Meryl and Hilary

My admiration for Meryl Streep continues to grow. This Tribute to Hilary Clinton is quite wonderful and well worth watching
 Such depth of perception. Such articulateness. I really want to believe that this wasn't the work of a professional speechwriter, and it doesn't seem to be.

For all the greatness of his electioon, it is also the great sadness about Obama being elected that Hilary wasn't. But maybe she was saved the denigration that inevitably follows.

Absolutely Super

Well, the only thing better/worse than 10 months of Australian electoral campaigning is 10 months of US campaigning. We look with interest at what today might mean for the pruning of the field.
Some commentary on the Clinton/Obama rivalry has been very perceptive. I note particularly:

• the US, despite its liberal nature. has the lowest real participation of women in elected Government of any Western democracy. There are less women in the State and Federal legislatures than anywhere else in the world claiming to be democratic
• it is a pity that the Obama/Clinton divide has polarised the debate so that Clinton is about women and Obama about blacks.
• This has the unfortunate side effectthat it seems that the women's issue is about white women, and the black issue about black men
• I think this observation is fairly true, and the net effect is to disempower black women. This bears some thinking about

We look forward with interest!!

The incredible benefit of backstabbing

Will we ever understand the election process of the US? I doubt it. What we're witnessing at the moment is virtually the parties selecting their candidates, not the voting of the people for a new president. Commentary is both effulgent and effusive (see here for example) and we are warned that the dirty tricks have only just begun.
In Oz this takes place out of public view, what ever Howard said about Costello and vice versa, was firmly kept behind locked doors. What Clinton and Obama say about each other, or McCain and Romney will be said out in the open.
This public backstabbing is riveting stuff, even from the Antipodes. It has the advantage of ( win lose or draw) knowing what your "friends" can say about you in the event that you become your party's anointed. This is a benefit in a way that Howard and Costello must attest to, part (at least) of what caused their downfall was the electorate's uncertainty about them. What did they really think about each other?
Had there been blindingly open critique in the selection process, the whispering campaign would have been sliced into tiny little pieces. But it was not to be
It is always faintly amusing to watch the way the Democrats and Republican get behind their chose candidate eventually. Obama or Clinton will stand side by side and attest that the other was the best thing since Drive In Movies, despite the fact that this week she called him a hypocrite and a liar.
The big mistake (of course ) that the Democrats have made is in wanting either the first woman or the first black person, they should have concatenated the two. But I suppose Dr Rice is a Republican!