A Political Glimpse from Ireland

I believe this is a special Independence Day for many people because they can feel the change in the air. No, this is not an Obama post but rather a post about the the changing world that we live in and how we can either fight these changes or accept them. Every July 4th, I am thankful for my time growing up in America as I would have not wanted to grow up anywhere else. Europe is great especially for a liberal like myself but nothing would beat a good hot dog, and some Baseball tonight.

On any Independence Day we should also remember the principle behind these days which is freedom. There are still many millions of people around the world who are not free and it should be the effort of every person to ensure that the world moves forward in its progress for freedom and equality for all. Another word also associated with Independence Days is “patriotism”.  Patriotism is defined in the American heritage dictionary:

Love of and devotion to one’s country.

Patriotism is a beautiful word but in recent years it has been used to divide America between those who oppose the war and those who support the war. This word should not be used for that because no matter if you oppose or support the war, you are still a patriot if you love America. Therefore I hope running up to the general election that we will hear no more nonsense about the patriotism of either candidate and that the media will focus on the issues at hand:

Happy Independence Day to all my friends in America, I really wish I was hanging out with you guys today.

The Economy is officially the number one issue on the minds of Americans given the new record price of oil today and other negative economic indicators. Analysts also point out, rightly so that it is the current party that takes the blame for a bad economy. John McCain is running for that party at the moment and he is going to have a hard time justifying current GOP policies that have not done any good for the American economy. Deregulation has allowed American companies to take advantage of the system to “cook the books” and create the current sub-prime crisis that sparked the global economic downturn. The Iraq war continues to cost the American people and future generations of Americans more money that they do not have. Tax cuts to the oil companies have done nothing to prevent the price of oil increasing to $145.44 cents as of today. Companies deserve a certain measure of freedom but you let a dog run free and you can guarantee he is going to  do some damage.

A recent Gallup poll show’s the negativity of each state with regards to the Economy:

This poll clearly indicates how important the economy is to the entire of the United States and the Gallup methodology is as sound as ever conducting a proportional amount of interviews with the States population. This news is the golden egg for Senator Obama because like I suggested above; Senator McCain is going to have a hard time explaining how his economic policies are going to change the economy. Conducting a quick calculation in terms of electoral votes, Senator McCain retains a total of 72 electoral votes based on every state with a negativity score of 55% or less. This would mean a decisive victory for Senator Obama in the most optimistic scenario but a victory none the less in the most pessimistic scenario.

The task for the McCain campaign is to craft an effective economic strategy that veers away from the current GOP set of policies but not so far that Senator McCain distances himself from the Republican base. That isn’t going to happen given this his lack of knowledge on economic issues:

A few of the blogs I visited today are talking about the disunity amongst the Democrats, I believe there is a certain portion of the Democratic base that feels that Senator Obama has betrayed liberal principles or that Hillary should have been the Democratic nominee. Given the political smarts the Obama campaign has on their side, I would ask the following question:

Why have the Obama campaign not urgently addressed this issue?

The only logical conclusion given the demonstrated political savvy of the Obama campaign is that the number crunchers have computed that this proportion of the democratic base is small and would not necessarily have an impact in the overall campaign. That does not mean Senator Obama has forgotten about some of the disgruntled democratic base but given the dwindling time before the general election, the Senator has a short amount of time to convince the so-called “left-leaning liberals” and “moderates” that he is the best person to be the next President of the United States.

Listening to some of my liberal friends in Massachusetts and the surrounding area, I realize that as Liberals we believe that a politician should embody only the principles that he believes in. Some of us want the perfect liberal president who says “No” to guns, religion in public places, and supports open borders. The reality for both sides of the political divide is that having a President that totally embodies liberal or conservative values would be detrimental to the United States. Given the size and vast political differences that span from West to East, a good President is someone that realizes he has to embody a vast number of principles, beliefs and values and makes the effort to do so.

