Now it’s been a few weeks since the G20 Summit and Protests in Toronto, but I’m still at a loss for explanations. Normally I can understand things that I don’t agree with, but this certainly is not one of those times.
When the G20 was announced in Toronto, I didn’t understand. They started moving the G8 Summits to small towns, like Huntsville, to stop disrupting local economies, and ensure easier security. So why did they put this giant summit in the biggest city in the country?
Way back in May I had the absolute pleasure of heading to China’s Western Frontier, Xinjiang Province. It was simply a breath-taking experience. I got to see pristine mountains, vast seas of desert, and bargain for goods in several different languages.
The main reason that I have not made a post about it here, is because I had the chance to make a post for it elsewhere. I had the chance to write about my experiences on ChinaTravel.net a very popular and excellent China Travel website. If you are at all interested in reading about my experiences in a very unique setting, then give it a read.
Now I was very lucky to go to Xinjiang in May, as opposed to July. As many of you know, there were a series of riots in Urumqi by the Uighurs against the Han Chinese. Since then the province has been more or less on lockdown, and the tourism industry has slowed down. While it is apparently safe at this point, there are still a wide range of restrictions including a complete blackout of the internet and international phone calls.
A fantastic blog worth following about Xinjiang is FarWestChina.com, ran by Josh Summers, an expat living in the province. While he is understandably blogging less than usual at this point he made an excellent post entitled “Urumqi: A Week After the Riots” were he describes a visit to “Ground Zero” for the riots. Powerful, powerful stuff there.
So if any of you are interested in heading out that way, I would HIGHLY recommend it. It is one of my favourite trips that I have ever made (remember, you can read what my thoughts here). But as always, be sure to stay informed of the political situation.
Safe journeys,
G
Just in case any of you were worried, there was not a hint of unrest or disorder in my part of China last Thursday on the anniversary of what shant be named. As I mentioned in my post on the day, the internet was less than accessible, and some careful subversion had to be done to get around the Great Firewall of China. However, all was for not because at the end of the day not a heck of a lot happened.
The one interesting story comes from the CNN, BBC, and AFP reporters who had the strangest form of censorship that we may have ever seen. As their reporters were on the edge of the square attempting to report on the day, they had plain clothes officers with large umbrellas come in between the journalists and their camera to try to attempt to block the shot. I understand what they were trying to do but it came across as being pretty stupid. I’m not sure who came up with this idea, but I am sure that they did not deserve a raise for it.
Check it out for yourself (courtesy of the Shangaiist):
Great eh? How about it as a video…
If that wasn’t enough, check out this great remix of it, sadly there is no Rihanna involved….
Umbrellas, saving the masses from the horrible truth since 2009.
Until next time,
G
WAR IS PEACE
FREEDOM IS SLAVERY
IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH
Party Mottoes, 1984
Some days I feel like I am living in Orwell’s nightmare.
Today is an important anniversary of a solemn event, or maybe it is a day like any other, it all depends on who you ask, or who you don’t ask. As many of you may know, twenty years ago today an infamous student protest in China drew the wrath of the government and their tanks, and many people were killed. Pardon me for using cryptic language, but I do not want to attract the attention of the powers that be in the country I reside in.
There has been a huge crackdown in the buildup to this day. A few months ago YouTube was banned, and blogger is currently banned (I am posting this via a proxy), while Wordpress has been banned since I arrived in August. The most recent additions to this were Twitter, Flickr, and Hotmail which went down on Tuesday (eerily as I type the rough draft for this post). Interestingly, the on-again-off-again bans on sites like BBC, Wikipedia, and Google are not in effect. In essence websites that allow regular people like me to communicate with the outside world (through posting videos or blogs) are not allowed. Somebody is worried that something is going to happen.
Also, the popular messaging system Skype, is very difficult to download in this country, instead it diverts you to a program called TOM-Skype, which restricts some of the messages that you send. For example, if you try to send the F word the message will not go through. I read reports (not going to link, too dangerous at this time) of it tracking the use of certain hotbed words that the people in charge would not like.
But the internet is not alone in it’s censoring. Apparently there has been some grassroots movement to get people to wear white (the colour of mourning in Asia) on the day. There is a rumour persisting that newscasters are not to wear white for the next several weeks (which appears to be adhered to by turning on the television). A few weeks ago, an interesting bit of news came out that 300,000 newspapers had to be recalled because it had an incredibly subversive photo in it. Just in case you didn’t see it when it made the rounds a few weeks ago, check it out.
