William Quill

This is not 2004. In that year, the Massachusetts Supreme Court ruled in favour of allowing gay and lesbian couples to marry, the first US state to allow this. It was only a year after Lawrence v. Texas, in which the US Supreme Court overturned sodomy laws in 14 states. In that year’s presidential election, the Republican incumbent George W. Bush proposed a Federal Marriage Amendment to amend the US Constitution to define marriage as between a man and and a woman, prohibiting states from enacting laws to contrary effect. It would have been the second Amendment to restrict the freedoms of US citizens, the first being the 18th Amendment in 1919, introducing prohibition (repealed in 1933). President Bush’s Democratic opponent, John Kerry, a Senator from Massachusetts, supported civil unions, while opposing both equal marriage and any proposal to define marriage at a federal level. Referendums to amend state constitutions to define marriage as only between a man and a woman appeared on the ballot in a number of states in November 2004, driving up conservative turnout, and contributing to the vote of Bush against Kerry, in what was a close election.

But a lot has changed in those eight years on the issue of gay marriage. Then it seemed destined to be a nice feature of certain liberal enclaves, whether in the US or in Europe. Now it seems an inevitability, only a matter of time across most of the developed world. Last year, public tracking polling by Gallup showed for the first time that a majority of Americans supported legal gay marriage, with 53% in favour and 45% against. The figures in 2004 were 55% in favour, and 42% against. The figures in 2004 were 42% in favour and 55% against, and they remained steady till last year. An annual tracking poll should be reliable, but in case it looks too sudden to be credible, it was corroborated by similar figures from the Washington Post (53%) and CNN (51%).

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President Obama is clearly in a safer place in his re-election campaign after the killing of Osama bin Laden over the weekend. It removes the critique that he is soft on foreign matters, such as that of former Sen. Rick Santorum, who claimed recently that the president does not believe in American exceptionalism. As far as most Americans care about the war in Afghanistan, and even to a certain extent in Iraq, it was about getting bin Laden.

OK, Barack Obama is now quite likely to be re-elected, though there’s little chance he’ll keep the lead of 56 to 38 he polled yesterday. While he will have this in the background, the Republicans will soon begin to focus entirely on the economy. Compare this to George H. W. Bush, who seemed a shoo-in in 1991 after his Gulf War victory, but was beaten by Bill Clinton in 1992.

And what does this mean for who the Republicans are more likely to choose? Again, this isn’t clear. Tyler Cowen reckons that they will give up on trying to win from the centre, pick an extreme candidate and lose badly. Sort of like how they picked Barry Goldwater in 1964 when Lyndon B. Johnson seemed unbeatable. The Economist’s Democracy in America blog on the other hand that it will move them towards the centre, with former Ambassador to China Jon Huntsman in the strongest position. It really is far too early to look at poll numbers for any of these to asses any such impact.

Possibly the biggest thing this will do for President Obama, if even at a subliminal level, is to enhance his reputation for being cool-headed, which was one of the things during the final months of the 2008 election that strengthened him against John McCain, in his reactions to events such as the financial crisis or violence in Georgia. People will remember that he kept a poker face on Saturday night while he was roasting Donald Trump at the Correspondents’ Dinner, throwing his attempt at a campaign completely out of the water. That he dealt with the serious business of the budget and possible government shutdown, with the frivolity of whether he would release his birth cert, all while knowing this was coming down the line.

Paddy Power are now putting Luke “Ming” Flanagan as one of those likely to get a seat in Roscommon–South Leitrim, behind sitting Fine Gael TDs Frank Feighan and Denis Naughten. When he came to prominence in the 1999 European election, he was regarded as a fringe candidate, but is now a well-liked Mayor, and since the retirement of Michael Finneran, a Fianna Fáil Minister of State, it has become ever more possible that he could be elected. He can no longer be seen as a single-issue candidate, but if he is elected, there could be a worthwhile debate on the issue.

Since his election, President Barack Obama has taken online questions annually. On each of these three occasions, a question on the continuing illegality of cannabis came on top. In 2009, he laughed at the question, asking what it said about the online audience. In 2010, he ignored the question and answered the second most popular topic, on net neutrality. This year, when confronted with a question on the subject from a former police officer, representing Law Enforcers Against Prohibition, he eventually has had to concede that it is a legitimate topic for political debate, though he waffled in his response.

There is a large element of hypocrisy in Western politics on this question. Just as it is commonly known that during the US Prohibition Era (1920–33), public figures as high as Presidents, notably Warren G. Harding (serving 1921–23) felt free to privately drink alcohol, many public figures today will happily consume drugs quite a bit stronger than cannabis in high society. It is now almost customary for those seeking to lead their country to concede having taken drugs of one sort or other during the college days, from Bill Clinton not inhaling (actually because he took cannabis in cookie form), to Barack Obama, David Cameron and Brian Cowen more recently. Though somehow I doubt that Enda Kenny is carefully drafting a response to this question on his student days.

I fail to see how the current policy is either morally justifiable or effective in its aims. Those in favour of retaining the current regime of prohibition are arguing that all consumers of illicit drugs, however infrequently, should have a permanent mark on their criminal record. In a free society, we allow people take risks that do not harm others in the process. We allow people to go mountain-climbing or paragliding, despite the possibly fatal risks. We also allow people to smoke and consume alcohol, which are more harmful in some respects than certain prohibited substances. The effects of smoking a joint, leading a group at a party to mellow out, compare favourably the effects of drink which we see in the street violence in town on Friday night after closing time.

