Â鶹¹ÙÍøÊ×Ò³Èë¿Ú

Hmmm. You pulled out one of two articles you ever published on the Canadian federal election, as 'evidence' of your coverage of the whole of North America.

Canada is a G7 country, main trading partner of the biggest economy on earth, a major oil supplier, a NATO member, with armed forces in Afghanistan. Yet your North American Correspondent has not sent a single report from there.

Mexico has the third biggest population in the western hemisphere, and its' recent crime and drugs stories have a direct resonance to the USA. Yet your North American Correspondent has not sent a single report from there.

Contrast your airtime for Canada with the airtime for Australia - a smaller country, further away, with less economic clout; yet Nick Bryant makes a living from blogging there every week on your behalf.

The evidence that you treat the rest of North America in a proportionate way with the USA does not stack up.

we ignore canada but as a quiet world power the canadians have worked hard to achieve there position and i am pleased they get little attention becouse it may well damage the work they do.
there only error was scrapping the avro arrow before it went online infavour of more expensive american missiles that were useless.
go canada go.

Still no explanation of why the 'Palin is guilty' report was on page one a while back but today's 'Palin is innocent' report is hidden away.

Obviously this will result in many people hearing that a report found her guilty, but not being aware of the latest one exonerating her - resulting in them having a false impression of events.


Is this deliberate?

jon112uk:

Still no explanation of why the 'Palin is guilty' report was on page one a while back but today's 'Palin is innocent' report is hidden away.

I saw the link on the front page yesterday as well as in the ticker.

Today... well that should be obvious, shouldn't it? Just as it is with all the other news outlets. The big day takes over. What do we expect, with the Alaska Personnel Board releasing this news just hours before people head to the polls?

4. dotconnect

"I saw the link on the front page yesterday as well as in the ticker."

Can't disagree with you, all I can say is 'not when I read the front page' - maybe later.

Other news sources were covering the 'exoneration' (which I give no greater status than the 'guilty' report) today.

Some days I've seen 4-5 items on Obama, zero on McCain on here. I think the way the election was covered with it's own page - read it in detail if you want, ignore it if you don't - was an excellent idea. Unfortunately only Obama (or Palin) seemed to make it onto the main pages.

At one point I met someone who thought Obama was president, having beaten Clinton. She had never heard of McCain.

Maybe he is the 'new JFK' (I dont know, I'm a bit cynical about ALL politicians including Obama) however IMHO I'd have liked the coverage to be a bit more even.

OK. I'm back from working the polls, and I have the results ready to post. (in case you wish to verify them, they can be checked out at www.scvotes.org . Under the election results section, look under Greenville County and the Spring Forest precinct.) I've also added the difference between the 2004 results by comparison:

President:
McCain 630 (-36 from Bush 2004)
Obama 447 (+101 from Kerry 2004)
Baldwin 11 (+6 from Peroutka 2004)
Barr 4 (+3 from Bandarik 2004)
Nader 4 (+2 from Nader 2004)
McKinney 2 (+0 from Cobb 2004)

Greenville County is one of the most Republican counties in the state, so it's no surprise that McCain would win it. However, McCain getting fewer votes than Bush is not a good sign for his general appeal, and while Obama's gains are rather significant.
The turnout was almost 100 more people than in 2004.

Uh, Jon112uk, the current report was from the Alaska Personnel Board. Its three members were appointed by Palin's predecessor, but one was renominated by Palin and another donated to her campaign. The board's leading investigator worked on handling the bonds forthe Wasilla Hockey Complex when Palin was Mayor. Far from an independent report, this report appears to me to be pure CYA for Palin. A truly independent report was the legislative report of a few weeks ago, in which ten Republicans and six Democrats unanimously found that Palin had broken ethics rules. In addition their findings contradicted many of Palin's sworn statements, raising the possibility of perjury.

7. Orvillethird

"...truly independent report was the legislative report of a few weeks ago..."



Thats fine. I'm happy for people to tell me about that. That would have made interesting reading in a detailed item about the new report.

I just like to hear both sides of the story, not have people tell me one half to influence my opinion.