Do you get why it was somehow subversive? I’ll give you a hint, look at the pants of people in the front row. Now divide the picture in two and count the people on either side. Now think of today’s date.
There are six people on the right side and four people on the left side, translate that into a date and you have today. Look at the four digit number on the little boy’s pants in the bottom left and you have the year that the event took place.
Think about this for a second or two. If this was something that someone caught after the fact, what more obvious things are being caught before publication? I imagine someone refusing to publish an image because it bears a picture of someone who resembles a certain spiritual leader or not taking an ad for the classified because every 5th word spelled out the National Anthem for the island that China claims to be its own. I’m probably wrong, but maybe not too far off. If this picture is deemed subversive, what else gets to be in the same category?
All of this is done with one simple mission in mind: to restrict the flow of information. In other words, the government wants to keep people ignorant in order to keep the nation strong. Ignorance is strength.
What I find the saddest about all of this is how most of the concern comes from outside of the country. In the two decades that have passed since this event China has undergone a tremendous economic boom. Naturally in times of economic fortune people tend to not focus on problems with the government, and demands for change lessen. This coupled with the party’s crackdown has made many of the demands of the original dissenters disappear.
Most people in this country seem to be living in a bit of a fool’s paradise, similar to how I imagine America being in the 1950s, and even the 1990s. There were certainly bad things happening in the country then, but people mostly kept quiet because things were going well and they did not want to rock the boat. Flash forward a decade in either case, and the economy starts to fall and people start to protest more about the “corrupt government” and “illegal wars” which were going on before, but nobody ever cared when they were making money.
The party seems to have found the right mix of 1984 and Brave New World. Oppress people and control information while giving them all sorts of distractions that they have never imagined. Either way, it is keeping people in this country from the one thing that they truly need for development, the truth.
Until next time,
G
It seems like whenever I click on some news somebody is always talking North Korea, and their nuclear ambitions. It seems like everybody is ready for World War III to start on the Korean Peninsula. It seems like nobody is taking the time to realize that nothing is going to change.
That’s right, there will be no nuclear war, no reunification, just more of the same status-quo that has persisted for the last 56 years. This is just another big scare that will inevitably blow over, and things will continue on as they are.
Sure, the North seems to have nuclear capabilities (maybe), and long range missiles (definitely) which seem like quite the game changer, but we can’t forget the ultimate x-factor, and biggest benefactor from the way that things are, China.
Allow me to give a quick overview of East Asian geopolitics. The unquestioned forces are Japan and China, which are currently the 2nd and 3rd largest economies in the world, respectively (although they will probably flip by the end of the year). China has a very large military, and while Japan does not have any forces of their own, they have near unquestioned support of the Americans. Japan and China have long been distrustful of the other, and have been at war with each other several times in their history, most notably during WWII. Conveniently, between the two nations, there is the Korean Peninsula. This was divided at the conclusion of the Second World War, with the southern half being in the US sphere of influence, and the Northern half being in the Soviet sphere of influence. North Korea quickly became a reclusive state, relying on itself, and only itself, with the South has grown into a very vibrant economy and has served as a model for development in Asia.
While the South has been culturally closer to Japan, in recent years it’s economy has been getting closer to China’s. According to John Pomfret’s blog on the Washington Post “Why China Won’t Do More With North Korea” (the inspiration for this post), he mentions that China is South Korea’s largest trading partner. While this may seem surprising, let me tell you from the inside that there are a LOT of very wealthy Korean companies doing business in China. Almost forty percent of the students at the international school that I currently work at are Korean and those kids do not come from poverty.
This huge amount of money pouring into the PRC is helping fund the current economic boom, and China needs to keep it that way. Obviously a thermonuclear war in a country that has so much investment in China is not in their best economic interests. So they will do nothing to help empower the North in a horrible to “reclaim” the South.
All of this Korean money is flowing into China because, quite frankly, there is not much else for them to develop in their own country. However, should the North collapse a massive humanitarian and economic undertaking would ensue. The North would need to be developed in a bad, bad way which would trigger require a flow of capital and efforts from companies like Samsung and Dae Woo, which are currently doing business in China. Given the current economic climate, it is likely that any of those companies would need to contract elsewhere in order to set up shop in North Korea, which would probably mean a lot of them would move out of China. China can not let this happen, certainly not while their economy continues to benefit from Korean involvment in the country.
