The US Presidential Elections.

[purpleronnie]

I expect Obama to walk it.

[ADK]

Maybe it's the quality of reporting in the UK on the American elections, but it seems the general default position is that this election is about whether you are a racist/homophobe (vote Romney) or not (vote Obama). It's quite insulting to Americans as it supposes that they're incapable of rational thought or engaging in debate.

Thats just how the election appears to most non-Americans and possibly alot of Americans too.

[Rincewind]

most people vote on issues that will affect or are important to them.

[breadandcheese]

Thats just how the election appears to most non-Americans and possibly alot of Americans too.

Fair enough. It seems a shame that it's cheapened and distorted to such an extent.

[Smudge]

I'd have a great pint with anyone, no doubt we would.

I thought the Republicans were a decent party and when I think of what they for America in the 70's/80's it's very sad what the current one is like, like I said to Jordan I don't rate either of the two at the minute, Mitt doesnt look fit to run the US, I still cannot see anything from Obama that makes me think the US's credit rating will be restored and he can get people back in their homes.

Maybe, but at the time the American people were firmly behind both wars and from what I remember about Afghanistan absolutely baying for blood, that massive military spending was being backed for the first four years by almost everyone in the senate.

That isn't my recollection at all. They were certainly behind ousting the Taliban and killing Bin Laden but as to Iraq I'd say, the case wasn't convincing and we thought Bush had overstepped his bounds. Colin Powell was less than convincing at the UN. The lack of organization for the occupation was a debacle, hotly followed by no signs of nukes or chemicals for that matter. It would be cynical of me to point out that Bush was from Texas and Cheney the ex CEO of Halliburton.

You have mentioned the increase in debt since Obama took over, the first tranche of that was authorized by Bush. Here's an aide memoire. Sept 25th 2008 5 months before Obama took over.

[sphericalfox]

I'd have a great pint with anyone, no doubt we would.

I thought the Republicans were a decent party and when I think of what they for America in the 70's/80's it's very sad what the current one is like, like I said to Jordan I don't rate either of the two at the minute, Mitt doesnt look fit to run the US, I still cannot see anything from Obama that makes me think the US's credit rating will be restored and he can get people back in their homes.

Maybe, but at the time the American people were firmly behind both wars and from what I remember about Afghanistan absolutely baying for blood, that massive military spending was being backed for the first four years by almost everyone in the senate.

[Guest MattP]

That isn't my recollection at all. They were certainly behind ousting the Taliban and killing Bin Laden but as to Iraq I'd say, the case wasn't convincing and we thought Bush had overstepped his bounds. Colin Powell was less than convincing at the UN. The lack of organization for the occupation was a debacle, hotly followed by no signs of nukes or chemicals for that matter. It would be cynical of me to point out that Bush was from Texas and Cheney the ex CEO of Halliburton.

You have mentioned the increase in debt since Obama took over, the first tranche of that was authorized by Bush. Here's an aide memoire. Sept 25th 2008 5 months before Obama took over.

Fair enough, I'll take it back when it comes to Iraq.

[Jordan]

I'd have a great pint with anyone, no doubt we would.

I thought the Republicans were a decent party and when I think of what they for America in the 70's/80's it's very sad what the current one is like, like I said to Jordan I don't rate either of the two at the minute, Mitt doesnt look fit to run the US, I still cannot see anything from Obama that makes me think the US's credit rating will be restored and he can get people back in their homes.

As an Obama supporter, I can concede that this is a legitimate argument that can be made against the current administration. A lot of critics (mostly from the liberal/progressive area of the spectrum) of the Obama administration's economic policy believe the White House made a big error by not setting the housing crisis (the primary cause of the global financial meltdown) as the #1 target of its economic recovery measures (see here, here and here).

[Just as good of an argument can be made that the recovery measures enacted by this administration went a long way towards avoiding an all-out catastrophe, have been a huge help in stimulating private sector job growth, and have put our country on the right track (I think recent employment and housing figures show that we're moving along).]

However, you'll never get that sort of rational critique of the President from today's Republican Party, who seem a lot more focused on making ridiculous claims about Obama's job creation record than anything else.

I think the U.S. credit downgrade by S&P last year was silly, and the only severe threats to the U.S.'s credit are debt ceiling brinksmanship by the House Republicans, or deep cuts in tax revenue that will come next year if the Republicans have a successful November.

[Smudge]

Bush v Clinton

Clinton v Dole

Bush v Gore

Bush v Kerry

Obama v McCain

Obama v Romney

Only one of those was palatable, well Monica thought so

[Phube]

I expect Obama to walk it.

Scarily, according to report on Radio 4, Romney is supposedly 1 point higher than Obama on the polls!

[Jordan]

Scarily, according to report on Radio 4, Romney is supposedly 1 point higher than Obama on the polls!

How do they figure?

