Election poll

[Jerkass]

Just a little bit of US election fun.

Winner receives an all-expenses-paid tour of Iraq, which will run much longer than you might think.

[amner]

I'm kinda thinking it's going to be a lot less tight than we think (and it's a while since I said that).

[pandop]

There wasn't an option for

'the sooner the better as I am sick of hearing about it'

Hazel

[wshaw]

I'm kinda thining it's going to be a lot less tight than we think (and it's a while since I said that).

Having been pessimistic for so long, I'm beginning to think you may be right.

[bakunin_the_cat]

I think it will take at least a few days, if not a few weeks to sort out out the Son of Chad voting chaos in Florida. Many people think the electronic voting system being used in some counties is, if anything, even more dodgy than its dimple pressing predecessor. What was wrong with a good old fashioned X in a box?

I saw something on BBC4 with Rich Hall in Montana which gave me some hope. You'd think that rural cattle country would be pretty much pro-Bush, but this was not the case. In fact it seemed pretty much an even split. Maybe it's the fact that Montana has the lowest wages in the country, and these people are unlikely to get any favours from the Party of the Rich. And though the Party of the Rich with Slightly More Guilt/Conscience probably wouldn't be a helluva lot better, if they do achieve some progress towards universal healthcare by cutting spending on the mastery of goats, it would be the people at the bottom of the pile who would benefit.

[Jerkass]

Some interesting statistics for you on healthcare in the US...

Lots of people are fond of throwing around that great '42 million uninsured Americans' number. Back when that was 40 million about a year ago, that could be broken down as follows:

18 million - able to afford their own private insurance but just didn't bother
13 million - eligible for government-sponsored insurance but didn't bother to sign up for it until it was needed
9 million - the true deprived souls we really should be talking about, who neither can afford to pay for insurance nor are eligible for government coverage

The great thing about universal healthcare in the US is that everyone thinks it's a great idea...as long as there aren't any taxes levied to pay for it.

[bradyguido]

Do you really think Kerry can do it? My boyfriend says he thinks Bush will win again and I am getting carried away on a tide of hope. I know what you all hope, but what do you actually think will happen? For the record, I think kerry is actually going to win it. Guess for fun. :?:

[John Self]

Some pundit on Newsnight last night, who was apparently closest to being right last time, called it for Kerry. That's good enough for me. In fact, can we just run with that result and not bother with the whole voting thing? (Rather like my feeling, as a non-football-supporter, that they should just declare the winner with the coin toss at the start of the game and not bother running around for 90 minutes.)

[wshaw]

Well, I reckon it's a bit less likely he is going to lose than it was a week ago.

[bakunin_the_cat]

The great thing about universal healthcare in the US is that everyone thinks it's a great idea...as long as there aren't any taxes levied to pay for it.

Sound familiar anyone? People complaining about public service but when it actually comes down to putting your hand in your pocket, well, sorry i can't right now, maybe next time. And I used to think Britain and America were so different.

[Wavid]

It's brilliant that Kerry has got so close, when you think the trouble he was having right back at the start of the primaries.

I think the tide started to turn in his favour around the time that the 1,000th US death was announced in Iraq - I think this really made people think about the way the war was being fought, and whether alternatives were plausible. Then his performances in those televised debates made him more acceptable to many voters.

My issue, though, is with the appalling standard of the campaigning. Did anyone see Peter Oborne's programme on C4 last night? A pretty damning portrayal of both candidate's style. Negative, smear tactics, keeping the electorate as ill-informed as possible. For example - just how does John Kerry plan to deal with the Iraq situation differently? I haven't a clue.

[bradyguido]

I know, and those images a few weeks back, of kerry parading with guns, and the whole vietnam thing. He's certainly not my ideal choice for a world leader, but lets face it... hes not bush. HUGE plus.

[John Self]

The concentration on Iraq and the 'War on Terror' is slightly misleading. I don't seriously think either candidate will put their people's security at risk - or more at risk than the other. Iraq cannot be undone so neither candidate can make it a particularly clean outcome. So it really comes down to domestic issues, where Kerry has Bush fried, although whether the American people think that way remains to be seen.

Interestingly, the rigorous electoral-vote.com (http://www.electoral-vote.com)website, which works out probable electoral college votes based on state-by-state polls, is now calling it strongly for Kerry, with 298 votes to Bush's 231. For most of the last two weeks - and possibly further back as I haven't been checking it that long - it has been suggesting a firm win for Bush.

Oh please, oh please, oh please...

[amner]

Plus, at least Kerry is a walking around, interacting human being and not a strategically shaved australopithecus.

http://www.cyberolimpiadas.com.sv/proyectos/inch2003/images/z-1.gif
.
Mr Bush setting off to vote this morning.

[amner]

Interestingly, the rigorous electoral-vote.com (http://www.electoral-vote.com)website, which works out probable electoral college votes based on state-by-state polls, is now calling it strongly for Kerry, with 298 votes to Bush's 231. For most of the last two weeks - and possibly further back as I haven't been checking it that long - it has been suggesting a firm win for Bush.

That winning margin is taken up by the 'Barely Kerry' Florida (sixty-eight), though.

[John Self]

Florida has only 27 electoral college votes so even if Kerry lost it he would still win with 271 votes to 258...

[wshaw]

Interestingly, the rigorous electoral-vote.com (http://www.electoral-vote.com)website, which works out probable electoral college votes based on state-by-state polls, is now calling it strongly for Kerry, with 298 votes to Bush's 231. For most of the last two weeks - and possibly further back as I haven't been checking it that long - it has been suggesting a firm win for Bush.

Oh please, oh please, oh please...

Yes... the fact that electoral-vote.com showed Kerry swing into the lead yesterday was noted in the US national press.

Which seems to be being taken as an indication of a last minute swing towards Kerry in volatile states. How accurate it is remains to be seen, as it depends on ignoring all margin-of-error statistics, presumably.

[John Self]

The webmaster of electoral-vote.com also tells us that

normally people with a cell phone but no landline are not polled. Most of these are in the 18-29 year old group. Up until now, no one has known how their absence from the polling data might affect the results. Zogby has now conducted a very large (N = 6039) poll exclusively on cell phones using SMS messaging to get a feeling of how they will vote. The results are that they go strongly for Kerry, 55% to 40%, with a margin of error of only 1.2%. If they all vote tomorrow, the pollsters are going to spend the rest of the week wiping egg from their faces. But historically, younger voters have a miserable turnout record, so the pollsters need not yet stock up on paper towels.

[Digger]

Did anyone see Peter Oborne's programme on C4 last night? A pretty damning portrayal of both candidate's style. Negative, smear tactics, keeping the electorate as ill-informed as possible.

yep, good show, up there with 'The Power of Nightmares' , I did wonder if, as the show pertained to the electoral system, he was going to talk at all about the electoral colleges, I am still not entirely sure how it works... the people vote for the members and the memebers vote for the president - but don't have to vote according to their party? So the people's vote goes where...?

As a dual national who realised too late that I was eligable to vote from here, I am attempting to see how far sheer will power gets the process, and urging my sister on in Boulder to get her vote into the Kerry box.

[amner]

Florida has only 27 electoral college votes so even if Kerry lost it he would still win with 271 votes to 258...

Explain that for me then John, why the 68 figure?

BTW, another prediction there (put up yesterday) has it Kerry 306 : Bush 218


Hmmm.