Also, should the North fall and the Peninsula become unified, there is the pesky question of the ethnic Koreans living in the Chinese Northeast. A huge swell in Korean nationalism would no doubt catalyze the notion that those people should join their reunified homeland. Jilin and Liaoning provinces both have sizeable Korean populations, and should they ever get vocal about their land leaving China, then the PRC has large problems on its hand. They already have enough seperatist regions to deal with, why add another one? Especially one that would have Japan and America’s sympathy? Jilin in particular has a great deal of national resources, notably iron, coal, and oil, which an industrializing nation like China certainly needs and could not afford to jeopordize.
China is in a clear case of “damned if we do” with very little “damned if we don’t”. This can only lead us to one conclusion, we’re going to get more of the same, so you can crawl out of the bomb shelter.
Until next time,
G
Date: November 4, 2008
Prologue: One man claimed that he had the power to transform an entire nation. Many doubted him, but it turns out that maybe, just maybe, he had the power all along…
The Democratic Primary was never supposed to be in doubt. Hilary Clinton had the thing all locked up. With her massive amount of super-delegates, her apparently limitless war chest, and of course the wildly successful Clinton brand behind her, it appeared that she was a lock to not only be the Democratic candidate, but to be the nations first female President.
But things, do not always go as they seem. The eyes of the nation convened on Iowa on January 3rd, for the first stop on the Primary circuit, the Iowa Caucus. Clinton was wildly expected to win, but not by the landslides that she was polling in other states such as New Hampshire. However, she decided to break with her husbands course and try to win the Caucus.
Perhaps, she felt unbeatable, perhaps she just did not think it through. Either way, it was a decision that would haunt her as the unthinkable happened. Hilary Clinton lost. Not only did she lose, but she finished an embarrassing third place, finishing behind 2004 running-mate John Edwards, and a relative newcomer to national politics, Barack Obama.
Obama stunned everyone by winning in Iowa. Sure he was young, attractive, and an amazing speaker, but this was a Clinton for God-sakes, and if there is one thing that they don’t do, it’s lose.
Obama set his sights to New Hampshire, he thought maybe if he could win that one that Clinton would be out of the race. Her inevitability would be gone, as she would be associated with the stink of failure. However, one can never count out a Clinton, as Hikary proceeded to through her all into the next contest, New Hampshire, one that she would rally back and win.
And so began a six month long journey. Obama would win a state, Clinton would win a state, lather, rinse repeat. While Clinton would tend to win the larger states, such as California, and New York, she would only win by a small margin, and sometimes, not even win the delegate count. Obama, on the other hand, would win smaller states, but by a larger margin. After Super Tuesday, Obama was ahead on the delegate count, which is what ultimately decided the winner.
Things got bleaker for Clinton as, Obama won 10, albeit small states in a row in the middle of February. He ended up ahead of Clinton by around 100 delegates, a lead that he would never give up. Still though, to her credit, Clinton kept fighting. She would never quite get to the point where she would be fully eliminated from contention.
However, that massive war chest of hers, started to run out, well sort of. See there are rules for how much that a person can donate, and there are rules for how much a candidate can spend on either a primary or the general election. Clinton, was given millions, upon millions of dollars by some very wealthy people. She had to divide this money between the primary battles, and the general election, and well, she had spent all that she could for the primary, leaving her both too poor to compete in the primaries, and with an abundance of wealth for the general election.
Despite all of this Clinton fought on, when Obama had a chance to put the nail in the coffin with the Texas and Ohio primary, Clinton won. When the oppourtunity presended itself in Pennsylvania, Clinton fought back. However, as the winter turned to spring, it appeared that hope was blooming, and that there was nothing to stop Obama.
Finally, 6 months to the day after the first ballot was cast in Iowa, the last primaries in Montana and South Dakota came, and the numbers were finally beyond denying. Obama won the nomination, and the right to face John McCain for the President of hte United States.
It is probably a good time to mention something that I haven’t mentioned, but you all no doubt know. Barack Obama is a black man. He is the first black man to be a serious contender for President of the United States. That’s right, finally a nation that was founded by slave-holders looked to have a president whose father could not eat at every restaurant, or ride where he wanted to on a bus, or even marry his white wife in every state of the union.
Of course, Obama’s feel good story was not over then. There still stood the Republican Maverick, the man who many feel was robbed in 2000, John McCain. McCain had easily won the Republican Primary, and had things all wrapped up in February.