Well the Â鶹¹ÙÍøÊ×Ò³Èë¿Ú coverage this morning was truly abysmal. We had endless soundbites from black americans and very smart looking white men with very camp accents saying they voted Obama and one woman who looked half human half frog croaking she voted McCain. Given that nearly 50% of the US voted McCain its hardly a balanced view.

In addition to that we switched constantly between 4 or 5 Â鶹¹ÙÍøÊ×Ò³Èë¿Ú reporters who all confirmed that Obama has still won. Sadly all your US correspondents seem too busy partying to spare more than a second to mention the plane that crashes in Mexico city killing the mexican interior minister.

On the plus side if the Â鶹¹ÙÍøÊ×Ò³Èë¿Ú is to be believed the credit crunch is over and we have peace in the middle east... after all wasn't that what a vote for Super-Obama was meant to deliver?

#5 "Maybe he is the 'new JFK' "

God I hope not. JFK was the son of a hitler supporting English hating anti-semite who made his billions selling bootleg whisky during prohibition. JFK won the election by having the mafia and teamsters swing Illinios (and all this is on record- I've even heard the tapes of Joe Kennedy talking to the dons about this so the mods needn't worry about defamatory statements)

When in office Kennedy presided over the cuban missile crisis, bay of pigs fiasco tried killing Castro about 40 times, started the Vietnam war and still had time to cheat on his wife with several mistresses including Marilyn Monroe.

Nixon was a saint in comparision!

Well the Â鶹¹ÙÍøÊ×Ò³Èë¿Ú got their man huh.....

Now it will be interesting to see just how accurately the honeymoon is reported.

I don't buy into the culture of "first black president" because, in a truly integrated society, it does not matter one iota. Obama is a politician - he is most certainly not the average black man on the street whose life may not change one little bit for the better in the next four years. I am really dismayed at the league of people who keep harking back to MLK because his dream was not to have a black man in the White House it was to have a country where the colour of your skin or the ethnicity you inherit are immaterial to what happens to you in your life. If anyone seriously believes this election will make that difference then I feel they are consumed by hype.

If anyone from the Â鶹¹ÙÍøÊ×Ò³Èë¿Ú is reading this - can you at least try and make an effort to pretend to be impartial !?

I am very pleased that Obama has won, but then I am not a 'journalist'. The radio has been quite measured, but TV seems to be in a 'love-in' mode at the moment with Jane Hill seeming particularly excitable.

This is an 'historic' moment, but surely we have a right to expect some circumspection here ? No problem with Justin Webb's laid-back approach - but the ginormous caravan of people they have transplanted from the UK seem lamentable, to my relatively untrained eye...

What do others think ??

USO8 is a major story,BUT, in the next 2 years a bigger "story" will be presented to the public....

Bush jr signed the "security and prosperity partnership of north america"...aka the north american union..on 23march2005..in waco texas....

usa,canada and mexico join in a union (like the EU), with a single currency called the "AMERO"......

is there really "democracy", when Mr Obama (is told to)bring this in, or are the public just been mocked...

kind regards
nomorefakenews

#13 do you have ANY other topic than your delusions about 'amero's'?

Its not so much nomorefakenews as nomorenewsofanysortjustconspiracyrants

Buying a "pig in a poke" is always dangerous and it is sad to see the Â鶹¹ÙÍøÊ×Ò³Èë¿Ú and the young people of the USA get carried away on a wave of hysteria over Obama. This is NOT a historic moment - it happens every four years - and it will not consume the USA with a new haze of optimism for very long.

That the USA can produce two such poor candidates for their "top" office tells its own story and I feel the Â鶹¹ÙÍøÊ×Ò³Èë¿Ú could do an awful lot more to cover this story with a degree of pragmatism instead of the same "PC euphoria" that accompanied Tiger Woods and Lewis Hamilton.

Integration is the acceptance that we are all the same on this planet - Obama to his credit actually said this - and the Â鶹¹ÙÍøÊ×Ò³Èë¿Ú would do well to pay attention to his words, come down from their high, and get on with the job of objective reporting. You may also wish to get all your freebie journalists back from the USA PDQ.

#3

The Â鶹¹ÙÍøÊ×Ò³Èë¿Ú don't do "fair and balanced" anymore.

