US Mid-terms 2014

So the Republicans have won control of both Houses of Congress in the mid-term elections. Here wer go for yet another two years with no proper budget in the US... perhaps we'll even have another shutdown.

While the Republicans have been highly obstructive, Obama has been a disappointment to say the least. His only achievement of note? Obamacare and that's not all it's cracked up to be (there has been an increase in premiums for many). The Russians have Crimea, the Arab Spring has produced Islamic State and firearm ownership is on the increase.

Well at least it's a good time to make cannabis; more states are legalising it following ballots yesterday.

Better ways to spend six billion dollars: US Election Analysis

Change of plan - as it's going to take a few days for Florida to be decided for sure (although it will go Obama), here's my analysis.

Barack Obama got about eight million votes less than in 2008. Fortunately for him, Mitt Romney appears to be getting less votes than John McCain did.

(Edit: Final totals are not yet confirmed)

 There was a semi-open goal here and Romney-Ryan missed it by a country mile.

About six billion dollars were spent on this - and we merely got the status quo ante, pretty much.


Why Obama won

1.  He was successfully able to claim an improving, although still poor, economy and two big foreign policy achievements: withdrawing from Iraq without that country collapsing into civil war (it's not brilliant, but it's not Syria) and killing Osama bin Laden.
2. Excellent campaigning with strong leveraging of social media and micro-targeting of voters. The ground game was superb as well.
3. His performances in the second and third debate, along with Biden's VP one. He looked presidential and knew his stuff.
4. Strong support among minority voters, especially Latinos. The electorate was nearly exactly like 2008 - in fact there were more minority voters - when many pundits (understandably) thought it would look different, maybe (less understandably) like the GOP win in 2010.
5. The GM bailout, which saved a great many jobs in Ohio in particular. Regardless of the economic sense or lack thereof of that, people don't like becoming unemployed.

Why Romney lost

1. Flip-flopping on a scale greater than John Kerry between primary and general campaign - in an Internet age, it's easy to get called on.
2. The '47%' comment. I said at the time that was a massive gaffe and it showed an apparent contempt for Democratic voters (most of whom actually work) that many Republicans seem to show.
3. Reliance on a dwindling coalition of angry white people at the expense of nearly everyone else. Ignoring - no, actually offending with the "self-deportation" policy - 10% of the voting public is a bad idea.
4. Allowing Obama to define him early as an out-of-touch plutocrat - and acting in a manner that seemed to make it true (not releasing those tax returns, $10k bets, "I like firing people").
5. George W Bush, who he couldn't use on the campaign trail and whose legacy is positively toxic for the Republicans. There is no living Republican great statesman they can wheel out - Reagan is dead and wouldn't win the GOP nomination at present because he would not be conservative enough.

Ten takeaways from this election

1. The capacity of people to engage in self-delusion is quite amazing. Think the polls might be off is understandable, but don't be that sure of it.
2. Don't make stupid comments on rape - Mourdock and Akin learnt this to their cost.
3. Nate Silver will be listened to a great deal more in 2016, but even he can get things wrong (he miscalled two Senate races here)
4. We need to make sure that three hour polling lines don't happen next time - it probably put many people off.
5. The GOP needs to get rid of the poisonous influence of the Tea Party in a way that does not drive those voters out of the party, or it will continue to lose.
6. Scott Rasmussen's robo-polling is discredited, but the internet pollsters did very well indeed - YouGov were third closest overall.
7. Negative campaigning works, sadly.
8. Partisan gridlock is sadly likely to be the order of the day in the US for the next four years, unless Obama can do well enough to flip the House in 2014.
9. Precedents are not guarantees, although the one about incumbents and strong primary challenges held up.
10. A silly line can get around the Internet faster than you can print a newspaper.

So, that's it for this one. Now, let's hope Obama does better in the second term.

US Elections 2012 - my prediction

I predict that Barack Obama will be re-elected with a 1 to 2 percent popular vote lead and between 300 and 340 Electoral College Votes.

