Click here to view the embedded video.

Earlier this week the world changed with the election of Senator Obama to be the next President of the United States. The people of Korea were quite mixed in terms of an Obama presidency with the younger Korean people gravitating towards the Senator for the same reasons that most young Americans do. However the older Korean people were not so happy due to Senator Obama’s stated intention to renegotiate the FTA between Korea and the USA. I was happy off course and spent the entire lunch break and then some extra time until Senator Obama achieved the required 270 electoral votes to clinch the presidency.

That entire day was a little extraordinary because I was watching the election with one liberal Canadian and one conservative from the state of Washington. I also work with another conservative from Arizona and both of my co-workers were not happy at all when Senator Obama won. I was simply over the moon and every time on that day, I thought about “President Obama” I couldn’t help but smile. At the same time I felt a little sad for some of my conservative co-workers who started to mutter statements like:

I am just so sad to see the United States of America become the United Socialist States of America.

I think that is a bit overstated, I don’t beleive the USA will ever become socialist regardless of the policies implemented by the Obama administration. I have argued on this blog that certain policies that lean towards socialism would not be so bad especially when it comes to healthcare. For example, I was quite astounded to pay $17 to visit a Doctor and purchase antibiotics here in Korea (My health insurance doesn’t start until December). Anyway this is not meant to be an argumentative post but merely a statement of hope that some conservatives/republicans will slowly stop feeling bitter with regards to the Obama presidency.

Click here to view the embedded video.

There have been a few news articles scattered around the web this past week talking about the difference between the Democrats and the Republicans in terms of enthusiasm. I don’t remember the specifics but I remember seeing double digit differences between the interest factor of the respective parties. This interest was thought to have disappeared after the “Big Media” played up the division between the Hillary and the Obama supporters however as expected, those rumors are false.

A further point, that the Left Anchor made quite astutely is that people are much more civil in the Obama rallies. No one shouts “McCain…..terrorist….” It really escapes me how people are so afraid of one man and what he could do for America. I am reminded at this point of what Gordon/The Griper once mentioned, I am not sure who because both of them are quite knowledgeable:

Even if Obama wins, America can survive one Obama term if not two.

I know I got that quote wrong so I hope the parties involved will forgive me but I am imploring conservatives to tone it down because some people actually really do believe Senator Obama is a muslim and a terrorist.

I can’t wait until Senator Obama wins the election…

I must admit, that statement is a fair bit arrogant but I was feeling pretty good given that the current economic situation heavily favors Senator Obama. Today I spoke to my older brother who works within the London financial sector, he told me the scariest aspect of the next few months as far as the global economy is concerned is that we are heading into the realm of theoretical economics.

What this means is that no one knows what is going to happen next, not Bernanke or any other egghead employed by any company in the world. This lack of knowledge heavily favors Senator Obama despite him knowing about as much about the situation as anyone else. The problem is that Senator McCain knows he would lose an Obama/McCain economic fight therefore he is stirring up all this trouble with regards to Senator Obama and terrorism.

This strategy is disgusting if not despicable and I cannot wait until Senator McCain gets what he deserves. Therefore at this juncture, I will call the election as a slim victory for Senator Obama and Senator Biden.

Korea is actually amazing and not what I expected in any way or form, the people are really nice though I really need to improve my speaking and reading. I tried to take the bus to into the city today and only realized after 30 minutes that I was heading into the country. Thankfully I got off before I ended up somewhere I didn’t want to be. The language barrier is the biggest issue so far as I often have to resort to hand gestures that I am sure people perceive as: “another crazy foreigner.” I have taken some pictures and I will upload them in due course, but on to the politics.

I have managed to keep track of the politics while I have been here and regarding Sarah Palin, I think she is a smart move for the McCain campaign as evidenced by her energizing the republican base. This energy is only slightly less than the Obama campaign but the problem with choosing her is that Senator McCain can no longer use the experience attack line against Senator Obama because he will inevitably be criticizing his own VP who has minimal experience. Sarah Palin is too radical and conflicts with Senator McCain’s image of a reformer as she is by far more conservative than he is and this is not a good thing.

The New York Times has an interesting comparison up on their site detailing the number of times Democrats and Republicans have used certain keywords. The interesting thing to note from a liberal perspective is that the Democrats are hitting the economy more often than the Republicans which is what the majority of Americans care about at this juncture in the political race. The Republicans have talked about god twice as much as the Democrats but that is no surprise there given that evangelicals always side with conservatives. A cursory glance at this comparison gives me hope, yes I said it , if the Democrats keep hitting the right notes and the Republicans continue on old lines of attack, we are sure to win.