Palin's decimation at the hands of the pro-Obama movement was largely unjustified as were some of the more vicious diatribes set against her. That the Â鶹¹ÙÍøÊ×Ò³Èë¿Ú have shown such a lack of balance (even last night on the Â鶹¹ÙÍøÊ×Ò³Èë¿Ú1 overnight coverage which was largely an Obama love in) will not be forgotten by me and I'll be ramming down the throats of the journalists on these blogs when Obama's honeymoon is over.

Simply put neither McCain nor Obama were worthy candidates for presidency and I feel it will not be long before the vast majority of Americans realise what a rod for their own backs they have created as a result of this election.

But my real concern is that the Â鶹¹ÙÍøÊ×Ò³Èë¿Ú have completely forgotten how to be impartial. So bad is this amnesia that they haven't even got the courage to admit that their coverage was biased.

Perhaps the Daily Mail have finally got through to that solitary brain cell the Â鶹¹ÙÍøÊ×Ò³Èë¿Ú has become.

#14 hello again peter, you really don't like my posts do you? check this out.....

Dr Robert A Pastor who was the co chair of the "council of foreign relations"(CFR) in 2005 he said words to the effect...

"Introducing the AMERO single currency as a monetary foundation of macro economic cooperation among the three NAFTA (north american free trade agreement)countries"

also in his book "Toward a North American community" published 2001 he stated...

"In the long term the AMERO (currency)is in the best interests of all three countries(usa,canada and mexico)"

consPIRACY rants, i don't think so!just facts!

kind regards
nomorefakenews

Stayed up till 4am last night watching your coverage.

Overall - good - but a few minor and one major gripe:

Minor:
- The grapics - impressive looking but a bit tempramental. I take it this was a run out of the software you will be using in the next UK election?

- I'm not sure it was necessary to fly over so many junior reports to essentially report the same thing, but from different locations.

Major gripe:

David Dimbleby. I'm sorry, but it was far from his best performance - he was disappointing on the US Question time as well. Is he passed his sell by date? He seemed poorly briefed and confused for most of the night - however his most unforgivable lapse was not sticking up for his colleagues during the deranged ranting from John Boulton.

Boulton's discraceful bullying of the report in Arizona (who had the timerity to suggest that the selection of Palin had put off many independent voters - a fair point given that it point off several high profile Republicans) and ludicrous call for the sacking of a junior reporter due to his 'obvious left-wing bias' - should have been forcefully rebutted.

Paxman wouldn't have been so spineless.

The reporting is still slanted.

The votes at 62.5m to 55.4m - hardly a landslide.

Beware of repeating the mistake you made in May 1997 when the "new dawn" arrived in the UK.

A little more critical reporting and a little less lapping up the scraps tossed to you by Mandelson and Campbell might have avoided some of the wilder extremes of bias displayed by the Â鶹¹ÙÍøÊ×Ò³Èë¿Ú in those years.

I noticed something quite ironic and mildly amusing following John McCain's farewell speech.

As he left the stage waving and smiling, a film score ran subdued in the background. A moving and distinct piece of music which matched the tone and feelings of the moment perfectly (in more ways than one!).

My girlfriend thought it was from Star Wars (!) but in fact it was from 'Crimson Tide' where a sophisticated and eloquent black Commander of a US nuclear submarine rallied and overcame the grizzled and blinkered Captain to save the world!

I know Americans aren't known for their sence of irony (and forgive me if this has been picked up already) but you couldn't make it up could you! Maybe that was US Navy John McCain's passing gift.

I was very disappointed this morning to have the whole of the Today programme from 6.00, until I left for the office at 6.50, (apart from 15 minutes business news) taken up with the American election. Enough is enough!

John Bolton's bullying rant at the Â鶹¹ÙÍøÊ×Ò³Èë¿Ú was pathetic, and the sign of sour grapes. Anyone claiming that McCain's mistake was in not moving further to the right deserves to be challenged given all the evidence to the contrary. At least Katty Kay had a chance to call him on it. And much as I'd liked to have seen Bolton put in his place following his rant at your other correspondent (I forget his name), I suppose Dimbleby's restraint in rising above it was admirable.