But Obama seemed unstoppable. His poll numbers where huge, and no attacks seemed to work. The Republicans called him inexperienced and unpresidential, so he went on a Presidential-style trip abroad, and received record number of crowds. They tried to paint him as an empty headed celebrity, but then they chose Sarah Palin as their running mate, a woman who makes Paris Hilton look like Kofi Annan.
Finally, on November 4, the night of the election, Barack Obama was declared the President of hte United States of America. He won the electoral college 365-173, an absolute landslide.
So what is he going to do now? Clearly, he did not just want to win the election, but he wanted to do something. He constantly through the word “Change” around implying that he was going to somehow alter the course of the United States, and bring it back to its former glory. The main targets are Guantanimo Bay, the economy, the war in Iraq, and America’s standing abroad. This is a really tall order for anyone, but many feel if there is anyone out there who can do it, it is Mr. Obama.
Wait four years, and we shall see if anything will really change.
Epilogue: Obama was officially innagurated on January 20, 2009. In his first few days of office, he has already begun looking at ways to phase out American involvment from Iraq, he has taken steps to close Guantanimo Bay, and appears to be making a play for real bipartisanship. It appears, my friends, that change is not coming, it is here.
Until next time,
G
Achieved Year in Review Posts:
The Fall of the Prophet – January 6th
The Rise of the Ice Queen -January 7th
An Unlikely Fruition – January 7th
Attack of the Three-Headed Terror – January 9th
A Most Sincere Inquiry – January 10th
The Golden League – January 14th
The Fall from Grace – January 16th
The Eighth Layer of Injustice – January 16th
The Transmuter of Nations – January 22nd
Prologue: What happens when the people speak, but don’t really say anything?
It leaves the powers that be in a very odd situation, as they tend to lose control. With such a gap in power, it appeared that a three-headed creature would seize the reigns, however one man had to appeal to a higher power to delay the onslaught and hold on.
After over two-years of a reasonably successful Minority Government, Prime Minister, Stephen Harper, began to make claims that Parliament had become dysfunctional, and an election was needed. On September 7, Stephen Harper went to Governor General Michelle Jean, and requested the dissolution of parliament. The Governor General complied, and we had an election on October 14.
To the surprise of nobody, the Conservatives won yet again, with another Minority Government. However, this time they had a larger seat total, garnering 143 seats. This compared to the 77 earned by the Liberals, 49 by the Bloc Quebecois, and 37 to the NDP (along with 2 Independents).
(Editorial Tangent: Now before we continue, we need to examine one of the central principals of a Parliamentary Democracy. The electorate (in theory) never vote for the Prime Minister, or even the political party. Technically you vote for the representative of your constituency, and it is up to those representatives (MPs) to chose the leader of their group. It just happens in practice that almost every politician is affiliated with a party, and each party has a leader who is understood to become Prime Minister in the event of a victory for their party.)
Before Parliament had even sat, the Finance Minister, Jim Flaherty delivered his fiscal update, which is essentially a mini-budget. This update was quickly, and vehemently panned by the three opposition parties. With three main points of contention: a lack of an economic stimulus plan to prevent recession, removal of civil servants right to strike, and the removal of subsidies for political parties. The last being the most crucial, as it would essentially bankrupt all three opposition parties at once.
(Editorial Tangent #2: While it is by no means required, it is expected that the political parties cooperate and compromise in the event of a Minority Government. After all, if the will of the populace is divided, then surely the actions of the government are expected to reflect this.)
This sent all three parties, and much of the population, into an incendiary rage. However, the only way to stop this was to table a Non-Confidence motion, and therefore trigger yet another election. Since this was something that nobody wanted, especially the Liberals who had delivered perhaps their poorest electoral showing in history.
As a result, something daring was proposed, a change in government without an election.
After a series of talks, it was announced that the Liberals and NDP would form a coalition, lasting until June 30, 2011. They would place the Liberal leader as Prime Minister, and create a cabinet of 23 other ministers, including 6 NDPs. However, with a quick amount of math you can notice that the 114 seats that the two parties have combined is not enough, so they needed a little bit more support. They then formed an agreement with the Bloc Quebecois to support the coalition until June 30, 2010.
This prompted Stephen Harper and the Conservatives to launch a full scale media blitz, calling the coalition ruthlessly undemocratic, even addressing the nation on prime time. There were two central arguments against the coalition: the widely unpopular Stephane Dion would be Prime Minster, and that it required the support of the Bloc Quebecois.