[John Self]

The 68 includes Ohio and Pennsylvania which are also "barely Kerry", though this is a strong (or weak) way of putting it as Kerry leads by 4 points in Pennsylvania... Obviously if Bush took Pennsylvania, Ohio and Florida then he would win, but the polls suggest that is unlikely.

[wshaw]

The webmaster of electoral-vote.com also tells us that

normally people with a cell phone but no landline are not polled. Most of these are in the 18-29 year old group. Up until now, no one has known how their absence from the polling data might affect the results. Zogby has now conducted a very large (N = 6039) poll exclusively on cell phones using SMS messaging to get a feeling of how they will vote. The results are that they go strongly for Kerry, 55% to 40%, with a margin of error of only 1.2%. If they all vote tomorrow, the pollsters are going to spend the rest of the week wiping egg from their faces. But historically, younger voters have a miserable turnout record, so the pollsters need not yet stock up on paper towels.

If you want to get really anal about this, it's been analysed by blogger The Mystery Pollster (http://www.mysterypollster.com/main/2004/10/arianna_huffing.html) who specialises in preposterously detailed analyses of poll data. His main page also has some interesting projections about whether Kerry gets Ohio or not.

[wshaw]

, I am still not entirely sure how it works... the people vote for the members and the memebers vote for the president - but don't have to vote according to their party? So the people's vote goes where...?.

As I understand it, that depends entirely on the state. Basically the voters don't vote for the President, technically, they simply vote to tell their state's electors which way to vote. Constitutionally, what the electors must do with that vote varies from state to state. In some, like Florida, if Bush is in a tiny majority, he gets the vote of all the electors. In others they split the electors' votes to reflect the state's. Any yanks that can help us out here?

[amner]

Gosh, sounds remarkably undemocratic to me. :wink:

[bradyguido]

In many ways it is a good system, as it spreads the vote well and small states are better represented, however, the fact that a president can be elected without the majority of the popular vote is a bit crap isn't it? And of course it would be so much more democratic if voters weren't being intimidated at the polls by republican vote monitors as they apparently are being today (reported on R4 earlier).

[John Self]

I would take great pleasure in being 'intimidated' by Republican observers, ushering them over to let them see me punch the Kerry button, then taking my leave of them with an elegant yet obscene gesture involving one hand.

[bradyguido]

Indeed. :lol:

[wshaw]

Today's NYT has this op-ed piece where they ask well-known political bloggers to look back and nominate turning points in the campaigns and pick their preferred candidate. Mostly they're full of that self-important old media tedium that I thought new media was supposed to get rid of. Until you get to Wonkette's (http://www.wonkette.com) answer:

I was all set to vote for George Bush even after finding out that he wouldn't let me marry Mary Cheney if I wanted to. And when he made the pronunciation of "Lambeau Field" a campaign issue? It seemed fair. After all, he's proved that not knowing the names of foreign leaders is much less important than correctly pronouncing the homes of popular sports teams. Of course, he totally sold me with the debates: any man who explains a mystery bulge as bad tailoring is more than confident enough to take on the Euroweenies. But in the end, with the fate of the free world at stake and all, I've got to go with the guy who would admit that sending thousands of American soldiers and Iraqi civilians to their deaths to protect us from imaginary weapons was, in fact, a mistake.

[wshaw]

This guy, (http://election.princeton.edu/) a slightly more weighty poll compiler, also gives it to Kerry.

Are they just teasing us?

[Bertie]

Are they just teasing us?

Well it's very cruel if they are. While I have no great love for Kerry, he isn't Bush, and that's good enough for me.

[Jerkass]

keeping the electorate as ill-informed as possible. For example - just how does John Kerry plan to deal with the Iraq situation differently? I haven't a clue.

This is a deliberate political tactic first used to great effect by Bill Clinton, at least in my memory. Ol' Bill figured out that your average voter really wasn't that clever, or at least wasn't really bothered if anything made sense as long as a candidate claimed to be for his or her pet issue. From Bill ("I'm for everything and everyone") on, every candidate just talks nonsense that is not at all directed at the few intelligent, discerning people who are looking for something rational in the campaigns, and the person who manages to talk the most nonsense that appeals to the largest number of people wins.

And I actually seriously believe this, by the way.

[jim]

This guy, (http://election.princeton.edu/) a slightly more weighty poll compiler, also gives it to Kerry.

Are they just teasing us?


My God. Do they do this just for fun?

[John Self]

Must ... not ... get ... hopes ... up ...

[Jerkass]

So it really comes down to domestic issues, where Kerry has Bush fried[/i]

Just curious to see which issues those would be.

***Comments from a committed apolitical creature follow***

For example, some clever person in Bush's campaign just about three weeks ago finally thought it might be a good idea to point out that the recession constantly blamed on Bush was actually at the end of Clinton's term. I still don't think any of them have been clever enough to point out that employment trends follow economic trends by 6-12 months or more, meaning that people finally start firing people well after the economy bottoms out, and they don't start hiring again until well after the economy picks up. The economy's done fairly well (a look at the GDP numbers probably would surprise most of you) in the past four years, considering Bush inherited a recession and had to deal with a serious disruption (9/11), as well. Of course, Presidents don't direct economies, anyway, so this is a silly discussion.

As for the outsourcing of jobs, this has been going on in America for 60 years. George didn't invent this.

These are just two of the issues I'm constantly hearing mentioned as being in Bush's negative column.

I'm just fed up with the whole misleading, incredibly expensive and annoying process, honestly, and I realise I'm spending even more time on it that I should be. Sorry.

I'm particularly fired up today, because someone who feels that it's perfectly acceptable to leave litter on my windscreen broke my wiper this morning. Thanks, Claire McCaskill for Missouri Governor.

[John Self]

Presidents don't direct economies but if the economy is going well they would want the credit, so they have to take the rough with the smooth.

I suppose when I said Kerry has Bush fried, I meant mostly in relation to my own views on policies which may not necessarily equate with those of the American people. For example, Bush's belief that trickle-down (or voodoo) economics will deal with everything. He shirks universal healthcare whereas Kerry will enable all citizens to join federal employee healthcare schemes. Bush's oil-based brain wants to drill for more of his second favourite intoxicant in wildlife reserves whereas Kerry supports investment in alternative energy. Bush tries to tear up the constitution by adding personal hobby-horse riders on same sex marriage, unlike Kerry. Bush opposes abortion, Kerry supports the right to it. Bush opposes stem cell research, Kerry supports it. Kerry, like Bush, would not ratify the Kyoto protocol, but you can't have everything.

Then again there are issues which most Americans would surely agree with. Kerry would reverse Bush's high-earners tax cut which would help to reverse the record deficit he has set (immediately following the independently-forecast record surplus Clinton left). A nice evocative soundbite is that Bush has increased the budget deficit by more than every president from George Washington to Ronald Reagan combined. (Doesn't take account of inflation which is why it's such an impressive-sounding quote.)

[Jerkass]

The budget deficit number also doesn't take into account a major terrorist strike which required some response--whether the correct response was made or not--and therefore required some expenditure.

Fair points on many of the other issues, however. They just don't seem to be the issues anyone brings up--they tend to bring up the ones that don't make any sense.

As for tax cuts for the wealthy--when the wealthy are paying a disproportionate share of the taxes already (we don't have a flat tax rate as you do in the UK, so I mean that the percentage tax rates on the wealthy are higher), any cut to taxes almost by definition will "favour" the wealthy. You can't cut taxes for people who aren't paying any, for example.

