The US Elections: The Law of Unintended Consequences

In the 1970's, the US government provided the Shah of Iran with presses capable of printing currency of the same quality as American bills.

In 1979, the Shah decided to take a very long vacation; two weeks later, grand ayatollah Khomeini rode in triumph through Persepolis (oh all right, then, Tehran).

And then, some years later, counterfeit $100 bills began to flood the Mideast, eventually spreading around the world. Given the global dependency on American currency, these bills posed a serious problem for international markets. Accusatory fingers were pointed in various directions, but the most likely suspect was obvious: an anti-US Iranian government that possessed the very same printing presses used to create American money.

True or not, this story - which I found here - is a nice example of the Law of Unintended Consequences. This is the law that states, according to a Wikipedia entry, "that for any action one can will, there will always be some unintended consequences that result, that are not intended to be". Or, to put it a more simply: any action aimed at a certain consequence will have unintended consequences as well.

Even better examples of this law, it might be argued, can be found by looking at the various changes the Democrats have made in their presidential nomination process over the last 40 years.

Back in 1968, that nomination process was, to put it mildly, a very undemocratic thing. Yes, there were primaries, and so ordinary Democrats could go out and vote for their candidate of choice - but that choice didn't amount to much. And so, during that year’s disastrous DNC in Chicago, it wasn't the anti-Vietnam War candidate Eugene McCarthy who got the nomination. It was the insider Hubert Humphrey, who hadn't actually campaigned during during the primary season and who, during that campaign, had amassed no more than about 2% of the popular vote. And who, of course, went on to lose the election against Richard Nixon.

With riots having broken out on their very doorstep, the Dems felt it was time for an overhaul of the nomination process. A commission was set up - spearheaded by George McGovern - which resulted in the balance of power being shifted resolutely from the party elite to the voters. In effect, a new rule was added to the Delegate Selection Rules, Rule 11 (H), which stipulated that delegates at the convention were henceforth required to vote for the candidate they had been elected to support.

Unfortunately, though, the Law of Unintended Consequences set in straight away.

McGovern himself won the 1972 nomination on the basis of the new rules, only to lose - in a landslide - to the incumbent Nixon (a defeat due in part to the fact that the Democratic establishment didn't like McGovern at all, leading some of them to actively campaign for Nixon). Four years on, a second surprise materialised in the form of Jimmy Carter, another outsider who astounded the party elite by clinching the nomination. And whilst Carter did, of course, go on to win the White House, it is difficult to this day to find a sentence containing his name that does not also include the words “failed presidency”: by the end of his first term, the aforementioned Khomeini had set up shop in Iran and a resounding defeat to Ronald Reagan was a foregone conclusion.

All in all, the new delegate voting rule had had just about the opposite result it was intended to have. Instead of ensuring that viable and popular candidates were nominated to the delight of radical and moderate Democrats alike, it had effectively strengthened the party’s penchant for internal bickering and the likelihood of bickering's baby - a.k.a. the Democrats' nominee - being The Wrong Guy.

It was, in short, a triumph for the Law.

Not surprisingly, a new change was deemed to be in order. Another commission was set up, led by Governor Jim Hunt of North Carolina, which argued - with astonishing success - that a substantial slice of the power to nominate should revert back to the party bosses.

Here's a snippet from what Hunt said at the time:

“We must also give our convention more flexibility to respond to changing circumstances and, in cases where the voters’ mandate is less than clear, to make a reasoned choice. One step in this direction would be to loosen the much-disputed “binding” Rule 11 (H) as it applies to all delegates. An equally important step would be to permit a substantial number of party leader and elected official delegates to be selected without requiring a prior declaration of preference. We would then return a measure of decision-making power and discretion to the organized party and increase the incentive it has to offer elected officials for serious involvement.”

Now, to understand this, one should realise that "loosening" Rule 11 (H) meant that pledged delegates would no longer be compelled to act in accordance with the wishes of the electorate,
but that their votes should still “in all good conscience reflect the sentiments of those who elected them”. The pledged delegates, in other words, were still bound, even though the rule binding them was deliberately worded vaguely.

More importantly, however, the proposals called for the creation of a new and “substantial” class of delegates who would, by definition, not be bound by the popular vote at all. If you're wondering who belongs to this “substantial" class, don't. You know who they are: they're called superdelegates.