Freedom also has the record of working. I don’t seek to diminish the serious effects of drug addiction, particularly in drugs like heroin, but in Portugal since all drugs were decriminalized in 2001, the negative effects of drug use have decreased. They took the decision because the drug problem had got to the stage where it seemed the only sensible way to address the problem, and ten years later there is no movement from any leading political party or group to reverse the change. Glenn Greenwald, in a report for the Cato Institute, outlined the effects of their decision. For all substances, deaths from drug use have diminished, or at most remained steady. For example, deaths from heroin and other opiates stood at 281 in 20001. That number has decreased steadily since decriminalization, to 133 in 2006. Decriminalization hasn’t eliminated these problems, but it has made it easier to address them. This wasn’t just part of a trend, problems from drug use were increasing until they took the decision in 2001. Drug users are no longer stigmatized as criminals, making it more socially acceptable to seek help. Resources that had been devoted to prosecuting addicts could now be devoted to helping them. Drug usage rates continue to be lower in Portugal than under policy regimes with greater degrees of prohibition.

Some emphasize the economic benefits of legalization, that the transactions would be taxed, but I would see the primary benefit as the reduction in the influence of criminals and the potential for improvement in the lives of those who suffer. While a policy that has worked in one jurisdiction cannot necessarily be transplanted to another, at the very least, it should be treated as a respectable subject for debate, and that either decriminalization or legalization should be be on the table.

I’ll close here with a clip on the subject from the free-market economist, Milton Friedman. I would not be in complete agreement with Friedman, but he does present a clear case against prohibition. Among other things, he proposes the hypothesis that crack, possibly the most lethal of drugs, would not have been developed had it not been for the regime of prohibition.

During the 2008 presidential election, I supported Hillary Rodham Clinton as the choice for the Democratic nomination during the primaries, until the “Well that depends on what your definition of sniper fire is” moment. At that point, I thought it the most dignified thing for Clinton to do was to concede defeat what that continuing in a losing battle, though I did not become a fully-throated supporter of Barack Obama. Looking back, it was ultimately a good thing in many respects that she fought to the end, giving all states a chance to express their choice for the nomination, and giving Obama more opportunities to debate before the general. Had I been a Clinton supporter in South Dakota, I would have been pleased with her decision to contest to the end.

My reasons for supporting Clinton were that her experience in Washington as a Senator since 2001 had shown her ability to work with people in the skills of negotiating legislation. She had built up relationships with Republican as well as Democratic Senators. Of course, were she to be president, old partners as cosignatories on bills would become partisan, but that instinctive knowledge of where others stood would have been an advantage to her. Her experience as First Lady were also relevant. Something that would certainly not be true of all political spouses, she was an active political player during President Clinton’s term of office. In fact, she had had clear experience with the issue which was to be a major one during both the campaign and the first year of President Obama’s year in office, that of health care. Ultimately, what became known as Hillarycare did not succeed, but it did give her that background on the issue.
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It is not really news that President Barack Obama is a little narcissistic. The only way he knows of being self-deprecating is by accentuating this, as seen in his speech at the Al Smith dinner last year. In a speech earlier this year on national security, he thought it made sense to see this through his life story, telling the audience of the uniqueness of his family situation, for the benefit of the nine Americans who hadn’t yet heard it, as if that gave him such a particular outlook.

I stand here today as someone whose own life was made possible by these documents. My father came to these shores in search of the promise that they offered. My mother made me rise before dawn to learn their truths when I lived as a child in a foreign land. My own American journey was paved by generations of citizens who gave meaning to those simple words — “to form a more perfect union.” I’ve studied the Constitution as a student, I’ve taught it as a teacher, I’ve been bound by it as a lawyer and a legislator. I took an oath to preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution as Commander-in-Chief, and as a citizen, I know that we must never, ever, turn our back on its enduring principles for expedience sake.

But courtesy of The Bugle, I heard an example that may have topped this. In his message commemorating the fall of the Berlin Wall, being too busy to attend the ceremonies, President Obama described the truly remarkable aspect of the change in the world since 9 November 1989:

Few would have foreseen that day that a united Germany would be led by a woman from Brandenburg or that their American ally would be led by a man of African descent.

So remembering the fall of the Berlin Wall is not about the political leaders of that time, or the many in civil society groups who had the courage to come together despite the real fear of oppression by their communist rulers. It is about him.

I understand that his speech writers are in awe of him, and that this worked during the campaign, but surely he could have had the humility to reword that particular sentence.

This Tuesday, the voters of Maine repealed the decision of their legislature to allow gay couples to marry by voting Yes to Proposition 1. This is a disappointing decision, but not just because of the principles of the case. Those interested in politics might take sides in elections and issues in other countries, but in most cases on a small scale, it’s only a matter of preference, rather a belief in the effect it will have on them. But with an issue like this, the development in other countries matters here in Ireland and elsewhere. I think it’s inevitable that at some point, whether in five or thirty years, that there will be no restrictions on gay couples marrying. But the more other countries and states there are allow this, the sooner it will happen. We tend to catch up a little late on certain issues here after they have become a trend elsewhere.