[Alexikokopops]

Well this can't have helped them much

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-19414600

Nut-throwers ejected from Republican National Convention

Two attendees were ejected from Republican National Convention on Tuesday for throwing nuts at a black CNN camerawoman.

[fleckneymike]

How do they figure?

Quite a lot of polling data is showing in favour of Romney in terms of likely voters. The whole race hinges on a few swing states and Romney is within the margin of error in Florida 29 votes, Ohio 18 and Carolina 15. Obama took Florida and Carolina last time round. If those go with Romney a lot then rests on Colarado.

You can play with the figures on the Huffington Post

http://elections.huffingtonpost.com/2012/custom-presidential-election-map#home

[Jordan]

Quite a lot of polling data is showing in favour of Romney in terms of likely voters. The whole race hinges on a few swing states and Romney is within the margin of error in Florida 29 votes, Ohio 18 and Carolina 15. Obama took Florida and Carolina last time round. If those go with Romney a lot then rests on Colarado.

You can play with the figures on the Huffington Post

http://elections.huf...ection-map#home

You can also play with the numbers to remove the Gallup and Ras trackers, as DailyKos.com has been doing for the past two weeks, because of inconsistencies they have in their voter models compared to other polls and likely voter projection models.

This is a close race and a snapshot poll showing a 1 percent lead, either way, in any poll, should not make a difference on August 29. Nearly every reputable pollster average/aggregate has shown Obama with a slim but consistent lead over Romney for quite some time, so while a lot of the polls indicate a statistical dead heat (and there are outliers, of course), a larger sample size reduces statistical noise.

Polling will be crazy over the next couple of weeks, because Romney just had his post-VP-nomination bounce, he's about to get a national convention bounce, and then the Dems will get their own national convention bounce starting next week.

But back to how that affects the race: The big battles will be fought in the swing states, that's for sure. And you can look out for an all-out spending spree by the Romney campaign, the RNC, and the Super PACs on advertising in the swing states as they have built a substantial funding advantage over the Obama campaign thanks to the Citizens United decision that's opened the corporate political spending floodgates.

However, Romney still has a lot of work to do. He will flip Indiana, but we can color North Carolina (likely), Florida (toss-up), and Ohio (unlikely) red and he'd still be short of the 270 EVs needed to win.

The 2nd night of the GOP convention is about to kick off, and Paul Ryan will finish the night's speeches.

[Jordan]

The party conventions have come and gone, and we're now into the heart of campaign season.

This will be a long post, so if you don't want to read it all, the consensus in the U.S. is that the past two weeks were won by President Obama and the Democratic Party.

The days of conventions being tense affairs with political careers helped or harmed by deals made in smoke-filled rooms are long gone. The prime-time hours of conventions have become glorified pep rallies, offering less in policy details every campaign cycle, and seem to reach smaller audiences and appeal to less undecided voters every time (television ratings were down this year). However, they often provide great political theater. Sure, I might be a politics nerd, but I love watching the convention speeches and have since I was a little kid. After doing the math, I realized I watched about 24 hours of convention coverage over the past two weeks--whoa.

Of course, I have a bit of a bias but I was struck by how much more negative and inconsistent the GOP's convention's tone was than the Democrats'. The theme of the first night, "We Built It," was based entirely on an Obama quite deliberately taken out of context. The GOP paraded a bunch of business owners on stage, each one telling a story about how s/he built her/his business through pure grit and determination without a single bit of help from the government, yet every one of those business owners have received loans and grants from the government. Ann Romney' speech focused on love, yet Gov. Chris Christie spoke immediately after about how being respected is more important than being loved. Rep. Rand Paul, who represents the small, yet vocal libertarian wing of the party, said explicitly that the government needs to reduce defense spending, and he was followed by Sen. John McCain and Condoleeza Rice demanding that defense spending be increased.

Vice Presidential candidate Rep. Paul Ryan, normally a policy wonk, embraced the running mate's traditional role as the attack dog with a passionate rebuke of President Obama's policies. As good as the speech was rhetorically, it was universally panned by fact-checkers for several blatant lies and it could have even been a detriment to the campaign. Besides criticizing the Obama administration's policies and approaches, the other big goal of the GOP convention was to make Mitt Romney "likeable." But Romney , of a wealthy background, has a lot of trouble connecting with middle-class voters. His speech was safe, but he appeared a bit reticent, and unfortunately for Romney, he has less than two months to improve his appeal on a personal level.

Rep. Marco Rubio was the big winner in Charlotte, and his speech helped his rising political career continue to gain momentum. But the biggest loser by miles was Clint Eastwood, whose rambling, insane, extemporaneous "conversation" with a chair and an invisible Obama is easily the most bizarre convention speech I have ever seen. Meltdown.

