World

Obama “too good” to be President… [Hat-tip: Norm]

Like most people, I guess, I’m still coming to terms with John McCain’s decision to select a running-mate young enough to be his wife. Sarah Palin is not the pick I would have predicted. But, what a coup de theatre! Who’s that Obama fellow? What was that speech he gave last night? Some of the smartest conservatives I read – Noah Millman, Ross Douthat – declare themselves excited. That counts for something. And, indeed, from what we’ve seen of her today, there’s clearly considerable upside to the pick. Apart form anything else, it gives some “buzz” to a McCain campaign that was beginning to seem prickly, thin-skinned and bad-termpered. It

Jonah Goldberg at National Review Online: I was in the car listening on XM when Obama was officially nominated. But I didn’t want to let it pass without saying that it is a wonderful thing that a black man can gain the nomination of a major American political party. The Democratic Party, which didn’t admit black delegates to one of its conventions until 1936 (the GOP did nearly a half-century earlier) has done a great and historic thing. It’s another example of America’s greatness many fail to appreciate: We are better at racial and ethnic reconciliation and assimilation than pretty much all of these countries that are supposed to be

Art Goldhammer looks at the Democratic convention in Denver and lets loose his imagination… I got to thinking about what would have happened had a comparable scene been staged in France. Just try to imagine Carla Bruni rattling on about her first meeting with Sarkozy at a posh Parisian dinner party. And the family vetting? Would she have brought “Nick” home to meet her sister Valeria, an actress rather than a basketball coach like Michelle’s brother, and would Valeria have offered an opinion on Nick’s prowess as a persuasive public speaker? And how about the kids? Might Jean Sarkozy have motored on stage aboard his scooter, patted Carla on the

Shut up! You think this sort of stuff actually helps Barack Obama? You be mad then. Pure Hollywood comedy… [[Hat-tip: Andrew Sullivan]

Sometime today or sometime tomorrow Barack Obama will put a grateful planet out of its misery and let us know the identity of his running-mate. After Bayh and Kaine surges, the punditocracy is embracing Joe Biden today. And I’d say Obama could do a lot worse. But, working on the time-honoured premise that losing betting slips are discarded and soon forgotten, while winning tickets are framed and presented as evidence of an uncanny perspicacity, let me take a punt and back a long-shot contender to sneak up and emerge the winner of the 2008 Veepstakes… Montana governor Brian Schweitzer. Unlikely? Perhaps. But there’s no great pundit penalty for being wrong

I suspect that this sort of polling is really meaningless. But, still, it’s enough to make one despair. Ben Smith reports that a poll: commissioned by the Democratic-leaning True Patriot Network, found that 74% of Americans say McCain is patriotic, and that just 56% say the same of Obama. Of course, when they say “patriotic” I suspect they really mean “nationalist”, even if it’s the case that many Americans don’t actually see the difference between the terms. One scarce dare think upon what grounds these voters deny the “patriotism” (in the true sense of the term) of either candidate, nor why this love of country must, apparently,  be something to

Tyler Cowen is generously soliciting questions: here’s mine, asked knowing that Tyler is keen on South America and capable of answering almost anything… Why do Latin American countries perform so poorly at the Olympic Games? The Republics of the Caucasus and Central Asia win medals in sports such as wrestling and weight-lifting, West Africa has produced sprinters while East Africans dominate distance running. So it can’t just be poverty, right? Is Latin America’s comparative failure explained by a combination of poverty and physiological factors? That is to say, do Latin American countries with high Indian populations suffer from an in-built disadvantage? If so, does this help explain why Argentina, Brazil

Bill Keller’s piece on “Springtime for Autocrats” in the New York Times has received plenty of attention (See Yglesias’s sane response for instance) but for Russian and Caucasus commentary I’d recommend Neal Ascherson’s article in the Observer. It’s probably the best-balanced, most historically aware and, for that matter, humane piece I’d read on the whole grisly affair. As he puts it, we’ve been here before in the Caucasus and only the Russians have learnt anything from history. A foolish, counter-productive Georgian policy has failed (again) and the west should think long and hard about when and how it plans to bluff in the future… Ascherson, a veteran Black Sea hand,

Douglas Murray tours a country despondent about its presidential race and increasingly uncertain about Barack Obama. Yet the world still needs America’s strengths In front of me at the University of Chicago, and several times my height, is a stone carving of a half-human deity from the Assyrian empire. All round this exhibition on ancient Iraq are towering artefacts from lost cities and faded empires. The whole is overshadowed by a room featuring the Baghdad looting of 2003. Beside me, a father tries to answer a question from his son: ‘What happened to Babylon?’ The father attempts to explain how empires ebb and flow — how armies rise and fall.

Expect more of this. The ad hits McCain on jobs, lobbying and Washington insiderishness and has a nativist whack at dodgy foreigners too. In other words, it’s probably pretty effective…

Episode three of the Geras vs Massie cricketing showdown is underway. It’s Norm’s turn to pick first and, as I feared he might, he’s exploiting his greater knowledge of South African cricket. Getting my excuses in early, I consider myself the underdog in this game. Anyway, the rules are the same as ever: only chaps who have played post-1945 are eligible for selection… You can follow the action here and, of course, at Norm’s place too.