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23 January 2012

The US Presidential Race

The U.S. Republican Party's attempts to find a candidate to challenge Barak Obama in November is nothing if not entertaining.


It's a shame that American politics is dictated so much by how much wealth you have and/or how much extra cash you can raise, apparently without limit, but that democratic deficit is somewhat offset by the sheer entertainment value of the shenanigans these guys get up to in order to get elected.


They indulge in negative campaigning on radio and television to an extent that British politicians can only dream of. Newt Gingrich (what kind of a name is that?! Nearly as weird as Barak Obama) put out an advert the other week designed to punch out his main rival, Mitt Romney. Added to Romney's many sins, including the fact that he "loves firing people" was the fact that "he speaks French"! I'm struggling to find that a reason for disqualifying the man.


Of course all American politicians have to be openly followers of God. The trouble is, which God? The Evangelicals' God, the Catholics' God, the Baptist's God, the Presbyterians' God, the Mormons' God? Perhaps not the Mormons' God (could be Mitt Romney's undoing), and certainly not the Muslims' God. If you don't like (the avowed Christian) Barak Obama one of the popular insults is to call him a Muslim. This is all very perplexing to us in the UK because our politicians "don't do God", nor would we expect them to.


The election of an openly atheist American to the presidency is about as likely as Greece paying off its debts

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The front runners for the Republican nomination now appear to be Mitt Romney the Mormon, or Newt Gingrich the "open marriage" advocate. There must be a touch of the Mormon in Gingrich, having had several wives, though to be fair in his case, not all at the same time. But Romney is a rare Republican in having once supported the idea of a health care programme; this might have something to do with God telling Joseph Smith to keep on taking the tablets.


If I were a betting man I'd put money on Barak Obama still being President after November.