As things stand, The Netherlands, Belgium, Canada, Spain, South Africa, Norway and Sweden all allow gay couples to marry, with the change in law occurring variously since 2001. In the United States, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Vermont, Iowa and New Hampshire do. The most significant of these is Iowa, outside of the traditionally more liberal states of New England. But in all cases where it has been put directly to the people, the electorate have opposed equality.

Personally, I dislike the idea of deciding people’s rights by a vote of the majority. But it is still perhaps time to stop and realize that however much this might be seen in terms of rights and equality, there are large numbers of people for whom it does not make sense that marriage should be anything other than a union between a man and a woman, however dictionaries might now define it. It’s difficult to know what it will take to change people’s mind on this, or how long it will take. But the political approach should take this into account.

What needs to be addressed is the question of how this affects children. The Yes to One campaign in Maine used an interview with a couple from Massachusetts, which had previously been used successfully by the Yes to Eight campaign in California, in which their son found out about homosexuality through a fairy tale read in class.

While I wonder about whether young boys would have any interest in reading lovey-dovey stories about princes and princesses, that would be my only reason to be cautious about a teacher reading such a story in class. Ultimately speaking, yes, if gay couples can marry, it would have to be mentioned in schools. Not in any orchestrated, “Now we’re going to talk about gay people” way, just as something that exists in society. Increasingly children will hear of prominent gay figures mentioned in the media, possibly referring to their husband or wife, while not referring to any big gay-specific issue. If a child were to ask his teacher about this, and is told, “Yes, they’re married”, they would probably just go back and play with their friends and not give it much thought other than that, where if the teacher were to say “I’m not allowed talk to you about that”, they would inevitably be intrigued. Where equality exists in law, there is no real reason to prohibit discussion about it. As to their son, chances are he won’t turn out to be gay, and if he does, something his teacher read to him in second grade will not have been the cause. So some of this problem, and of opposition to allowing gay couples to marry in general, is still due to the nature-nurture confusion about the issue.

Speaking of the defeat of Proposition 1, I would have to agree with those such as Andrew Sullivan who laid some of the blame for the result with President Barack Obama. During his campaign for presidency, he stated clearly speaking to Pastor Rick Warren that he believes “marriage is a union between a man and a woman”, and that he further believes that it is a sacred because of its religious origins.

Opponents of marriage for gay couples have used that quote on every occasion since, and it is gold dust from their point of view. It allows those who see themselves as moderate or liberal in many respects to oppose marriage equality, given that the man dubbed the most liberal President ever (though that is mostly due to his economic positions) feels that way. He did oppose Prop 8 in California, albeit it from the classical conservative stare decisis perspective. But some of that may have simply been political, to speak on both sides of the issue during the campaign. He claimed that he would be a fierce advocate for gay rights, that he would repeal Don’t Ask Don’t Tell (prohibiting gays from serving openly in the army, which led to the dismissal of an Arabic translator earlier this year) and the Defense of Marriage Act (prohibiting the recognition at a federal level of gay unions as marriage), but he has failed to show any signs of movement on either. In this, he is letting down a group of Americans whose activists don’t feel they can turn elsewhere politically for support.

People such as myself whose political views are moderate or liberal on issues of social and personal freedom while seeing the merits of capitalism see the large voice unions have within the Democratic Party and the considerable left-wing support there and like to imagine that there are still some chance that the more liberal forces within the Republican Party that would bring it back to its old ways of being very much the party of freedom, which Michael Steele likes to pretend it still is. I might hope that the lack of a lasting success after President George W. Bush’s presidency could convince them against such a focus on social conservatism. Ultimately, I’d like to imagine them to be a party where Arnold Vinick could be a leading figure and a possible presidential candidate.

The campaign for the special election to New York’s 23rd Congressional District, scheduled after Republican John McHugh resigned to become Secretary of the Navy is another blow to this illusion. The local Republican Party chose State Assembly member Dierdre Scozzafava, who favours marriage equality and the right to abortion, while the Democrats chose Bill Owens, who believes that New York’s current law on civil unions for gay couples are adequate. This is one issue where it would have been beneficial to have a Republican on-side, both as an influence within the Republicans, and so to put pressure on the Democrats who would feel less that they could rely on gay voters.

The the Conservative Party of New York, normally a minor player in New York politics, nominated Doug Hoffman. Hoffman had sought the nomination for the Republicans, but had trailed at all of the nominating party meetings. He received the support of the Club for Growth, the same pressure group that forced Sen. Arlen Specter out of the Pennsylvanian Republican Party earlier this year, leading to the Democrats reaching their 60-seat supermajority in the Senate.

Hoffman also received the support of many leading Republican politicians, including Sarah Palin, current governor of Minnesota Tim Pawlenty and former candidate for the 2008 presidential nomination former Sen. Fred Thompson, and the most partisan of media figures like Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity and Glenn Beck.

As polls showed that this formerly safe GOP seat would be lost to either the Democrats or the Conservatives, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, President Clinton’s chief political sparring partner (and on whom Jeff Haffley is loosely based), appealed for party unity, endorsing Scozzafava as the official Republican candidate, calling for a respect for the claimed tradition of local independence.