This sparked a fervour and debate across the country as rallies were held on both sides of the argument. Something that has not been seen in Canada since the Meech Lake and Charlottetown Accords over a decade and a half ago.
Stephen Harper made an unprecedented request to the Governor General to prorogue parliament. She complied, and delayed the Parliament to January 26th (From December 8th) in a wildly debated move. Normally prorogation is reserved for genuine national emergencies, such as war or natural disasters, and has never been used for political emergencies.
In a snap move, Stephane Dion then announced that he would step down as Liberal (and coalition) leader, and Michael Ignatieff was quickly selected as his replacement. Ignatieff has softened talks of a coalition, but by no means has stated that he will comply with the Conservatives.
However, we will have to wait until the 26th to find out what will happen, and that, my friends, is something that we will be discussing in our 2009 year in review.
Epilogue: While the government has not been seated, the Canadian economy continues to suffer, the 100th Canadian solider died in Afghanistan, one of the worst winters in memory started to take place, and nothing is being done to remedy either of those situations.
Somehow claims by the government of having the best interest of the people in mind are not being debated.
Until next time,
G
Achieved Year in Review Posts:
The Fall of the Prophet – January 6th
The Rise of the Ice Queen -January 7th
An Unlikely Fruition – January 7th
Attack of the Three-Headed Terror – January 9th
A Most Sincere Inquiry – January 10th
The Golden League – January 14th
The Fall from Grace – January 16th
The Eighth Layer of Injustice – January 16th
The Transmuter of Nations – January 22nd
Date: August 28, 2008
Prologue: Two men engage in a year long battle. One man, who continues to play by his own rules, gains momentum, but realizes that he is unable to achieve victory on his own. He summons a previously unknown maiden from the land of ice and snow, to aid him in his mission. Quickly though, this Ice Queen begins to overshadow the very man that she was supposed to assist, which puts things on an irreversible path.
August seems like a lifetime ago by now, doesn’t it? In reality though it has only been a little over 4 months since John McCain introduced the world to Sarah Palin, and the course of the campaign changed in a matter of minutes.
Back in August, John McCain was taking a chip out of Obama’s huge lead, with the extremely successful “World’s Biggest Celebrity” advertisements. Obama had just made a safe albeit boring running mate selection of Joe Biden, which hardly set the world on fire. However, his convention came pretty close to (figuratively) setting things ablaze. It had the emotion of Hilary Clinton’s speech, and the stunning visualization of Obama addressing 80, 000 people on a Denver night.
McCain knew that he needed to do something to both upstage Obama’s running mate, and get peopel to stop talking about his acceptance speech. John McCain, ever the maverick, did not take such likely candidates as Pawlenty, Romney, or Liberman, instead he went with a much wilder pick that certain got people talking. He chose Alaska Governor, Sarah Palin.
At first, this was a huge success. People wondered who this young, unheralded, and attractive woman was. They saw her as a an excellent “outsider” both as a woman in a man’s world, and as someone who has little connection in Washington. Also, people who had originally supported Hilary Clinton, seemed to flock towards Sarah Palin.
She became a huge star in no time.
And that was the biggest problem.
Everyone wanted to know more about this mysterious Palin. We had gotten two years to get to know Obama on a national stage, but had no idea who this woman was. Quickly, John McCain became an afterthought, as people began to flock towards his running mate.
Palin ralies became huge events, drawing massive crowds, while McCain’s ralies had far smaller numbers.
And that was the next biggest problem.
Palin became in control of the campaign. McCain had pledged long and hard to run an honourable campaign, however, Palin made no such promises. She began to accuse Obama of “Pallin’ around with terrorists”, and an intense amount of hatred and blatant racism would begin to emerge at her rallies, as she began to fan the flames of hatred. Certainly not an honourable campaign that John McCain wanted.
Since Palin became an overnight sensation, the media wanted to get a hold of her for an interview.
And that was the next, next biggest problem.
She really had no idea how to handle any sort of questions. She was either completely unprepared or completely ignorant, or perhaps both. Take a look at the most infamous blunder of hers from an interview with Katie Couric.
Amazing eh?
Now that certainly is “gotcha” journalism, with that tricky Couric asking a hard question.
