Barack obama

Blooper reels won’t dethrone Obama

From our UK edition

This compilation of President Obama's gaffes is going viral, as they say.     Quite amusing. There's something satisfying about seeing that 'President Cool'  isn't such a smooth operator. Obama is good with teleprompters, but he blunders when extemporising. It's mostly forgotten that, in the 2008 debates against Hillary Clinton, he often looked and sounded out of his depth.   Still, it is a bit hysterical — and humourless — for Gary L Bauer to call his video '53 seconds that should end the Obama presidency', in reference to Rick Perry's infamous disaster answer in a debate.   Voters don't really care about presidential bloopers. And is it wise for Republicans to attack the president for verbal clumsiness?

America’s version of the ‘tax the rich’ debate

From our UK edition

While the battle continues to rage over the government's plan to cap tax relief, on the other side of the Atlantic the US bill that inspired it has been killed. The ‘Paying a Fair Share Act 2012’ — more commonly known as the ‘Buffett Rule’ after billionaire Warren Buffett — failed to get the votes it needed to be debated in the Senate. It was backed by a majority of senators, with 51 voting ‘Yea’ to 45 ‘Nay’s, but fell short of the 60 votes needed to break a filibuster.

Romney’s pivot to the centre will be tough

From our UK edition

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LSh7G48_wOI As Freddy reported on Tuesday night, Rick Santorum has dropped out of the race for this year's Republican nomination, making Mitt Romney virtually certain to be the nominee. Sure, Newt Gingrich and Ron Paul are still hanging in there — just as Mike Huckabee and, erm, Ron Paul did in 2008. Back then, as he continued campaigning even once John McCain was the clear winner, Huckabee said: ‘I know the pundits and I know what they say: well the math doesn't work out. Folks, I didn't major in math; I majored in miracles, and I still believe in those too.’ But the miracle didn't come for Huckabee four years ago, and it's not going to come for Gingrich or Paul this time round.

Santorum drops out

From our UK edition

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rG61tGeagWo So, Rick Santorum has called it quits and abandoned his quest for the nomination. The decision effectively makes Romney the 2012 Republican nominee. Finally. Republican Party chiefs will feel a sense of relief after an exhaustive and bruising primary season in which the party seemed to be beating itself up for months on end. But they must also reckon that a candidate who took so long to defeat his adversaries for the nomination – despite his advantage in terms of campaign funding – can't stand much of chance against the might of the Democratic machine and as talented a campaigner as President Obama.

Osborne’s tax avoidance clampdown

From our UK edition

So, George Osborne has taken a look at the tax arrangements of some of the UK’s wealthiest people. And his reaction? ‘Shocked’, apparently — or so he’s told the Telegraph: ‘I was shocked to see that some of the very wealthiest people in the country have organised their tax affairs, and to be fair it’s within the tax laws, so that they were regularly paying virtually no income tax. And I don’t think that’s right. I’m talking about people right at the top. I’m talking about people with incomes of many millions of pounds a year. The general principle is that people should pay income tax and that includes people with the highest incomes.

Who’ll be Romney’s running mate?

From our UK edition

As I said earlier, it now looks almost certain that Mitt Romney will clinch the nomination. The primaries may not quite be over yet, but it's never too early to speculate about who he'll pick to be his Vice Presidential candidate. Indeed, 2008 Republican nominee John McCain weighed in this morning. ‘I think it should be Sarah Palin,’ he chuckled. ‘We have a wealth of talent out there and I’m sure that Mitt will make the right choice,’ he added more seriously, before breaking into laughter again as he said ’Obviously, it’s a tough decision’. The favourite for the job is still Florida Senator Marco Rubio.