This was ultimately to no avail, as tonight Dede Scozzafava announced the suspension of her campaign. If Doug Hoffman is elected, he will be taken in by the Republican House Caucus.

If this tells us anything about the grassroots within the Republican Party and who their current leaders are willing to support in future, which it might not, President Obama should have little trouble when the time comes for his reelection campaign. Considering his approval rate in the current economic circumstances, despite the justified criticism of his leadership at times, he appears to be still convincing the public that he is doing what seems best. Those remaining within the Republican Party seem committed to ideological purity and compliance a wholesale endorsement of their party platform by party candidates wherever possible.

It’s difficult to see where this will lead them, how many presidential cycles will it take for them to nominate a candidate with a wider appeal than this. And how long will they hold the remaining moderates such as Sen. Olympia Snowe, who would be very unlikely to leave, but has publicly expressed her disappointment that the party has failed to recognize the mistakes of recent years and risks becoming very much a minority party.

For my part, had I a vote in NY-23, I would go ahead and waste my vote and cast it for Scozzafava.

I’m following up here on a story I initially posted on Facebook. Last week I posted a video which Glen Beck showed on Fox News of Anita Dunn, President Obama’s Communications Director, his Toby Ziegler, in which she quoted Mother Teresa and Mao Tse-Tung, calling them her favourite philosophers.

Ms Dunn has responded, saying that she got the quote from Lee Atwater, a Republican strategist in the 1980s.

Her response is not good enough. In the discussion following my Facebook posting, someone commented that people often quote historical figures, such as Caesar or Oliver Cromwell. Yes, Joan Burton, Labour Spokesperson on Finance, did quote Cromwell addressing the government a few months ago, saying “In the name of God, go!” But from that simple statement, no one claim that Cromwell was one of her favourite political thinkers. Ms Dunn does use that expression.

Her statement, presumably written after she quickly searched for any reference of Republicans and Mao, also makes reference to the fact that President Bush recommended a book on Mao to Karl Rove. Whatever about quoting someone, reading a book a biography does not make one an enthusiast. Indeed, if it was Mao: The Untold Story by Jung Chang, it might have been where Glenn Beck got his figure of 70 million deaths attributed to Mao.

Further, Lee Atwater, whom she quotes was party for one of the most insidious electoral strategies of twentieth-century American politics, the Southern strategy of the Republican Party, the effort to secure the votes of racists whose votes had previously been sought by the Democrats. Mr Atwater was an advisor to Sen. Storm Thurmond, a Democrat who left the party to run on a segregationist ticket in the 1948 presidential election, winning four states. Sen. Thurmond became a Republican in 1964, in what was to become the most shameful period in that party’s history.

Over the weekend, I also had occasion to listen to an episode of D.J. Grothe’s excellent podcast, Point of Inquiry. In it, Jeff Sharlett discussed his new book, The Family: The Secret Fundamentalism at the Heart of American Power. The Family is a religious political group which preaches biblical capitalism and celebrates power, even to the extent that despite claiming to be a conservative group, they praised the methods of dictators such as Mao. Sen. Thurmond was himself a member of The Family. Ms Dunn says, “The Mao quote is one I picked up from the late Republican strategist Lee Atwater from something I read in the late 1980s, so I hope I don’t get my progressive friends mad at me”. They would clearly be justified in being so.

I don’t mean to praise the methods of Fox News, or to cast general aspersions on President Obama’s administration. My point here is that it is no defence on Ms Dunn’s part to point to some of the most despicable campaigners who also thought that we should “Fight our own fight” as Mao did, and she should be held to account her statement. She is either incredibly naïve and misguided, or truly has no problem praising the ideals of one of the worst tyrants in recorded history.

First published on the Ireland for Europe blog

Mr President, we can empathise.

Originally posted on Facebook
IN its November 1st issue, The Economist will endorse a candidate for the election the following Tuesday to the position of 44th president of the United States, as they have done most years since 1980. For the record, they endorsed Governor Ronald Reagan in 1980, had no equivalent article in 1984, refused to endorse either Vice President George H. W. Bush or Governor Michael Dukakis in 1988, endorsed Governor Bill Clinton in 1992, Senator Bob Dole in 1996, Governor George W. Bush in 2000 and Senator John Kerry in 2004. So while we could assume that they would have endorsed President Reagan had they written such an article in 1984, they did not in any of these cases choose the incumbent party. Not merely on the basis of this trend, but on their coverage to date, I expect that they will and hope that they do endorse Senator Barack Obama this year.

In putting the case for Mr Obama, I’m aware that an endorsement of his candidacy has gone beyond the point of being notable and needing much explanation. In the past few weeks, among the articles I’ve posted on Facebook were endorsements by Christopher Buckley, a former writer for the National Review, a conservative magazine and son of its founder William Buckley, one of the icons of American conservatism, by Christopher Hitchens, who has supported the Iraq War from the beginning and has been strongly critical of Democrats including Mr Obama for their opposition to it, and by Colin Powell, former Secretary of State who argued for the legitimacy of the invasion of Iraq before the United Nations. Others in a similar vein, dubbed Obamacons in this week’s issue of The Economist, include Kenneth Adelman who worked for President Reagan, and Senators Chuck Hagel and Dick Lugar, who have all but endorsed Mr Obama.