Other proud moments for Mrs. Palin, include her not understanding the Bush Doctrine, getting confused as to the role of the Vice President, and thinking that Africa is a country. Certainly something that someone who wants the second highest office in the land should know.
Also, a new sueprstar in politics, especially one with such gaping holes in her knowledge set, became excellent fodder for satire. Including this, perhaps the most memorable moment of the 2008 campaign.
After eight years, jokes at George W. Bush’s expense were in need of freshening up, and thankfully, the Republicans came through yet again for us. Not only did 2008 give us a richer target for satire, it gave us a more polarizing character than we have seen in a very long time. Due to her age, and relative freshness on the national stage, this is one that will not be going away soon.
Epilogue: In the end, Palin became an absolute cancer to the McCain campaign. Five days before the election, almost 60% of Americans thought that she was unprepared for the job of Vice President (to say nothing about President), and over 40% had an unfavourable opinion of her.
In case you haven’t heard, McCain-Palin were absolutely crushed in the election.
Sarah Palin is considered an early contender for the Republican nomination in 2012.
Until next time,
G
Achieved Year in Review Posts:
The Fall of the Prophet – January 6th
The Rise of the Ice Queen -January 7th
An Unlikely Fruition – January 7th
Attack of the Three-Headed Terror – January 9th
A Most Sincere Inquiry – January 10th
The Golden League – January 14th
The Fall from Grace – January 16th
The Eighth Layer of Injustice – January 16th
The Transmuter of Nations – January 22nd
All week, scratch that, all year, I’ve been ready to write an article outlining my sheer overjoy at an Obama Presidency. Now, since it happened a few short days ago, I have been at a loss. I struggle to find the time or the necessary words to express the sheer magnitude of emotions that I have been feeling since that fateful November night.
Obviously as a long-time Obama supporter and believer in his inevitable victory (look through my archived posts if you don’t believe me), I am ecstatic, hopeful, and vindicated. However, that is not going to be the goal of this post, since that would just be a series of expletives, videos posted and “I told you so’s”, instead I am going to look at a few major ways that everything changed this week.
No matter what you think of Obama, you have to admit that this is a special, and magical moment, by a pretty special and magical individual. He has long been campaigning on “Change” and even if he does absolutely nothing or is (somehow) a worse President than George W. Bush, he has already brought a great deal of change.
The Race Card: Let’s start with the elephant in the room. Barrack Obama is (half) black. Kind of hard not to see that one. Now he has never really played the race card, but the Clintons and McCain/Palin have been subtly playing on racial fears as a method of opposition. Once upon a time (i.e. last week), there were all sorts of talk about America being “ready” for a black President, or concerns that Obama was over polling due to the Bradley Effect.
Yet on November 4th, 2008, all that proved to be for naught. America, once considered to be the most racists of the Industrialized Nations has produced a symbol for hope and unity. Sure, there are still lots of racists in the United States, both whites and minorities, both Southerners and Northerners, but the rest of the world has to start to look at their own racial politics now. All of a sudden people in Canada, Britain, France, Australia, and every other Western Democracy have to stop saying that the United States is so racist, and need to ask themselves if they are ready for a leader with a different skin colour.
The End of Inevitability: While it seems like ancient history already, one cannot overstate the impossible task he faced going up against Hilary Clinton in the primaries. Everyone was so used to saying “President Clinton” once more, and it seemed like a lock that she would win, en route to crushing the Republicans, and the Bush-Clinton-Bush-Clinton circle would be complete. Things, however, did not work out that way. Obama shocked the world with a victory in Iowa, en route to a series of victories in the longest, and most engaging Primary campaign that the United States has ever seen.
Perhaps more shocking, was the thought that only a few years before, the phrase “Permanent Republican Majority” was tossed around frequently. It was thought the Republicans had build up such a solid amount of support in the south by pushing hot button issues like gay marriage and abortion, that they were unbeatable, and would remain so for an indefinite amount of time.
The Re-drawing of the Map: Connected to the above point, is the fact that the US Electoral Map is vastly different than it has been for years. After Nixon created the “Solid South” in 1968, the Democrats were able to consistently win the North East, and the West Coast. However, the electoral count was never enough to push them over.
As a result, it seemed like the only way the the Democrats could win, would be by choosing a leader from the South in order to flip one of the previous Republican states. It should come as no coincidence that the only Democrats to have won an election since Kennedy were from Southern States (Johnson was from Texas, Carter from Georgia, and Clinton from Arkansas) while the Democratic Candidates to not have won an election, McGovern, Dukakis, and Kerry, were from the North. The only exception is Al Gore, being from Tennessee, but I will leave it to you to decide if he won or lost that election.