And no, I'm not wealthy, although I'm more wealthy than some, I suppose.

I'm really going to stop talking about politics any second now, I promise. I'm not really very good at it (although I am quite good on the economic front, at least).

[Jerkass]

Oh, and on this one:

"Kerry will enable all citizens to join federal employee healthcare schemes"

The healthcare system is something I cover extensively as part of my job, and there isn't any hint whatsoever that this great plan of Kerry's could even possibly work.

I feel like I now should say lots of negative things about Bush, to even out my comments (I'm not voting for either today)...but just take all the obvious points as made, ok? I personally hold it against Mr. Bush, for example, that when I get out in the world, people immediately dislike me more than they did four years ago, just because I'm American. Americans are perfectly capable of being disliked around the world without your help Mr. President, ALL RIGHT!

[John Self]

You must have been away a while Jerkass - we don't have flat income tax rates here either - it starts at 10%, rising to 22% and then to 40%. The Liberal Democrats would bring in a higher rate of 50% for very high earners.

[Jerkass]

And my prediction: Kerry by a wide margin. This has changed since I cast my vote in my own poll yesterday (election decided on a Wednesday in mid-December).

There are reports of extremely high voter turnout, and with the people who generally don't vote being the young and minority groups--both of whom vote overwhelmingly Democrat--I think we're all going to be surprised, and we'll have a clear winner before bed-time.

[wshaw]

Americans are perfectly capable of being disliked around the world without your help Mr. President, ALL RIGHT!

Jerkass, we'll make a point of liking you, but only to thwart Bush's plan to make Americans despised the world over, you understand.

[Jerkass]

My apologies, JS--did some extensive research on income tax in the UK earlier this year (and the tax treaty between our two countries...that's fun reading), trying to figure out what my tax situation might be if I ended up being a citizen of my country and a resident of yours. I thought I had found a flat tax rate. I won't confess to remembering the details, though...but I have a great spreadsheet set up to determine my tax bill under a variety of different scenarios.

The comment about the effects of a tax cut on a graduated tax system is still valid, though.

[wshaw]

Check electoral-vote.com now. New polls have swung it to a technical heat.

[John Self]

Based on Fox News polls, I see! :evil:

[Jerkass]

Working through all of the background information on that site, and the huge mysterious swings from Kerry to Bush in several states overnight, I would say I'm now fairly confident in my prediction for a Kerry victory by a wide margin.

Plus, Mrs. Jerkass, who was undecided until the second she cast her vote, informs me that she voted for Kerry (but not for the Missouri candidate for governor who broke my windscreen wiper today)--so there's evidence of 100% of the undecided vote going his way!

[Jerkass]

Twenty past three EST, and the Kerry campaign has just announced that they're waiting until every last ballot in Ohio is cast before deciding anything. Good thing I've stayed up all night thinking we might settle the matter.

Bush leading by 128,000 votes in Ohio with estimates of 250k-400k votes left to be counted...would require an incredible haul by Kerry to overhaul that lead. If Bush carries Ohio and doesn't win another electoral vote, we end up 269-269, which sends the vote to the House of Representatives, in which each state's delegation gets one vote. Republicans have something like 30 of the 50 delegations, I think, so that would go to Bush.

So much for my clever predictions, in any case. Looks like someone might have found some new Republicans hiding somewhere, much to everyone's shock.

[John Self]

It's looking bad all right.

people immediately dislike me more than they did four years ago, just because I'm American

As it's obvious that a clear majority of voters have either voted for Bush or not voted at all, then frankly the American people have earned our contempt. Present company excepted, of course.

[Digger]

Sighs and despondency, gloom and doom, this morning's news bodes ill for the world, it just generally bodes, :( :| :evil:
Woke up to the Today Programme, and immediately wished I could burrow back under the covers and emerge again in four years...

[wshaw]

Poor dear old America. You are well and truly jiggered.

[Colyngbourne]

With the divide seeming so clear, I'm wondering at what point the United States will actually dissolve into two or more separate countries.

I can't bear to watch the news, and like Digger, it was terrible to wake up to the disaster that is Four More Years. A lot of online friends are feeling like they should de-camp to Canada or here - not that I'd recommend Blair as a leader very much at the moment, esp. if Bush wins.

:( :x

[NottyImp]

I think America is about to become one of the most hated democracies of all time. It had better hope it never slips from it's Super-power pinnacle, because after another four years of Bush and his cronies, there will be more than a few people out for a bit of revenge.

[bradyguido]

Oh it will slip. There is a great history of superpowers falling. its is completely inevitable. its a shame we are so entangled in it all. China is on the ascendant too, next superpower apparently. Also very scary.

[NottyImp]

I think you could be right: after all, we used to be the world's Superpower, hard though it now might be to believe it. I actually think the Bush administration may hasten this process not just with his foreign, but also his domestic policy. The American people seem to have taken their eye off the ball in that respect, in thrall as they are to The War on Terror. They may well pay a serious economic price for that in years to come.

[Colyngbourne]

I think America is about to become one of the most hated democracies of all time.

I'm going to make that "democracy" in quotation marks from now on. It prides itself on the word, whilst denying people fundamental human rights.

[amner]

... in thrall as they are to The War on Terror.

I much prefer The War Against Terror; the initials seem so apposite.

[NottyImp]

I believe there's a famous picture with that in the background and George W looking like his usual chimp self in the foreground. Not sure if it's genuine, however.

[wshaw]

Well, Coly, I hate the result as much as the next person, and it's a disaster for America, but they've had a remarkably high voter turn out and this time around Bush has a majority vote. I'd say that this is a democracy working.

You could argue that the two party system with multi-million dollar business funding and the business-owned media make it not a real democracy at all, but sadly I'd say that this time around Americans know exactly what they're voting for. And that's why they're going to be increasingly despised around the world for what they've just done.

[bradyguido]

His smugness is going to be (even more) unbearable now isn't it. I can't watch the news for a while. I might explode.

[wshaw]

Still, if you think it feels bad for us right now, just thing what it must be like for anyone who lives in Falluja. I don't know what the Arabic for "We're fucked," is, but I'm sure they're saying it right now.

[Colyngbourne]

Well, Coly, I hate the result as much as the next person, and it's a disaster for America, but they've had a remarkably high voter turn out and this time around Bush has a majority vote. I'd say that this is a democracy working.

You could argue that the two party system with multi-million dollar business funding and the business-owned media make it not a real democracy at all, but sadly I'd say that this time around Americans know exactly what they're voting for. And that's why they're going to be increasingly despised around the world for what they've just done.

Yes, I know; I agree really - they're voting themselves into doom. I just can't fathom it. The arrogance, the intransigence, the blindness.

[amner]

The pattern of Empires is a good thing to bring up here, as already pointed out. I'm sure that during the 19th and very early 20th Centuries the various GB bods-in-charge were considered the leaders in smugness (Christ, to some people, we still are). The current lot just don't have the Kitchener handlebar 'tache to hide the lip curl smile.

[Colyngbourne]

Apparently the votes in Ohio are mostly of the 'punch-card'-type as well - scenarios of counting chads begin to loom.

Counting stands at Bush 249 to Kerry 242 at the moment.

[bradyguido]

I just heard on the radio that it was 252 to 250 to bush.

[John Self]

Still, it could be worse, guys!

Oh hang on - no it couldn't. :cry:

[Colyngbourne]

BBC News 24 has just stated it's 254/252 to Bush, and leading by 134,000 votes in Ohio.