Gore Vidal did another great job of presenting himself as the most pompous man on the planet. Age is no excuse, Mr Vidal. You provided some laughs anyway, even if they were at you rather than with you.

On the whole, I thought the Â鶹¹ÙÍøÊ×Ò³Èë¿Ú's TV coverage was a bit below par to be honest. People visible hiding behind a chair, echoes, loss of sound, on screen graphics obstructing speaking commentators, Times Square displayed as "Time" Square, some inane questioning (Asking a black couple what will it mean if Obama wins; their reply: it will be historic. Â鶹¹ÙÍøÊ×Ò³Èë¿Ú follow-up question: "why will it be historic?" - !!) I suppose part of that comes with any live broadcast on this scale, but it was hard not to prefer Alistair Stewart's coverage over on ITV, even though it was more pared down.

The website coverage though has - as always - been spot-on. Cannot fault that at all.

Regarding post #13 - those of you who say the Â鶹¹ÙÍøÊ×Ò³Èë¿Ú is siding with Obama should look at the comments made on Justin Webb's blogs which accuse him of siding with McCain throughout the campaign.

It makes both sets of accusations look laughable.

#17 I think you mean post singular. You have a mono-topic of posting in every damn blog on this site.

The really funny reason is that I actually think a common US currency and free borders between Mexico the US and Canada makes huge sense. What irritates me is the massive sense of drama mixed in your matrix fantasies about 'reality' you use to describe a thoroughly dull idea. Europe hasn't exactly done badly from switching to the Euro has it?

#20. What are the chances of that happening by accident? Less than none. It sounds to me like McCain having a little laugh and having seen the polls and how yesterday was likely to pan out it was pre-prepared. Of course the thing about Crimson tide is that both the captain and black exec officer were equally in the wrong (or in the right depending on your POV). Its a suprisingly intelligent film by hollywood standards.

"Palin's decimation at the hands of the pro-Obama movement was largely unjustified as were some of the more vicious diatribes set against her."

Let's see:
She believed that the Iraq War was a task sent from God, which I consider blasphemy.
She asked people to pray for a gas pipeline to be built, while she broke the law so a company with connections to her can get it.
She broke ethics laws and claimed innocence. (Contrary to her approved Personnel Board, she did violate ethics laws, according to the Alaska Legislative panel (10 Republicans, 6 Democrats- all unanimous. They also found numerous things she said to be false, raising the specter of perjury.)

Finally, the Obama campaign did not attack Palin a tenth as much as Palin attacked Obama.

(Disclosure: I'm no Obama supporter. If Palin deserves impeachment, then Biden deserves it as much or more, due to his lies about Iraqi WMD in 2002, and his stacking the deck for war.)

I absolutely agree with number 18. David Dimbleby seemed on several occasions to have no idea what was going on. Then when interesting comments were made that could have started a good debate he just passed over them and moved on. I did have to laugh though when his face was left on behind Jeremy Vine as he had a rant at the disastrous technical mishaps during the programme's intro.

#25. Its a peculiar phenomena of US presidential elections that the two presidential candidates don't attack each other. The negative campaigning is the job of the VP candidates and Palin did her job (being a pitbull wearing lipstick) very well. What I noticed (or rather didn't) was that this election was Obama v McCain-Palin. Bidden seems to be the invisible man at least on the Â鶹¹ÙÍøÊ×Ò³Èë¿Ú.

Your list regarding Palin's 'shortcomings' seems fair enough, but I'd suggest its a fairly minor list compared to most politicians. If thats the worst muck that can be raked on her she's far cleaner than most. Imagine the list you could compile on Cheney???

I'm not sure who said 'the only people who can become president of the US are the people who shouldn't' but its pretty accurate.

Obama is a snappy new label on the same old product. Zbig Brother lurks in the background (Brezinzki) and the war machine still whirrs in the backroom...

Once everyone comes down off their sugar high - I suspect disillusionment will settle in fairly quickly, especially as Biden is talking up some strange 'event' that he says 'will' challenge O within 6 months...

