I'll preface this by saying that I'm not a Democrat - I'm not American and live in London - and I have no faith the ability of the Democrats, led by Gore or anyone else, to get us out of a situation that's been brewing for decades. I'm just making an observation about electoral democracy.
Since his constitutional speech, I've been thinking a little about Al Gore. I've always had a little sympathy for the way he got shafted for claims he never made about the Internet, and generally his heart seemed to be in the right place on the environment.
But he's a politician, and the little betrayals of principal necessary to hold office, including his role in the Clinton government's foreign policy crimes and misadventures, have pretty well eroded my limited sympathy; not to mention his failure to take a stand when the Bushcons stole the election.
I started thinking about this again when I read about An Inconvenient Truth, which is doing the rounds at the moment. It follows him around an unglamorous and unpaid lecture circuit, beating the drum about global warming, and from what I can tell he comes across as sincere and sympathetic.
So, let me tell you about a UK election, and a little-noted underpinning of Tony Blair's own historic election victory. First we have to go back to the previous election, between Conservative Party leader John Major and Labour Party leader John Smith. Everyone expected Labour to win, including the Tories, who were 'mired in sleaze'. Everyone was very surprised to discover the Tories still in power.
And life went on. But when John Smith died, there was an unexpected outpouring of public grief, which was quite odd. A lot of people put it down to the "Diana effect" - the British public's newly discovered taste for public displays of emotion, acquired after the death of Diana, Princess of Wales.
Article comments
1 - Eric Olsen
I have really come to appreciate your elegant, often profound little observations, this one in particular
2 - Bing
He repeats the propaganda that "Bush stole the election" and he's profound?
I think sad and deluded is more appropriate.
3 - Eric Olsen
it appears you missed the point, which is peering into the collective subconscious. The election wasn't "stolen" in any literal sense as far as I'm concerned but Gore DID receive the majority of the popular vote, so he is not your average loser. There is certainly not the air of finality you find in a typical election. Any way you look at it, it was an asterisk election - I believe that is his point.
4 - Baronius
Eric, Gore is not your average loser.
He went into the election knowing the rules, and failed. If the rules had been different, both parties would have used different strategies, the Republicans wouldn't have neglected Calif. for 20 years, and the Duchess of Quebec would have vetoed the election on the grounds of blasphemy. Gore lost in the Electoral College, and he keeps implying that it wasn't fair. Any respect I had for him (I used to have a lot) is long gone.
But that's not what Chromatius means by "stolen election", is it?
5 - Chromatius
That's right. And Eric made a point I should have about the Gore/Bush result - whatever side of the debate you're on, everyone recognises that Gore had a majority. (I did mean to put 'stolen' in quote marks).
And (no time to check) I'm pretty sure the same was true of the UK election I refer to - because of the way electoral boundaries are drawn up, it's not that uncommon in the UK for the losing party to have a greater number of total votes. Changing electoral boundaries is one of the perks of office.
6 - Chromatius
I guess to some extent what I'm inferring here is the mirror image of that draining of support and ability to rule we describe as 'lame duck'.
(And thanks for the vote, Eric, much appreciated.)
7 - Bing
HMMM where to begin........
First of all the electoral college is what we use to decide who wins the election. Yes the person who wins that usually wins the popular vote but Gore lost the electoral college. So in no sense was the election "stolen."
It seems to me that those on the far left are so arrogant and just assume that the majority of people agree with them and that when they lose an election it's because of fraud. They said it in 2000 they said it again in 2006. Although they didn't have any proof that didn't stop them from screaming stolen election. The reality is that the majority of Americans do not share thier far left views. To be fair the majority of Americans are not far right either. However I would suggest that the majority of Americans do tend to be slightly right of center, holding traditional American values. As proof I would point to the large number of polls showing that most Americans believe that if abortion is legal it should be restricted and used seldom. Also the recent Sam Alito confirmation. Every major poll showed that over 50% of Americans believed he should be approved and would make a good judge yet we had the liberal Dems in congress railing that Alito was out of the mainstream. Another piece of evidence would be the number of states that have amended thier constituions to ban gay marriage. The amendments have been voted on in 18 states by the citizens of those states and in all 18 states gay marriage has been banned including some very liberal states like Hawaii and Oregon. Despite all of this the far left continues to behave in thier arrogant, condescending, narcissistic way.
