Bob's blog - the realm of threalm

. It's Melbourne Cup day in Australia: a day full of strained horse racing metaphors, lots of forced jollity, and much illusion about chance; hence the superficial inspiration for my segue to: The interesting, refreshing and credible view now developing that "horse race" style politics is currently (if temporarily) on the outer in the big democratic conversation in the US. The argument runs along these lines: The triumph for grass roots democracy seen in the presidential election of Obama last year, cuts both ways: to big central planning idealists like Obama, but also to small government idealists like Ron Paul. This means that the previously dominant gamers and tacticians in politics (Karl Rove, Josh Lyman, Bill Clinton), who downplay substance and the ideas of candidates and who look primarily to the sport of political contests (the horse race metaphor), are now less important than they have been for ages. Triangulating, seeking the middle ground between poles, whic...

McCain loses when he shows the content of his characterisation It's an inspiring and historic thing that America can transcend race and elect a black man to be its president. My residual concern is that however storied this triumph of the great American experiment in democracy may be, they may not have got the right guy for the job. It is not enough that he is black. He really does need to be good enough too. If America is to live out the true meaning of Martin Luther King's words that a man should be judged, not by the colour of his skin, but by the content of his character, it seems quite possible that America has again chosen poorly. If McCain had won instead, we might also have had cause to have doubts on this too. I know that the conventional wisdom is that McCain's true mettle for this job was already tempered and battle tested as authentic by his experience as a POW and as a working Senator with a real resume of achievements. How can one not respect and admire this c...

Get Palin . Get the Plumber. Just get Obama the Presidency. An understanding of what constitutes fair play had, within tolerable limits, quite wide common ground in the communities I grew up in. That includes the books, newspapers, magazines, television programs and radio broadcasts that have shaped my perceptions, as well as my homes, schools, teams and workplaces. I'm certainly not the first to say this, as a parent of teenagers or as an ageing adult, but I am still genuinely surprised I have to say it. This is no longer the case. "Fairness" has been captured by post-modernism to such an extent that it has become a casualty of the culture conflicts of contemporary society, the same way that "truth" has. Just look at the media reporting of the Obama and Palin phenomena. Reporters and commentators (they are now the same thing) no longer feel the need to even be seen dealing fairly with the subjects of their news reports about unfolding political processes. Chec...