Colon Powell and Condi Rice are also darker-hued - and both turned out to be neo-con dissemblers of the first order: Condi with her 'mushroom clouds' and and Powell with his show-and-tell vials in the UN that helped usher in an illegal war.

I thought the coverage was weak. The party in Times Square was awful and I thought the presenters seemed pretty biased towards Obama. I much prefer my coverage to be more even-handed.

Particular annoying comments included:

Justin Webb talking about Obama's black children running around the White House - which seemed patronising and irrelevant.

Jon Sopel in Virginia asked the Republican representative to explain the Bradley effect - and then asked him if he was hoping that this would happen in Virginia. Basically - that is accusing the Republican (who seemed like a nice enough person) of being racist and hoping people would vote for their candidate because he had white skin.

There seemed to be many more borderline accusations of racism against the Republicans throughout the show - which were unnecessary.

John Bolton is wheeled out as a token Republican - when his views are extremely neo-con in nature. There are other sensible Republicans who better represent McCain's position in the party.

Having said all this - I was hoping that Obama would win - I just wish the Â鶹¹ÙÍøÊ×Ò³Èë¿Ú staff had hidden their preferences and reported the news factually. They need to get some practise before the next General Election.

The Â鶹¹ÙÍøÊ×Ò³Èë¿Ú1 US08 Election Night programme fronted by David Dimbleby can be described in one word - dull. I channel hopped all night, and found that Sky News had quite a fast paced, and informative prog with some decent interviewees. ITV's had a more 'homely' feel and a simplicity to it that worked quite well.

In comparison, the Â鶹¹ÙÍøÊ×Ò³Èë¿Ú prog was just pretty drab and dysmal. Dimbleby not on good form combined with a poor choice of guests. Some of the reporting was just a waste of time. Maybe too many cooks (Â鶹¹ÙÍøÊ×Ò³Èë¿Ú reporters) spoilt the broth? Perhaps the Â鶹¹ÙÍøÊ×Ò³Èë¿Ú should try to do less but do it better?

Hopefully you'll get it sorted out by the time of the next UK election!

sirjohnwood # 28 - So cynical for one so young ! but you are right..

Is it true that ONE HUNDRED AND SEVENTY FIVE of your Â鶹¹ÙÍøÊ×Ò³Èë¿Ú staff were in the States ??

Er, why ? I speak as a fan of the Â鶹¹ÙÍøÊ×Ò³Èë¿Ú but that seems an astonishing amount of 'overkill'.

The 'too many cooks' may have spoiled the broth, and you may want to have a think about that for the General Election coverage.

And while I didn't watch enough of the TV coverage to feel justified in giving David Dimbleby a kicking, I do feel his pompous and smug presentation style on Question Time make me question whether he's past his sell by date. Trouble is you're probably stuck with him.

What about the Daily Politics team of Brillo et al ? They would do fine work, probably at half the price.

Mind you, to end on a high note, anything which annoys John Bolton that much can't be all bad.

When will the TV coverage include the topics mentioned in your article. I mean coverage not a summary headline?

#11, MeACoalPit wrote:

I don't buy into the culture of "first black president" because, in a truly integrated society, it does not matter one iota. Obama is a politician - he is most certainly not the average black man on the street whose life may not change one little bit ... If anyone seriously believes this election will make that difference then I feel they are consumed by hype.

YouACoalPit, you're entirely right in all of this, but it seems that you don't understand the culture in the states. There is, not always, but very often, the presumption of racism: everywhere. A black man tries to get a refund and is denied because he lacks his receipt? Very often, he assumes it's due to racism. He is denied a promotion? He assumes it's due to racism. And that's very destructive:

It's destructive because the assumption is that this simply must be accepted; and if not the most available method of fighting it is to accuse the decision-maker of racism; which is a conversation that rarely goes well; and then the white decision maker, who maybe was just following the rules, is bent out of shape for days because he has been accused when in fact he was doing his job in a color-blind fashion; and then he's half-liable to start muttering about blacks feeling entitled; it's a real mess.

And that's only one dimension of it; there are a number of different kinds of things that can go wrong, especially when you consider that some whites are racist, and some blacks are too.