Lastly, unless the GOP runs Bin Laden in 2006, Hillary will not win. She is the queen of far left, arrogant, patronizing, narcissistic liberals. She realizes Bill ran as more of a moderate and she is desparately trying to position herself as a moderate but she isn't fooling anyone . The only ones who will vote for her are those on the far left and a small portion of moderates/undecided and that's not enough.
8 - Dave Nalle
If Gore has any added 'gravitas' it's because he hasn't bitched and whined excessively about the election loss in 2000. You've got to respect that. But the flip side is that the stuff Gore talks about on these lecture tours is incresingly whacky and out of touch with the concerns of the American people, and that's going to count against him in any actuall election, even if it wins him big points in Europe. Eurosocialists still don't get to vote here in America, thank god.
Dave
9 - Nancy
When you talk about "the majority" of the American people, you are talking about a razor-thin technical margin, which was only achieved thru playing blatant political games with hanging chads and manipulation of vote counting, by both sides. That, I believe, is the problem the author is talking about: there was NO sizable, clear majority to satisfy the (extremely large) percentage who lost that it was a fair loss. Additionally, the contest then got thrown into the USSC, where it got the additional perception of being decided by a group already biased in favor of one of the contenders, which in the end only served to sully the image of the USSC as an independent & unbiased institution, which only added to the bitterness of the losing block.
All this adds up to a subliminal sense, whether true or false, that the election was 'stolen' & those who were against Bush were cheated of their democratic rights as voters. As noted, this was and is a sizable chunk of the US population - 49% of it, which while technically a minority, is still one whopping BIG minority to feel this way.
Gore himself disappointed me bitterly by throwing in the towel the way he did. I was even a little disgusted by his refusal to use dirty tricks against BushCo, once they started using the Rove smear tactics on him, altho I hold Rove in utter contempt at all times as being unfit to live, let alone be near/in the seat of power. I suppose I was as bitter about Gore as I was, because I'd been screwed not that long before by Ross Perot & his chickenshit disappearing act in the middle of what I deemed to be a vitally necessary correction to US politics of breaking up the monopoly (bipoly?) of the current two-party system, both sides of which are in the long run equally rife with corruption, cronyism, hypocrisy, arrogance, overprivilege, and money. A letdown like that was hard to take a second time running, as it were.
10 - Mark Saleski
...is incresingly whacky and out of touch with the concerns of the American people
right. like you know what the concerns of the american people are. please.
it's this kind of reductionist thought that in part fuels our current political divisiveness.
11 - Dave Nalle
Mark, I know what the concerns of the American people I interract with, and one of them is that we get better leadership than Gore in the White House. I don't pretend that the farmers, businessmen and barbeque junkies I hang out with are representative of everyone in America, but then I've also got access to demographics and polls that back up some of my observations. Democrats and Republicans alike seem to want someone moderate with good common sense, and that doesn't necessarily describe Gore and certainly doesn't describe Hillary.
Dave
12 - Bing
Never get tired of spinning the facts do you Nancy?
Bush won the electoral college. End of story. He won the election so who gives a damn if the losing side doesn't think it's "fair" because it wasn't a landslide. The election only went to the supreme court after Gore refused to concede and demanded numerous recounts in the hopes of getting the outcome he desired. The election wasn't stolen, rather those on the left acted like the petty, hypocritical losers that they are.
Need anything else explained to you about the reality of the 2000 election Nancy?
Second it seems that the Democrats in Congress are fond of saying that they represent the majority of Americans when they don't. Republican president, Republican Congress, and most governors are Republican. Therefore as far as the voting public is concerned they are more Republican than Democratic. It's not a large majority but Republicans do represent more Americans views and beliefs at this point in time. I know it's a harsh reality for Democrats and thier suporters to accept and that they will do anything and smear anybody in order to get the power that they once held back but hey it's reality none the less.
Seems liek everyone under the sun on the left is predicting Dem wins in 2006 and Hillary in 2008. Well they're wrong again on both counts. But that's nothing new.
13 - Nancy
Well, I certainly don't need anything explained by someone as much a legend in their own mind as you, bing.
14 - zingzing
2000 was a long time ago. just forget about it. if dems don't represent the american people, then bush doesn't either. he's too far gone on the religion thing. and the spying thing. and the warmongering thing. maybe republican values do more fairly represent the american masses (who, let's face it, are retarded), but it's bush, the maverick king, and his crazy cronies who are in charge.
15 - Dave Nalle
Zing, I believe your masters want you to write that as 'The King's Krazy Kronies'
Dave