July 21, 2008
Column: One simple way to predict a victor
One cannot help but be struck by the current disconnection in US presidential politics between, on one hand, the excitement and enthusiasm that attend Barack Obama’s candidacy and, on the other, the tightness of the race according to recent polls. The first suggests a sweeping victory for the Democrat in November, the second a close election and the distinct possibility of a win for John McCain.
Most would agree that Senator Obama has so far waged a polished and efficient campaign. He stumbles occasionally. His endless iterations on troop withdrawals from Iraq, for instance, have given Senator McCain a valuable opening. But he recovers quickly from his missteps and despite them projects an air of competence and assurance that belies his lack of experience.
Mr McCain, in contrast, has all the experience one could wish but little, these days, of the composure and gravitas that it is supposed to confer. When he trips up, the error seems to stick and he looks ridiculous. Mr Obama looks presidential. Mr McCain, sad to say, does not.
The remainder of this column can be read here. Please post comments below.
I am not an expert, but here are some questions:
1. What if I find other variables which equally well predict the outcome? I could probably find many such models. Can the variables here be cited as “predictors” if their is not a 1-1 correspondence between the predictors and the outcome? Is this not a game akin to the technical analysis of stock prices?
2. A sample of n=15 is usually not statistically meaningful (as a rule-of-thumb n=30 would be a minimum).
3. Maybe not so important, but their is multicollinearity in the variables: GDP growth and an incumbent’s approval ratings are related.
Posted by: RCS | July 21st, 2008 at 2:56 am | Report this commentClive,
Posted by: David Seaton | July 21st, 2008 at 6:50 am | Report this commentThere is only one tried and true method for knowing the victor of the race for US president in advance, it is the Halloween Mask Poll (no kidding). The advance sales for Halloween masks have always predicted the results accurately.
I too have felt that the polls seemed really out of touch with what was going on in the US.
Posted by: meljomur | July 21st, 2008 at 7:38 am | Report this commentWhere is the passion and support for McCain? Best I can tell, some of the media are the only ones championing a McCain presidency.
I suspect it is in the medias own best interest to report that this is such a tight race, and I too have suspected all along that this was really going to be a big victory for Obama.
I hope I am not wrong, because I truly don’t feel that the USA could handle 4 more years of Republican rule in the WH!
The race is very tight. Don’t kid yourself.
McCain is a known quantity, there is nothing new to talk about. So people aren’t talking that much. In general people, even Democrats, have a good opinion of McCain. They can make a decision to vote for him in the blink of an eye and feel comfortable with it. The question is Obama. Who is he? Aside from the speeches, what is there? People are thinking about it a lot and that is not good for Obama, not good at all.
The media dragged Obama over the finish line against Hillary: all the early momentum is gone and people are beginning to examine him more closely. People are thinking about Obama, rolling the idea around in their minds. The media like them both. Obama sells more advertising. The idea of the American image getting even a “dead cat bounce” from Obama is attractive to the media. But the majority of people are still not convinced. It shouldn’t be this close in the polls right now.
With Bush in the White House a Democrat should be 15 or 20 points ahead in the polls. And these polls do have meaning. Obama’s campaign should be a victory lap and it isn’t. A Democrat that is statistically tied with a Republican, with both under 50%, usually doesn’t win in November. The Republican organization, which is very professional, with very good databases, usually trumps everything but a huge and enthusiastic voter turnout. The polls are not showing that enthusiasm. This is anything but done and dusted.
Posted by: David Seaton | July 21st, 2008 at 11:18 am | Report this comment> “This laughably simple metric has correctly forecast the winner of the popular vote in 14 out of 15 postwar presidential elections.”
For this sort of exercise you need to calibrate the prediction rule to one set of data, then test it on an independent set of data. It’s not clear from the article whether he’s done this.
Posted by: JY | July 21st, 2008 at 1:45 pm | Report this commentThank you and AMEN! The polls for this presidential election have been going on for two years–enough already.
The only thing worse–and growing worse by the day–is the TV advertising for the two candidates. I always have my remote and its “MUTE” button handy.
I’d really like to hear and see some real news–maybe about the candidates, but there are other issues than this election–on TV and in the newspapers. The lack of attention to other issues and the superficiality of reporting is terrible.
I hope your article has an impact.