I am also aware that of potential readers of this note, I came to support Mr Obama relatively late, having been a supporter of Hillary Clinton for most of the time before and during the primaries (I dropped that support after her liberal definition of “sniper fire” became clear). I was skeptical about Mr Obama’s true abilities outside the context of an election, in the proverbial 3 a.m. situation, and other situations that would similarly call for judgment. Even recently enough in two notes here, I outlined some complaints I had with him. But in the 20 months since he declared his candidacy, Mr Obama has been tested and has shown himself to capable. Certainly hanging around Washington, D.C., for another four to eight years would not have added to those abilities.

In general terms, between the two parties, I would feel more inclined towards the Democrats for what are termed cultural reasons, being strongly opposed to any breakdown in the wall of separation between church and state, concerned with infringements on civil liberties and supporting the decision of Roe v. Wade. Like any good reader of The Economist, however, I disagree with the suspicions that a lot of Democratic politicians and supporters express for the market and while I initially opposed the Iraq War, I believed that it was going well for a while after the time of the toppling of the Saddam Hussein statue in Firdos Square early in the proceedings, and that with elections there in 2005 it was a worthwhile invasion, even if like many others I would now be less enthusiastically supportive of it. Overall then, it would not be impossible that I could be swayed by a Republican. But while the statements by Mr McCain that he would appoint Supreme Court Justices like Samuel Alito or John Roberts might on its own send me toward the Democrats, in this election my decision does not come down to the single issue of secularism.

Still the economy
Beginning with the most important current issue, the economy, Mr Obama seems far more capable than Mr McCain. By his own admission, Mr McCain needs to educated on economics. I give him credit for understanding the benefits of free trade and globalization and for arguing in its favour even when this stance has occasionally cost him politically. As a worldwide concern, and as it affects Ireland, free trade is a major issue for me. However, I don’t believe Mr Obama is as opposed as he has suggested publicly. While he attacked Ms Clinton for supposedly supporting NAFTA, this was probably no more than posturing and the real Obama was the one who contacted the Canadian Ambassador to let him know that they should not be worried and who later described his language during that time as overheated. It is by no means unusual for a Democratic candidate to swing left during the primaries to secure the nomination, but there is no reason to suspect that as president his administration would be less supportive of global trade than those of Clinton or Bartlett. The fact that Congress is also expected to be heavily Democratic has been raised particularly on this question, so that for the sake of balanced government it would be better to have a Republican president. But Mr Obama does have the ability to carry the Democratic party with him on this issue, particularly as a declared skeptic on trade policy.

On the more pressing concern of credit crisis, Mr Obama has taken a far more organized and cool-headed approach. Mr McCain had to suspend his campaign to get his head around the crisis, while Mr Obama stressed the fact that as president he would have to deal with more with more than one concern at a time. In the last few weeks, Mr McCain has acted much more erratically, so that for all his emphasis on experience earlier in the campaign (at least until the choice of Sarah Palin for vice president, of whom more later), he seems the riskier candidate. Neither candidate has iterated clearly how he intends to deal specifically with the credit crisis, knowing that it would make more sense to suffer any political disaffection only when in power. But we can tell something of what their approaches would probably be from what they have said so far. Mr McCain is right when it comes to trade, but the hands off approach does not work across the economy as a whole, something he and others who promoted widespread deregulation are now realizing. While my instincts in economic terms are towards less regulation and lower taxes, it it better that the president not take this view as a matter of ideological conviction. It is very much to Mr Obama’s credit that he is winning votes on his tax policies, something Democrats have failed for years to find support for. He would be more pragmatic and plans to readjust the tax burden is part of a general plan to reduce the deficit, where Mr McCain seems to be following the supply-side Republican line of Presidents Reagan and the Bushes, that taxes should be cut at the top rates at all costs, and to hell with the budget line. It is one reason we need a full change in party control in the Washington, in the White House now to follow the change on the Capitol in 2006, so that Republicans suffer for reversing the budget surpluses that they inherited from President Clinton to a massive deficit.

Appearances abroad
Mr McCain ran believing that his strong foreign policy credentials, rather than the little he can say on the economy, would serve him well. This was clearly not the year for him then. According to Gallup, voters still trust Mr McCain more on the war in Iraq (50% to 46%) and on terrorism (55% to 39%), but they have ceased to be priority issues. Mr McCain deserves credit for advocating the surge policy, which is working reasonably effectively since its adoption in 2007 (on January 10th, the same day as a Hist debate on Iraq). However, that does not mitigate the fact that it was relatively late in the proceedings of the war that he began to criticize it, and Mr Obama’s strong attack in the first presidential debate was apt. Mr McCain was wrong to believe that they would be greeted as liberators, to believe that they knew where weapons of mass destruction were or that there was no history of violence between Shia and Sunni. I have always held that there should not be an untimely withdrawal of American troops from Iraq, as that would leave the situation much worse, but there is no chance of that happening on a serious scale regardless which candidate is elected. Both have indicated that depending on events on the ground, troops can start to properly withdraw from within 18 months of the new administration. There is no reason to believe that Mr Obama will be soft on international terrorism, given the emphasis he has put on fighting Al-Qaeda both in Afghanistan and also in Pakistan if necessary.

