Post-election thoughts and questions

1. Anybody else feel really quite deflated that it's all over?

2. Currently it looks like Obama got just over 64 million votes to Mccain's 56.5 million. Impressive, yes, but didn't you get the feeling from the coverage both in the run-up and during that McCain would be more adrift than that? At times it seemed impossible to imagine that anyone apart from a few rednecks in Alabama would vote for him.

3. A similar feeling re turn-out. it seems to have been around 64%. Considering the hype of the huge numbers voting and massive queues, this seems a pretty ordinary figure to me. How would they cope if they had a genuinely really high turn-out of, say, 80%?

4. Anybody understand what it means to be a 'registered Democrat/Republican'? Don't think it means you're a member of the Party. In its familiarity but unfathomability it's a bit like mysterious talk of being a 'sophomore' or 'in 9th grade'.

5. Thank goodness that la Palin continues to be the gift that keeps on giving. Firstly, there was the excellent prank call* in the run up to polling, and now we have the Republican infighting starting, leading to these excellent spilt beans on Fox News (via the Daily Kos, which in common with many left-leaning blogs is very sweet in not quite believing that it didn't all go wrong at the eleventh hour):

Reporter: I wish I could have told you more at the time but all of it was put off the record until after the election. There was great concern in the McCain campaign that Sarah Palin lack the degree of knowledgeability necessary to be a running mate, a vice president, and a heartbeat away from the presidency. We’re told by folks that she didn’t know what countries that were in NAFTA, the North American Free Trade Agreement, that being the Canada, the US, and Mexico. We’re told she didn’t understand that Africa was a continent rather than a country just in itself...

Textbook, absolutely textbook.

*During the prank call she told 'Sarkozy', in response to a comment about how she would make an excellent President, 'Maybe in eight years.' Sarah, honey, I'm not sure the world can wait that long...

Update: an interesting take on turnout here (h/t Andrew Sullivan).

Wow

Now let the expectation management commence.

Still crazy (for the West Wing) after all these years

The JMP "Santos-McGarry" bumper sticker arrived yesterday, just in time for election day. Woo, as our American friends say, hoo!

(I did try to buy some official Obama merchandise, but was not allowed, not being a US citizen. But frankly, this is much better; Leo so knocks Joe Biden out of the park.)

A conspiracy theory I can believe

Look at the facts:

Fact A: Dick Cheney has, very late, publicly endorsed McCain for President.

Fact B: Dick Cheney is incredibly unpopular with the US public at large. (See Obama's gleeful leaping on the endorsement: "I'd like to congratulate Senator McCain on this endoresemnt because he really earnt it".)

Fact C: Dick Cheney and John McCain, it is generally agreed, hate, or at the very least dislike, each other. They have a history of clashing and of spats.  See eg this analysis. there has been talk that Cheney has resented McCain's attacks on the administration during the campaign as disloyal.

Fact D: Dick Cheney's age and health mean that he doesn't have a future in Republican politics.

Now, I think Dick Cheney must be aware of his unpopularity. In the light of all this, I think the following conclusion is both logical and eminently possible: Cheney has come out for McCain in a deliberate attempt to damage his campaign.

It seems to me the obvious alternative - Cheney genuinely wanted to help McCain, and thought his endorsement would provide a helpful shot in the arm - is simply not all that likely, because the politics doesn't work. Cheney might enthuse the hawkish neo-cons, but they have now accepted McCain as a poor candidate (eg on immigration) but ultimately worthy of support - see the Ann Coulter 'I'll vote for McCain but I'll have to get drunk to do it' line. They are going to get out and vote anyway, to keep out ol' terrorist-lovin', Muslim Obama. It's the undecideds - as much as 10% of the electorate according to some polls - that are crucial now, and they are likely to be put off by Cheney.

Andrew Sullivan disagrees; he sees another reason for the endorsement, arguing that Cheney genuinely thinks his aupport would be helpful, and wants McCain elected to ensure avoid prosecution for warcrimes. 

I just don't find this very convincing. I prefer to go with Darth Cheney stabbing his old foe in the back with the knife of his support, as one last, dark, subtle act of political warfare.