Posted by: Terry | July 21st, 2008 at 1:55 pm | Report this commentMr. Crook’s comments will not have an impact on anything, although his comments in this entry are accurate and intelligent, as usual. How does an Englishman or Britain, if not English, do such good reporting and analysis of the USA political and social scene. Remarkable.
The need to fill television air time with any kind of inanity and only inanities, whether political or not, is evident by flicking through the channels available to see what is broadcast at any hour of the day. Lowest of the lowest quality on any topic, including the broadcasting on so-called news channels. The only channels of note are the C-SPAN channels which show “news” in any form unalloyed by commentary, unless that of guest on the many excellent C-SPAN shows. They also allow for the people to speak in the many call-in features offered. Interesting and informative to hear what people think over the widest of spectra of background and politics. Not statistically relevant but at least indicative of what is on people’s minds and how that might affect Presidential or Congressional voting this year.
Posted by: Wendell Murray | July 21st, 2008 at 5:38 pm | Report this comment“This laughably simple metric has correctly forecast the winner of the popular vote in 14 out of 15 postwar presidential elections”
So, it’s as accurate as “the taller candidate will win” (every time except 2004), then?
Posted by: ajay | July 21st, 2008 at 5:47 pm | Report this commentAlso, worth pointing out that the even simpler “time for a change” effect alone - the governing party wins after one term, loses after two terms - accurately predicts 12 out of 15 postwar elections: 1952, 1956, 1960, 1964, 1968, 1972, 1976, 1984, 1992, 1996, 2000*, and 2004.
I think it’s far too crude of an analysis to say that the media has an “increasingly shameless bias” towards Obama. How could this be, when the same people in charge of the media in 2000 handed George Bush the presidency? (case in point: Al Gore never claimed to invent the Internet, though the media told America that he did) It’s simple: the media is not “biased towards” Obama. The media is OBSESSED with Obama. There’s a big difference. For instance, PerezHilton.com is obsessed with Lindsey Lohan, but they are most definitely not “biased towards” Lindsey Lohan. They just know that talking about her gets them pageviews. Likewise, the media (they are a business after all) knows that any article/piece about Barack Obama will get them better ratings than one on John McCain. This cuts both ways. This means that while Obama’s current Middle East tour is accompanied by all of the major news anchors, giving him increased visibility in a very “presidential” way, the media also does things like ignore McCain’s verbal gaffes and rumors in ways that they would never have done with Obama.
The best example is McCain’s alleged “gorilla rape” joke. While this is only a rumor, if there was a rumor that Barack Obama had made this joke, it would have dominated the Cable news talk shows for at least a week or more (just as they’ve done with the rumors of Obama’s “secret Islamic-ness”). But since it’s affiliated with McCain, it’s seemingly shrugged off completely.
Posted by: Gabriel | July 21st, 2008 at 6:27 pm | Report this commentOn July 11, 2008, Barack Obama, once again proved that he has very poor foreign policy judgment, as he did in his disastrous 2006 trip to Africa when he openly criticised the democratically elected presidents of South Africa and Kenya, which were then the two most stable and economically advanced societies in Africa. Obama did so in 2006 for the sake of cheap publicity, from a horde of news media who accompanied Obama to Africa, to promote his own presidential ambitions at the expense of American taxpayers. However, what was and remains overlooked by an American press corps intoxicated by Obamamania was the fact that Obama used federal government funds to openly campaign for his then undisclosed first cousin Raila Odinga by appearing in Odinga political rallies to promote the Kenyan presidential candidacy of Odinga and chide the democratically elected government of Kenya. Last week Obama was at it again, displaying the very same character flaws that undermine President Bushes leadership abilities — arrogance, dismissive of counter views and criticism, stubbornness, and a false sense of his own historical importance.
Prior to ever stepping foot in Afghanistan and before leaving on a purported “fact finding” trip to that country Obama in an internationally televised interview with CNN (which was televised on July 13,2008) had the temerity to publicly criticise Afghanistan’s president, by proclaiming: “I think the Karzai government has not gotten out of the bunker and helped to organize Afghanistan and (the) government, the judiciary, police forces, in ways that would give people confidence,” Obama said. So there are a lot of problems there,” he added, ahead of an expected visit to Afghanistan and Iraq. “A big chunk of the issue is that we allowed the Taliban and Al-Qaeda to regenerate itself when we had them on the ropes,” Obama went on to say. “That was a big mistake and it’s one I’m going to correct when I’m president.”