So now all of a sudden we have Obama being from Hawaii and/or Chicago, who was able to win big in traditional Republican “Bible Belt” states such as Virginia, North Carolina, Iowa, Colorado, and even one Electoral Vote out of Nebraska. This is a huge shift in the way that politics have focused so much on “Swing States” like Ohio, Florida, and Pennsylvania. Obama could have lost those three states that were so key in 2000 and 2004, but still won the election. Something completely unthinkable for a Democrat to have done even a year ago.
The success of this has to be credited to Howard Dean and his 50 State Strategy. He was laughed at for suggesting that the Democrats run ads in typical Republican strongholds, in order for them to spread their wealth and attention, however in the end it worked. This can lead to a radical change in the way that US politics are done, and an electoral map that is far more fluid from term to term than we have seen in a very long time.
Back to the Drawing Board: Again, tied into “The End of Inevitability” is the long road that that the Republican party has in front of it. They were simply embarrassed by the results, and need to make some difficult decisions.
We have already seen the McCain camp come out and blame much of the loss on Sarah Palin, and I assume that we will see Palin’s people do much of the same in the coming weeks. This presents a very crucial decision for the Republicans to make. Do they go with a more moderate, ideological based side represented by McCain, and championed by other members like Jindal and Romney? Or do they go with the religious right, represented by Palin, and includes Huckabee? Or do they go back to the drawing board?
This is hardly the big tent party that Regan built, or the champions of the “Common Sense Revolution” lead by Newt Gingrich and friends. They need to find their way, fast, or they could be in a lot of trouble.
While I am a huge bleeding heart liberal, I know that the US needs the Republicans to be a strong party once more. Democracy works best when you have more than one viable option, so that they can push one another to offer more to the voters.
Bottom Up: Due to all of the hype that Obama has been getting in the past few months, it is easy to miss the fact that this campaign was a grassroots movement. Whether it was out of choice, or out of sheer necessity, going up against the Clinton machine, it worked. With the last several Presidents being Washington insiders, with a great deal of support from the party machines, it is interesting to see a campaign done by the people, for the people work.
Obama raised more money than any other political candidate in history, and he did so mostly because of his contact with ordinary people. He had a plethora of small donors give a little, so he could always lean on them more later. This is a stark contrast to the small amounts of maxed out big donors that had been relied upon in the past.
Digital Democracy: There are people who voted in this election who could conceivably not remember a time when the internet was not a part of their lives. While it has been used as a campaign tool before, this marks the first time it was such a central part of a successful campaign.
This reason is two fold. For starters, all of the politicians to have served since 1996 (ish) have been older, and in general, the internet is the domain of younger people. The other, more important reason, is that this is the first Web 2.0 election. Since 2005, the use of blogs has boomed, YouTube started to broadcast, Google cemented its status as a verb, Digg and Delicious brought stories to you, Wikipedia changed the definition of truth, and Facebook has become a household name. The internet is a very different place than it was during the US election, and the Obama campaign was quick to make use of it. They communicated frequently with their supporters on Facebook, dominated Digg, and make any of his speeches easily accessible on their YouTube Channel.
The internet is clearly here to stay, and politicians can no longer ignore its power in the democratic process.
Enthusiasm: Regular followers of this blog will know that I am currently teaching in China, and due to the time difference, the election results were coming in at the same time that the school day started. What I saw over the course of the day simply amazed me.
Throughout the morning, I had students come up to me as we would share our latest electoral counts, and when I walked through the halls all that I could hear was “Obama” in between heated discussions in Chinese or Korean. When the final call was made, just before lunch break, the energy in the school was simply breathtaking. I had students run up to me and give me a high five, and all sorts of them simply overjoyed with the results.
This is the change that has the most potential to make a lasting difference. Think about this, there were teenagers, notoriously the most apathetic of demographics, on the other side of the planet, living in a communist country no less, who became emotionally involved in the political process on the other side of the planet. From what I have read, this was not an isolated incident.
The enthusiasm that was generated as a result of this candidacy is something that hasn’t been witnessed in my life time, and probably has not been witnessed since the 1960 US election. This has the real potential to inspire a generation of youthful activists the same way that Kennedy was able to do two generations ago. Once more, with the increase in communication and shrinking of the world, it has potential to be far more far reaching. If people in China were happy about how a democratic election turned out, who is to say that they can’t look for one of their own some day soon?