Morgan Spurlock and his fiancée Alex leave their fabulous New York lifestyles behind for the heart of the Midwest, Columbus, Ohio. Morgan and Alex work at multiple minimum wage jobs for 30 days earning $5.15 per hour. They get to experience first hand the struggles minimum wage earning families face as Morgan’s niece and nephew come to live with them

His latest documentary emerged because his wife was pregnant and he wanted to make the world a safer place by finding Osama Bin Laden, the worlds most wanted man. He does this by flying to Egypt, Afghanistan, Jordan, Saudia Arabia and Pakistan talking to regular people as well as those with ties to terrorism about Bin Laden as well as the “War on Terror.” A few facts from the documentary:

1. Some Muslims believe that America wants to eradicate Islam
2. There were 13720 terrorist attacks in 2007, a significant increase since America invaded Iraq
3. The majority of Muslim people do not support Al-Qaeda

I really enjoyed this documentary because it was enlightening while mixing up those serious moments with moments of humor. It can be purchased from Amazon.com for $16.99 if you haven’t seen it in the theater’s otherwise alternatively you can buy the book.  If you have enough to read, the documentary is just over 90 minutes which flies by quite quickly, an 8/10 on my personal ten point scale.

Now this is what I call Senator Obama stepping up to the plate to show McCain he can attack as well as any Republican. Well done Sir:

Twitter is an amazing tool; living in Ireland one of my biggest dislikes is that the time difference screws up me watching certain political events that occur in America. A great function of twitter until a few weeks ago was that you could follow certain people like Barack Obama on your mobile phone and twitter would send you an SMS:

politifact Joe Biden: Says McCain “supported George Bush’s policies 95 percent of the time.” http://tinyurl.com/5c4bxe about 19 hours ago from twitterfeed

The problem for international users like myself is that it was costing Twitter $1,000 a person so they don’t offer that service anymore unless you live in America. Regardless, Twitter is an example of a social service Senator Obama’s media team has used to keep his supporters informed when he makes speeches and on other events like his choice of a VP.  Senator McCain does not need to use technology because his focus is on the seasoned voter, the older voter etc… however does this lack of technology use reduce involvement with his campaign?

Senator Obama can maintain a level of involvement with his supporters through social media that allows him to keep up donations while reminding his supporters to spread the word, get their neighbors involved or make people aware about any nasty smear by right-wing organizations.Senator McCain on the other hand has to rely on TV and the radio which is not as fast, or personal as spreading issue awareness compared to a simple SMS to a cellphone or a post on Senator Obama’s  Facebook group.

Will this new method of involvement make the difference, only the next two months will tell the whole story but I believe the McCain camp is at a distinct disadvantage:

Michelle Obama is as eloquent as her husband if not more, she accurately gave people a better understanding of Senator Obama while reinforcing the themes of the Obama campaign. She touched on the journey their family have taken and most importantly focused on the plight of the middle class family in modern day America. Another highlight last night was Senator Kennedy’s speech which you can find here.

Today, I thought I would try something new; I am going to “twitter” the convention basically meaning I will update my Twitter account with a 140 character sentence every 5 minutes. This is obviously nothing compared to actually being at the convention but its close enough for those people who live outside of America like myself. You can follow these updates on the right hand sidebar or alternatively open this page and refresh it every now and then while you are browsing.

I stumbled upon a few good YouTube video’s today but the most thought provoking of them was those created by people expressing why they are Democrats. Have you ever thought about it to those of my liberal/progressive friends and to those conservatives, why are you not  a Democrat? One reason for myself is that I understand the Democratic party to be more forward looking in the sense that they readily embrace the future of America while not clinging to the past as some Republicans like to do:

John McCain’s campaign is trying to paint Barack Obama as a big spender. In a new radio ad, an announcer says Obama wants to implement “$863-billion in new government programs - a 23 percent increase in the size of government.”

The percentage-increase claim is so far off base that we’re going to grant McCain several questionable assumptions - and then show that he’s still way off.

<snip>

And lastly, how can McCain argue that an increase in discretionary spending is the same as an increase “in the size of government”? Here’s what Pounder had to say about that: “By size of government, we are referring to government spending outside of mandatory spending. It’s the argument that outside of mandatory spending, this is the most immediate way that Barack Obama will have an impact on government spending and when you include his spending proposals it accounts for a 23 percent increase.”

That’s the equivalent of saying, “By size of government, we are referring to a government with no Social Security, no Medicare, no Medicaid, no food stamps, no federal employee retirement benefits and no interest on the national debt.”

Senator McCain’s 2nd mistake this week is to continue to mislead his base with attacks against Senator Obama’s tax plan however as I have stated in numerous posts, Senator McCain’s tax plan spends more money in his first term not to mention maintains the tax cuts for the richest Americans rather than those who need it the most:

Lastly the Sunlight Foundation is an organization that keeps track of politicians wealth, do you want to guess how elite Senator McCain is? $36,431,099 in 2006 according to Senator McCain’s personal disclosure forms. Senator Obama for that same year was worth just shy of $800,000. For those of you who think Senator McCain understands what it means to be in the middle class or that his policies help middle America, think again.