Was this good foreign policy judgment in front of Obama’s first trip to that country to openly criticise the democratically elected government of Karazi, as a freshman Senator with no foreign policy experience, save insulting the presidents of South Africa and Kenya in 2006? They are two important American allies in Africa fighting the spread of Islamic fundamentalism and jihad, as is Karazi.
Obama, whose only life experience was a stint as a civil rights worker in South Chicago before joining the Chicago machine and winning office by disqualifying all other candidates in the Democratic primary for state senator, made some off-the-cuff gaffs that the political press corps has all but ignored. Afganistan, like South Africa and Kenya is a multi-ethnic and tribalistic society. What would any person with a modicum of true foreign policy experience say publicly before meeting President Karzai? Little, if anything. For the conduct of foreign policy is given to the executive branch of the U.S. government by the Constitution. Obama, despite all his public arrogance, has not yet been elected to executive office.
Moreover, Obama’s rhetoric confuses glib and cheap campaign tactics of Chicago machine politics with the refined nuances of conducting foreign policy with democratically elected governments of sovereign nations. Obama needs to be reminded that Afganistan was not stabalised by the Soviet Red Army from its December 1979 invasion through its 1988 pull-out. Three brigades of additional combat troops is akin to trying to put out a forrest fire with a garden hose. Afgahnistan is a vast country with harsh terrain as the Red Army found out. The foreign fighters have retreated to Pakistan and intermarried with local brides of natives. They cross the border at will and operate out or Soviet era caves before retreating back to Pakistan. Three more brigades may sound great for domestic American political consumption, but does not make for good foreign policy. The question that may have escaped Barack Obama is whether committing more troups to pacify Afgahanistan is prudent or a repeat of the failed Soviet strategy.
Progress in Afganistan, like Africa, in political and economic development, as well as legal systems has been and remains slow and painful.
Furthermore, Afganistan is not an American possession and public criticism of its democratically elected government serves no purpose other than a selfish agenda to promote Obama’s presidential bid by world-wide publicity at the expense of undermining the allied government of President Karzai.
Will more American military presence in Afgahnistan engender progress? Will increased military presence evoke nationalistic reproach against the ruling elite of the country. To date the most sucessful military strategy has been to play one war lord off against another permitting them to fight to long term indecisive draws.
Perhaps Obama’s criticism would be better directed to Pakistan’s creation of jihadi madrassas established under the military rule of madman General Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq, who overthrew the democratically elected government of President Ali Bhutto, hung Bhutto, established Shariah law in Pakistan. The creation of the nationwide web of jihidi incubators throughout Pakistan, through government sponsored and funded madrassas, is the root cause of present day radical Islamic fundamentalism and jihidi terrorism. Just look where the first World Trade Center bomber in 1993, Ramzi Mohammed Yousef, was indoctrinated - - at a Pakistani madrassa, although he was a Kuwaiti by birth. Ramzi Yousef lived in Karachi while he planned several terrorist attacks on innocent civilians. Barack Obama, unwittingly revealed that he visited Pakistan in 1981, during the military rule of Zia, as did thousand of militant Islamic fundamentalist radicals, during the infamous “Bittergate” fundraising speech in San Francisco, ironically exposed by The Huffington Post. Query: What was Barack Obama up to in Karachi, Pakistan in 1981?
Posted by: Kevin | July 21st, 2008 at 6:49 pm | Report this commentI’m confused. I read this article because it was linked from RealClearPolitics.com, a non-partisan site that (among other things) keeps daily track of poll results. And according to RealClearPolitics.com, Obama is clearly leading McCain in the Electoral College by 255 to 163 with 120 votes classified as toss-ups, or, with toss-ups assigned to the leading candidate no matter how narrow the edge, Obama wins by 322 to 216.
Furthermore, Obama’s margin has been increasing over the last several weeks.
This doesn’t exactly strike me as “giving McCain a real shot at victory.”
Posted by: herzliebster | July 21st, 2008 at 7:37 pm | Report this commentAs one whose job for years involved making (economic) forecasts, I can truly testify it is a humbling enterprise.
However, humans seem built psychologically to crave them nevertheless.
I do think the Greeks had the definitive story on this, as on so many things.
Cassandra was given the gift to tell the future accurately, accompanied by the curse that no one would believe her.
After two victories by the most incompetent and emotionally repellant president in America’s history, it is difficult to offer any rational thought on the functioning of American politics.