[John Self]

The really shocking thing is how states like Nebraska, Kansas, Alaska etc. vote for Bush with literally 25-30% leads. Who are these people?

wshaw is right, this is democracy in action, like it or not. (Um - not, I think.) It's just that, to quote Winston Churchill, "democracy is the worst form of government." I omit the rest of the quote for misleading partisan purposes.

[John Self]

There is one glimmer of light in the gloom:

California 'backs' stem cell move (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/3977347.stm)

Also, a couple of weeks ago Charlie Brooker who writes the Screen Burn (http://www.guardian.co.uk/theguide/columnists/story/0,,1338952,00.html)column in the Guardian got in trouble for ending his column with "John Wilkes Booth, Lee Harvey Oswald, John Hinckley, where are you when we need you?" This gave rise to the following apology:

The final sentence of a column in The Guide on Saturday caused offence to some readers. The Guardian associates itself with the following statement from the writer. "Charlie Brooker apologises for any offence caused by his comments relating to President Bush in his TV column, Screen Burn. The views expressed in this column are not those of the Guardian. Although flippant and tasteless, his closing comments were intended as an ironic joke, not as a call to action - an intention he believed regular readers of his humorous column would understand. He deplores violence of any kind."

This is of course correct - I mean, assassinating Bush before the election would have guaranteed success for the Republicans. Whereas ... oh damn. Ah, what the hell.

[Colyngbourne]

There is one glimmer of light in the gloom:

California 'backs' stem cell move (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/3977347.stm)


But other patches of darker gloom among the gloom too - Eleven states ban gay marriage (http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6383353/)

[John Self]

From The Onion:

http://www.theonion.com/images/409/image_article2644_418x430.jpg

[Wavid]

And according to the BBC, the Republicans are taking an even bigger share of the Senate and Representatives, too. :(

[John Self]

Mildly off-topic - can anyone tell me what GOP stands for? It's been used throughout the print media to refer generally to the Republican Party and/or its election machine, but I have no idea what the letters mean... :oops:

[wshaw]

Mildly off-topic - can anyone tell me what GOP stands for? It's been used throughout the print media to refer generally to the Republican Party and/or its election machine, but I have no idea what the letters mean... :oops:

It used to be the Gallant Old Party, believe it or not.

Now it's officially the Grand Old Party.

Or maybe it's the Gathering Of Pricks.

[John Self]

Lol - thanks.

[John Self]

Unsurprisingly the overwhelming majority of viewers of BBC News Online who have expressed opinions are as appalled and aghast as everyone here seems to be. There is the occasional dope:

President Bush has convictions...
Anthony Miller, Atlanta, Georgia, USA

Yeah, but drink driving is the only one we know about.

[amner]

It's just that, to quote Winston Churchill, "democracy is the worst form of government."

Similarly:

"The best argument against democracy is a five minute conversation with the average voter."

Mind, I have issues with the old fart, so best to stick to pithy aphorisms.

[wshaw]

I was just speaking to American friend who said that living in America right now was like going through school in a class full of retards.

[John Self]

In that case, didn't Edmund Burke say something like, For democracy to work requires an informed electorate?

[Jerkass]

The good and the bad side of the probable Bush victory, for the Palimpsest audience (which seems to be leaning just slightly toward the left, if I may say so without any experience as a professional pollster):

The good: after about a year, everyone in power in Mr. Bush's own party will probably start angling for their own shot at the Presidency--which may help shape the party's direction, and may keep the President (or, more importantly, Donald Rumsfeld--someone I don't think anyone likes, by the way) in check to some degree.

The bad: it looks like Bush was swept to victory by the sudden appearance of a pile of far-right "evangelicals" at the polls, who probably will start pointing this out to the President in the near future and will expect favours in return. Now that's scary.

[Colyngbourne]

I heard a figure being touted of one fifth of the electorate as being far-right white evangelicals.

[rick green]

I'm still holding out for Kerry in Ohio.
He will need a large percentage of the provisional ballots to win.
It seems likely to me that he will have a large percentage of those.
I say this because provisional ballots are cast when a voters eligibility is called into question. To my knowledge, the Republican's with their cage lists, paper-weight schemes, etc. were very intent on disenfranchising voters. Therefore, making a leap of faith, most of those challenged, and thus forced to cast provisional ballots were Democrats.
Here's hoping.

[John Self]

Left or right lose meaning when we're talking about Bush - outside America anyway. Wasn't there a poll cited elsewhere on this forum that showed clear majorities in most countries polled (I think the exceptions were Israel, obviously, and Poland, strangely) choose Kerry over Bush?

As someone pointed out to me today, "Essentially, Bush has been told that not only does god approve of pre-emptive wars, extra-judicial imprisonment, torture and abolition of civil rights, but the American people do, too. ... Plus the republicans have both houses of congress and a large majority of state governors, which means that enormous amounts of fundamentalist theocratic legislation will be passed relatively easily (gay marriage is, I'm sure, just the first) and constitutional amendments (which need a two-thirds majority in both houses and among states) become do-able."

When I hear that 22% of the population according to exit polls (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/3973197.stm)feel that "moral values" are the most significant issue facing the country - yes, that's right, Iraq and terrorism and the economy were all red [sic] herrings - I can believe Col's one-in-five figure.

Jeb Bush -v- Hillary Clinton for 2008, anyone?

[John Self]

I'm still holding out for Kerry in Ohio

Too late, rick - BBC News is telling us on its Latest flash that Kerry is preparing to concede.

[wshaw]

To quote thismodernworld.com:

Fuck. Fuckity fuck fuck.

[John Self]

Right. That's it! I can't live in the United States any more. I'm moving to another country!

[Wavid]

Yes! I have heard that Northern Ireland is totally sane when it comes to politics - why not go there!?!!?

[John Self]

A fine plan. Paddyland here I come!

http://www.eirefirst.com/clipart/gifs/Leprechaun%20Mooning.gif

[amner]

Great. This makes a bad week even worse. On top of all that I now have an 8 mile bike ride home, in the dark, to contend with. What's that? It's started raining? Deep joy.

The day at the hospital tomorrow waiting for my Mom to come out of surgery looks rosy too. That and the garage bill (having broken down yesterday). Great.

Anyone fancy a drink? I fucking need one.

[John Self]

I refer the honourable gentleman to my pictorial response to the day, above. (Could he be a friend of Jude McBride, do you think?)

[wshaw]

Anyone fancy a drink? I fucking need one.

Suddenly I'm all for the 24-hour-drinking law. For the next four years, anway.

[Digger]

absolutely up for a drink, and anything else that could remove us all from this shocking reality for the next four years! Could I be drunk for the next four years without damaging my health do you think!?

[Jerkass]

Back on the issues front JS mentioned--Healthcare, where Kerry had some appealing-sounding but completely unexplained plans that probably should have swayed quite a few people anyway, ranked fifth or sixth on the issues front. Shocking.

One undeniably good thing that came out of the election--we can stop wasting a bunch of money on polls, I think, particularly the exit polls.
Apologies to any pollsters here, of course...but I saw several professional pollsters on television last night claiming to be embarrassed by their profession and expressing the same sentiments I just did.

I think Kerry conceded on the maths in Ohio--if every single disputed ballot, at the high end of estimates, happened to be allowed, he still would have had to win 89% of those votes, by my estimates.

