In reference to the ongoing conspiracy theory:

Matthew Symonds?

OR

Matthew Symonds? (at bottom of page)

New Links! Had a tinker with my links bar to add two new sites - the word and picture related tomfoolery of hot lunch, and a link to mr thomas whitehead, a good friend and great graphic designer. Of course this praise has nothing to do with the link to Falling With Style he put on his site. Oh no.

Booming economic climate? Awareness of dangerous terrorist groups but without overblown paranoia? Muddled and somewhat chaotic but basically liberal government? Ah, the America of but four years ago. It seems like a lifetime. The good news is that the election of 2004 looks like being a lot closer than it did several months ago. Bush's once certain hold on the presidency, bolstered by a loyal Republican Congress is almost breakable (though I hesitate to call it a winnable election from the Democratic standpoint).

The keys are candidate and message. This seems self-evident but look at the current White house resident: a scion of the reviled George Herbert Bush, whose slack-jawed yokel-isms appeal to a certain portion of the silent majority but would look foolish against a Kennedy-esque candidate, especially one able to put the boot into the laughably ill-implemented promise of 'compassionate conservatism'.

Candidate: Let's be clear - it's Kerry or Dean. One has the hawk-nosed New England patrician poise of a President, a statesman, a leader. The other has a human, liberal, warm exterior and policies with liberal bite, but a complete hinterland of calculation and homework. They represent two potentially winning candidacies, one attacking Bush's hokey schtick the other his haphazard government. They also hate each other Joe Klein writes well of the Dean/Kerry divide, particularly noting the flock of policy wonks (the sophistic equivocators who helped kill Gore) gathering around Kerry due to his long-running status as favourite. But Dean has a level of grass-roots support reminiscent of the '72 McGovern campaign. Hopefully this is all Dean has in common with the candidate appointed due partly to Nixon's dirty tricks and who turned out to be as unelectable as CREEP hoped. Though Bush's team have declared that Dean is their preferred opponent (indeed White House Machiavel Karl Rove has been spotted at a Dean rally), a well run, honest campaign that dampens down domestic paranoia, highlights the state-level economic crisis (budgets diverted from schools to homeland security and the like) and challenges Bush at a man-of-the-people level could hole the neo-cons below the waterline.

On the other hand Kerry is the superficial favourite; a vet with a liberal voting record but not a threat to middle America. Yet there has been a dilution of the spirit he showed early in the race. Fundamentally he looks and sounds like a safe bet for the Democrats, not too much of this, not too much of that maybe pulling the candidature back to the centre after the pragmatic conservative mumblings of Gore and the hawkish button-down attitude of Lieberman.

For the failing of 2000 was not so much candidate (though I think Lieberman's VP ticket was a huge mistake) but message. There was none. Now there are a number of fronts available for a sensible but vocal and opinionated candidate to take. The muzzle of the focus group addicts needs to be removed.

Of course the rejection of Lieberman raises the question of the VP candidate. Both Dean and Kerry would need Southern support; Gray Davis in California is out - he is still fighting the effects of the energy crisis. John Edwards seems likely but is disliked by his North Carolinan constituents for grabbing at the presidency and largely leaving local concerns unanswered. This is key - a Democrat victory in 2004 would require concentration at a local level. A controversial choice, one that would highlight the Bush family's questionable dynasticism, focus on a particular state, recall the Clinton years and the 2000 election debacle (admittedly a move that could seriously backfire) would be Janet Reno; former attorney general and unsuccessful Demo candidate for Florida governor. Ideally I would pair her with Dean. It might not work, but would show more courage than another wishy-washy collapse in the Gore mould, and would bely the rather shoddy behaviour of 'big' potential candidates like Hilary Clinton and Wesley Clark who show every intention of holding fire until 2008.

Back from Spain having spent ten days cooking myself behind the walls of a villa, closeted away from the local population and honing my South African accent. Beautiful. Highlights: drinking Pedro Ximenez sherry straight from the cask, watching dolphins in the med and an eighties evening of justice watching Ghostbusters and then Wall Street (which also counts as work... cashback!)

I can sum up the last two weeks as work, Oliver Stone, Polyphonic Spree. I've had enough of this country, so it's off to Spain for ten days of Sangria, tapas and a disgusting amount of reading. It's not new year but even so this seems like an appropriate juncture to swear that I'll write more, better and, possibly, silghtly interesting stuff on this blog when I get back. Peace out y'all.