There have been several polls showing Obama with a significant lead, on the order of eight points, but there are also polls showingg more or less a tie.
My gut feeling tells me Obama is going to win by a surprisingly large margin.
He is an attractive and highly articulate candidate. John McCain, much less so.
I think the words that instantly come to mind in making a comparison are “fresh” versus “tired.”
Obama beat an opponent who had great name-recognition, someone every American knows over the last fifteen years. That remains a stunning achievement.
John McCain has a number of serious weaknesses, chief among them a truly ugly temper. I can’t see him getting through the difficult months ahead without a couple of big blow-ups.
The economy is full of threatening signals, and there may be more yet, and the man in the White House now has a deservedly low approval rating.
The one really big unknown is Israel’s possible action against Iran. I believe Bush and Co. have quietly resigned themselves to not bombing Iran, but Israel may, stretching its resources to the limit, be able to carry off what it threatens daily.
If they decide to do so foolish a thing, it would likely come before Bush is gone.
The fall-out, from even a failed attempt could be immense. Of course, instantly, oil prices will skyrocket. And at least one strike back with Iranian missiles seems a certainty, being an entirely legitimate response.
Would American voters then look to the nasty old military man ready to spend a hundred years in Iraq - a war that was largely about Israel’s situation - or turn to the thoughtful intelligence of Obame?
It has the potential for being a real turning point in America’s relationship with Israel if Israel insists on dragging America into another war.
Posted by: JOHN CHUCKMAN, TORONTO | July 21st, 2008 at 8:09 pm | Report this commentJohn Chuckman,
Firing missiles at civilian populations, blindly targeting urban conurbations, can never be a legitimate response to anything. It is a war crime, if not a crime against humanity.
Posted by: RCS | July 21st, 2008 at 10:23 pm | Report this commentJohn Chuckman: “…if Israel insists on dragging America into another war.”
Chilling words. There instantly bring to mind Hitler’s warning to the Jews: if they once again succeed in dragging Germany to war…
Posted by: RCS | July 21st, 2008 at 10:28 pm | Report this commentRCS,
Please, it would be helpful if you tried thinking before posting. There’s no meaningful discussion generated by childish, name-calling words such as yours.
In both your last posts you manage to say nothing of substance while suggesting my words are evil. Pathetic, really.
As to war crimes around bombing, need I remind you Israel just a short time ago killed about 1500 people - mostly civilians - in Lebanon?
How about the tens of thousands killed in the last invasion?
Need I remind you that the U.S. has killed over half a million in Iraq?
How about three million in Vietnam?
Or two cities obliterated by nuclear weapons in Japan.
The only honest thing you say is that such bombing is a war crime, but then you make your statement dishonest by asserting it only for Iran’s theoretical response to an Israeli attack.
I believe, and I think most decent people would agree, that all of these examples and more are war crimes.
The main difference is that my list includes all actual criminal acts, not speculations about possible future reactions.
As for Hitler, first you have his quote incorrect.
Second, and far more importantly, you entirely misread what I wrote. Is that deliberate or just owing to such a deep well of prejudice that you cannot read words clearly?
What I wrote is: “It has the potential for being a real turning point in America’s relationship with Israel if Israel insists on dragging America into another war.”
Clearly, I am not threatening anything or anyone in that statement.
I am making a speculation about contingent events.
And they clearly are events in which I am not an actor.
Events in which I have no possible connection other than as observer and commentator.
I do trust you accept people are still free to express their thoughts?
I’ve always felt that people who have strong things to say should say them under their own name. Seems doubly cowardly to attack people personally and to do it without using your name, wouldn’t you say?
Posted by: JOHN CHUCKMAN, TORONTO | July 21st, 2008 at 11:46 pm | Report this commentAs for John McCain’s chances, look what he is doing already:
http://www.swamppolitics.com/news/politics/blog/2008/07/john_mccain_geography.html#comments
He is not a great deal better informed than Bush.
Posted by: JOHN CHUCKMAN, TORONTO | July 22nd, 2008 at 12:02 am | Report this commentThis election is about Obama. McCain is an afterthought. For Obama or against, that’s all this election is about. McCain could be a stump and he’d poll as well.
Posted by: Dan, TX | July 22nd, 2008 at 12:31 am | Report this commentJohn Chuckman,
Your visceral reaction to the thought of a theoretical (and surgical) Israeli attack against Iranian nuclear facilities was to condone a war crime against Israel’s population. Yes, that is evil. The examples you cite of other parties allegedly doing the same do not justify it either. I think you should retract that statement.