As for attempts to disenfranchise people and all of that, there appear to have been just about no complaints this year, so we're going to have to let that go, I'm afraid. One of the news networks had this entire segment devoted to voter complaints as they arrived in real time, and there was this chap set up in the studio, and you could see that he had figured he'd have a big, important, late-breaking news topic he could cover, giving him great exposure on election night. They'd break to him about every half-hour, and, as the night went on, his, "No, we have no complaints to report," response became more and more despondent.

[John Self]

The regular Guardian/ICM poll for the state of the political parties in the UK used to routinely (and may still) adjust the Conservative figures upwards because people were ashamed to admit to voting Tory. Maybe the same tactic should have been applied to Bush's figures in the US polls.

[John Self]

Also to quote thismodernworld.com (thanks wshaw) - well actually, they are quoting someone else but hey -

Four more years of American soldiers being used as cannon fodder.

Four more years of scientific decisions being made by people who believe in a ghost in the clouds.

Four more years of debt that our children and grandchildren will have to pay off.

Four more years of racists and lunatics for judicial appointments

Four more years of looting the treasury and squandering it on corporate cronies.

Four more years of making enemies faster than we can kill them.

Four more years of fear and darkness and racism and hatred and stupidity and guns and bad country music.

I look at the big map and all of the red in flyover country and I feel like I've been locked in a room with the slow learners. We have become the country that pulls a dry cleaning bag over its head to play astronaut.

Or this, from R.E.M.'s Peter Buck, interviewed in Word magazine:

Why does Bush provoke such hatred?

As much as I disliked Reagan's politics, he seemed like a charming person. Bush seems like every rich college kid you've ever had the misfortune to meet - uneducated, doesn't care, and has that smirk at all hours of the day because he knows that money is more important than thought. My favourite Bush moment is when an organisation of scientists put out a paper on global warming. Someone asked him about it at a press conference and he smirked and said, 'Yes I know what the bureaucrats said.' And I thought, Wait a minute, they're scientists, you're a bureaucrat.

[wshaw]

I'm closing two pieces for American magazines today and, God, do the people I'm talking to sound shell-shocked.

[John Self]

The only American I have spoken to today is in a "deep depression."

Much is being made by the Republicans of Bush's vote as the highest ever for a president. This is true - 58,400,000 or thereabouts. However it's worth noting that the positive vote against him - 55,200,000 including Nader - is also by far its highest. In fact the next highest vote against a winning president was in 51,000,000 - against Bush again of course, in 2000. And the next highest? 41,000,000 voted against Bush Sr in 1988. (In fact, more people voted against Bush this time than have voted for any previous president.)

So Bush has the dubious honour of being officially the most hated president domestically in the history of the United States.

[Colyngbourne]

The four or five United States folks I have had contact with, are also deeply depressed. The terrible medical non-provision issue in particular affects one friend. What do those 54 million Democrat-voting folk do now with their despair?

[Jerkass]

What do those 54 million Democrat-voting folk do now with their despair?

Secede from the union and form their own country called the United Coastal States of America. Deny the USA access to ports, and somehow swing treaties with Mexico and Canada (might not be too hard, with Democrats taking the northern Midwest, too) not to trade with the USA. Or to allow them to cross their borders or use their airspace.

Ok, actually, this plan closely mirrors my plan for what Canada should do with Quebec.

[wshaw]

I like it. So your last civil was was about horizontal lines; the next one can be all verticals.

[John Self]

Well if we're all done moaning, then how about some conspiracy theorising?

Published on Thursday, August 28, 2003 by the Cleveland Plain Dealer
Voting Machine Controversy
by Julie Carr Smyth

COLUMBUS - The head of a company vying to sell voting machines in Ohio told Republicans in a recent fund-raising letter that he is "committed to helping Ohio deliver its electoral votes to the president next year."

The Aug. 14 letter from Walden O'Dell, chief executive of Diebold Inc. - who has become active in the re-election effort of President Bush - prompted Democrats this week to question the propriety of allowing O'Dell's company to calculate votes in the 2004 presidential election.

O'Dell attended a strategy pow-wow with wealthy Bush benefactors - known as Rangers and Pioneers - at the president's Crawford, Texas, ranch earlier this month. The next week, he penned invitations to a $1,000-a-plate fund-raiser to benefit the Ohio Republican Party's federal campaign fund - partially benefiting Bush - at his mansion in the Columbus suburb of Upper Arlington.

The letter went out the day before Ohio Secretary of State Ken Blackwell, also a Republican, was set to qualify Diebold as one of three firms eligible to sell upgraded electronic voting machines to Ohio counties in time for the 2004 election.

Blackwell's announcement is still in limbo because of a court challenge over the fairness of the selection process by a disqualified bidder, Sequoia Voting Systems.

In his invitation letter, O'Dell asked guests to consider donating or raising up to $10,000 each for the federal account that the state GOP will use to help Bush and other federal candidates - money that legislative Democratic leaders charged could come back to benefit Blackwell.

Full story (http://www.commondreams.org/headlines03/0828-08.htm). Ohio did end up using the Diebold voting machines in many areas, where electors complained yesterday about there being no paper trail to prove how they had voted.

[Jerkass]

I was just at lunch trying to figure out how Bush won this election, or more appropriately, how Kerry failed to beat him. On Kerry's front, whether you agree ideologically with his party or not, I'm not at all sure he formulated coherent, realistic plans on several important issues, and I think that might have been his downfall. Too much of the campaign seemed to be, "I'll do things better than the other guy...trust me." Not a horrible plan, maybe, considering the President's lack of popularity, but it didn't turn out to be enough.

I think I have just about decided, however, that fear won this election for George Bush. In a place like the UK that has been dealing with terrorism for a long time, I'm not sure (but I'm willing to be corrected) you can fully understand the huge psychological effects September 11th had on the US. Remember that most Americans can't be bothered with the rest of the world, anyway, so on September 11th, the rest of the world was reclassified from the 'inconsequential' to the 'dangerous' category, in the mind of your average American. At least that's how I see it.

Now, should Bush have seen September 11th coming? Who knows. Shouldn't Clinton have? Should we not have planted the seed for all this mess in decades past? Not relevant, when it came to voting yesterday. Voters did know that we had received this horrible, unexpected blow, and, since then--probably more through luck than through anything else--we haven't suffered another one INSIDE of the US. Could this have been due to our clever policy of setting up much simpler targets like US soldiers and international aid workers in Iraq, sparing terrorists (or whatever we want to call particular people in particular incidents) the trouble of planning something grand in the US? Could it be due to homeland security initiatives, as heavy-handed and xenophobic as they may have been? Could it have been that the terrorists have something spectacular cooked up for next Tuesday? I don't know.

I really do believe, though, the more I think about it, that your average American voter cast his or her vote out of fear, and the fact that, through whatever design or chance, we haven't been struck on our own soil again, probably swung it George's way.

I'm not sure I'm appealing for clemency from the rest of the world when it comes to your typical American, but the fear, at least, may be understandable (and underappreciated--have I just used business-speak there?). Now...fear is one thing. The actions you take to deal with things you fear are somewhat important, too, though, and I think my country has fallen on its face on that front.

I think our only hope in foreign policy is for a George Bush Lite, shackled to some degree by concerns over his legacy (if he knows what that is), by his own party looking toward the next Presidential election, or by more input from his non-Rumsfeld advisors.

[John Self]

All good points Jerkass. Bowling for Columbine I thought was excellent on the climate of fear perpetrated by the news media, which of course is not restricted to the US (the Daily Mail was founded on the basis of its owner, Lord Rothermere's, determination to give its readers a "daily hate"). Of course that does not excuse voters from finding out the truth behind the sensationalist headlines.