The theme of the Democratic convention in Charlotte was that we are better off as a nation now than we were four years ago, but a Romney presidency would bring things back to failed past policies, so it was in their best interest to keep things as positive as possible but attack at opportune times. For the most part, the Dems stuck to their message pretty well, and their convention was highlighted by several excellent speeches. On the first night, Michelle Obama delivered an eloquent speech about her husband's values, and San Antonio mayor Julian Castro did himself and his party a favor with a solid keynote address.

But that was just setting things up for the return of the Big Dog, Bill Clinton, on Wednesday. Say what you will about Bill, but even his biggest critics can admit that he is an able, charismatic politician. He was quite clearly back in his element in Charlotte, and his speech was trademark Clinton: his actual speech was nearly twice as long as his prepared remarks, and he deepened his Obama endorsement/Romney rebuke into an awesome 50-minute-long speech. When Obama came out to give Clinton a bro-hug at the end of the speech, I wouldn't be surprised if Clinton told him, "You're welcome."

Barack Obama, whose speeches lit up the past two Democratic conventions, almost oddly didn't meet the high standard set the previous two nights. His speech didn't have the rousing optimism of 2004 and 2008, but he stuck to the general themes of his campaign, spoke assertively as if he is leading this race, and used his speech to rally his support for the final two months.

The DNC might not have been helped by speeches from consumer advocate and Massachusetts Senate candidate Elizabeth Warren, women's rights activist Sandra Fluke, and NARAL Pro-Choice America's Cecile Richards (whose mother, the late Texas Gov. Ann Richards, gave a famous speech at the 1988 DNC). Personally, I liked Warren's speech about how things are stacked unfairly against the poor and middle class, and Fluke and Richards' speeches about abortion and women's health, but the three are polarizing figures, and their speeches do not seem like they were well-received by moderate voters. Vice President Joe Biden's praise of President Obama's decisions in office was earnest, but he tripped over a few words... Biden is a good debater, but I wonder if his best speaking days are behind him, and he will have to be on his toes against Ryan, who is sure to come out swinging.

Clinton's speech was the pièce de resistance of the conventions, but the most heart-warming moment of Tampa and Charlotte was Gabby Giffords--who survived that horrific assassination attempt in 2011--reciting the Pledge of Allegiance before the delegation on Thursday night. Bless her... Politics and gun law policy have become increasingly ill-tempered in America, but Giffords' recovery is one of the rare things that can get everybody in accord. I thought it was very classy of Republican House Majority Leader Eric Cantor to rise above partisan bickering and call Giffords "an inspiration to all Americans" on Thursday.

Now that all of the balloons have been dropped from the ceiling, if this were an American football game, we are now in the fourth quarter and Barack Obama has the lead and the ball. Polling showed a modest-at-best post-convention "bounce" for Romney, while Obama's bounce is more noticeable, he leads in all of the trackers, has the edge in the swing states, and his rating in the Gallup job approval poll cracked 50% this week (the first time it's been that high since bin Laden was killed).

Back to my football analogy, the Romney team needs to work quickly, blitz when they don't have the ball and throw it down the field when they do. Having had mixed results campaigning, Romney/Ryan have two big opportunities to turn this race around: 1) with strong performances in the three presidential debates and one vice-presidential debate in October, and 2) with an effective targeted ad campaign in the swing states, using the $200m they have saved (and the millions more of cash the Super PACs have on hand).

President Obama has to keep hold of the ball and run out the clock. He needs to spend September ensuring the themes of the Democratic convention dominate the campaign news cycle, not give Romney any opening to attack in the debates, and use his excellent ground game to ensure that voter turnout is high. Although demographics favor the Democrats, Democrats tend not to be as enthusiastic voters as Republicans. Obama has to get Democrats that are ambivalent about the election and independents that may favor Obama, but may not be inspired to vote, to the polls.

[Captain...]

Thanks Jordan it is really good to hear first hand what is happening the other side of the pond.

[ozleicester]

Its all irrelevant anyway.... voting is pointless, it just matters who "Fox News" (yes the evil cvnt Murdoch) announces as winner.

Just read this... makes it all pretty clear

[Jordan]

Voting absolutely does matter. In several states, there are fierce legal battles ongoing about voter registration, voter identification, amd early voting. Republicans are arguing that new laws are necessary to prevent voter fraud. Democrats are arguing that voter fraud is quite rare, that Republicans are attempting to suppress votes, and that requiring all voters to have a government-issued identification (all of which cost money to receive) can be construed as a poll tax, which is unconstitutional. These are fierce battles being fought in the state legislatures and the courts--battles that wouldn't be fought if voting and elections were all for show.

As for Fox News, the links between Fox and the Republican Party are well-established, and I do not take Fox News seriously as a news outlet. For many Americans, though, Fox News is nearly the only media outlet they trust. The authors of the book you referenced are from Media Matters, a watchdog group that has its hands more than full investigating all of the Republican propaganda disseminated by Fox News.

Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Oregon) was recently quoted in a NY Times op-ed where he said he never envisioned a day when people would watch their own news channels to match their politics. On the other side, MSNBC has used the rise of Fox News to create its own market of liberal viewers, and have filled their evening hours with liberal commentary shows (and Al Gore helped start a new channel, Current TV, but that's not an easily-accessible network).

Fox News has quite actively promoted Republican causes, and gave an inordinate amount of coverage to the "Tea Party" movement. In a weird way, the Tea Party became a story and a huge force in the Republican Party because Fox News made them a big story before they were. And then, other news outlets, politicians, political groups and corporations see this, and they in turn decide this is a huge story because Fox News says so. Then, the Tea Party turned into a huge deal that drives Fox News' coverage and a political sensation that helped the Republicans sweep to big gains in the 2010 midterm elections. That's modern journalism for you.

Fox is so effective at driving the direction of the party (or trying to get the GOP in line) because it has taken a large portion of disaffected voters who distrust what they see as a "liberal media" and effectively created an echo chamber for them.

Fox has also accelerated a change that was started by CNN, whereby news coverage is replaced by commentary from pundits. On all three major networks now, there's very little straight news coverage and a lot more political talk shows and commentary shows. Even the news is constantly peppered with instant analysis (though usually more like "analysis"). In essence, Americans that watch cable news are not getting that much news, but are getting someone else's opinion.

Anyway, IIRC, Murdoch seemed to indicate support for Rick Santorum during the GOP primaries. He likes Paul Ryan, but seems to think Mitt Romney is a flawed candidate. But who knows, maybe he really wants Obama to win--just think of what it would do to Fox's ratings if they didn't have the secret Muslim, Marxist Nazi America-hater bogeyman in the White House to yell at...

[Webbo]

Its all irrelevant anyway.... voting is pointless, it just matters who "Fox News" (yes the evil cvnt Murdoch) announces as winner.

Just read this... makes it all pretty clear

So how come the Republicans didn't win the last election?

[Zingari]

I expect Obama to walk it.

That's harsh

Even the most redneck southerners would have allowed him to sit at the back of the bus !!

[Jordan]

So how come the Republicans didn't win the last election?

They did awfully well in the 2010 midterms, though, and many of their House seat pickups (and a few Senate seats) were due in large part to the Tea Party phenomenon.

I'm not saying that Fox won 2010 for the GOP, but having Fox clearly didn't hurt the GOP two years ago.

[Mack]

They did awfully well in the 2010 midterms, though, and many of their House seat pickups (and a few Senate seats) were due in large part to the Tea Party phenomenon.

I'm not saying that Fox won 2010 for the GOP, but having Fox clearly didn't hurt the GOP two years ago.

Have you ever watched Fox?

You'd have to be seriously thick to believe some of the crap spouted on there.

American elections seem to be a beauty contest.

[Captain...]

Have you ever watched Fox?

You'd have to be seriously thick to believe some of the crap spouted on there.

American elections seem to be a beauty contest.

Have you read the Sun?

It is easy to believe it when it is all you know, and the rest is just considered to be the liberal media, like liberal is a bad word.

[Mack]

Have you read the Sun?

It is easy to believe it when it is all you know, and the rest is just considered to be the liberal media, like liberal is a bad word.

Unfortunately yes.

However I was given a brain and have the ability to dilute news from bollocks.

Fox News is however one long and often aggressive advertisement for the Republican Party. If we had a 'news' channel like that here I would wager the complaints and distaste it would cause would soon see it in bother with the broadcast regulators.

[Captain...]

Unfortunately yes.

However I was given a brain and have the ability to dilute news from bollocks.

Fox News is however one long and often aggressive advertisement for the Republican Party. If we had a 'news' channel like that here I would wager the complaints and distaste it would cause would soon see it in bother with the broadcast regulators.

The problem in the US is they don't have an independent channel like the BBC, which is not free from political bias, but has a duty to remain neutral and is not influenced by political pressure.

In the US the news channel you watch is like the papers here, a Tory reads the Telegraph, and Lefty reads the Guardian, a bigot reads the Mail, and the disinterested look at the pictures in the red tops.

We all to an extent choose our news outlet based on political leanings, but we also by default go to the BBC, which tends to keep things in perspective a bit more.

Fox news can exist because most of it is opinion pieces, the bits I see on The Daily Show are shocking, but obviously the worst examples, and you can say what you want if it is your opinion, in the UK we don't have the 5th amendment, there is no actual constitutional right to freedom of speech, we can't say what we want because we have quite strict laws on defamation, libel and slander.

It doesn't seem to be the case in the US, because, like the right to bear arms, it is constitutional, and anybody denying that right, is therefore denying the constitution and therefore a terrorist.