Obama's presidency demonstrated, once and for all, that race need not limit you: that, yes, it may create obstacles, but that those obstacles are surmountable. And, quite simply, a majority of Americans are sufficiently not racist that when they want a man to be their President, the fact that he's black does not disqualify him in their eyes.

As you say, it does not demonstrate that America is post-racial, but it does demonstrate that America is at least 51% post-racist.

-FreeClench

27. At 4:15pm on 05 Nov 2008, Peter_Sym wrote:

#25. Its a peculiar phenomena of US presidential elections that the two presidential candidates don't attack each other. The negative campaigning is the job of the VP candidates and Palin did her job (being a pitbull wearing lipstick) very well. What I noticed (or rather didn't) was that this election was Obama v McCain-Palin. Bidden seems to be the invisible man at least on the Â鶹¹ÙÍøÊ×Ò³Èë¿Ú.

Yes, exactly: so that the Presidential candidate doesn't need to dirty his hands, the VP candidate takes care of it. I don't know how effective that is, since a VP who resorts to sufficiently dirty tricks will alter the public perception of the ticket anyway...

Joe Biden was kept deliberately quiet, and carefully coached not to be hostile to Palin. He didn't need to be hostile to Palin; Palin was an incoherent mess. If he had commented on it, though, that would have risked rallying people to her side. Americans like to protect hockey-moms.

Your list regarding Palin's 'shortcomings' seems fair enough, but I'd suggest its a fairly minor list compared to most politicians. If thats the worst muck that can be raked on her she's far cleaner than most. Imagine the list you could compile on Cheney???

The fundamental problem with Palin was that she could not give coherent answers to Katie Couric's questions -- I mean, she could not speak in complete sentences; she could not name a single Supreme Court case other than Roe v. Wade (which made abortion legal if regulated); and she could not name a single newspaper that she read.

Perhaps the Â鶹¹ÙÍøÊ×Ò³Èë¿Ú didn't cover this out of pity: Couric asked her, "What is your favorite newspaper?" and Palin replied, "There are a number of newspapers I enjoy reading." Couric asked, "Well, could you name one of them?" Palin stared at her.

For a long time.

Palin was young and attractive, but once it became clear that she didn't know her stuff -- that she couldn't function in any of the contexts or capacities required of a VP, that began working against her.

Finally, although it wasn't covered much in the press, it came out that Palin belonged to a weird fundamentalist Christian church -- you have to understand that these are alive and well in the heartland of the US, often predicting that any minute now Jesus Christ will come as a consequence of nuclear global Ragnarok -- and video was released where an African witch hunter told the audience they needed to focus more on inflitrating the government, told them to pray for Sarah Palin, and then brought her on stage where he laid his magic hands on her.

You can find this quite easily on YouTube.

While Americans do believe, mostly, that we shouldn't discriminate against people on religious belief, her candidacy did not strike many of us as a promising way to ensure our beloved separation of church and state.

(Also, she advocated absitance-only sex education but had a pregnant 17-year-old daughter and her husband apparently belonged to an Alaskan secessionist movement; which was so ludicrous nobody really wanted to credit it with discussion, but from what I can tell had at least some basis in fact.)

So, in sum, she was bad in all the ways that W. was bad -- a religious nut; one who hired a-competent personal church friends to positions of great power; verbally incoherent; demonstrating no substantial intellectual ability when put on the spot -- only much more so. That, in combination with McCain's age and regrettable history of health problems, made her a poor candidate.

-FreeClench

#25

Palin is a politician who has lived on the edge to make it in a State where tough goes with the territory. Like most politicians, including Obama, she has dirty hands - so what?

The measure of the bias can be seen on the number of news entries relating to Obama's running mate compared to Palin who was seen as fair game given her stated vices and political weaknesses.

That does not make her a "risk" any more than Obama is a "risk". Indeed I suspect Obama will be the dampest squib for the many Americans who somehow see him as a shining beacon. Unfortunately for him the hype will last less time than his term of office.

But my real concern over Palin was the obvious resort to panning her gender referring to her as a "beauty queen", "hockey mum", "good looking" etc etc. Shades of this same "image" lead judgment of character has bedeviled the whole campaign and that is why I observe that two worse candidates for the White House could not have been found. Is that the depth to which US politics have plummeted?