From a wider international context, after the Bush presidency, it would America better for Mr Obama to be elected than Mr McCain. In the same way that there was a benefit in Nicolas Sarkozy and Angela Merkel to succeed as president of France and chancellor of Germany respectively, as both were much more Atlanticist than their predecessors, the strained relations between Europe and the United States will be far better served if the candidate who is in a better position to improve these is elected. Mr McCain would certainly be an improvement on President Bush, and the United States and the Republican Party would be in a better position had he been successful in 2000, but from where things stand someone who clearly shares and espouses the common values between the two continents would be a large benefit.

Worse than Quayle
The main constitutional role of the vice president, other than resolving ties in the Senate, is to succeed to the presidency in the case of death, resignation or other permanent incapacity of the president. Most presidential candidates presumably pick their running mate with the assumption that such an event will not take place, but nine times since 1789 has this taken place, with Presidents Calvin Coolidge, Harry S Truman, Lyndon B. Johnson and Gerald Ford completing a term in the 20th century. The choice for vice president is perhaps the only decision made during a campaign that a candidate must continue with into their term in office if elected. The choices of Messrs McCain and Obama have typified their respective approaches to the campaign since securing the nominations. Showing that he is by no means a risky choice, Mr Obama chose the strongest but also the safest of those mentioned with Senator Joe Biden. He is knowledgeable and experienced in foreign affairs, even if he does have a tendency towards verbosity and gaffes (e.g., “The number one job facing the middle-class is a three letter word, jobs: J-O-B-S”).

Whatever can be said about Mr Biden, Mr McCain’s choice of Governor Sarah Palin is probably the strongest mark against his campaign. Given Mr McCain’s age, his choice of vice president was a little more relevant than it usually must be. Further, under Dick Cheney the role of the vice president has increased, and while this may not be permanent, we cannot know this will develop under future administrations. In what may have been just a media stunt to kill the coverage of Mr Obama’s convention speech in the news cycle, Mr McCain chose someone who was vastly unsuitable. It was not simply a question of the length of her experience, or whether it was executive or legislative, these are not the sole relevant criteria who vice presidential candidate. She is representative of the wilful ignorance that has plagued the Republican party in recent decades as well as their alignment to the evangelical Christians. As mayor of Wasilla, she discussed removing books from the town’s public library, she could not isolate a newspaper she reads in her interview with Katie Couric and she recently denigrated scientific work, specifically on genetic research on flies, not appreciating that research in one area can have wide implications for our knowledge. She was raised a Roman Catholic, but joined the Wasilla Assembly of God in later life. It is often best to avoid bringing a candidate’s religion into discussion, but it is relevant when it has implications on policy. She is open to schools teaching creationism as well as evolution, she has an extreme anti-abortion view, that would also prevent stem-cell research. She is skeptical that climate change has been caused by humans, so she is out of touch with scientific thought on many of these current issues. That Mr McCain would choose someone of this nature as his running mate shows the length to which he would go to appeal to the worst sections of the Republican base. It shows poor judgement on his part, and if this is what his once-deserved claim to be a maverick now amounts to, it is damning indictment.

The choice for commander-in-chief
Ultimately, the choice between the two is one of leadership, and throughout the campaign Mr Obama has shown himself to be capable to take the reins on January 20th, 2009. To come from near nowhere on the political scene to be almost certain of becoming president next week is no small achievement. Eight years ago he could not even get a floor pass to the Democratic National Convention; this year he beat the strong Clinton machine, one of the most formidable in recent times. By organizing his campaign well, he ensured that the votes were where he needed them from the beginning, and all the time he managed to stay calm and in control. This contrasts sharply with Mr McCain, whose campaign has been erratic since the summer, and has not shown the leadership qualities he was supposed to have espoused. Mr Obama’s nomination was historic given his mixed race, but throughout the campaign race was rarely an issue. That was to his credit, and as president, he will not be there as a black president. But it will help to normalize race relations, for a generation of children to grow up with someone who is not white as their president. He has also managed to survive a worse charge in American politics, of being an elitist and out of touch. He would represent a real shift, and play a transformational role in American politics, and his victory would also represent a victory for meritocracy. He the brighter and the better candidate, and if I had a vote, would choose him.

It was nice to read to the reaction to the note I wrote on Sen. Obama last week, and in responding briefly to these, I want to follow up on Stephen’s lengthy response in particular.

I can accept your point about bipartisanship, that what matters is the actual policies and bills, not token bipartisanship for its own sake. But that cant be said of the two most prominent acts of bipartisanship from McCain. In both of the cases, McCain deserves more credit than Feingold or Kennedy respectively, because they were taking a more politically safe option from their own background. My problem with Obama’s sparse record of bipartisanship is that despite a lot of his talk, he hasnt acted in a way that would be politically dangerous for him. Obviously this was difficult for him during his time in the Senate, as he was planning on stading for president from the time he was sworn in, but that didn’t stop McCain advocating the unpopular surge in Iraq.

