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Bliss was it in that dawn to be alive!
Ah, well, hope is a good breakfast.

Brian, we may have found a deep metaphysical truth that we agree on.

The breakfast bit I mean.

GV

Can we reduce the size of the picture. We get the point. He won. Now America can go bomb a different set of countries.

GV

And I'll bet historians will look back and blame Iraq and the bamking crisis - McCain dipped just as Lehman collapsed. Palin's a convenient scape-goat for Republicans.

GV

Graham:

Now, steady one. America is a 'peace-loving nation'. Bush said it. So has every President in every era that they have attacked or invaded or violated the sovereignty of another country. All in the cause of peace, you understand.

Steady one should, of course, be steady on.

BTW:

The quote "Hope is a good breakfast, but it is a bad supper" is from the divine Francis.

Congrats to Barak. I'm pleased he won.
I don't want this to seem mean spirited but is it any less racicist to vote for a candidate because of his colour than not to vote for a candidate because of his colour?

Can we PLEASE downsize the picture? I've a religious objection to icons.

Picture downsized. The original size was an error caused by lack of sleep rather than a political or iconographical statement.

The true tests of his worth will be how quickly (or indeed whether) he closes the US detention camp in Guantanamo Bay; if he ends the torture of political prisoners both directly by agents of his own government and vicariously by agents of US client states; and whether he makes available to British justice the names of British agents who have participated in such activities - given that of-course British citizens can be made pay for their actions before international courts. Even better, it would be nice to see America subject its own citizens to such sanctions. Sorry to be a misery guts but I'm not holding my breath for a full house.

I wouldn't call it a landslide. Not the way Johnson beat Goldwater, Nixon beat McGovern, or Reagan beat Mondale. The winner take all system of the electoral college (with rare exception like Nebraska) is designed to exaggerate the importance of smaller states so a big win in the electoral college doesn't necessarily reflect huge differences in the popular votes.



Compare the differences in the elections I cited in the link above and you'll see what I mean.

Many factors conspired against McCain. The economy was certainly one of them (although there was more than enough blame to go around for both parties on that one) Palin was another, the country being fed up with the Republicans and wanting a change is another. Ironically the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and US foreign relations was not a significant factor. But the expectations of Obama may be far greater than what even a competent individual could deliver. This tyro is intelligent but he'd better win the Guiness book of records for climbing the steepest climb which will be his learning curve or we are all in for a disaster. That's what I'm expecting. In fact that is what my financial planning is counting on. I saw all this including the economic collapse of the world coming although I underestimated its size. Why did the Dow drop 500 points today? In expectation of higher capital gains taxes. The Democrats tax the rich policy will not help the economy. They would be far better off with lots of inflation and printing lots of money which is their usual mode of handling recessions the Republicans create.

Marcus- The definition of a landslide in the U.S. is 60 percent or more of the electoral college. Obama qualifies; it's a landslide.

John Wright, you have your definition, I have mine.

Now a landslide is a relative term? Can we argue that Obama lost? You've your definition of a win and I have mine?

GV

Marcus, time to eat your words, isn't it? This is one of the biggest landslides in American history!

If Obama won each of the fifty states by one vote, by the definition of some people that would have been a landslide, he'd have taken all of the electoral votes. In fact, he would have won by fifty votes out of over 130 million cast. Is that a landslide? Well that depends on whose definition of landslide you use but it isn't by mine.

I said here about a year ago, that Obama would not win. I was wrong. I never imagined the old saw which has it that nobody ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American people would prove so true.

I know a lot of you like Barack Obama for quite a number of reasons. I like him too but not for President of the United States, at least not right now. We'll see just how much you still like him once he's had a chance to demonstrate how he handles the office. So far all he's proved is that he could win the election against a candidate and a party that had all of the cards stacked against them and made one blunder after another. He also proved his strategy of winning against Hillary Clinton by going after the caucus states in the primaries worked. Let's hope he's as formidable an adversary when he sits across the table from Vladimir Putin or Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.