Moving on from the Republican primaries

From our UK edition

So, it looks like we can finally say that Mitt Romney will be the Republican nominee to take on Barack Obama in November. Last night, he swept the three primaries in Wisconsin, Maryland and the District of Columbia, adding 85 delegates to his count. Romney now has now amassed around 650 of the 1,144 delegates he needs to clinch the nomination. That may make it seem like he’s got a lot more work to do, but in fact it means he needs to claim just 42 per cent of the remaining delegates to reach the winning line. Considering he’s won 58 per cent of the ones up for grabs so far, that doesn’t seem too tough a goal. His campaign’s also been bolstered in the last few days by endorsements from big name Republicans like Jeb Bush, Paul Ryan and Marco Rubio.

Romney attacked from the Sixties

From our UK edition

Mad Men may not be jumping the sharks quite yet, but the latest series is showing signs of collapsing under the weight of its own hype. The carefully built ambiguity of the first few seasons is being lost, replaced by cheesy self-awareness and standard-issue liberal correctness. In this week’s episode, which was broadcast in America last night and will be shown here tomorrow, there was even a little political swipe at Republican candidate Mitt Romney. In the scene above, the character Henry Francis, a political operator for New York mayor John Lindsay, says he doesn’t want his boss to attend an event in Michigan ‘because Romney's a clown and I don’t want him standing next to him'.

Obama reiterates his commitment to a nuke-free future

From our UK edition

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ajuq5u3IoSQ As leaders from 53 nations gather in Seoul for the second Nuclear Security Summit, President Obama spoke of his ‘vision of a world without nuclear weapons’. It’s a vision he described during his 2008 campaign, and which was later the focus of his 2009 speech in Prague. Today, as then, he talked about the ‘obligation’ he feels to act on this in strikingly personal terms: ‘I say it as a father, who wants my two young daughters to grow up in a world where everything they know and love can’t be instantly wiped out.

Romney can’t shake off his ‘Etch A Sketch’ label

From our UK edition

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cKtNYmsarUE Presidential candidates are used to having all sorts of derogatory monikers hurled in their direction. But they don’t expect them to come from one of their own senior advisers. And yet that’s exactly what’s happened to Mitt Romney this week. On Wednesday, just after Romney had won the Illinois primary and secured the endorsement of former Florida Governor Jeb Bush, Eric Fehrnstrom told CNN: ‘Well, I think you hit a reset button for the fall campaign. Everything changes.

Cameron and Obama bargain over fuel

From our UK edition

No wonder David Cameron and Barack Obama were being so chummy: they both knew that they could help each other. The Times carries an intriguing story (£) on its front page this morning, about how the two men discussed a plan to get fuel prices down in the UK and the US. The idea is that both countries — and perhaps more — would release some of their oil reserves. And so supply would go up, and prices would come down. As would our reliance on the oil-rich countries of the Middle East. Apparently, we're some distance from a deal yet, but you can see why both the PM and the President would want one to be struck — and soon.

Cameron dines with Obama… and Clooney

From our UK edition

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mX6mT0kpoyQ The Camerons weren’t the Obamas' only big-name guests at the State Dinner last night. They were joined by a host of stars including Warren Buffett, Richard Branson and George Clooney, who’s just returned from war-torn Sudan. In their speeches (above), the two leaders had very warm words for each other. Of Cameron, Obama said: ‘In good times and in bad, he’s just the kind of partner that you want at your side. I trust him. He says what he does and he does what he says.’ And the PM returned the compliments: ‘There are three things about Barack that really stand out for me: strength, moral authority and wisdom.

Afghanistan overshadows Cameron’s America trip

From our UK edition

Afghanistan, what now? After a week of death and retaliation in the country, it appears that a car bomb has been detonated on the runway at Camp Bastion — probably aimed at the visiting US Secretary of Defence, Leon Panetta. A spokesman has since said that ‘at no point was anyone on board Mr Panetta's plane at risk,’ but it certainly highlights the dangers attached to his visit. What chance, now, that he will be successful in his goal of ‘easing tensions’? The incident cropped up very briefly in David Cameron and Barack Obama's press conference just now.