An issue he could have taken to stand out from accepted Democratic orthodoxy would be on trade. I dont mean to say it’s the only one, only that it’s one (as you must have gathered) that I’m interested in, and having mentioned it in the last note, it leads me nicely to my next point. I dont believe Obama is any more a protectionist than President Clinton was, or that he’s much more so than I am myself. He could well be less of a protectionist than the current President Bush. My problem with him on this front is his rhetoric on the matter. That he was promising in the primaries to renogiate NAFTA while letting it be leaked that he was reassuring the Canadians that he make no significant change so that those of us who understand the problem with tariffs as a policy will know where he really stands was a genuine Scanton-San Francisco moment. He could have told the crowds that the failing of recent administrations was opening up trade without the appropriate safety net and transitional programs for those who would lose in the short term, thus addressing the real and legitimate concerns with the pace of globalization you mention. The reason Americans are more concerned with opening up of trade than most Europeans is because of the stronger social services in countries here, so that a European who loses a job due to it being relocated does not become as close to destitution as his or her American counterpart. (Thanks for that link on his economic policies, it was quite interesting).

On the religious question, it is obviously very difficult to know what Obama believes. If he was an agnostic and isnt telling us, he wouldnt make it clear in his memoir. Perhaps both Hitchens and I simply have a biased view and think that a man of his intelligence, having been brought up by atheist parents, would not become a Christian. It is sentences like “And it was in search of some practical application of those values that I accpeted work after college as a community organizer for a group of churches in Chicago that were trying to cope with joblessness, drugs, and hopelessness in their midst” and “I came to realize that without a vessel for my beliefs, without an unequivocal commitment to a particular community of faith, I would be consigned at some level to always remain apart” (p. 206) that made me think that Obama was a social liberal who found Trinity United to be the best way to connect with those who he was working with on the ground.

Given that, however, I will admit that I could be wrong. There is what I would call a Brideshead (and Hitchens, also a fan of Waugh, should know what I mean) moment two pages later, when he says “The questions I had did not magically disappear. But kneeling beneath that cross on the South Side of Chicago, I felt God’s spirit beckoning me”. One way or another, you mentioned something that I’ve brought up with you before, whether the influence of Christian churches on Obama’s policy could be harmful. He has proposed expanding the current faith-based initiatives started under the current President Bush to a formal Council for Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships. The more benign way of looking at this is that rather than have faceless bureaucrats dealing with those in need, they will get to meet someone in their own community who would probably be more in touch with their actual needs. Despite these good intentions, I worry about the precedent. While First Amendment violations could be rare in the one or two terms of an Obama presidency, that could be quite different under a religiously conservative president like Bush or Reagan. Those involved in churches could still be involved even without it explicitly in the title, so I believe the emphasis was an attempt to improve his credentials and lessen the impact of his clinging remarks (which was probably in turn an attempt to lessen the impact of his involvement with Trinity United).

I will give Obama credit for raising the depth of political debate, but my difficulties with him really come down to a gut feeling that he lacks honesty a lot of the time. Yes, you’re right that the hard-line position the Democrats have on abortion is ridiculous, my own views on the matter would probably class me as a conservative in their eyes. That whole discussion, however, just seemed to be another case of being economical with the truth, claiming to have voted against the Born Alive Bill because of it’s effect on Roe v. Wade, despite the proviso that bill had stating that it would not affect it.

A lot of this does come down to gut reaction, and many like you will say that at least on these counts, he is far better than most politicians America has had in recent times. But on what really matters, I’m with him. Were it simply a question of character, I’d favour Sen. McCain, but it is obviously about who I’d rather see implementing policy as President of the United States.

Thanks for the other comments as well. I had a feeling that other ex-Clinton supporters like Iain would feel the same way about him, but still on balance follow the Democratic ticket because of the issues. Then as to John, if I make a habit of these notes, as I hope to, I would like to come back to your argument that states should legislate for abortion, and why one way or other on the abortion question, with the Bill of Rights and other later Amendments, it should be determined at a federal level.

Originally written as a Facebook note
What I dislike about Obama, but why I will probably continue to back him
From the beginning of the election campaign last year, I felt inclined to align myself with a candidate, and when it became clear that the Democratic nomination was between Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton and Sen. Barack Obama, I backed Ms Clinton. This was partly because I admired how President Clinton handled the economy managing to eliminate deficits, much better than the supposedly fiscally responsible Republican Party during the Reagan years where there were deficits year after year. I would also be very much a Democrat with regard to my positions on so-called cultural issues, being strongly in favour of church-state separation, abortion rights, extending full marital rights to gay couples and taking the equivalent liberal views on other such issues.

The real question of this election, however, was whether to support Barack Obama. That one was in agreement with the direction of the two Clinton terms was for many no reason not to be enthusiastic about supporting Mr Obama, the new light in politics, the man needed to change the way politics is done in Washington. From the start, I wasn’t particularly enthusiastic. At first, what I didn’t like about him was that as early as 2004 when he made his speech to the Democratic National Convention, his aim in being in Washington at all was to get to the White House. Alan Greenspan joked when commenting on Nixon that he would like to propose a constitutional amendment saying, “Anyone willing to do what is required to become president of the United States is thereby barred from taking that office” and given the power one person holds if elected, the apprehension here is understandable. The point about Mr Obama’s lack of experience was that he exemplifies the careerist politician for whom any office is only a step to a higher office, who live in the world of the permanent campaign and who we never get to see what they would do legislating or governing. This is not to fault ambition; we undoubtedly need the brightest and most able politicians not to feel satisfied with lower offices than they are worthy of, but to say that before the people elect someone to a higher office, there should be time to observe them acting and voting outside of the glare of high media scrutiny, outside of the context of a campaign.