Fast forward to 2008. We still live by these two Hunt tenets. And they are, as everyone knows, the lifeline of the Clinton campaign. Well, one of them, at least: whilst technically it's conceivable some pledged delegates would allow their “good conscience” to ignore the voters’ wishes (something Clinton has recently pointed out) – Clinton's only truly viable option lies with the superdelegates.

But the way that option currently might work out is, again, a prime example of the Law of Unintended Consequences.

You see, when Hunt made his proposals, there was understandable opposition from the left of the party. These were basically the people who favoured Edward Kennedy above the more establishment figure of Walter Mondale; and they included, amongst others, the party feminists.

These people weren’t against the “loosening” of Rule 11 (H); in fact, it was Kennedy himself who, during the 1980 DNC, argued that pledged delegates could shift allegiance if they felt like it (Kennedy’s interest in this being that Carter had managed to get more delegates during the primary campaign than he had done). They were, however, very much opposed to the creation of the superdelegate class.

The feminists, in particular, were ready to wage a war on that issue. They felt that the superdelegates would be predominately white and male, and that – even if women made up about half of the total of all delegates – a male-dominated, unpledged superdelegate class amounted to an unacceptable shift in power.

In the end, they didn't manage to land any real blows, though. Unbeknownst to them, a deal was struck between the Kennedy and Mondale camps and the superdelegates were a reality, the compromise being that they didn’t make up 30% of the delegate total (as Hunt had proposed), but only 14%. The feminists were left gnashing their teeth in frustration, as a recent article by Susan Estrich – who spearheaded the feminist front at the time - makes clear.

Back to the current campaign and, indeed, the future. If there is one group supporting Clinton for president, it is the group of Democratic feminists. These are the women who sometimes seem to be having real (and therefore often honest) difficulties in understanding that a Democrat could prefer Obama to Clinton without being driven by suspect and perhaps sexist motives. They are the ones I wrote about – not too seriously - in The Wondrous World of Misogyny.

But they are also the ones whose only hope of a nomination success rests entirely in the hands of the superdelegate class, a class which they must now firmly support and which in their minds must surely see reason and help overturn that horrid pledged delegate count.

And so the Law threatens to strike again. If it were ever true, as the feminists argued, that the superdelegate rule threatened to adversely affect a woman candidate’s chances, then these same feminists are now fervently hoping that the actual consequence of that rule turns out to be the exact opposite.

They are, in effect, banking on the Law to take full effect once again.

And, to be fair, their hope is not without merit: Clinton has led in the superdelegate count right from the word go. And in spite of everything - and, frankly, there have been a few too many everythings lately - she does so still. It is, even now, very possible indeed that the Law might ultimately pull her through.

As for those printing presses in Iran, though, I hold lesser hopes. Frankly, I doubt they’re in much use today. Unless, of course, some bright soul managed to convert 'em to produce Euro bills instead.

The US Elections: The Wright Stuff

So much has been written and said about the speech Obama gave that morning in Pennsylvania on March 18th that it sort of boggles the mind.

Well, it boggled my mind, at least.

Now that some time has passed and we're back to simpler issues (such as Clinton's amusingly fictional heroics at Tuzla), I guess it might be time to try and give a few comments of my own.

The first - and very obvious - thing that caught my attention is how differently the speech was viewed by the commentators. As a result, they initially reminded me of the blind men examining their elephant, all of them coming up with surprisingly self-confident conclusions that were often partly true and always partly wrong.

Here are two quotes which illustrate this. The first is from a piece written by Andrew Sullivan for The Atlantic Magazine:

"(...) I do want to say that this searing, nuanced, gut-wrenching, loyal, and deeply, deeply Christian speech is the most honest speech on race in America in my adult lifetime. It is a speech we have all been waiting for for a generation. Its ability to embrace both the legitimate fears and resentments of whites and the understandable anger and dashed hopes of many blacks was, in my view, unique in recent American history."

The second is from Charles Krauthammer's article in The Washington Post:

"The question is why didn't [Obama] leave that church? Why didn't he leave -- why doesn't he leave even today -- a pastor who thundered not once but three times from the pulpit (on a DVD the church proudly sells) "God damn America"? Obama's 5,000-word speech, fawned over as a great meditation on race, is little more than an elegantly crafted, brilliantly sophistic justification of that scandalous dereliction."

Huh? Are these two people actually talking about the same thing? How did Obama manage to give what was a relatively compact speech and end up with something "we have all been waiting for for a generation" and reveal a "scandalous dereliction"?