Cameron and Obama, sans yellow mustard

From our UK edition

Above is what they call the ‘raw video’ of David Cameron's and Barack Obama's trip to a basketball game last night. It's the unrefined version of what Downing St hopes will be refined, packaged and sent to your television screen at hyperspeed: images of the PM and the President dressed casually and chatting away as the game goes on. Like I said yesterday, it's political theatre — designed to benefit both men. They were then both interviewed at halftime, which you can watch here.

Cameron lands in America

From our UK edition

David Cameron’s plane has just landed in Washington. The next few days should provide him with a set of images that will portray him as a significant figure on the global stage. The Obama administration is giving Cameron the full works: a huge event on the White House lawn and the kind of banquet that is normally reserved for heads of state. This is an arrangement that benefits both sides. The Obama re-election campaign wants to foster the sense that the President is friends with a Conservative British Prime Minister given that their Republican opponent in the fall will accuse him of being a left-wing radical. I suspect, though, that Downing Street will be rather worried that the arrests of Charlie and Rebekah Brooks could overshadow the opening day of the visit.

Will Obama and Cameron discuss a faster pullout from Afghanistan?

From our UK edition

The political theatre of David Cameron's trip to America will have Downing Street drooling. The PM is, today, not only going to become the first world leader to fly aboard Air Force One with Barack Obama, but then they're also going to take in a game of basketball together. It's a carefully calibrated blend of statesmanship and down-to-earth-ship that will suit both men. Obama, because it might appeal, in some way, to conservative voters ahead of this year's presidential election. Cameron, because, well… does Ed Miliband do this sort of thing? The theatre carries over into print too, with a joint article by Cameron and Obama in today's Washington Post.

Rising gas prices hurt Obama

From our UK edition

Barack Obama’s re-election has been looking more and more likely in recent weeks. His approval rating has risen fairly steadily, economic forecasts have improved and he’s opened a nice lead in head-to-head polling against Mitt Romney, as the Republican primaries have taken their toll on his most likely opponent. But the latest polls show things moving dramatically in the other direction, for the first time since early October. A Washington Post-ABC poll conducted last week shows Obama’s approval rating dropping from a healthy 50 per cent last month to 46 per cent now. It also shows Romney leading Obama 49 to 47, compared to 51-45 to Obama last month.

Why Cameron should pay heed to Romney

From our UK edition

Cameron flies out to Washington on Tuesday, and when he gets there he’ll have no need to play the infatuated teenager. The days of Gordon Brown-style adulation are over, and Cameron has a more mature, less needy relationship with Obama. The truth is that there’s precious little he can learn from Obama, but there might be a thing or two he can learn from Mitt Romney. I look at this in my Telegraph column today. Cameron has never loved America, in the way that so many people in SW1 do. He toured America in his youth, but had never been to Washington until he became Tory leader. Cameron is more interested in the West coast, the latest theories from California about how information can change government. But from Obama? Not so much.

Republican ‘negativity’ has improved Romney’s campaign

From our UK edition

In the wake of Super Tuesday, lots of British journalists are saying that the Republican nomination race has been too ‘negative’ — i.e. the candidates have attacked each other too much ahead of the real contest in November. Mitt Romney may now be close to victory but he's been badly damaged. This is thought to be an indication that American conservatism is tearing itself apart. But that isn't necessarily right. Nobody thought that the Democratic party was in decline when Hillary Clinton and Obama were at each other's throats in 2008. Hillary, if you remember, even flirted with racist tactics in an attempt to derail her rival. And yet the Democratic dream survived.

Obama wins Super Tuesday

From our UK edition

It wasn’t a great night for Mitt Romney — but it wasn’t a particularly bad one either. He won by big margins in the four states he was supposed to: Massachussetts, Vermont, Virginia and Idaho. He also won Alaska by a four-point margin and managed to beat Rick Santorum by just one point in Ohio. The fact that he finished way behind Newt Gingrich in Georgia was no surprise, nor was his losing to Santorum in Oklahoma. He could have done with better results in North Dakota (third, 16 points behind Santorum and 4 behind Ron Paul) and Tennessee (second, 9 points behind Santorum), but six wins from ten states is probably about what he was expecting.