election6

couple of things that have struck me about the election as it has progressed we have been swamped with coverage there has been a lot of stuff about sarah palin; she has been ubiquitous in terms of the election. it has created a sense that mccain and palin are a team. joe biden? who he? totally out of the picture. this is about obama and biden is just there as the token white politician and no one cares about him and he will have an easy job for the next 4 years of doing nothing.
the other thing about the campaign is how important that the candidate’s families are to the whole thing. it is almost as if the voters are not just voting on the policies of the candidates but they are also involved in a popularity contest and judging the families. one of the ways this is shown is in the photo ops with the candidate and their family. today is an important one where the candidate votes – so the media can cover them voting (hmmm i wonder who they voted for), the family rocks up in support, but they are not seen as voting. the question is: do they vote?

jesse jackson is being interviewed asked what the difference between when jackson ran and now. jackson’s answer 20 years and a lot more money. ted koppel has pointed out that while obama and jackson are cut from different cloth, jackson is one of the reasons that obama can become the president.

money has been cited a couple of times as the night has progressed as a reason for why obama has done so well. considering the amount of cash that has been splashed to contest the election you have to wonder is it worth it.

someone has commented that the bradley effect has not happened (basically white votes lying that they would vote for a black candidate).

one of the bbc commentators has mentioned that a lot of black americans he has spoken to offer up the comment that they are worried that once obama is in that they are worried that something bad will happen to him. he went on to say that all the chances are slim that anything would occur it is not like there hasn’t been form.

currently standing at:
mccain 76
obama 175
(but they are only separated by 1% in the popular vote).