Mr Obama claims to represent a new kind of politics, and one might think listening to his eloquent speeches that he is a model of bipartisanship. He emphasizes that politics needs to move away from point-scoring and cross-party rivalry. Yet, he has not acted on this in practice, having sponsored no bill of worth a senator from across the floor, something both his rival for the Democratic nomination and his current rival for the White House in Sen. John McCain have done. On Mr Obama’s part, the reason for this was that as a Freshman Senator, and particularly one looking for presidential endorsements, he needed to get to know the fellow members of his party in the short time he had there since January 2005, so avoided stepping away from the party orthodoxy. In his years in the Senate, Mr McCain has worked with Democrats on particular issues, and provoked the ire of his fellow-party members with the Campaign Reform Act in 2002 which he wrote with the socially democratic Russ Feingold and with the immigration reform bill with Ted Kennedy which he championed into the time of the presidential debates last year. (It was amusing to hear one Republican speaker after another at their convention praise his bravery in standing up to the establishment, particularly the very opponents who had slammed him for those positions in the primaries). Even Sarah Palin in her short time as Governor of Alaska has acted with more bipartisanship in her strongly Republican state than has Mr Obama in his time in the United States Senate.

Then there are Mr Obama’s claims to represent a new kind of politics, without lobbying and special interests. Yet his voting record does not stand up to this. He voted for Bush’s now widely discredited Energy Policy Act in 2005, which cost that United States taxpayer by subsidises the economically and environmentally inefficient ethanol industry as a vain attempt to find a substitute for oil. The inefficiency of this method was not something that was known only in the past three years, and has been recognized for a while that it also compromises food production. The fact, however, that farmers in Mr Obama’s home state of Illinois was a factor in his support for this flawed bill. The question of global free trade is not by a great deal an open one in economics and most educated politicians know this, that the benefits of trade outweight any losses and that it is the country that allows more imports that benefits most. Despite this, in the first half of the year, while debating Ms Clinton, he continually stoked protectionist feelings among voters, while Mr McCain risked elections in Iowa and Michigan by telling them the truth that he should not and would not protect their local industries from outside competition. Now, having secured the nomination, Mr Obama casually dismisses his previous remarks by saying that language got overheated during the primary season.

This brings me on to my next point, about Mr Obama’s lack of honesty. It was Ms Clinton’s “Well, that depends on what your definition of sniper fire” moment that prompted me to stop backing her, as it shows quite an act of desperation to fabricate an entire event to show foreign policy experience. Mr Obama’s dishonesty is of a different sort. Arriving in Chicago to embark on a political career, and as far as I can tell from his second memoir, The Audacity of Hope, fairly much agnostic, he chose to attend Trinity United Church of Christ. Not just a middle-of-the-road episcopalian or methodist church but a megachurch with a slightly unstable pastor, that Mr Obama was able to conveniently cast aside after first claiming that it would be tantamount to disclaiming a family member. He is not open matters that could be divisive, with the weasel answer, “That’s above my pay grade” when asked difficult questions about abortion.

But when it comes to who I hope will be president in January, I have to return to my first paragraph. I wrote this to answer a few comments on my status indicating support for Mr McCain over Mr Obama, and thought writing a note better than a quick response. I am holding Mr Obama to a higher standard in many areas than I would perhaps other politicians, in large part because of the claims he makes for himself. Despite all I have written above, he is the Democratic nominee. I do trust Mr McCain more with the economy, and while I believe they would act largely the same with regard to Iraq, having advocated the surge in the first place, I think he deserves the credit for its success. But the economy will survive and as long as a serious depression is held at bay, in the long run, the policies of one or the other will not be so different in effect. What does matter in the long term are cultural issues. Mr McCain is not religious evangelical that Presidents Reagan or Bush were, but with the Supreme Court in such a delicate balance, where the retirement or death of one liberal Justice and the appointment of a conservative would put in the control of the latter section. In which case, a test case on Roe v. Wade could find it overturned, as well as changes affecting the separation of church and state. Antonin Scalia is the worst example, but when we have him justifying his support for the death penalty by stating that “few doubted the morality of the death penalty in the age that believed in the divine right of kings”, we can see why there is reason to fear the impact such theocrats can have given the influence they have in shaping the state of the culture of the United States. Not while there are far fewer such Justices on the Bench, and until the Republican Party rids itself of its evangelical wing (such a change is not impossible; the Democrats once had a racist and bigoted wing), could I comfortably support the Republicans. Yes, this does not affect me directly, but were I a United States citizen I would not support such government, despite economic concerns, and I do not think I could wish it on them, even if Mr McCain would be more secure for the Irish economy. And yes, in a country with school prayer and no abortion rights, it may seem hypocritical and irrelevant to complain of such changes across the water, but I can hope for the laws and Constitution of the United States to remain as a standard for ours to achieve.