Us politics

Saturday

Jonathan Jones

America's new political battles begin

It may be less than a fortnight since the 2012 US elections, but it’s never too early to start speculating about what might happen in the next ones. So here’s a quick first look: 2013: New Jersey and Virginia (and Massachusetts?) It may be an off-year, but there’ll be at least two — and possibly three — exciting high-profile races to look forward to. Republican Chris Christie will likely run for a second term as Governor of New Jersey. He has strong approval ratings and has been praised for his response to Hurricane Sandy, but will likely face tough opposition in a state that Obama carried by 17 points. One

Thursday

Shiraz Maher

The Petraeus and Allen business raises questions about US defence

Leaving aside the moral implications of the scandal which caused General Petraeus to resign as head of the CIA, this is an issue which demands serious attention from the American defence establishment. We know that Petraeus’ alleged mistress Paula Broadwell is said to have accessed his emails, and that she sent threatening emails to another lady, Jill Kelly, who she believed was getting too close to the General. Now it also transpires that General John Allen has been sending between 20,000 and 30,000 pages of ‘inappropriate emails’ to Kelly. The emails are said to have been sent from 2010-2012 which, even using the lowest figure amounts to something like 27

Friday

Jonathan Jones

Briefing: The US fiscal cliff

With the elections over and Barack Obama returned to the White House for four more years, the attention of US politicians has turned to the so-called ‘fiscal cliff’ — a collection of tax hikes and spending cuts that threaten to send the country back into recession. But what exactly is going on, and why? The Bush tax cuts George W Bush passed two major tax cut packages during the first term of his Presidency: the Economic Growth and Tax Relief Reconciliation Act of 2001 and the Jobs and Growth Tax Relief Reconciliation Act of 2003. Together, they lowered federal tax rates on income (for example, the top rate fell from

James Forsyth

The Romney campaign meets electoral reality

When I worked in Washington, I was shown round the White House by a junior Bush administration staffer. As our group made it round the building we passed various photos of George W. Bush signing bits of legislation into law, at nearly everyone our guide would stop and tell us how many voters in various key states would benefit from it. When there was a picture of Bush with a governor, we’d be regaled with both sets of approval ratings. It was clear that whatever the administration’s flaws – and there were many – it had an acute understanding of the importance of data and the changing nature of the

Thursday

Jonathan Jones

The Democrats won more than just the Presidency on Tuesday night

The focus, of course, is on President Barack Obama’s resounding re-election — but there are plenty of other reasons why Democrats are celebrating Tuesday night’s results. In the summer, it looked like Obama’s party would struggle to maintain their Senate majority. Instead, they have extended it. Embattled incumbents held on in tight races in Missouri, Montana and Ohio. The Democrats also retained vulnerable seats in New Mexico, North Dakota, Virginia and Wisconsin despite the incumbents having retired. And they took seats off the Republicans in Indiana and Massachusetts, to take their total up to 54 Senators — and it could rise to 55 if newly-elected independent Angus King decides to

Shiraz Maher

Obama's top foreign policy concerns for his second term

With Barack Obama being returned to the White House, it’s worth considering what his key foreign policy challenges will be during the second term. I’ve outlined a few areas I think will dominate his thinking over the next four years. 1. Afghanistan and Pakistan Obama has committed to withdrawing American forces from Afghanistan by the end of 2014. This will be a far from smooth transition. As the number of US forces declines, expect to see a resurgence of the Taliban, greater instability across the country, and the accelerated erosion of Hamid Karzai’s authority. American frustrations will also heighten if the pace of ‘green on blue’ attacks (where Afghan National

Alex Massie

Immigration is only part of the problem Republicans have with hispanic voters - Spectator Blogs

Lord knows there are plenty of people to blame for Mitt Romney’s defeat. One chap has not been mentioned often enough, however. Step forward and take your medicine Rick Perry! The Governor of Texas, who once persuaded otherwise sensible folk (and me) he was a more than plausible contender for the GOP nomination, played an important part in securing Barack Obama’s re-election. Perhaps the President should send him a set of Presidential-seal embossed cowboy boots. There are bound to be some left from the Dubya days. It was Perry who insisted that, if you had a heart, you should support Texas’s policy of not preventing the children of illegal immigrants

Wednesday

James Forsyth

Obama’s victory is a great solace to Cameron, and No.10 will exploit it to the full

Four years ago, in opposition, the Cameron offices were a swing state in the US election. Most were for Obama but there was still a sizable number who held a torch for John McCain. But this time round it is hard to think of anyone in Downing Street who wanted a Romney win. I asked several people in No. 10 who would have voted for Romney, but only one name ever came up. The idea of a Tory Downing Street urging on a Democratic President would come as a shock to those who served in the Thatcher and Major governments. In the 1980s, Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher had common

Isabel Hardman

US election 2012: Obama's victory is a relief for David Cameron

David Cameron welcomed Barack Obama’s re-election in the early hours of this morning, tweeting: ‘Warm congratulations to my friend @BarackObama. Look forward to continuing to work together.’ He later released this statement: ‘I would like to congratulate Barack Obama on his re-election. I have really enjoyed working with him over the last few years and I look forward to working with him again over the next four years. There are so many things that we need to do: we need to kick start the world economy and I want to see an EU-US trade deal. Right here in Jordan I am hearing appalling stories about what has happened inside Syria

Isabel Hardman

Obama keeps that hopey-changey thing going in victory speech

Even though Obama’s victory speech in Chicago was far less hopey-changey than his rockstar delivery four years ago, the re-elected president did still manage to sound a little as though he was delivering an address at a wedding, smoothing over the ugly bits and telling America that ‘the best is yet to come’. Both he and Mitt Romney made calls for co-operation between Republicans and Democrats, with Obama saying: ‘Tonight, you voted for action, not politics as usual. You elected us to focus on your jobs, not ours, and in the coming weeks and months I am looking forward to reaching out and working with leaders of both parties to