Anyway.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/nol/shared/spl/hi/pop_ups/newspapers/4_november_2004/img/8.jpg http://news.bbc.co.uk/nol/shared/spl/hi/pop_ups/newspapers/4_november_2004/img/3.jpg

[wshaw]

Looking into the abyss, this (http://www.nationalreview.com/comment/bennett200411031109.asp) sort of thing is particularly depressing. The new right can rightly claim that what won the election was a deliberately anti-liberal appeal to conservative moral values. Now they're calling for a Cultural Revolution style jihad on Enlightenment values: the Great Relearning. Sheesh.

[NottyImp]

Like others on this board, I can see the religious fundamentalist Right launching some pretty fierce attacks on State and domestic national policy and legislation in America. I follow the Creation v Evolution debate quite closely over the internet, and I can see that one hotting up.

Did you know in some areas pharmacists are now refusing to redeem patient perscriptions for the contraceptive pill becuase it is against their religious beliefs? Expect it to get worse...

[John Self]

Nice piece here (http://www.guardian.co.uk/uselections2004/story/0,13918,1342798,00.html)which sums up yesterday for most Palimpsesters, I think:

We went to bed daring to hope and awoke to the crushing news. And ever since we've been swapping emails and texts about how miserable we feel. Emma Brockes on how George Bush's victory catapaulted liberal Britain into collective depression.

And if you want to get apocalyptic about it, how about this extract?

"Ach," says Oliver James, the clinical psychologist. "I was too depressed to even speak this morning. I thought of my late mother, who read Mein Kampf when it came out in the 1930s and thought, 'Why doesn't anyone see where this is leading?'"

[wshaw]

And looking at life from the other side of the Looking Glass, here's (http://www.nationalreview.com/derbyshire/derbyshire200411030232.asp) what it felt like to be a Republican during those same hours. With particular venom directed at the Emma Brockes's of this world.

[wshaw]

... and to get really gloomy, Arafat is about to croak. He's now gone into a coma. With an emboldenend Bush back in the saddle, what are the chances of the Palestinians getting a leadership strong and diplomatic enough help lead them out of this mess? Or of Sharon, who wins the prize as the most murderous of all the serving Middle Eastern leaders, and who can now basically do what he likes for the next few months, letting them?

[NottyImp]

One of the most chilling statements in Bush's victory speech for me was his "...no limit to America's greatness..." comment. The last time we heard that from a European politician was circa 1933 in Germany, and we know where that led. You'd have to go pre-WW1 I suspect to hear it from a serious British politico. Perhaps America needs an apocalyptic war to learn a little humility in the arena of international politics.

[Wavid]

And looking at life from the other side of the Looking Glass, here's (http://www.nationalreview.com/derbyshire/derbyshire200411030232.asp) what it felt like to be a Republican during those same hours. With particular venom directed at the Emma Brockes's of this world.

Depressing and disturbing in equal measure. What gets me is the fact that Bush and his cronies claiming to be conservatives, when they clearly aren't - they're some sort of weird oil-raddled radical evangelical fundametalists whose social agenda seems to involve legislating to control people's personal lives to an absurd degree.

[John Self]

Although wshaw's description of Sharon is bang on, like all politicians he has found that once in power he needs to learn how to say Yes as well as No. This means that as he directs the removal of knuckle-headed wall-banging settlers from the Gaza Strip, suddenly he's become, to them, a traitor and insufficiently hardline. Hilarious, in a bone-chilling way. (The DUP are about to learn similar lessons in Northern Ireland.)

The Emma Brockes piece reminded me of how enclosed we are, in the sense that not only do I not know anyone who didn't want Bush to be trounced - I don't know anyone who doesn't want him hung from a lamppost and shot. Which reminded me of the fine line in Amis's The Information, which has lost something in the transition to the 21st century and is best read in the memory that it was published in 1995, when Britain was in the 17th year of consecutive Conservative rule:

It often seemed to him, moving in the circles he moved in and reading what he read, that everyone in England was Labour, except the government.

As for that great thinker on the National Review Online: the fact that he believes the BBC - as opposed to, say, Fox - is a biased news organisation says all we need to know about him. (Which brings up another point. I often wondered during the BBC's coverage of the election, why it felt it had to be even-handed to both candidates. It's not a UK election after all. We know (http://www.guardian.co.uk/uselections2004/story/0,13918,1332594,00.html)that people in the UK supported Kerry over Bush by a ratio of 3:1, so why shouldn't the British Broadcasting Corporation reflect the views of the British people?)

[wshaw]

(The DUP are about to learn similar lessons in Northern Ireland.)

So now Paisley - arguably the guy who ignited the Troubles in the first place - is supping with the Papist Bertie Ahern, he's going to get flack from the good people of nornireland?

[John Self]

Well in some ways I would like to think so - to teach the bastard a lesson before he (finally, finally!) dies soon - but on the other hand if he can bring his supporters with him to the negotiating (and compromise) table then I'd actually be quite happy. As Simon Hoggart says: The people of Northern Ireland will do anything for peace, except vote for it.

Oh and the full contraction is of course norniron.

[John Self]

Incidentally, in just a few days this has become our fourth most-posted-to thread. Just goes to show that there are some things that interest Palimpsesters other than limericks, recent purchases, and some flamethrowing fairy whose name eludes me for the moment.

[Jerkass]

A possible less dangerous alternate reality for the next four years:

*****

George Bush is walking around the White House one day, when, as usual, he finds Donald Rumsfeld hanging around just behind his left shoulder. "Oh, hello Donny," he says.

"Hiya George."

"Donny--there's something I want to talk about."

"You know I'm always happy to talk to you, George."

"There's a new country I'd like to deal with in the next four years."

"Ooooh, oooh!" Donald says, "which one...Iran? Syria? North Korea? Germany? Or...oh, I don't know, maybe Iceland...or China even!"

"No, no, Donny...it's a new country that another of my advisors..."

"Another of your advisors?" Donald breaks in, suspiciously.

"Yes," George continues, resolutely, now looking determinedly away from Rumsfeld and concentrating on something outside the window, "yes, another advisor has just told me about another country that she..."

"She?!?"

"...yes, she thinks we should deal with. It's called the United States."

Silence. "But...how do we deal with the United States?"

More silence.

Rumsfeld, looking both confused and hurt, continues. "But...we can't really send soldiers in there...well, we...we have the National Guard, I suppose..."

"No, no, Donny," Geore says, less sure of himself now and wishing he hadn't started the conversation. "No...not soldiers."

Silence.

"Not soldiers?" Rumsfeld says quietly. He shakes his head. "I don't understand."

George sees the pain in his friend's face, and he finally loses his nerve. "Oh, never mind," he says, trying to grin cheerfully but only succeeding in looking like a sheepish chimp. "Don't worry--we'll send in the soldiers."

****

Ok, so even the alternate reality doesn't work.

[John Self]

The BBC has provided a useful page (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/talking_point/3981669.stm)for Bush-voters to explain themselves to the world. The responses are in two camps (apart from the one who said they elected him so that he can clean up the mess he's made): 1 - we need to keep the same leader in a time of war (er, war which he started, you mean?), and 2 - moral values. Moral values! You mean like torturing inmates, imprisonment without trial, pre-emptive strikes? Here's an example:

As much as I wanted him to win, I never prayed that he would. I just prayed that God's will be done. I do believe it was. The bias liberal news media infuriates the American people for the way they treat Bush.