While it is easy to get caught up in the excitement of Obama’s victory, and expect an immediate end to the problems in Iraq and on Wall Street. We must remember though, those changes will take time to work out. However, in a lot of ways, the world we enter this week is a vastly different one than the world that started just a few short days ago. Change, my friends, is not coming, it is here.
Until next time,
G
After months, and months of voting, it is finally upon us. After following this story for months, and month, I have put together a very AUDACIOUS electoral map preview. John McCain had best HOPE that I am wrong on this one, or he may be looking for a CHANGE of careers. It may be a bit to Obamistic, but allow me to explain the swing states.
In using the exceptionally cool Electoral Map generator at Real Clear Politics, the final numbers that I am predicting are:
Obama/Biden: 396
McCain/Palin: 142
Wasn’t this race supposed to be close? Wasn’t John McCain going to give hope an audacious battle to the top? Wasn’t Sarah Palin supposed to energize the Republican base and discontented Clinton supporters enough to put more red states on the map?
As we stand on the brink of the most exciting election in generations, clearly none of these things happened. Obama is poised for an absolute landslide victory, and the United States is set to have yet another dramatic shifts in direction.
For starters, let me get something out of the way. John McCain will not win the election. It would take either on act of God or an act of fraud to get him into the win column. Obama is securely in the lead in all of the Kerry states from 2004, plus Iowa and New Mexico. This puts him at 264 electoral votes, when he needs 270 to win. Meaning he only needs either Virginia or Colorado to win the election, and he has enough of a lead in both states, to put them securely in the blue column. This of course says nothing for Ohio, Florida, Nevada, and a multitude of other states poised to switch colours today. The numbers simply do not lie at this point, and the McCain camp can not put enough red on the map to push him over 270, thinking anything else at this point is simply delusional.
Looking at the map that I generated, you will notice that I give Obama/Biden far more than the 270 needed. Worth noting, they take both Florida and Ohio, which are just for insurance at this point, and not quite so crucial as they have been in recent elections. Also, I switched Nevada and Colorado, given Obama’s strong enough lead in both states.
Of real interest though are the traditional “Bible Belt” Midwest/Southern states of Indiana, Missouri, Georgia, and North Carolina all going Democrat. The polls in all of these states have been essentially statistical ties. However, the Obama camp has been very proactive with their “Get Out and Vote” campaigns, as has been demonstrated with the massive turnouts all over the United States for early voting. North Carolina and Georgia have shown absolute surges in African American voting, and for both racial and ideological reasons, those should massively favour Obama. At the end of the day, ballots in the box are more important than polling numbers. Indiana and Missouri are so close to Obama’s homestate of Illinois that they should be flooded with Democrat volunteers who can help the state switch sides.
That ultimately leaves Arizona, Montana, North Dakota, and West Virginia as the other toss-up states. The mere fact that these states, all of which Bush carried by double digits in 2004, are competitive is a huge Obama victory. I think that McCain should carry both his homestate of Arizona, and the traditional Republican stronghold of West Virginia in races that should not be as close as they are, however that is where I see his luck running out. While McCain has almost a 4% lead in Montana, I think that Obama is going to take this one. Ron Paul, mega-right wing Libertarian is on the ballot in Montana, and should take about 5% of McCain’s vote, and coupled with Obama’s vastly superior ground game, he should be able to pull out an upset. North Dakota is very close, and polling data suggests a dead heat, I’m going to give this one to Obama, since he has the superior ground game, and in cases of a tie, one can never underestimate the enthusiasm of Obama’s supporters, who are far more likely to go and vote than McCain’s supporters at this point, people like to back a winner after all.
All of this adds up to 396, which you don’t need to be a math expert to understand that is a bigger number than 270, and translates into three simple words. Yes, we did.
Until next time,
G
Post Script: If you are interested in a variety of different electoral previews taking different things into account check out the following sites:
McNutt Against the Music
411mania.com/politics
538
Karl Rove
Pollster
Real Clear Politics
Post-Post Script: Obligatory comment: If you are American be sure to vote. It’s not often that the entire world wants to take part in the democratic process of a single day, so please go and cast your ballots.
Post-Post-Post Script: Feel like reliving/reeducating yourself? Check out This. Fucking. Election. You won’t be disappointed.
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