I feel your statement regarding Israel dragging America to war was tinged with that same anger. Its implication that Israel does indeed have such influence on the actions of the hyperpower is analogous to similar claims made against the Jews during the inter-war period. Of course, prima facie you said no such thing. But in the wake of your previous statement, I could not help but make the connection.
Best,
Ron Cohen-Seban, Haifa
Posted by: RCS | July 22nd, 2008 at 2:08 am | Report this comment“the US media’s increasingly shameless bias in favour of Mr Obama” fails to accurately or adequately recognize the role of corporate media in US politics.
McCain has been getting a free ride much of the time. Cindy McCain (and her substantial wealth, and the fact that Mad Dog’s money is in her name) have been utterly ignored by the national media in favor of microanalysis of “terrorist fist bumps” and other nonsensical musing about the suitability of Michelle Obama to be first lady.
With Obama’s ground-breaking Middle East trip, Barack has demonstrated that he is more in command of the situation than either McCain or the current administration, which lamely (”we’re not there to negotiate”) and belatedly (”we don’t negotiate with terrorists”) sent a high-ranking member of the State Department in a desperate and failed attempt to steal Obama’s thunder.
Posted by: Noah | July 22nd, 2008 at 2:45 am | Report this commentNoah,
The conservative media made a good attempt (a worthwhile one, in my opinion) to stop the McCain campaign last summer, with the WSJ even reporting that McCain was ready to drop out.
The left media has done is regular poor job of painting McCain (and generally all veterans) as warmongers, which I think backfires, though it is not for lack of effort.
Regardless of the US Press, European media has been even more reckless in its partisan coverage of the race.
I can’t think of a good thing to say about the media until one of them decides to show in Sen. Obama’s home neighborhood and take a first hand look around at the results of his “community organizing” “hope” and “change” has take his constituents in his lifetime as a professional politician.
JBP
Posted by: John Powers | July 22nd, 2008 at 3:21 pm | Report this commentLike Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz, Mr. Crook is clicking his heels three times in the hope of wishing his candidate, Mr. Obama to victory.
Like the left’s last unknown candidate, Senator Kerry, or its prior pretenders, from Dukakis to McGovern et al, Mr. Crook’s reliance on “scientific analysis” to achieve his hoped for and predicted victory leaves out the most important elements.
Flatly put, the common denominator of all these candidates is their decided disconnection from mainstream American values. Mr. Obama, even without reference to his wife, is quite possibly the most radical Presidential candidate in the history of the young republic. Like his predecessors they share a common disdain for America’s nobility of spirit, it’s work ethic and ultimate reliance on the strength of individual freedoms based on a traditional interpretation of our Constitution.
All have been apologists for America’s willingness to defend those freedoms and critics of the ultimate costs of those freedoms; from Vietnam, the cold war assault of Reagan and now our transitional multigenerational war with Islamo- fascism.
Theirs is an America not of opportunity but of denial and division. Theirs is a world of resentment and racism. Even including Presidents Carter and Clinton, both anomalies and reactions to Republican failures, the esprit and approach has been the same.
We are still living with the disastrous consequences of these two outbound farm boys who created chasms within the traditions of this nation. The former, in his hesitation and denial of the Shah and indeed his active support of Ayatollah Khomeini and his similar approach to the Marxist illiberal Robert Mugabe.
In the case of the latter, his disgraceful avoidance of the pursuit of Bin Laden, when he “had him” on more than one occasion. As well as his bewildering conduct with North Korea, only matched by his lack of support for our special forces in the Somalian debacle.
So as you sit with your pencil trying to will your candidate over the line, there is a more fundamental reason why he is unlikely to win come November.
In spite of his one advantage, the fact that he is black and, unlike him, his wife and his life long (now denied) Minister Wright, America is color blind; whereas Mr. Crook is simply blind.
Robert F. Agostinelli
Posted by: Robert Agostinelli | July 22nd, 2008 at 9:40 pm | Report this commentLondon, England
I thought that ft.com was supposed to be like the FT - about facts not political propaganda aimed at the uninformed. Partisans on both sides are indulging in embarrassingly* obvious mis-statements.
