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Posts Tagged ‘US eletion’

Why Obama Won – part 1

Friday, November 14th, 2008

As promised, my amateur assessment of the reasons behind the Obama victory.

A clear and consistent message

US presidential elections are about creating a narrative – who your candidate is and what they’ll do for the country if you vote for them. The simplicity and consistency of the Obama message was one of the best performances in modern politics. What did Obama believe in? Change and Hope. It was a message he’d started refining in his magnificent speech at the 2004 Democratic Convention. It’s a great speech and a clear reminder of how powerful a tool speech-writing and oratory can be.

The McCain narrative was all about his past – his long service to the US in the military, his time in a prisoner of war camp, his seat at the table for many of the major political decisions of the last two decades. It was if they thought time was reversing and McCain was running to be president for 2008 to 2000.

Logistics

Politics mattered in this election. The politics of organisation, of fundraising, of securing volunteers mattered in this election.

The Howard Dean-driven strategy of competing in all states and in every possible county they could paid off big time. I read plenty of reports during the campaign that McCain offices would close early and remain shut on weekends because of a lack of volunteers while Obama offices would still be open until 7pm on weeknights and across the weekend. But more importantly, by refusing to give up on solidly Republican counties, the Democrats made their job easier in battleground states like Virginia and North Carolina. The Democrats could have easily decided to not establish offices or have volunteers in solidly Republican counties where the vote for Bush in 2004 had been in the order of 70% or 75%. But by setting up shop and working hard they managed to reduce the McCain vote in some of those areas to 55% or 60%. They mightn’t have won many of those types of places but that didn’t matter. The broad strategy meant narrowing

In this sense the prolonged primary race between Obama and Clinton helped the Democrats. Each time they went to a new state for a primary they attracted tens of thousands of new voters. The Democrats had access to all these extra names and addresses when the big show came to town. The Obama/Clinton contest had made the party stronger.

Obama’s decision to eschew public financing for his campaign was another political masterstroke. Although it probably delivered the death knell for public financing of’ presidential campaigns it had to be done. The Republican Party itself is still way ahead of the Democrats when it comes to fund raising. In this election the Republican Party raised $100 million more in political donations than their Democrat rivals. So the Obama camp made the strategic decision to ditch the guaranteed $85 million public finance limit and see how much they could raise on their own. This is entirely why Obama was able to outspend McCain three to one for the last month of the campaign.

Tomorrow: Age and Race as Indicators of Change, and The Palin Gambit and other McCain errors

Tags: US eletion
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An American election – part 5

Thursday, November 6th, 2008

The day after America elected its first African American president I decided to take a wander around Harlem. I took the above photo at the Apollo Theatre on West 125th St, where entertainers like James Brown, Stevie Wonder and Gladys Knight got their start.

The mood in Harlem was vibrant and enthusiastic. I talked to a few people and they were proud of the Obama (or “OB” as many referred to the president-elect) win. They were proud because they had voted for a candidate they wanted rather than just having to settle for a candidate who they thought was the lesser of two evils.

Stalls peppered the streets but there wasn’t much election paraphernalia on offer. Mostly it was just incense stall after incense stall but a few enterprising souls had t-shirts with a picture of Obama and a line saying “We did it”. My favourite was the t-shirt that said: “He’s my president. And he’s black.” (In the interests of full disclosure – I bought my Obama 08 hat yesterday).

I’m working on a post about the main reasons Obama won. I’ll hopefully have that up tonight or tomorrow.

Tags: US eletion
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An American election – part 4

Wednesday, November 5th, 2008

During the campaign for the 1999 republic referendum in Australia I worked in a political office. When people called to argue the case against giving our country an Australian head of state I often asked them whether they had a young son or daughter, or grand-child. Or a young niece or nephew.

If they said yes, I asked them whether they wanted that young boy or girl to have a chance to be their country’s head of state. Obviously it was a question designed to get a “yes” in response. Well, I’d say to them, you realise under our constitutional monarchy that young child is forbidden from becoming head of state.

It rarely made much of a difference – then again people who bother to call a political office are rarely willing to have their mind changed.

But watching the result of the US election makes me feel the same way. If a minority candidate with a strange name and a Kenyan ancestry can become US president maybe there’s hope for my daughter – born well after the 1999 republic referendum was lost – can become Australia’s head of state.

Here’s hoping.

Tags: US eletion
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An American election – part 3

Wednesday, November 5th, 2008

It’s over. Officially.

We spent the last four hours sitting in a dodgy New York bar with an Australian friend of ours watching results come in. While I was nervous for the first hour or so, I got increasingly excited as we saw the results in Pennsylvania, Virginia and Florida.

McCain’s concession speech is gracious but uninspiring. The Obama speech may be different and I wonder whether he’ll focus again on th slogan he ran on: “Change we can believe in.” A great theme to centre a campaign on.

Now it’s time to deliver.

Tags: US eletion
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An American election – part 2

Wednesday, November 5th, 2008

A quick update.

It’s 6pm in New York and we’re heading to a bar shortly to settle in for the night and watch the election results. The mood here is upbeat and very pro-Obama – as you’d expect from New York City.

I took the picture below at the entry to a polling booth about two hours after voting started this morning. The line you see goes to the end of the block, around corner and all the way down the block and around another corner. The wait was about an hour and a half when we went past. By the time we went back on our way home the line had gone, though there may be a post-work surge.

An Obama volunteer I spoke to said turnout was very strong and she had not previously seen lines this long at that polling station.

Polls in Virginia and Indiana close in an hour. If Obama wins those states and McCain can’t turn Pennsylvania around at 8pm the night will already be over for the Arizona senator. That’s change you can believe in.

Tags: US eletion
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An American election – part 1

Tuesday, November 4th, 2008

Last week when we walked out of the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art we were assailed by a young clipboard-laden woman asking us whether we’d be interested in helping rid the country of a bad government that had taken the country to war on false pretences. We were in a hurry so I simply said: “We’re from Australia and we did our bit and got rid of our government last year.”

Tomorrow it’s America’s turn.

Almost every American I spoke to was an Obama support and almost all of them were still concerned about how the vote would go. I am not. Obama has been in front of McCain in every national poll for six weeks. He is not in danger of losing any of the states John Kerry won when he tried to dethrone George W Bush in 2004 and he’s ahead in about a dozen battleground states. Polls are a science and they will not be that wildly inaccurate but like the 2007 Australian election that sent John Howard packing it’s not in the media’s best interest to say it’s all over too soon.

Tonight we arrive in New York and I’m going to scope out a few bars that might be suitable to watch the election in tomorrow night. I’ll try to post as regularly as I can and capture some of the mood before and after the vote tomorrow.

Tags: US eletion
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Posts Tagged ‘US eletion’

Why Obama Won – part 1

An American election – part 5

An American election – part 4

An American election – part 3

An American election – part 2

An American election – part 1

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