Will Barack Obama be re-elected? (1)
June 12th, 2012 by Roger Darlington
Most people outside the United States assume that Obama will win a second term in November. After all, he is the incumbent, he has not suffered any personal or political scandal, he is so intelligent and fluent, he baled out the auto industry, he is reforming the financial system, he is introducing a new healthcare system, he has pulled troops out of Iraq and is in the process of doing the same in Afghanistan
However, in the United States where I have just spent two weeks, things look very different.
To conservatives and Republicans – specially of the Tea Party variety – he favours federal spending programmes, he wants to increase taxes, he supports gay marriage, and what’s more he’s an intellectual (which is true) and black (not that they admit this is a factor) and in some minds he is not a US citizen, not a Christian, and a socialist and communist (these people have never visited a communist country).
Meanwhile, to liberals and Democrats, he has failed to be as radical as his election campaign led them to hope, he has compromised with Congress too easily, he has done nothing to support the unions, he has put security before liberty on too many issues, and abroad he has not closed down Guantanamo Bay prison and he has supported drone attacks and a kill list.
So, in opinion polls, Barack Obama and Mitt Romney are pretty much neck and neck at the moment.
In fact, in a US presidential election, what is important is not just how people vote but where they vote.
This is because it is perfectly possible for one candidate to win more votes than the other nationwide but still lose the election. This is what happened with Al Gore running against George W Bush in 2000. The explanation for this is that the choice of president is not determined by the number of votes cast by the electorate but the number of votes allocated by the Electoral College which, according to the the US Constitution, has the responsibility for selecting the president.
Now, of the 50 states (plus the District of Columbia), the majority can be reliably assumed to vote either Democrat (a blue state) or Republican (a red state), so the only states that really matter are those – around 12 – where the outcome is uncertain (what the political commentators call ‘competitive’).
So, to estimate how the likely presidential candidates – Obama for the Democrats and Romney for the Republicans – are probably going to do in the forthcoming election, we need to know two things:
1) How many Electoral College votes does each state have? You’ll find the answer here.
2) Which states are fairly certain for Obama and Romney respectively and which are in contention? You’ll find an estimate here.
If the Real Clear Politics estimate is correct, Obama and Romney are close in the nationwide polls, but the President is better placed in terms of likely votes in the Electoral College.
Clearly the states that really, really matter are ones with lots of Electoral College votes which are still competitive – places such as Florida (29 votes), Pennsylvania (20) and perhaps especially Ohio (18).
In the end, it will probably come down to turnout on the two sides. How angry are Republicans? How disillusioned are Democrats? In five months time, we will know.
Meanwhile watch this space – I’ll be blogging on the contest as it unfolds.
Posted in American current affairs | Comments (2)
A different view of Iraq
June 11th, 2012 by Roger Darlington
I’ve visited 56 countries and would love to go to more. I learn so much on my travels and see the world very differently.
One country which fascinates me is Iraq. I would not be willing to travel to most parts of the country in current circumstances, but I would be open to visiting the Kurdish part of the country in the north.
My friend Gary Kent has now been there nine times and you can read his latest report here.
Posted in World current affairs | Comments (0)
An account of our two week holiday in the USA
June 10th, 2012 by Roger Darlington
Since I started maintaining a web site 13 years ago, whenever I’ve travelled abroad on holiday, I’ve produced an account of the trip for my web site – see full list here.
Usually, this takes me a week to two but, for our holiday in the USA visiting Washington and New York, I took an iPad and composed the basic text of the account as we went along. So at home I just had to do the formatting and add appropriate hyperlinks. You can read the result here.
I’ll add some photographs later. Meanwhile enjoy.
Posted in My life & thoughts | Comments (0)
Versions of free speech – the debate continues
June 9th, 2012 by Roger Darlington
Almost a month ago now, I did a posting about the different approaches in the United States and Europe to the sensitive issue of free speech.
I have just returned from a two-week holiday in the USA where this subject came up several times in conversation. I encouraged one of my American friends to post a comment on my original blog piece which now has three thoughtful comments in all. You can check out the debate here.