This woman is allowed to vote? She shouldn't be allowed to drive.

[ono no komachi]

There's also a page for 'reactions around the world', where amongst the BS of diplomacy, are these little gems:

Jesus Perez, Venezuelan Foreign Minister

We are dancing the tango. When you are dancing the tango and your toe is stepped on, hurting your toe, you complain. If it is stepped on harder, you complain again. There's a whole game, but we are prepared to continue dancing the tango.

Moody Awori, Kenyan Vice-President

I am a little bit apprehensive because the first term of Bush, he had come in as a lame duck.
Now it appears as if he is winning very convincingly. To me, I think we are going to see more dictatorship on an international scale. We are going to see more extremism come out of there.
We are going to see even more isolationism where America will not bother about the United Nations. To me that is a very sad affair.

Alexander Downer, Australian Foreign Minister

We've had a very good relationship with them the last four years. I'm sure we'll be able to keep building on that over the next four.
But, look, frankly, if Senator Kerry somehow miraculously comes through here or if in any case he had been elected, we would have worked pretty well with them as well.

[John Self]

Nice!

US Election 2004 (BBC1) was like Groundhog Day. It was nearly a repeat. Everything happened almost exactly as it did four years ago. The BBC, who had arrived in force, were visibly stunned. It would have taken a heart of stone not to laugh.

Peter Snow, standing on a computer-generated jigsaw of the 50 states, was his usual effervescent self. "I can promise you an electrifying few hours." At this point a computer-generated presidential helicopter landed on top of him. He frothed some more. "It's going to be very, very exciting. You won't be able to turn us off."

In the course of six hours we met, as in a weird dream, Loyd Grossman, Jerry Springer and Esmée Hermit, who at 71 had voted for the first time. "Oh, it's a joy to mah soul!" she cried. "Glory to God!" chorused her family. I have never seen such enthusiastic voters. Queues snaked around the polling stations hours after the polls had officially closed. "What is going on?" said David Dimbleby. "Democracy," said Professor Allan Lichtman. "What Churchill called the worst sort of government, apart from all the others."

Churchill had another admirer. Don King, the boxing promoter, blew in. Wild haired, plastered with Bush badges and flourishing a large cigar. "I want to say thanks to Tony Blair and God Save the Queen!" he cried. "Bush will win! Stand up and fight for freedom! This is a contest. Leadership should be bold and audacious. As Churchill said: 'We will fight them on the beaches, we will never surrender!' God Save the Queen!" It felt strangely quiet after he left.

John Simpson at the Bush HQ suddenly found spokesmen happy to chat. He said: "We couldn't get any important figures to talk to, but an hour ago the mood started to change. Now they feel they are in with a chance for a slender victory." Equally suddenly Bridget Kendall at Kerry's HQ found herself alone. She said: "We've been looking for Kerry people but we haven't found any." Like flowers, which they do not otherwise resemble, spokesmen only come out when its warm.

"It's a cliffhanger," said Dimbleby. A news item, which punctuated the election coverage, showed a woman in Chile hanging from a 10th-floor balcony. She was hanging there every time the news returned. You knew how she felt.

Peter Snow was still plugged into his own electricity supply. "This is fascinatingly exciting. We're going to be up all night!" It was like waiting for Godot except we were waiting for Ohio. Like a child doing a jigsaw it knows well, almost all the states had been quickly slotted into their accustomed place. Everything now depended on Ohio with its 20 electoral college votes.

James Thurber, who came from Columbus, Ohio, said he heard the clocks of Columbus in his dreams. Heard, because he was blind.

In Columbus the lively Michael Crick was interviewing men in vests at the Rainbow Lanes Bowling Alley. The noise was ear splitting. "Excuse me, sir, did you vote today?" "Not interested at all." "What makes you a Bush supporter, madam?" "My husband." "Why did you vote for Bush?" "Ah'm a hunter and ah'm a Christian." "Who did you vote for, sir?" "Ah didn't vote. Ah've never voted. Ah ain't voted for 30 years. It's a waste of time."

Ever the social butterfly, Crick moved on to Club 185, doggedly asking drunks how they voted. "I voted for George Bush," said one, "and Blair."

Dimbleby said: "I'm on tenterhooks." Snow said: "My heart has stopped beating." His map of the states now looked like a fitted red carpet with a large hole in it. Ohio.

Just before 6am, when election coverage ended, ITN announced that Fox had broken cover and given Ohio to Bush. Four years earlier all the TV networks had burned their fingers doing this for Florida. Dimbleby said warily: "If Fox are right ... " Professor Lichtman said: "Then Kerry cannot win." Bob Worcester of Mori said: "It's impossible."

Bridget Kendall was standing outside the Kerry HQ, which had been notable for its celebrity musicians. The bands had gone. It had started to rain. In the empty hall an unseen woman sang in a sweet, soul-soaked soprano: "From the mountains to the prairies to the oceans white with foam, God Bless America."

Peter Snow said: "My goodness, what a night it's been."

John Zogby of Zogby International ordered "a little bit of humble pie for breakfast". He is a pollster.

For me, Prof. Allan Lichtman was the star of the BBC coverage. You'd think he was sparked off a live terminal every time David Dimbleby pointed to him - a sudden rush of energy, excitement and elegant if baffling references to Ibsen. And hair to rival John Kerry. (Charlie Brooker in the Guardian pointed out that Kerry looks like "a haunted tree." Perhaps that was the seed of his defeat.)

For a bloke who looks a lot like a monkey, George W Bush has a strange disdain for evolution. Now, this might all seem very trivial to you, but the Bush administration has decided, just before this week's vote, to stand by its approval for a book that's being sold in National Park museums and bookshops. This book explains to young minds that the Grand Canyon is only a couple of thousand years old, and was created by Noah's flood, rather than by geological forces.

Lo! Grand Canyon National Park superintendent Joe Alston heroically intervened and referred the sale of the book to his superiors but they sinisterly kept it on the shelves. They also appear to have ignored a letter from the presidents of the Palaeological Society, the American Geophysical Union, the National Association of Geoscience Teachers, the American Geological Institute, the Geological Society of America, and more, all pointing out that the book was nonsense. And they told Congress that they'd have a review of whether they were going to sell the book, and then calmly didn't bother.

[Wavid]

From Jonathan Freedland (http://www.guardian.co.uk/uselections2004/comment/story/0,14259,1342920,00.html)'s column in the Guardian:

But the Republican revolution will not stop there. A subplot to this week's drama has been playing out at the supreme court, where the 80-year old Chief Justice, William Rehnquist, has been incapacitated by thyroid cancer. Few expect him to serve for much longer, giving President Bush the chance to appoint a successor. A social conservative, such as White House counsel, Alberto Gonzales, is a likely nominee.

Other vacancies on the bench are imminent. Once filled, Bush will have overturned the court's wafer-thin moderate majority. The court could set to work unravelling a 50-year settlement that has asserted the rights of women, black Americans and, more recently, homosexuals. Opposition to affirmative action or abortion rights has, until now, been a minority position in America's highest court. That could change. And the conservative takeover of all three branches of the American government (executive, legislative and judiciary) would be complete.

