The trouble is, and I don’t claim to know “phil” or his character, but there are some that would bizarrely prefer that this country was run in to the ground with minority favouring policies like Bush has managed to achieve. Go figure

And one last note: I have repeatedly in my own blog commented on Obama’s shortcomings, but perspective is needed. It is only in recent years that the netroots has been able to have such a profound impact on elections (Hillary losing would be an incredible accomplishment, but having Joe Lieberman kicked out of the Democratic Party was another). The decentralization of information provides an interesting opportunity here and we view Obama as just one step in a larger movement to bring progressive values to the country.

For one I, despite my comments above, do think the US election is important. The standards of US education, of their economy and of course their foreign policy always have a great impact on the western world. I just don’t think it is 7 or 8 posts in a row worth of importance

It seems pretty clear to me that you have very little understanding of U.S. politics, or else you wouldn’t think that there weren’t a difference between the best Republican candidate John “We Could be in Iraq for Another 100 Years” McCain and someone like Obama who, again, spoke out against the war from day one.

What sort of plan was this supposed to be exactly?
If Saddam wanted to “undermine” the dollar by taking euros for oil he could just as easily have sold the dollars himself afterwards (or forward) as demanding the buyer do so – exactly the same market impact.
And those dollars as a proportion of total daily dollar/euro trading volumes are what?
Small beer.

Is there nobody else on this blog who finds the US election as depressing as 1997?

You people are *excited* by Obama??? Please read Gary Younge

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/story/0,,2236548,00.html

or Johan Hari

http://comment.independent.co.uk/commentators/johann_hari/article3315049.ece

or

http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/jeff_jarvis/2008/01/rattling_on_about_change.html

Getting rid of Bush is like getting rid of the Tories, the incoming will be the same old stuff. Is this a Euston site?

I’d be quite happy to take a pro-war stance, as Devil’s advocate, but I was always against it. Shame. Anyone who wants to write a pro-war diatribe – from a Liberal perspective – is welcome to email Sunny. I have time for the pro-war left who wanted rid of the fascists in Baghdad, but they have to face up to the reality that they were used by an American military/industrial establishment, which ever since the OPEC crisis (and the subsequent humiliation of the US), has aimed to control the Middle East.

I know it’s fashionable for liberal bloggers to claim it wasn’t about the oil (and Saddam’s plan to deal in Euros), but it ignores US foreign policy ever since 1950.

I’ll get my coat…

I’ll be happy when Casting the net comes back into force to hopefully throw up some of these lesser read/known blogs daring to be different

But really, my points all come to the same thing…everyone is expected to talk about the primaries, and yes the left is expected to be anti-war. Wouldn’t it be quaint if this site was the place you could come to to see the unexpected side of the L/L’s outrage and opinion on issues of the week less heard?

As for your other points: see ‘Special Relationship’…

BAe, anyone?

Our country’s foreign policy has everything to do with our government and not the US, it is our own decisions which cause us to be entwined with the president race and perhaps it is those decisions which are more important for us to be looking at. If we’re just interested in leaderships of other important countries then we also need not spend all our time with the US-not-even-a-real-election-yet given just how many elections and political upheavals are going on in the world right now.

This might seem odd for a group site that is supposedly concerned with the direction of the British Liberal-Left.

Not at all, quite the opposite in fact if you look at the main focus of the Liberal/Left over the last half decade: Iraq.

It makes perfect sense for us to be following very closely the US Presidential elections given the power and impact the outcome has on our country’s foreign policy.

Maybe we could sack Jonathan Ross, trimming the BBC’s costs by 85%, and then slash the license fee?

I’m very much in favour of small government, but it’s times like this I just can’t help but love the BBC. May Auntie live forever.

That said, I shall be very much glued to the whole process in the US as much as the next man!