Well, as mentioned, the elephant answer is the first to spring to mind. To paraphrase John Godfrey Saxe: each disputant, it seems, is railing on in apparant ignorance of what the other means. They're prattling on about an elephant they're not able or willing to look at in total.

I have come to believe, though, that this answer doesn't quite cut it. It's true as far as it goes, but it ignores a very basic fact: however diametrically opposed the reactions to the speech at first seem to be, there is also an underlying similarity.

Consider for a moment Krauthammer's outrage at Wright's words "God damn America!"

And now compare it to the the final part of the Andrew Sullivan article:

"Bill Clinton once said that everything bad in America can be rectified by what is good in America. He was right - and Obama takes that to a new level. And does it with the deepest darkest wound in this country's history.

I love this country. I don't remember loving it or hoping more from it than today."

Isn't Sullivan in effect saying: "Listen to Obama. Isn't this a great country?" And isn't Krauthammer saying: "Don't listen to that crazy anti-American pastor! This is a great country!"?

Taken that way, don't they - in essence - have a similar starting point? The fact that they nevertheless totally disagree is not because their approaches are different. It's because they apply the same approach differently. Sullivan is enthralled with what Obama said because, for him, it exemplifies America's greatness. Krauthammer is appalled by what Wright said because he feels it disavows that greatness.

The underlying notion is, however, identical: the perceived notion of the inherent greatness of America. And since America is the land of the free and the home of the brave, Americans are great too.

Americans, to put it another way, have the right stuff. To quote Tom Wolfe:

"(...) and the idea was to prove at every foot of the way up that pyramid that you were one of the elected and anointed ones who had the right stuff and could move higher and higher and even – ultimately, God willing, one day – that you might be able to join that special few at the very top, that elite who had the capacity to bring tears to men's eyes, the very Brotherhood of the Right Stuff itself."

America is great; Americans are great: it is this idea, it seems to me, that is ingrained in both Sullivan's and Krauthammer's minds. And it's hardly surprising: it is, after all, ingrained in the minds of the vast majority of Americans. Children are basically force-fed it every day as they pledge their allegiance. Sport fans enact it with their invarying cries of "USA! USA!" at every international competition. And again and again, it is evoked at times of difficulty, most recently by John McCain in his first presidential election ad ("Stand up! We're Americans and we'll never surrender!")

But this is also, perhaps, the very idea that invites comparison between commentators like Sullivan and Krauthammer on the one hand, and those reputedly wise men and their elephant on the other. Unlike the wise men, though, Sullivan and Krauthammer aren't really blind; instead, they choose not to see. In his outpouring of love for America upon hearing Obama's words, Sullivan chooses to essentially ignore the fact that it is America that not only has given but still gives rise to the dark anger of Wright; in denouncing Obama, Krauthammer chooses to ignore those that are willing to work towards bridging a very real divide, and that one of them - by some rather miraculous twist of fate - has a very real chance of becoming president.

And because of this, it seems to me that this idea - this notion - of the right stuff, and the delusional but ubiquitous idea that it has already been attained, is preventing America from truly dealing with the Wright stuff. And from becoming - ultimately, God willing, one day - great.

US Elections: Clinton's test

Throughout the primary campaign, Hillary Clinton's major strategy in attempting to prevail over Barack Obama has revolved around creating the perception that she has the experience to lead the country, whilst Obama hasn't.

In the beginning, the Clinton mantra was: "Ready on Day One". More recently, her line of attack has focused on foreign policy and national security concerns, culminating in what must be one of the strangest statements of the campaign so far:

"I think that I have a lifetime of experience that I will bring to the White House. I know Senator McCain has a lifetime of experience to the White House. And Senator Obama has a speech he gave in 2002."

Leaving aside the obvious fact that the satement is rather illogical (doesn't everyone alive have, per definition, a lifetime of experience?) and politically very imprudent (any such "lifetime" argument is bound to favour McCain), it is also contradictory with Clinton's flirtatious suggestions that Obama could be her VP running mate. After all, far and away the most important qualification a vice president needs is to be ready and able to take over office at a moment's notice. So how can Obama not have a "lifetime of experience" and not be "Ready on Day One" and still make a good VP?

Rather like Clinton's foreign policy claims, the statement is undoubtedly "a wee bit silly".

