surely not the best use of resources?) The results can be seen here:

Having called Colin Powell's endorsement powerful, I risk revealing myself as a bit of a softy by admitting that the mawkish music and hard-luck stories worked on me as they were intended to. As Obama narrated the tales of hard-working families, struggling workers and retirees forced back into the workforce to get decent healthcare, one could be forgiven for thinking one was watching a tear-jerking documentary. Treacly? For sure. But also quite effective. Obama's documentary-cum-infomerical outperformed the usual programming in its 8 p.m. timeslot, drawing a total audience of 26.3 million. I doubt as many people would have been willing to listen to a politician lecture them for half an hour.

The advert took few risks - unlike McCain, Obama is not in a position where that would be necessary or wise. The four individuals and families chosen were spread evenly accross the crucial swing states and demographics, with a black couple and an Hispanic teacher sandwiched between two white households. None of them looked anything like the young acolytes whom some critics imagine Obama supporters to be. In between their stories, we heard moderate Democratic governors from midwestern swing states offer their endorsements. One could almost hear the boxes being ticked off as a retired Brigadier General reassured voters worried about Obama's credentials as Commander-in-Chief.

In the end, it is hard to imagine this commercial changing very much. Earlier in the campaign, it might have put to rest some voters' worries about a relatively unknown new figure on the political stage by showing him looking both moderate and presidential. But, if the breakdowns of the polling which followed them are anything to go by, it seems that the debates have already accomplished that. Nonetheless, it can hardly hurt to make Americans more comfortable with the man who in six days' time will likely be their President-Elect.

Update: According to the BBC's Friday night news bulletin, Obama's audience was in fact 33 million. 

A week ago, I wrote about the possibility of a Sarah Palin candidacy in 2012. Since then, Palin and those close to her appear to have brought this closer to reality by distancing themselves from John McCain. That makes sense if she wants to continue her ascent through the Republican ranks, because recriminations are sure to abound if McCain loses in six days' time. In fact, they have already begun. Joining a growing crowd of conservative commentators and intellectuals, moderate Republicans like Tom Ridge, the former Governor of Pennsylvania, have criticised the choice of Sarah Palin as running mate. (Ridge was widely believed to have been one of McCain's preferred VP picks before concerns about his base pushed him to choose someone more conservative.) Meanwhile, those further to the right have suggested that McCain's problem was that he was not conservative or aggressive enough.Palin has at times come close to voicing this latter critique, publicly urging McCain to "take the gloves off" and make Jeremiah Wright more of an issue. She would certainly not be the moderate wing's choice of candidate in 2012. I argued a week ago that moderates' criticism of her cannot fail to do some damage, but that non-moderates have a disproportionate influence in the primaries. Since then, discussion of her chances in 2012 has intensified, as evidenced by this summary in The Week.  I disagree with the dissenting voice quoted there, who suggests that people like me overestimate her political talents. Uneven though her performance has been this time around, she has shown an ability to draw huge crowds and intense support, and before her brand was tainted she enjoyed widespread popularity. Even more telling are her earlier achievements, which include unseating an incumbent governor in Alaska's Republican primaries, a truly impressive feat.This is not to deny that Palin would face significant challenges. Additional conservative critics may yet emerge once the campaign is over and the need for them to bite their tongues ceases. Assuming McCain loses, she is bound to attract some of the blame. Her popularity in Alaska shows signs of decreasing from its (very high) initial base, and events there may yet damage her. She will face formidable opponents, possibly including a better-funded Mike Huckabee and a re-energised Mitt Romney (whose former staffers have been involved in spreading anti-Palin spin to reporters, according to the American Spectator).  And, awkward though it is to say so, her looks - which constitute a significant part of her appeal for some people - will begin to fade as she goes from 44 to 48.