As much trouble as some Democrats are having, the Republicans are having equally the same amount of trouble with some of the conservative base unable to get behind McCain policies on Immigration, Free Trade etc.. Both campaigns have their fair share of trouble but Senator McCain is in real trouble given the reorganization of his campaign today:

WASHINGTON - Senator John McCain’s presidential campaign has gone through its second shake-up in a year as Mr. McCain, responding to Republican concerns that his candidacy was faltering, put Steve Schmidt in charge of day-to-day operations and abandoned an effort to have the campaign run by 11 regional managers, the senator’s aides said Wednesday.

There are also a few Republican Strategists who believe Senator McCain is going to lose given his current strategy as demonstrated by the “Morning Joe” show on MSNBC:

I was having breakfast this morning when I stumbled upon a discussion Fareed Zakaria was having with a presenter on Sky News about his latest book entitled: “The Post-American World.” This is not an American bashing book otherwise I would not even think about mentioning but rather a critical look at the changing world we find ourselves in and how the United States needs to adapt to this new world order. I have not read the book otherwise I would have written a more comprehensive review but rather I did a quick Google Search after breakfast and found a speech given by Mr. Zakaria at the Commonwealth of California Club on May 27th, 2008. This speech is fairly long so I encourage you to break out the popcorn or at least some sort of snack, but it is most enlightening and informative in terms of content so please do watch the whole discussion.

The author makes a host of valuable points in this video and if I decided to talk about all of them, I would be forced to write another dissertation which I am not inclined to do so at this point. For the next few days I will touch on a few points that he has mentioned in more detail but for today I want to talk about the position of America in the world. It is an undisputed fact that the world is not what it used to be 20 years ago, America used to be the sole power on the global throne but is now forced to share that throne with the likes of China, India and Russia.

This is not a bad change as the author mentions but he correctly calls the media out for fanning the flames of anti-globalization. There are two phrases in this speech that really mean a lot to me: “inter-dependent” and “work together.” Too often every nation put’s its own national interest above those of the global village so much so that we have reached a stalemate with regards to the climate crisis because no matter how much the West goes green, the Indians and the Chinese are going to continue setting up coal power plants to meet the needs of their burgeoning economies. Discussion is never considered because the current administration only talks to countries whose actions affect the national interest which is not global warming since the GOP does not believe in that “hullabaloo.”

Mr. Zakaria suggests and I agree with him on this point that the leadership of America needs to work with the global powers to counter-act threats like global warming, terrorism, and economic depression. America also needs to treat everyone equally rather than holding a standard for it’s allies and a different standard for everyone else. It is throug this change in foreign policy and attitude that America will grow as well as those countries currently driving the global economy.

I may have mentioned this before but I am a gamer, was born that way I think, since one of my earliest memories involves me getting up at 4am to play this RPG on a 486 (A really old computer). Anyway I heard about the release of a new game by Stardock Games called the Political Machine 2008 and decided to give it a try. This game puts in you in the role as your candidates campaign manager where you get to decide where your candidate goes and how much he or she spends. I initially wanted to see an Obama/McCain match-up but you are not allowed to do that in campaign mode so I think I need to finish the whole game before I can play against a computer-controlled McCain. Here was my first matchup:

I was initially caught off guard by the complexity of this game as you are required to generate money, give speeches, and manage your opponent’s success. The hardest part of the game was figuring out what strategy to take; in this instance I decided to go for the big states and even tried to turn Texas blue but former President Grant refused to relinquish his hold on the state. With one week to go until the general election, this is what the polling data looked like:

The blue states show my likely wins while the red show former President Grant’s likely wins. Of course Senator Obama won. Here is the victory shot:

I defeated former President Grant decisively however it must be noted that it is going to get even more difficult as the game progresses. I also outspent him by $2 million dollars which begs the question in reality, does Senator Obama’s money edge give him a better chance of winning?

This game is by no means a comprehensive simulation but it gives me an idea of how important a role money can play in a campaign. Getting your message out there is critical and can really help change the minds of voters regarding a candidate.  One year ago, I would have said that Senator Obama needed all the money he could get to help spread awareness about who he is and what he stands for howoever awareness is not the issue at the moment. The current issue is the far-left feeling that Senator Obama has betrayed them when he has done what every other political candidate has done before him, move towards the center in order to ensure the greatest appeal to the largest number of voters. The key at the end of the day for us liberals is that we get a Democrat in office, is it not?