#34. I'm not going to disagree with your assesement but don't forget by european standards at least nearly 50% of the US are 'religious nuts' and in a democracy you should be able to vote for the candidate who represents you best.

What I find very hypocritical on these blogs is the number of Europeans who will abuse Palin, W Bush etc about very aspect of their beliefs but who will simultaneously rant at anyone suggesting that the Iranian president with his belief in the 'hidden Imman' is a dangerous fundamentalist.

#33

So you are saying that racism in the USA is different to racism elsewhere - you are having a laugh!!!

The principal reason why anyone should assume "racism" in any given situation is because the two people at the heart of the disagreement are different. That is also at the root of sexism, of religious bigotry, of fat versus thin, of tall versus short. If we want to get delicate about a "difference" it means that we haven't grown up and so we resort to the difference. The big difference for people with physical differences is that neither can hide from the other, not should they want to.

Racism is a part of the huge game of scapegoat, victim, unworthy, unloved, uncared for. Unfortunately for us all this masks true racism where there is a deliberate act BECAUSE of the difference and no other reason.

Obama's accession has already lead to arguments about whether he is "truly" black and so we can already see signs of the fragile premise upon which the hype has been built. My argument is that the whole thing is outrageously unhealthy and yet our media are thumping it out like there is no tomorrow.

I'll repeat - it is not momentous. It is just another presidential election. In four years time you can tell me I was wrong or I will blog and willingly admit to it.

"The principal reason why anyone should assume "racism" in any given situation is because the two people at the heart of the disagreement are different."

Everyones different. I agree with #33 that there is too much percieved racism, especially in the US although it is getting more common in the UK. There are far too many employment tribunals investigating allegations of racism that simply do not exist: for instance if 1 black man and 3 white men go for a job interview then the black guy should only have a 25% chance of getting the job (presuming similar skills experience etc) yet all too many are screaming racism when they don't get appointed etc.

You only have to trawl back through the Â鶹¹ÙÍøÊ×Ò³Èë¿Ú blogs to see how many predicted Obama would lose because he was black. The perception was quite different to the truth.

24# oh dear peter!check this lot out!

May I suggest you obtain the book by (aledgedly written by him) the propagandist H G Wells called "The Open Conspiracy" (1933)written on behalf of,
"intellectual intelligencia",
"the establishment",
"the guardian class"
"the elitists",
"the banksters",
"the aristocratic families"
"the new world order".. etc...

the book (a blueprint for a agenda) is only 159 pages, if read from the perspective that we live in a micro managed society and we are not evolving, but simply living through a "script", and the end goal is what he calls a "world commonweal" which is a WORLD GOVERNMENT/single currency/one religion/interdependance on the state etc....the public have no say whatsoever......

Money/commerce is a con game and a simple trick, a deception by "privately" owned central banks...The word "money" does not appear on UK/USA banknotes only "a promise" to pay or "for debts", your belief in the system seals your fate!

kind regards
nomorefakenews

36. At 08:32am on 06 Nov 2008, Peter_Sym wrote:

#34. I'm not going to disagree with your assesement but don't forget by european standards at least nearly 50% of the US are 'religious nuts' and in a democracy you should be able to vote for the candidate who represents you best.

48 or 49% of the US *are* religious nuts, and they *did* vote for the candidates who represented them best; as this election and W.'s elections demonstrated.

What I find very hypocritical on these blogs is the number of Europeans who will abuse Palin, W Bush etc about very aspect of their beliefs but who will simultaneously rant at anyone suggesting that the Iranian president with his belief in the 'hidden Imman' is a dangerous fundamentalist.

Frankly, I don't know enough about the Iranian President to speak to that: but W. was, and still is, a very dangerous character. Whether that's through gross incompetence, pitiable stupidity, blind religiousity, or class bigotry I can't tell: but our just-retired General Eaton was so appalled at W.'s mishandling of US foreign policy that he came on TV to advocate that the US government adopt a "strategy of containment" toward its own President, and urged voters to replace conservative candidates with liberal ones.

