Some guys in Iceland have created an online polling booth so that the whole world can ‘vote’ in the US election. I snapshot the current electoral map above. Unsurprisingly, Obama is sweeping the vote, although turn out is very low — under 600K have voted so far — and the traditional battleground countries of Venezuela and Albania look tight again this year. In very bad news for McCain, even Bush strongholds such as Estonia appear to be flipping this year, apparently not having realized that Obama seeks to collectivize state industry and distribute wealth democratically while also ruling via a cult of personality and an authoritarian grip on government… oh wait, that’s Sarah Palin. Maybe a flash of recognition accounts for the strong showing of the Palin-McCain ticket in Venezuela? Not sure…
This is the second US election I have spent as a US citizen overseas — the first was in 2000, when I was in the field in Papua New Guinea and far away from cable TV (but Nau FM did broadcast updates on the situation in Florida between songs by the Venga Boys and Connections of Lae). I have to say that I am routinely surprised at just how much international interest there is in the 2008 election. I know that I personally am obsessed with the thing: I woke up early this morning to check HuffPo for response to the Obama 30-minute ad buy (I prefer my news tabloidy: only Huffington Post or Fox News will really do). I find myself wanting to talk about the election a lot, yet I worry that others here in Ireland will find this terribly ethnocentric: “Oh another American who thinks the US is the center of everything.” In fact, however, I’m finding that pretty much everyone is obsessed with the election. Back in Finland, people would talk authoritatively about the electoral college — e.g., could Obama hold Pennsylvania? There are live campaign reports nightly on BBC, France 24, and other Euro news channels. No doubt the world waits with bated breath for the exit of our dear leader W. And yet this election is probably special for other reasons as well. Like, you know, Barack Obama. Raised by an anthropologist! Truly part of the global village! Mainline Eisenhower Republican! What’s not to love?
At Culture Matters, LL captures my mood:
I know it’s not anthropology, but. Can I just say. That I cannot concentrate. On anthropology or anything else. Because all I can think about are the U.S. elections. I just tore myself away from the Obama ‘08 website because I was staring at it and starting to cry. I, who regularly pronounce my pompous disdain for patriotism, I just bought an American flag online, and had it shipped by express mail, so that it will arrive in time so that when Obama wins, less than a week from now, I can run through this Australian university campus waving the flag above my head and hooting. Somebody, please, help me to recover the dignity of ironic detachment from politics. I need to go back to editing thesis drafts for my students.
For me, the spectacle of US politics from a distance has been transfixing. It’s as though the best and the worst of the US have been purified into a basic contrast. But all the grotesque racism and xenophobia that characterizes so much US political discourse, and that has structured the entire narrative arc of the Republican campaign, has been more than matched by the unprecedented Obama phenomenon. We’ll see how it goes. The world appears to be holding its breath until it is blue in the face.
People here (Dakar) are obsessed too! My students all want to talk about Obama, all the time. Older people I know, those who have been in the US especially, are very, very worried about the possibility of assassination. My one Lebanese colleague (an older gentleman) is sure that “the American will never elect a BLACK!”
But I am with you and LL: I can think of nothing but the election. I watch CNN, then BBC, then Euronews, France 24, and then back to CNN.
I should note that information about the election–most of it quite accurate–is all over the news and popular press here. The general sentiment is that everyone here in Dakar has dreamed about the day that a person of African descent would would be in the White House. No one can believe they have lived to see it. Watching, waiting, cynicism….
Also, Strong: “Mainline Eisenhower Republican” TOTALLY, AND TOTALLY FUNNY. On point, as always.
“…Obama seeks to collectivize state industry and distribute wealth democratically while also ruling via a cult of personality and an authoritarian grip on government… oh wait, that’s Sarah Palin.”
No, you had it right the first time.
Interesting snapshot, though. As a Washington Redskins fan, I am fully supporting Brad Johnson over Tony Romo to quarterback the Dallas Cowboys for the rest of the season. Of course the rest of the world loves Obama. He’s entertaining. And they’re bored of W because he doesn’t listen to their complaints with enough solicitude.
Your gushing commentary feels a bit “academic” in it’s naivety. Once you get a mortgage, pay taxes, and get a few years older, you’ll understand that raising taxes on corporations and those making over $250K a year reduces the number of jobs for the middle class, that most Americans don’t want their wealth redistributed to those who don’t deserve it, and that defeating your enemies is more important than pandering to them.
This is the difference between Republicans and Democrats, and indeed between Americans and most Europeans, regardless of where you’re reading your news from.