What do you think?
Posted in American current affairs, World current affairs | Comments (0)
Have you missed me?
June 9th, 2012 by Roger Darlington
Sorry that I haven’t been posting to NightHawk for the last two week, but normal service will now be resumed with the usual daily postings.
My wife and I have been away for a two-week holiday in the United States – my first visit since 2000 and her first visit since 1998. We spent the first week staying with friends just outside Washington DC and travelled into and around the city. Then we spent the second week with a friend who lives south of New York City and commuted into the city most days.
We had a brilliant time and, as usual with our holidays. I’ll be adding a full account to my web site. Since I took my iPad this time, I was able to write up this account as we went along, so the text – if not, the photographs – should be up soon.
Posted in My life & thoughts | Comments (2)
Don’t you just love the British weather?
May 23rd, 2012 by Roger Darlington
Some countries don’t have four seasons in a year; here in Britain we can have four seasons in a day. The weather is so variable that it is an ending source of – usually meaningless – conversation.
After a really cold March and a real wet April, suddenly we are having a very hot May. Temperatures at this time of year usually average 14-16C, but today London (where I live) is experiencing 25C and the hottest part of the country is part of Sunderland with 27C [more information here].
Posted in My life & thoughts | Comments (2)
25 handy words that simply don’t exist in English
May 20th, 2012 by Roger Darlington
English has a massive vocabulary – but it doesn’t have these words.
Posted in Cultural issues | Comments (0)
The treatment of water
May 19th, 2012 by Roger Darlington
I am really enjoying my new appointment as Chair of the Customer Challenge Group at South East Water [for details, see here]. The issues are complex but fascinating and my new colleagues are very professional and supportive. But you would not believe how much there is to learn.
I’ve now been to the Snodland Head Office of the company on four days for detailed briefings from senior managers and regulatory staff. Currently I’m in the process of two days of site visits to parts of the company’s operations.
On Friday, I was in the Western Region with the Head of Operations for the region Doug Whitfield and the Capital & Programme Manager Tanya Sephton.
We started at the Bray Water Treatment Works which has just been renamed the Keleher works to mark the premature death of a much-admired colleague. This site abstracts up to 30 million litres of water a day from the River Thames and then treats it in five stages with complicated names and impressive results:
- pre-ozonation
- coagulation, flocculation and settlement
- sand filtration
- inter ozonation and granulated activated carbon contratcors
- disinfection
Here I was first introduced to the vital term turbidity which is the cloudiness of a liquid and a key measure of water quality [more information here].
Then we went to to visit the company’s laboratories at Frimley. You would be amazed at how much testing of water quality is conducted at every stage of the delivery process – including the tap in the kitchen – every day of the year. The labs do around 700,000 tests a year looking for anything between one and 60 characteristics.
After a light lunch, we went out to Farnham to look at some pipe laying and repair work. This is subcontracted out to Clancy Docwra. Finally we called into an unmanned Water Treatment Works at Bourne. This takes water from a nearby bore hole.
Inspecting water treatment equipment at Bray
Examining testing facilities at Frimley
Visiting external works in Farnham
Posted in Environment, My life & thoughts | Comments (1)
The case for social mobility
May 17th, 2012 by Roger Darlington
“If we want our children to have equal opportunities in life, reducing income inequality is the most important step we can take towards achieving that goal. Bigger income differences between rich and poor are a powerful constraint on social mobility, diminishing life chances for children from less privileged backgrounds and making a level playing field an even more distant prospect.”
This is an extract from an article published this week by Kate Pickett and Richard Wilkinson. They are actually the authors of an immensely thoughtful book called “The Spirit Levl” which i have reviewed here.
Posted in British current affairs, Social policy | Comments (0)
A review of “The Remains Of The Day”
May 15th, 2012 by Roger Darlington
As I explained in this posting, for World Book Night 2012 I was chosen as a ‘giver’ and I selected as the book to donate to 24 others the Man Booker Prize-winning “The Remains Of The Day” by Kazuo Ishiguro. I have now read the novel myself and reviewed it here.
Posted in Cultural issues | Comments (0)