I realize there's a culture of well-mannered tolerance of foreign leaders, but W. is not an honest conservative like his father or McCain.

-FreeClench

My dear LordBeddGelert - I bow to your superior wisdom and confess to a bad case of cynicism.

Posting from the ex-African colonies, I can inform our Dear Journalist that African-Africans, as opposed to African-Americans - have built up a healthy dose of scepticism while living under the Empirical boot.

They are more cynical about Politically Correct feel-good PR that gets beamed to them via Â鶹¹ÙÍøÊ×Ò³Èë¿Ú World. They chortle over the latest street joke: will the White House become known as the Non-White House once Obama moves in? ;-)

Africans acknowledge that they have made mistakes in the past: falling for the Cult of Personality and painting their leaders as Omniscient and Omnipotent and failing to read the small print.
Now Africans in our neck of the woods are amazed to see the cream of Western journalists uncritically promoting Cult of Personality and fawning about the feet of the apparently Omniscient, Omnipotent Obama.
They're concerned that journalists don't ask the hard questions: like, what is the new Prez going to do about genuine fair trade with Africa; and what will the Good Prez do about the US cotton subsidies that cripple and impoverish West African cotton farmers?

#38

Your post is just a variation on "glass half full or glass half empty" and I did cover the point you made in the whole text rather than the bit you selected out.

There isn't any difference in racism wherever you are - when it is real it is real and when it is just a cop out it is just a cop out.

My point is that the election of Obama proves absolutely nothing about US "idealism". #41 rather echoes my point in a candid kind of way.

Just wanderin' past couldn't help seeeing religion mentioned in a secular debate.

My only thought is to run, run .run like Forrest did!.

The evangelical 'We Can Win' that dominated Obama's speach was quite terrifying in its vector of intent.

As a non American I guess I could well have not understood its intention.

But I'll be quite honest, it was scary!

The world does not need a new Crusade.

#40. Its worth googling the history of the Iranian president: he's nicknamed '1000 bullets' because he was the guy who finished off the prisoners at Evan jail after the torturers finished with them. There's also enough evidence to charge him with multiple murders across Europe in the mid-80's as he was part of one of the Iranian hit squads who knocked off 'enemies of the revolution'. Not only is he a dangerous religious maniac, he has actually killed 1000's of people with his own hands.... that puts him into a class of his own.

W in contrast is nothing- he's only dangerous because of the power he had and I've no worries about his sanity, just his competence.

#39. That would be HG Wells the famous writter of Science Fiction?

I think that says it all........
you might as well claim Tom Clancy orchestrated 9/11 because one of his books had a 747 kamikaze into the Capitol.

Â鶹¹ÙÍøÊ×Ò³Èë¿Ú coverage of the US elections was lousy overall. The graphics were nowhere as detailed as that of CNN. It is time to get rid of geriatrics such as Dimbleby. And what authority does Simon Schama posess to talk about the US? Absolutely nothing. Please can you shutdown Â鶹¹ÙÍøÊ×Ò³Èë¿Ú America as it is a completely redundant and unnecessary expense.

Mr Obama, this is great. I stayed up all night watching the results come in and was ecstatic when you zoomed ahead past 270 to well over 300 to win the election. Wow. You absolutely annihilated John McCain. I guess the polls way underestimated you after a year of reporting how close you and McCain were, you received more than double his result. He didn't even go above 200. But is is well deserved. You and your team in America have worked hard for it and I wish you all the success. I have waited along with a lot of people around the world 8 years for the Democrats to come back and thanks to you they have done it in style.
Now we can all look forward to a better, fairer and more peaceful world now that you are in charge. These last eight years have been horrendous, and I will be happy if at the end of the next four years you have: reduced global warming, sorted the economic crisis and won the war on terror. But it will take longer and I hope you get a second term in 2012.

#47. The vote was actually 47% McCain : 52% Obama. Obama won double the states in the same way that Blair won twice as many seats as Howard last time. It doesn't mean he got twice as many votes. The polls were about right.

I presume you're joking about solving global warming* in 4 years too.... right?

*which you might note has seamlessly changed to 'climate change' in the media to hide the lack of warming.