The Democrats will retain the Senate, the Republicans the House.

Obama vs. Romney: Debate 3

It's only two weeks until the election and I'm glad it's that close - the rhetoric is starting to get boring now. This debate in particular went into that territory at times as attack lines got trotted out again and again by both candidates.


Bob Schieffer did an OK job as moderator, but really should have brought both candidates back to foreign policy, as they tended to go off onto the economy a good deal.

Mitt Romney's problem is that on the key foreign policy issues he either has the same view as President Obama or is on the wrong side of public opinion - regardless of your views re going into Afghanistan or Iraq, it is clear that these wars have not gone as well for the USA as they could have done. He sounded presidential to start off with, but towards the end he was just sounding hollow.

Obama again won this one - I don't agree with all his foreign policy views, but he came across very convincing and knew his policy brief well. Missed an opportunity to deploy a "You didn't build that" zinger on Romney in the discussion on Massachusetts education policy.

Third debates don't really as matter as much in the whole run of things, nor does foreign policy. This said, Romney needed a win and he didn't get one. My prediction for an Obama victory on 6 November remains unchanged.

Obama vs. Romney: Debate 2

I switched to CNN for this debate - they had the 'scrolling lines' thing here, but I still lost the last question when my recording stopped. Sort it out, Sky!

While not as good as Martha Raddatz and seriously lacking in an ability to rein candidates in (there is a place for a buzzer here), Candy Crowley did a competent job as moderator and her refuting of Romney's statement on the Libyan terrorist attacks, along with a clarification that the Obama administration did not use the term again for two weeks, will be a defining moment of this election. More of this please.

Barack Obama came back a good deal stronger than in the first debate, winning this one convincingly. He was stronger on style and a lot stronger on content.

Mitt Romney could have turned this into a toss-up race and I think he's blown it - the third debate has a far smaller impact as the undecided pool shrinks (and it's on foreign policy too). While getting style points, his contradictory statements from the primaries were made clear - his world view turns me off more and more.

Obama has saved his campaign and I would say his job.

European Union wins the Nobel Peace Prize

BBC News Report

I can see why, although the number of arguments it has probably started means the award isn't 100% deserved (although it's a better candidate than Barack Obama, who won it in 2009).

On the whole, I've got to say the EU has been a very good thing for Europe - the Schengen agreement certainly allowed me to spend more time in Estonia last month.

Obama vs. Romney: Debate 1

I've just watched the first of the US presidential debates, taping it from CNBC.

I'll begin by saying that Jim Lehrer's moderation was appallingly bad and he should clamped down hard on both candidates for going over the limit. As a result an entire section was lost and my recording cut off during Romney's closing statement. Also, I'd have had one section on government and governing, giving another one to something like crime or energy.

From watching this, the pundits' view that Romney won this debate is correct. He spoke more confidently, looked more Presidential (although he already does look like that) and had a folksy charm about him. I felt Obama's policy things came across better and I can't get my head around Romney's deficit reduction plan.

The consensus pre-debate was that Romney needed to deliver a knock-out here and I think he only won on points; with the next two debates being town hall and (IIRC) foreign policy, Obama has an advantage going in to those.

Can anyone tell me what the black thing on Romney's flag pin was as well?

Finally, here's FactCheck's discussion on the misleading use of facts by both candidates.

Mitt Romney, tax returns and the race for the White House

There have been increasing calls for Mitt Romney to release more tax returns than the two years that he currently has - Obama has gone back ten years. While I don't of course know what is in said returns, Romney's refusal to release them is actually harming his campaign as until he does so, there is little chance of the story actually moving on from that onto other issues.

That said, what he has released is damaging enough - he only paid 14% tax in 2010. I doubt many of my readers paid that little.

My comments in April on the likely outcome remain valid. Mitt Romney is turning into the David Cameron of US politics - and he won't be able to form a coalition when he misses a fairly open goal.