Posted by: John | July 23rd, 2008 at 2:14 am | Report this commentThe only valid comments are that any formula that ignores the individual candidates and the presence or absence of significant third-party candidates (Wallace and Perot) is fundamentally flawed and (much less significantly) that you should not quote the 1960 result as a success for predictive abilities whichever side you are on. Clive Crook’s formula ignores the significant handicap created by Jack Kennedy’s Catholicism just as much as it does the cheating by the Daley machine in Illinois.
*Noah is particularly objectionable as even 5000 miles away we know that the US media have been targeting Mrs McCain who was not seeking attention, but he/she is not alone.
One last comment about Noah - look at who declared war: Asquith and Chamberlain; who made peace: Lloyd George and Churchill. De Gaulle ended the war in Algeria. There are multitude of similar examples (the extreme example is that Richard the Lionheart and Saladin agreed a peace that allowed Christian and Muslim pilgrims both to have safe access to Jerusalem. Richard also had a truce with Scotland and Wales for the duration of his reign, so after his return he was only fighting the French who attacked his dominions in his absence.) The latter may seem incredible but just check it!
Just because Barack Obama may enjoy “rock star” status with the media does not mean that he is not being held to a higher standard than John McCain. For example, McCain’s recently departed economic advisor, the “Senator from Enron”, Phil Gramm, did far more real damage to the American public while he was in the Senate by supporting loopholes that helped that company than Jeremiah Wright ever did with his inflammatory speeches on race relations. Yet the stories about Wright lasted in the media for much longer than the ones about Gramm.
In the same way, Obama’s “bitter” comments, which were largely true, drew far more media flack than Gramm’s absurd and insulting “whiners” remarks about the economic problems of ordinary Americans.
Certainly, both candidates have changed positions on a number of issues, with, no doubt, many more flip flops to come on both sides. But Obama’s flip flops have received generally wider attention, while McCain’s are often minimized or even ignored.
For example, the other night on cable TV I saw a McCain supporter argue with a straight face that McCain had shown great courage last year by supporting the unpopular failed “amnesty” for illegal immigrants.
True enough. But there was no mention of the fact that McCain has since changed his position, giving into pressure from his intolerant right wing Republican base.
However, the most compelling argument against Clive Crook’s sanguine view of Obama’s chances of being elected president is the fact that the falsehoods and smears about Obama’s supposed “Muslim” identity and alleged lack of patriotism simply refuse to disappear. The biggest example of this was last week’s notorious New Yorker front page cartoon.
While the magazine claimed that this was legitimate satire intended to ridicule the right wing attempts to destroy Obama’s character reputation (and that of his wife) the help the cartoon actually gave him, in a country still fixated (for good reason) on 9/11, was more like the type of assistance that Brutus and Cassius gave Julius Caesar on 3/15.
Posted by: algasema | July 23rd, 2008 at 3:52 pm | Report this commentGramm was correct though in stating that the economy is not in recession. Sen. Obama is wrong in stating that it is in recession.
Deliberate falsehoods uttered by a presidential candidate should lead voters to disqualify that candidate.
JBP
Posted by: John Powers | July 24th, 2008 at 3:18 pm | Report this commentAs I understand it, John, Gramm was relying only on the indicator of corporate profits as the basis for his statement. Clearly, that is the only thing he cares about, not the economic well being (or lack of it) of the average American “whiner”, who is not an Enron top executive.
Who will McCain appoint as a replacement to Gramm? Marie Antoinette?
Posted by: algasema | July 24th, 2008 at 5:23 pm | Report this commentRoger,
No, you are wrong. Gramm was referring to the economy as a “mental recession” because it is not a arithmetic recession, as recession has been definted for 72 years (or so) now. Recession measures rely on economic growth, not corporate profits.
The “whiners” including Sen. Obama and Sen. McCain practiced election year economics to attack Sen. Gramm, regardless of the validity of his statement. Given that the media has been yamnming on about the disastrous economy for quite some time now, despite basic arithmentic, the term “whiner” seems perfectly appropriate.
For acting like an adult, rather than a spoiled child, Gramm is given the boot.
JBP
Posted by: John Powers | July 24th, 2008 at 7:15 pm | Report this commentJohn, there is no doubt that John McCain is an adult too, one unfortunately past his prime in terms of mental capacity, judging by his convoluted, non - stop serial gaffes on Iraq and the economy, which would have probably been serious enough to eliminate Obama instantly from contention if he had made even one of them.
Please don’t think that I am against older people; I am less than a year younger than McCain myself, and will admit to plenty of my own mistakes, especially with regard to typos, but by no means limited to those.