You know what, Cruz, I think that Strong’s and Gretchen’s and my “gushing” lies less in the promises that Obama makes than in the symbolism. I’d like to think that Obama will go out and NOT MAKE enemies, instead of either defeating or pandering to anyone, and I’d like to imagine that he can sort of the economy and give money and healthcare benefits and such to the people who DESERVE it, i.e. THE POOR, not just the middle class. BUT I am a realist and not so naive as to suppose that Obama will suddenly make a huge difference. I suspect that the US will continue to go about screwing things up all over the world, because that’s what superpowers do. But what is exciting about this election is what it means symbolically. That an African-American could be the president in a country where only a few decades ago, it took military force to ensure that little black kids could go to school, and people were attacked by dogs and beaten back by hoses just because they wanted to make it possible for black people to vote. That maybe Americans are finally coming around to reject Bush’s war-mongering, and the disastrous humanitarian and economic consequences that it has had.
And good grief, what in the world makes you think that Strong or anyone else who votes for a Democrat is just a young person who has no mortgage and doesn’t pay taxes? Did you say ‘naivety’??
It’s interesting to see that one of the closest “races” (for which the numbers might be approaching anything close to statistical significance) is in Venezuela. I have heard several immigrants from Latin America, including a Venezuelan last night, comparing Obama adversely to Chavez & other populist “cult of personality” types (actually heard an elderly holocaust survivor making similar comparisons to Hitler).
McCain also seems v. strong in Eastern Europe (Poland, Macedonia, Czech Republic, Albania). It could all be sampling error but it looks like a pattern.
South Africa, on the other hand, has Obama with a 2177-0 lead!
“But what is exciting about this election is what it means symbolically. That an African-American could be the president in a country where only a few decades ago, it took military force to ensure that little black kids could go to school, and people were attacked by dogs and beaten back by hoses just because they wanted to make it possible for black people to vote. That maybe Americans are finally coming around to reject Bush’s war-mongering, and the disastrous humanitarian and economic consequences that it has had.”
Does it really say much about America that it is going to have an African-American leader? The fact that Fulgencio Batista wasn’t white didn’t mean there was an enlightened view of race on his watch.
And while I do find McCain a bit of a warmonger I am also perturbed that the discourse calling for a withdrawal of the US military from Iraq tends to justify itself by making a reference to “Iraqi ingratitude.” That just sounds like a euphemism for, “We wash our hands of them” to me.
I’m not saying it’s the end of racism in the U.S., I’m just saying it is a symbol that things have gotten better!
Cruz, we tried lowering taxes on corporations and their shareholders over the last 8 years. With that money they did not proportionally invest in plant and equipment or create jobs. Instead they speculated in shady real estate loans and credit default swaps, a form of gambling that brought much larger returns in the short term with a disastrous downside we’re now seeing; cut real wages and expanded access to consumer debt to compensate, another gamble; and moved production overseas, where labor costs and workplace health and safety regulations were less expensive.
Alan Greenspan himself has recently admitted that he was wrong in assuming that banks would act in their long-term self-interest by investing prudently. In short, the belief that free markets will self-regulate for the common good has proven, yet again, to be delusional.
By the way, I have a house, and it’s insured, but I couldn’t tell you how many other people took out insurance on my house or how many times its value would need to be payed out if it burned down, because those are over-the-counter transactions (also known as side bets) and unregulated.
“But all the grotesque racism and xenophobia that characterizes so much US political discourse, and that has structured the entire narrative arc of the Republican campaign”
???
Meh — I’m a little burned out on polls ‘for the entire world’ which are actually polls for ‘people with an Internet connection who can read English’. This is more accurate:
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/gallup/
What I love about this poll is that of the top-10 pro-McCain countries, four are actually anti-McCain. It is just that they are LESS anti-McCain than the rest of the world. Meanwhile, India and China don’t care/aren’t telling.
Thanks Rex, but I don’t think any of us were mistaking the Icelandic site for an ‘accurate’ picture of world opinion; it’s just another instance of global interest in the election.
I can’t see either poll as much more than some sophisticated Rorschach blot… but there are always some nice grains of truth, such as the overwhelming response from Palestine that the election doesn’t make a difference… it certainly doesn’t, for Palestine… though i don’t quite know why it certainly does for South Korea.
yep, people here in Malawi are also obsessed. a friend brought me an obama-biden sticker from home and i plan to plaster it to my clothes today.
yesterday at the university i was meeting with two (malawian) colleagues, both of whom had the blue/red map up on their computer screens…