Letters to the Editor
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New face to the world
Obama would certainly present a new face to the world (and one that is more representative, I feel as a Canadian, after a recent trip to California, where virtually all the service people - those actually DOing something to keep the machinery going - were non-white).
But behind the "diverse" face, would it be Same Old Same Old? (Obama's already talked of invading Pakistan!) And, as another LW said, how much actual change would the establishment let him make? (And how much does he WANT to make? His record is a lot less inspiring than his oration.)
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A man with the patience of a saint, a man with gravitas as well as humour, an American
I give you the now-retired Senator from Maine, George Mitchell, who showed endless tolerance and persistence in bringing the warring factions in Northern Ireland together to settle their differences peacably. His father was American and his mother Lebanese which might have given him some empathy with the Middle East. I wonder why a man of his calibre never got further than the US Senate when the likes of George W. Bush was elected to the Presidency not just once but twice. I don't want to be disrespectful to anyone but the fact that Americans chose this man to be the leader of the most powerful (for how long?) country in the world was really astounding. He has no heft at all, no breadth of knowledge so that anyone abreast of current affairs could read that Karl Rove was "Bush's brain". In my opinion, your election campaigns are much too long and I don't understand why, in modern times, primaries have to be held month after month instead of on the same day. The campaign is turned into a carnival but not a life-affirming one and your media seems totally out of control with demogoguery replacing intelligent reporting. The European Union sent monitors to Russia to oversee the election there yesterday. A bit cheeky of the EU, I think, but they've reported that although the ballots were flawed they did represent the will of the people. That's more than can be said about Florida in 2000.
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maureenodonnell
I don't think anyone here is gonna argue with your last post.
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Everybody abroad loved Jimmy Carter too
That's right, look abroad (to the French, especially) for who they think an American president should be. Leave it to Obama to tell the American people he'll re-negotiate NAFTA and then go behind our backs and whisper to the Canadians that its just campaign rhetoric. I bet the Canadians would really love Obama, since he puts their interests before ours. The Iraqis too, given that Rezco and his Iraqi billionaire buddy have supported Obama from the beginning. I am sure Obama owes them, big time for thier support. No body wants to pay attention to these "Obama is a (rather dirty) politician too" news stories, though, do they? Message to Americans: Our national interest is not often the national interest of other countries. For example, when Reagan decided it was necessary to bomb Libya after their aggression, Europe booed us. Twenty years later, Muamar Kuadaffie is a puppy dog at the international economic table, begging to be let in to share the feast. Remember when Japan was loaning us big bucks and threatened they would no longer fund our debt in the 1990's? Well, the President told them that unless they bought our T-bills, we would not import their cars. Guess what, they bought T-bills. Hardball like this surely didn't win any popularity contests in Japan for our President, but it sure went a long way to saving us from financial disaster until the deficit was solved (by Clinton). Its called international competition. We can be good world citizens, but let's not collapse into a "we are the world" kind of foreign policy. If you want to reach out to other nations, buy a Eurail pass or join the peace corps but please, vote for a president who will champion the United States: That would be Hillary!!!!
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And what would you like this shiny new package to project?
Pretty clearly, anything the US has to say to or about anything or anyone you'd have a problem with short of some extremist earth mother solar transgender pacifist powered unicorn piss flavored fantasy. You don't like war you don't like industry you don't like commerce you don't like mass media you don't like much of anything created in the last 140 years. So unless you can come up with America the Amish, I doubt you'll find anything you can live with.
This I guess has some feedback into the MacGuffin-like appeal of Obama. He's whatever you want, the instant magic gold box of mystery.
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Brand America
At least this article is honest about the fact that America is now a corporation instead of a democracy.
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Government != Commerce
It's time to kill this beast, this idea that our National Government should somehow mimic a successful mega-corporation. The world of commerce bristles, and rightly so, when government meddles too much in its affairs. However, in the last two decades the shallow and foolish notion that government should pretend to be a corporation has flourished.
Government operates with different objectives and therefore works under different ethics than the world of commerce. There is no reason to pretend one is superior to the other, or that those successful in managing one are automatically suited to the other.
More than a "necessary evil", government is a fundamental element of our civilization, and playing like the Oval Office is a CEO's suite is guaranteed to lead its occupant astray.
I wish these retired executives would just give it a rest. Our government does not need rebranding or any other marketing nonsense. This is lunacy. We just need a leader who knows what s/he's doing and has a non-deranged perspective on the world.
FD: I support Obama.
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Canadian Gaffe
Are we concerned that Obama's economist felt he had license to talk with Canadian officials about Obama's economic policy behind the backs of the American people and Obama has done nothing to correct what this advisor said? Obama scares me when it comes to foreign policy. Why is Obama surprised that Canadian officials jumped on what his advisor had said and issued a 1300 page memo about the great harbinger of change Obama is? Of course they would!!! No national figure in the USA ever makes that kind of idiotic mistake with foreign governments. What a naive idiot. Obama's inexperience scares me when it comes to foreign policy. First, Obama casually broadcasts an intention to bomb Pakistan then he sends his economic advisor to the Canadians to tell them the opposite of what he said to the American people. This guy Obama is scary.