Change you can believe in

In an interview with The Spectator last September, Mark Penn, Hillary Clinton’s chief strategist, advanced the following paradoxical political principle: ‘What we have tried to do is make sure people understand that you need experience to bring about change.’ To translate: in order to usher in the new, it helps to be old — or at least to have been round the political block.

The thrilling start to the US presidential primary season has revolved around the (often infuriatingly vague) notion of ‘change’, and the question of who is best placed to implement it. Which of the candidates, in practice, truly personifies the clean break with the Bush years that the American electorate seems to crave?

Barack Obama’s mantra — ‘Change you can believe in’ — reflects his contention that the shift must be generational, and the next President fresh and unsullied. ‘They want me to stew in Washington and boil all of the hope out of me,’ says the Illinois Senator, cunningly presenting his youth and inexperience as an advantage rather than a potential weakness.

Senator Clinton’s slogan, in contrast, is ‘Ready for change’. Her claim to the presidency depends upon her experience in the White House and her familiarity with the dark arts of Capitol Hill. On the Republican side, John McCain also promises that ‘change is coming’, grounded in ‘the unique experience that prepares me to lead as commander-in-chief from day one’. Evidently, the voters of New Hampshire found Sen. Clinton’s curriculum vitae and Sen. McCain’s record of military valour and moral independence as impressive as their counterparts in Iowa found Sen. Obama’s charismatic novelty (and, for that matter, the Republican Mike Huckabee’s pitch as a shamelessly demotic outsider).

What relevance, if any, does this unfolding drama have for Westminster? As ever, the parallels between US and British politics are far from exact; but they are real.