But I am not running for president, and neither are any other people of my generation who may have to worry about “senior moments” and worse.
Some of McCain’s recent Iraq statements, especially on the “surge” timeline and Sunni/Shia have been so confused that even Fox News cannot cover them up. Sometimes one has to wonder if McCain even knows where he thinks he stands on any given day on any given issue.
I hope I have not made any spelling mistakes in this post.
Posted by: algasema | July 24th, 2008 at 9:16 pm | Report this commentObama message appears to be little long on rhetoric and short on policy.
Age should not be an issue for the Presidency, Alexander the great at the age of 20 went on to capture the entire known ancient world, on the other side of spectrum in this century Winston Churchill at the age of 63 to 70 led the war that changed the course of Europe and mankind. As recent as 80’s Ronald Reagan was an old man who changed the course of ‘economic history of the globe,’ supply side economy created new prosperity, the wealth locked in rarity of gold assets spread through knowledge assets like Google and Pentium chips. Incentive, innovation and free trade opened locked abilities of nations like India, China and Brazil, it is not an incident that impact of supply side economy in less than a decade converted yester communist and pauper nations into capitalist nations, last decade Russians, Indians were a pauper nation, the new demand and new rising boat of a huge middle class has put fresh challenges to mankind, BRICs nation and rising demand is a sign of victory over poverty, famine and shortages, it is not Malthusian scarcity but rather contrarily 40% of the mankind demanding superior standards of living. Ageing man has given lot of pluses and their know-how and gallant actions have definitely helped humanity move forward.
This is war of ideas; it is appeasement and diplomacy versus strong willed actions against vandals at mankind’s door. Within the crescent of Islam and arc of instability extends from Morocco to Bangladesh, even India shielded from the repercussions of ‘desert Islamic extremism’ is been threatened by a Mujahedeen Army. Al-Qaida, Taliban and political Islam are tentacles of antiquated archaic mode of living in its last sigh are trying to hold on to its territories, terror is the new constitution and bill of rights for majority who live under Taliban, they have written new rules of quiet war, where everyone is a innocent or guilt is a target. A hidden enemy that has hushed support of hundreds of million needs to be connected to the civilised world, Afghanistan revenge, and blood letting is as old as human history of feuds, carnage and atrocities begins.
It is sad to see that there is no way to measure the hidden benefits of war on terror, no one can analyse the benefits of hundreds of bloody attacks that were blocked whilst in the offing, in absence of these blocked attacks, these guys whose operational backbone has been broken look like normal human beings but they are not, the containment of their activities have leashed their fangs of terror on to their own brethren, Iraq, Pakistan and Afghanistan has casualties of more than 10,000 people from suicide bombings none were ‘infidels,’ the anger is their inability to operate in their favourite killing fields around Liberty Plaza or undergrounds in Madrid or London, this inability is translated by the short sighted and myopic view of liberal political leadership not as major successes but quite the opposite as no success. Perhaps post 911 and post 77 the biggest success is the ability to cut the operational backyard of the terrorists.
These are people with deep rooted hatred, here we see a globe where distance has died in no time, the amalgamation of the globe is threatening their insular system of living, these archaic societies were left on their own under toothless structure of political agents as East India and Raj ruled India, they were kings and rajas of their own land, it was ok as far they remained isolated across by a land barrier of Khyber pass and river Indus, with a modern connected world these forgotten lands have become part of our global society, it is here where major terror scripts are rehearsed and executed, now in a connected world these archaic societies can bring wrath of disproportional magnitude on the basic framework of mankind, the social contract mankind believes in that of ‘live and let live’ is directly opposite to their believes, this is the challenge of the next decade for the incoming President.
When you have to please too many your messages gets cluttered, the problem lies with Obama constituency too many different strains of ideology demanding incompatible actions and hence no action but dilly dallying on nearly everything, playing for the galleries and media never helps build firm politics which are required in present day and age.
Not only he will have to walk with the big stick he will have walk the talk and be able to use it,, no dilly dallying and no appeasement on that count McCain stands tall and high above Obama. He may be older but he knows exactly what needs to be done to contain this storm rising in the east. The message to the vandals has to be clear and unambiguous, regrettably Obama message appears to be little long on rhetoric and short on policy…
Posted by: Iqbal Latif | July 27th, 2008 at 12:49 pm | Report this comment