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Maybe a bit less budget deficit and a bit less world near economic collapse. I dunno though, that's just conjecture.
Democrat had been in the Oval Office. There is no doubt whatsoever the US government knew full well Saddam had fuck all to do with 9/11 (despite Dubya claiming otherwise) and also that Saddam no longer had WMDs or posed a threat. The only real reasons the Iraq war happened were the neocon, PNAC-driven agenda of the Republican Party and the lobbying from the oil corporations to gain control over Iraq's vast oil reserves. Would the Democrats have gone to war on such premises? I don't reckon so.
Bush has done more damage to the welfare of everyone on Earth than it is possible to imagine. I remain sceptic about most Republican candidates being any different in key issues such as foreign policy and the environment.
The Democrats (with some exceptions) hardly went out of their way to stop the Iraq War -in the Senate 29 supported it, 21 didn't.
Mitt Romey or John McCain are both moderate and pragmatic as far as foreign policy goes. Giuliani speaks very similar language to Bush. Huckabee has already been exposed as not having a clue about foreign relations...
Amongst the Democrats Hillary Clinton seems the most qualified based on foreign policy.
Obama's political experience is basically 2 years in the Senate. If he wins the nomination and faces an experienced (and moderate for a) Republican like Romney or McCain I don't think the Democrats stand a chance. Clinton is divisive but I think she's the Democrats best hope. Edwards is the most sincere and I think he's the only candidate who would bring real change but I think he'd struggle to stand up against Republican smears and attacks... and if he won the nomination he would more than any other candidate mobilise Republican and corporate opposition. I still want Edwards though - if the Republicans go for someone like Huckabee who I don't think has any chance of winning a presidential election.
Do you happen to know the candidates' stance on the war? I understand Obama was against the war from the off but suspect many others changed their mind later. I suppose McCain is (now at least) critical of the war? Any other Republicans?
Heh thanks..but meh, wikipedia. I'm supposed to be studying history & politics... and US presidential elections are way more interesting than dull ancient text books.
Edwards changed his mind (he originally voted for) and has admitted he got it wrong. Clinton has kinda done the same thing but I think she took longer and wasn't so frank.
McCain is critical of how the war has been handled but not the war itself... he supports the war and supported the surge, as far as I know he thinks the US should send more troops. Giuliani also supported the surge I think.. Just looked at Romney and he's apparently said he'd be willing to break with the Bush administration's Iraq policy.
Anyway a Democrat will hopefully win!
He also supports US withdrawal from the UN, NATO and WTO...
opinion polls for democrat primaries
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opinion_polling_for_the_Democratic_Party_%28United_States%29_presidential_primaries%2C_2008
and republican
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opinion_polling_for_the_Republican_Party_%28United_States%29_presidential_primaries%2C_2008
These are offically the point where people stop seeing wikipedia as an irrevelant resource...
TBH I was waiting on some vitriolic comments from you about the creationist Huckabee...
Interesting to see where he holds the poll leads in Jim's link above...
Even though I have little time for religious fruitcakes, if I had to choose between a fundie with reasonable foreign and environmental policies or an atheist warmonger and pro-polluting candidate, I'd go for the former.
That's not to say Huckabee or any of the others have reasonable foreign and environmental policies though... I suspect most of them don't.
I would like a more tolerant world (lol) with more restrictions on spending to help prevent massive inflation. It would also make me feel happier if America nationalised it's medical insurance, and provided healthcare free at the point of use, and it was an income based tax.
That probably wont get votes though. But I think I should be hoping the democrats win with Clinton. Since Bill Clinton was really good with the American economy and created a massive budget surplus which helped kick start the following global boom with very competitive economies, hopefully Hilary has made notes. Also, she has ranted several times about the state of the national healthcare issue, and I think it's a disgrace in a country such as America that has more money than any other in the world, that those who are the poorest are neglected by society. Not just in New Orleans where the support effort by the government was laughable, especially compared to charities and non-official fundraising - but with social welfare and so on. The sub prime market has collapsed because they were trying to bleed the poor dry, and in fact did. When people with no money were sold mortgages irrelevent of their income and could not afford to pay back high interest rates, them losing their homes is only of consequence to those in Wall Street because it affected their portfolios.
Whilst I'm sure the exploitations of the poor overseas are monumental compared to the UK and the US, we need to fix the problems here before we start preaching.
However, having said that, the UK is running very spend heavy and I genuinely think we're going to topple over in the next few years because there's not enough work being done compared to the amount of people who are living off it. I think we should lean up our public sector a bit before we hit a slowdown or recession in the economy, tax revenue dries up and we hit either a) sudden and unexpected closures of public services or b) massive budget deficit that creates further inflation, and putting more people out of work and potentially triggering a depression.
However, I'm not making any comment about who I'd like to see in the White House next. It's none of our business, frankly. If commentators in the USA were saying they'd like to see David Cameron as the next "Prime Minister of England", (for they'd most likely say that, wouldn't they?) I bet that the howls of outrage from this board would be deafening.
There is no denying that many policies of the US government have a global effect- in the majority of cases for the worse. I should think those people who live in one of several countries that could find themselves the target of the next American Crusade take a very keen interest on the US election. As should do anyone who lives at sea level or in a flood plain, anywhere on the planet.
he's also not a believer in the theory of evolution, as well as believing abortion is always wrong...
McCain was tortured himself, so I very much doubt even if he had gone into Iraq we would have had the internment camps and the UN treaty on human rights being refered to as quaint.
Yep a bit more velvet glove, but 9/11 would still have happened and the US would still have to deal with how you treat prisoners who aren't part of a conventional army and not covered under the Geneva convention. He might not have gone with waterboarding, but Gitmo (or something similar) would still be there.
... that all the ballots get lost so that nobody wins.
:no:
You wouldn't appreciate "advice" from the Americans, and I bet that a man not dissimilar to you in the USA would say the feeling's mutual.
But who am I kidding, meet the new boss, same as the old boss.