Playing the Long Game

“The first job of a political party is to get into power.” I was told that during one of my first A-Level politics lessons. It comes as a surprise therefore that the Republican Party seems to be doing everything in its power to make sure it doesn’t take the White House next autumn. Aside from Romney the other candidates are all pretty much unelectable and even Romney isn’t a particularly strong contender.

When faced with these two disparate points I’m forced to wonder, why it is that the Republican National Committee hasn’t chased after a more moderate candidate and asked them to run for the nomination. Could it be that the GOP doesn’t, in fact, want to win in 2012?

When you think about it this isn’t such a daft idea. Obviously the GOP can’t not put forward a candidate, but it’s also obvious that 2012 is not their year for at least two very good reasons, and possible more.

For starters it’s clear that there are problems within the GOP. The rise of the Tea Party has led to an increase in the number of – well I believe the polite term is crazies – and a move away from the moderate centre and towards the extreme right wing.  Now, while people may agree with people like Rick Perry’s stance on things such as abortion, I have yet to come across anyone who thinks that Perry or Bachmann’s desire to turn the US into a conservative theocracy is in any way a good idea. It is possible that by fielding the most impossible candidates the RNC is hoping that a loss either in the primaries or in the main election will force the crazies out of party and allow a shift back towards the moderate centre.

 The other problem is that the US (along with the rest of the world) is still knee deep in the worst recession this side of the Great Depression. Considering that the Republicans have a reputation as the party that is funded and supported by, and therefore looks out for, Big Business and given that in recent weeks they have shown again and again their dislike for the squeezed middle – to borrow a phrase from Ed Milliband – the RNC may believe that their chances of getting elected at this time are slim at best, so they aren’t really trying.

There is of course the chance that the GOP has just lost the plot but I think that is unlikely and maybe I’m just looking at this all the wrong way. Maybe the RNC does think it has a chance of getting elected with one of its current crop of clowns. But if I’m not wrong, then it is in fact playing a very long and very clever game. As mentioned above the Republicans can’t just sit this race out. But they may be willing to take a hit this time around, so that come 2016, by which time hopefully the Tea Party will have faded into memory and the economy will have righted itself, they can field a moderate candidate such as Chris Christie who will take the White House.

Time will tell.

Bit excessive don't you think?

It was recently reported in the press (yesterday or the day before I think) that the government is considering allowing police to subdue rioters with live ammunition. Not plastic bullets you understand. Proper bullets.

Ho hum. Not sure how I feel about this.

Not granted the government has made it clear that this will only be allowed in situations where the rioters are about to say burn down somebodys house or buisness - under which circumstances I can hardly see the owners objecting - and I know there is a great deal of difference between a protest and a riot though one can quickly become the other. But am I the only one who thinks this not only smacks of overly excessive realiation but also of slight hypocricy?

It's the social networking scenario all over again. Prior to the riots, we merrily decried every dicatatorial government we could find for wanting to limit its people access to social networking sites, claming its breaching their freedom of expression. Then post riots we find Cameron in discussion with web providers about how we could do the same thing. Now we have this. Prior to the riots  and for some time afterwords, we've been sending angry memos to Bashar al-Assad the President of Syria, ranging in content from

"Dear Mr Assad

Please stop shooting your citizens.

Thanks

Mr Cameron"

to

"Dear Mr Assad

If you don't stop shooting your citizens we will INVADE YOU.

Yours

Mr Cameron."

Now however Cameron is considering shooting British citizens, all be it in a non-lethal manner. Am I the only one who smells the hypocracy here?

Now I'm not suggesting for a moment we simply allow rioters to do as they please, of course I'm not. But surely considering we have access to water cannon, plastic bullets and bean bag rounds - though those of course have there own problems - they should surely be our first recourse in any situation.

To my mind the only time it would be acceptable to take pot shots at British citizens is

A: They start storming up Whitehall preparing to remove the Queen

B: They storm up Whitehall preparing to remove the Queen and replace her with Cameron/Cheryl Cole/Simon Cowell.

Under those circumstances, I'll be quite happy to pick them off. Just hand me a gun. But under any other circumstances.

No.  Just no.

Why the Grand Old Party needs to get it's act together.

US Presidential Elections are a slightly bigger deal than UK General Elections  They're slightly different as well, as they are only electing a leader, not a legislature (that's for the midterms) but that's beside the point. Where as in the UK the parties have about two months to campaign for votes, in the US the Presidential candidates have a year to nine months to prepare for the election.

Pity the Republican Party aren't going to be ready in time.

On January third next year, the Iowa Caucus will be held. This is an electoral event that helps decide who will be the Republican and Democrat nominees for the Presidency. As the first such caucus it gives an early indication of who migh end up being the nominee. Once the Caucus' are over and the nominee's are chosen the race can begin.

Now the chances of Obama (that is the sitting Democrat President in case anyone has forgotten) not reciving the Democratic nomination are slim. Chances are in fact that nobody will actually run against him. This means that he can focus all of his efforts from January to November on getting re-elected.

The Republicans meanwhile are going to go into the Cacus with six potential nominees. A Woman, two Texans, a former Senator, a former Govenor and a former Speaker of the House. Most of whom have policies that would make the most Conservative politican of the 1930's proud (and yes I'm looking at you Bachman and Perry).

The problem with that is that it's going to make choosing a candidate harder. With six candidates you're going to end up with a plurality of votes with no one candidate getting any one majority. The GOP will want to get through the Cacuses as quickly as possible in effort to get onto to the campagin trail. With six candidates that is going to take a while. At this stage they want to be down to two candidates. Three maximum and even that would create problems.

Having this number of candidates at this time, essentially means the GOP are going to be squabbling over candidates and nominees to Febuary/March time. Maybe even April. By then Obama will have a three/four month headstart in terms of campaigning. Which is something the GOP can't really afford.

If Romney or Gingrich (or even Perry or Paul) really want the White House, they need to get serious, quickly. And the GOP needs to start getting it's house in order.