Politics

Compared to the parochial goings on on this island state, the keenly fought battle on the other side of the Pond is always going to be more fascinating, but I guess i should start at home. The party conferences are now all behind us. The Lib Dems promised to cut taxes instead of their traditional habit of raising them, but the leadeship didn't have a clue what the average pension was, somehwat hurting their claim to the grey vote. Gordon Brown had a rousing speech to stake his claim as Labour leader, before tackling the economic crisis by saddling the country with worrying amounts of debt (though this indeed, was in all likelihood, necessary) and persuading the developed world to follow his lead.
The Tories have struggled in this economic maelstrom through their relative lack of high office experience. Geroge Osborne, back from strategically placing a begging bowl in the region of shadowy Russian billionaire Oleg Deripaska, had his Old Mother Hubbard moment - "The cupboard is bare!" - though he was referring to the country, not his own party's finances. Boris Johnson had his Britney Spears moment when defending banking chief executives - 'I'm addicted to you but I know that you're toxic (or at least your accumulated debts are)'. We all know Boris's mind is stuck in a time warp 200 years behind most people's, but Charles Dickens' father spent time in Marshalsea for running up debts, yet Boris says bankers should be absolved of what they have done, stating "there are plenty of other places in this universe they can go." You can just imagine a banker saying "yes, it's disgraceful. I'm off to Alpha Centaurai. At least there, minimum wage cleaners pay more tax than banking chiefs." The cockney rhyme slang that is coded as 'merchant banker' is very appropriate.
In a sideways move, not a banking firm (they've got no money to do anything), but the world's second largest advertising company, WPP, have moved HQ to the Republic of Ireland out of the UK, not through a passion for Guiness, shamrock or tales of loveable Oirish rogues, but to save £50m in tax. This after the UK government has not even said boo to a goose vis-a-vis business. Time to strip the CEO (nicknamed 'the mad dwarf') of his knighthood since he approves of the board decision. There will always be places that tax less and the UK cannot get involved in a Dutch auction, even with other EU countries. That Eire is one of the first countries to go into a recession and had to guarantee the deposits of all its banks abruptly suggests fiscal control might not be the strongest there (but then, the same could be said of the whole developed world).

Across the Atlantic, economic woes have helped the candidacy of Barack 'celebrity' Obama as he squares off against John 'angry face' McCain, since the former is seen as a clean break with a stronger grasp of economic fundamentals. I honestly thought his battle in the primaries with Hilary Clinton would go all the way to the party convention, but Hilary realised the numbers were against her and didn't want to be seen as damaging Democrat hopes of regaining the White House. McCain's air of desperation, letting his advisor choose his running mate, the initially stratospherically popular, now becalmed, intellectually and most other ways, Sarah Palin. At least in Joe Biden, Obama has a man of experience.
A lot of neo-con(artist)s are also endorsing Obama. So fond of exporting democracy, they could hardly be seen not to vote at home and disillusioned with McCain, not through shedding of integrity (which was his big selling point to to independents), they are going to vote for Obama by default. Maybe they also like Zbigniew Brzinzki, Jimmy Carter's National security Advisor and arguably on a par with Henry Kissinger in terms of evil (he supported the Khmer Rouge in the killing fields of Cambodia clandestinely and provoked the Soviets into invading Afghanistan by whipping up Islamic extremism (which eventually would lead the CIA in to being a surrogate for one Osama bin Laden and eventually 11th Sepetmber 2001), driven like Edward Teller (one of the inpsirations for Dr Strangelove) and to a lesser extent Kissinger by hatred of the Russians for occupying Eastern Europe in the Cold War. Ferociously intelligent, but regarding amorality in pursuit of realpolitik a badge of honour, these days he may have mellowed but he still looks like the dastardly Emperor Palpatine from Star Wars. I'm more of a fan of Warren Buffett being on Obama's team.
Obama may be ahead, but don't write off John McCain yet - he probably has stopped the Republicans from using carefully crafted racial slurs against Obama, but in all other aspects he has fallen back on using the same slimy techniques that destroyed his run for the White House eight years ago and which he said he would never use. A black candidate may be alienating to rednecks, but Obama is the best hope for ending divisiveness at home and repairing relations with those abroad. He'll fail to live up to all the grand hopes people have of him, but he's got a better chance of making the USA a more positive force in the world.