Monday

Isabel Hardman

The real Mitt Romney and why the American right can take heart

Iain Duncan Smith last night threw his weight behind Mitt Romney in a manner his colleagues have been reluctant to do. He told Pienaar’s Politics that he was unimpressed with the ‘appalling’ way the British media was covering the presidential race, saying: ‘I think the American election has been appallingly reported really over here in the UK, I think it’s misrepresented the whole nature of it. The reality is that either candidate has a real job to do. The idea – the demonisation of Mitt Romney over here has been appalling really. I’ve met many of his people, you know, they may have faults, all politicians have faults, this is

Saturday

Jonathan Jones

Mitt Romney's narrow paths to the White House

Can Mitt Romney win the presidential election on Tuesday? The answer is yes, he can — but it’ll be tough. Although the national polls taken in isolation suggest the race is roughly tied, the state-level polling points to a much bigger lead for Barack Obama. It seems that either the national polls are underestimating Obama’s strength or the state polls are overestimating it, or both. Nate Silver’s Fivethirtyeight model  assumes it’s both, so adjusts the national polling slightly towards Obama and the state polls slightly away from him, so they meet in the middle. And that leads it to forecast a win for Obama of slightly more than two points.

Wednesday

Alex Massie

Did America bring Hurricane Sandy upon itself? - Spectator Blogs

Apparently so. You can always count on the British left to sneer at the United States. (You can count on quite a bit of the British right to do so too.) According to Jon Snow, the veteran Channel 4 news presenter, the United States should probably recognise that it brought Hurricane Sandy on itself. If he stops just short of saying America had it coming that’s the pretty clear implication of his latest dispatch: This is the wrong season for hurricanes to hit so far north. What has brought this upon what is – at times, and in some places – the most sophisticated nation on earth? Has what is

Tuesday

Jonathan Jones

US Elections: Will everything just stay the same?

We’re now just a week away from election day in the United States. And after all the campaign rallies, all the debates, all the billions of dollars spent, it looks quite possible that things will be left pretty much the same as they are now — as far as control of the federal government goes, anyway. The most likely outcome of the Presidential election? Barack Obama re-elected. The most likely outcome of the Senate elections? 51 Democrats, 47 Republicans and two independents who caucus with the Democrats — just as there are now. And the most likely outcome of the House of Representatives elections? Well, the expert team at the

Shiraz Maher

Muslims and the Republican vote

Will American Muslims swing the US Presidential election? It seems highly unlikely, if not improbable, but that’s the line being pushed by the Council on American-Islamic Relations, a not uncontroversial lobby group with ties to the Muslim Brotherhood. A poll released by the group last week found that 68 per cent of American Muslims intend to vote for Obama. By contrast, only 7 per cent are committed to voting for Romney in next week’s election. That represents more than treble the number who voted for McCain in 2008 (when just 2.2 per cent of Muslims voted Republican) while the Democrat share of Muslim votes is down from just under 90

Tuesday

Fraser Nelson

Mitt Romney is closer than ever to the presidency

The presidential debates are over, and Mitt Romney is within touching distance of the White House. Barack Obama was the better candidate – just – in last night’s third and final presidential debate, on the attack and with his trademark eloquence restored. But he needed to deliver a knockout blow to Mitt Romney, and failed. Everyone knows Obama is great with words. What is not entirely clear to voters is that Mitt Romney isn’t evil. As it turned out, Romney came across as moderate, articulate and well-informed- and a plausible commander-in-chief. The next election may very well be his. A snap CNN Poll called it 48-40 for Obama, wider than

Tim Wigmore

Barack Obama tells Mitt Romney: 'We have fewer horses and bayonets'

Whoever wins the US presidency on 6 November will owe little of their success to foreign policy. A recent poll showed that 46 per cent of the electorate regards the economy as the most important issue of the election; just 6 per cent chose foreign policy. The tightness of this race meant that the foreign policy debate still had the potential to influence matters, but a stilted format contributed to a rather stale exchange last night. Barack Obama produced a more compelling performance, but when he wakes up it will not be to the sort of collective mood shift Mitt Romney enjoyed after the Denver debate. The essence of this campaign remains

Thursday

Douglas Murray

The fall of Barack Obama

I have a piece in this week’s magazine on the fall of Barack Obama. I’m not saying he may not still win, just that even if he does he will be a diminished President. It’s available online here.

Wednesday

Tim Wigmore

Obama campaigns for Clinton’s third term

This debate was never going to be easy for Mitt Romney. After his evisceration of Barack Obama in the first presidential debate, encapsulated by the New Yorker cover of Romney talking to an empty chair, it was certain that Obama would be rigorously schooled before the second debate. Obama’s performance 13 days ago was so anaemic that some even speculated whether, subconsciously at least, he still wanted to be President. But there was renewed vigour in this performance – a refusal to display passivity of the sort that ruined the Democrats’ night in Denver. The Town Hall debate format helped too: the need to engage with the audience’s questions made

Tuesday

Jonathan Jones

The challenges for Obama and Romney in the final 3 weeks of campaigning

Ahead of the second presidential debate tonight, it’s worth taking stock of the task facing each candidate in the last three weeks of the campaign. It is clear that Mitt Romney has received a sizeable bounce since the first debate, closing the gap to Barack Obama by probably around 4 points nationally. Nevertheless, it looks like he still remains about one point adrift of the President, and Nate Silver’s Fivethirtyeight forecast makes Obama the clear favourite, with the odds against his victory at about 1/2. Before the debates, talk of swing states and the electoral college seemed superfluous. Obama looked likely to win the popular vote by around four points, a