[shudder]

[John Self]

The BBC has been running a panel of ten Americans across the US throughout the election campaign to find out their thoughts on a series of issues. Now that the election is over they have canvassed their thoughts for the last time. I had to laugh at this from Jorge Caspary of Tallahassee, Florida, who voted for Bush:

My hopes are for a second term that will attempt to heal the rift in our society and create a more conciliatory tone with our friends in Europe.

Also, it is likely that in the next four years most terrorists will be eliminated and have a less effective organisational structure.

No doubt then, when most terrorists mysteriously fail to be eliminated by 2008, he will be voting against the Republican candidate.

Interestingly, the one thing all have been agreed on since Tuesday is that the turnout was massive, and higher than ever before. In fact it was roughly 60%, and I was reminded of the 2001 general election in the UK when turnout was 59%, the lowest since universal suffrage, which sparked all sorts of despair about lack of involvement. Weird.

[m.]

Left or right lose meaning when we're talking about Bush - outside America anyway. Wasn't there a poll cited elsewhere on this forum that showed clear majorities in most countries polled (I think the exceptions were Israel, obviously, and Poland, strangely) choose Kerry over Bush?

Thanks for that "strangely", John. I hope it's not a matter of time that on this and related topics people will say "and Poland, typically". It seems that across the board from left to right our politicians sympathise with Bush or are indifferent at best. It's better among the people, I think. I don't have energy to talk about that.

[wshaw]

See? (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/3984237.stm) He's not a bad guy.

Actually, The Enormous Egg - after which the poor puppy is named - is a story about a boy who finds a dinosaur egg that hatches. The boy then takes his triceratops to Washington to meet the President.

The dinosaur then eats the President because he's a creationist. (Actually, I'm not sure about that last bit.)

[bakunin_the_cat]

I knew it was a bad omen last week when my parents' TV blew up and they bought a replacement. Instead of Philips or Panasonic it said Bush.

Yesterday, was a strange morning for me, as I was probably the last person on the planet to find out, having spent much of Wednesday in my old London haunts downing the hatch and therefore blissfully unaware of the unfolding drama. So for a brief period whilst reading somebody's paper over their shoulder on the train, it looked like Kerry had won. Yippee!

Sadly it didn't last. Somebody else's paper seemed to be saying Bush had won, and when I got into Paddington, I had it confirmed in black and black and black. Four More Years. Four more fucking years!

And without wanting to kick you while you're down Rick + Jerkass, leaving America just won't be enough. America is the biggest bully in the playground and leaving the climbing frame to go and hide out by the bikesheds isn't going to help. Trouble will come and find you. The only hope is to get out of the school alltogether. Venus is starting to look very attractive. Anybody know of any cheap flights to Alpha centauri?

[Wavid]

http://www.davebriggs.net/blogstuff/bush.jpg

[NottyImp]

Lol - I like that a lot.

[Colyngbourne]

It seems as if they're worried about people skiving off to Canada, with this quote at the weekend in a blog I read:

... coming home on the train, ten minutes before the Canadian border, the US border guards came on and did an "exit check". I've never heard of this before, and neither has anyone else. They didn't do any more than glance at my passport and ask me if I'd been to New York. But they were really paying attention to the Americans around me, who they were, where they came from, what their jobs were, how long they were going to be in Canada, and they were looking at their return tickets. **** mentions in another post being asked why she wanted to leave the greatest country in the world.

[Jerkass]

Just a bit alarmist, I think.

Could be they might have had a tip-off about a drug shipment across the border or something similar. Especially since they were asking if someone had come from New York...I don't really think the President and his Supreme High King of Homeland Security would be deliberately trying to keep people from New York from visiting Canada. In fact, considering the voting, they might be encouraging it.

[John Self]

http://www.buzzflash.com/contributors/04/11/images/04new_map.jpg

[Jerkass]

News of a man clearly inspired by the strong showing of religious conservatives (http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6396422/) in last week's US elections.

The lion in the back there is looking on with a bemused expression, isn't it? The expression quite clearly says, "Dude...what are you thinkin'?"

[John Self]

www.theonion.com] (http:The Onion[/b]:

Nation's Poor Win Election For Nation's Rich

WASHINGTON, DC—The economically disadvantaged segment of the U.S. population provided the decisive factor in another presidential election last Tuesday, handing control of the government to the rich and powerful once again.

"The Republican party—the party of industrial mega-capitalists, corporate financiers, power brokers, and the moneyed elite—would like to thank the undereducated rural poor, the struggling blue-collar workers in Middle America, and the God-fearing underpriviledged minorities who voted George W. Bush back into office," Karl Rove, senior advisor to Bush, told reporters at a press conference Monday. "You have selflessly sacrificed your well-being and voted against your own economic interest. For this, we humbly thank you."

Added Rove: "You have acted beyond the call of duty—or, for that matter, good sense."

According to Rove, the Republicans found strong support in non-urban areas populated by the people who would have benefited most from the lower-income tax cuts and social-service programs championed by Kerry. Regardless of their own interests, these citizens turned out in record numbers to elect conservatives into office at all levels of the government.

"My family's been suffering ever since I lost my job at the screen-door factory, and I haven't seen a doctor for well on four years now," said father of four Buddy Kaldrin of Eerie, CO. "Shit, I don't even remember what a dentist's chair looks like... Basically, I'd give up if it weren't for God's grace. So it's good to know we have a president who cares about religion, too."

Kaldrin added: "That's why I always vote straight-ticket Republican, just like my daddy did, before he lost the farm and shot himself in the head, and just like his daddy did, before he died of black-lung disease in the company coal mines."

Kaldrin was one of many who listed moral issues among their primary reasons for voting Republican.

"Our society is falling apart—our treasured values are under attack by terrorists," said Ellen Blaine of Givens, OH, a tiny rural farming community as likely to be attacked by terrorists as it is to be hit by a meteor. "We need someone with old-time morals in the White House. I may not have much of anything in this world, but at least I have my family."

"John Kerry is a flip-flopper," she continued. "I saw it on TV. Who knows what terrible things might've happened to my sons overseas if he'd been put in charge?"

Kerry supporters also turned out in large numbers this year, but they were outnumbered by those citizens who voted for Bush.

"The alliance between the tiny fraction at the top of the pyramid and the teeming masses of mouth-breathers at its enormous base has never been stronger," a triumphant Bush said. "We have an understanding, them and us. They help us stay rich, and in return, we help them stay poor. See? No matter what naysayers may think, the system works."

Added Bush: "God bless America's backwards hicks, lunchpail-toting blockheads, doddering elderly, and bumpity-car-driving Spanish-speakers."

[amner]

Seems like some people are good enough to say sorry (http://www.sorryeverybody.com/gallery/1/).

[NottyImp]

Public guilt is never attractive though, is it?

[Maggie]

O.K. guys this was too funny. I haven't laughed about this since November 3rd. I was a little afraid to go into this post. Things are so touchy in the U.S.of A. that one is afraid to say anything at all that is not pro-Bush.
I worked on the Kerry campaign. I went door to door, plastered bumper stickers on my car, wore t-shirts proclaiming my Kerryism and pinned anti-Bush buttons on every inch of my clothing. All for naught I'm afraid.
We Kerry people have been very despondent.
What reallly worries most of us, is the amount of religion that has been thrown into governmental issues. If it remains there, we fear that it will fester and fume till it comes back to bite us in the a**.
Sorry state of affairs here :cry: :oops:

[Maggie]

I didn't mean to say that I was laughing at your concerns. I just found some of your posts about Bush hilarious ! I had not seen any of them before. To be sure, I will be sharing them with all of my despondent friends.