Even more silly, however, are the ways in which the Clinton campaign has attempted to explain their reasoning. In order to do this, they have made up what they call "a commander in chief test".

Now obviously no such test exists (although setting it up might actually not be such a bad idea: please tell us, Contestant Number 1, who the next president of Russia will be?). But that doesn't prevent the likes of Howard Wolfson (Clinton's chief spokesman) from using their fabrication in order to explain their position:

Asked about the contradiction of touting Obama as a vice presidential candidate while condemning his ability to lead, Clinton spokesman Howard Wolfson implied there was still time for Obama to prove himself before the Democratic Party convention in Denver in August.

"We do not believe Senator Obama has passed the commander in chief test," Wolfson said. "But there is a long way to go between now and Denver."

Ah, I see. So whether Obama can or cannnot become VP - or, indeed, president - is dependent upon how well he's going to do in a nonexistent test, the results of which are to be determined by the Clinton campaign?

Hmm. That goes beyond being a wee bit silly. It's disturbingly delusional.

The US Elections: The MaD race

So, Mississippi has come and gone, leaving Obama with yet another big but curiously unappealing victory. Depending upon whose figures you trust most, he won by about 60% or 61% to Clinton's 38% or 37%. In the pledged delegate count, he notched up 17 of the blighters, as compared to Clinton's 11.

More or less simultaneously, we finally got some projections from the Texas caucus. CNN is predicting that Obama's lead there will translate to 38 delegates, as opposed to Clinton's 29. If you set this off against the primary in that state (which Clinton narrowly won) you end up with an overal Texan "victory" for Obama amounting to a net gain of 5 pledged delegates.

Torturous math, indeed! No wonder a lot of pundits have been bemoaning the Democrats' proportional voting system. If only those overly fair Democrats had adopted the hard and fast winner-takes-all approach of the Republicans!

But wait a moment. What would be the situation if the Democrats had done that? Assume, for a moment, that each and every state where the Democrats' contenders have competed had allocated all their delegates to the winner, regardless of his or her margin of victory. And while we're at it, let's take the uncertainty of the superdelegates out of the equation as well and assume all superdelegates pledged themselves according to the vote in their state.

According to my (possibly slightly shaky) math, here's where we'd be after the Mississippi primary:

Obama: 1695 delegates
Clinton: 1660 delegates

In other words, the race would actually be closer than it is now.

Now I'm not suggesting that these would have been the actual figures if the Democratic primary had been structured along the lines of the Republican one. I am suggesting, however, that it is quite likely that such a system would, in this particular instance, not have provided the clarity many people seem to take for granted.

The problem, of course, is that this race has basically been split down the middle from the word go. It's been Clinton vs. Obama all the way, and as the race runs, so do the demographics: whites and blacks; blue-collars and "upscales"; young and old.

And this is why yesterday's victory may well leave a slightly sour taste in Obama's mouth. Yes, he won big, but he won big because of the black vote. Gone, it seems, are the days when it appeared he was significantly broadening his appeal with white voters in general (remember Virginia?). Core components of that constituency - ordinary, everyday workers and "older" women - remain as elusive as ever, if not more so.

And this is also why Clinton can afford to be just a little bit optimistic. Her "big states" rhetoric falls a little flat when taken only in the context of the primaries (where a delegate from Wyoming counts every bit as much as one from Ohio), but come the fall and the vagaries of presidential electorial system, things could work out a little differently.

Math and Demography: it's a MaD race.

International Affairs: A Step Towards War?

Forget, for the moment, Geraldine Ferraro's ill-advised comments about Obama (which, incidentally, nicely compliment yesterday's post, The Wondrous World of Misogyny). Forget, too, Spitzergate, the latest instalment in that ever-popular soap, Politics & Sex.

The news that should - but probably won't - dominate the headlines today is the sudden and premature "retirement" of Admiral William J. Fallon. In case you didn't know, Fallon is the commander of the United States Central Command (known as CentCom). As such, he is effectively David Petraeus's boss. You'll know who Petraeus is, of course: he's the guy spear-heading the war in Iraq.

Fallon retired? Now that's the sort of news that makes me feel a little queasy.

Why? Well because, simply put, Fallon is generally seen as being the top brass that's been calmly and quietly attempting to edge Bush away from what could be an international catastrophe on a scale to actually eclipse the Iraq invasion: a war against Iran.

Now, however, he's been fired. Yes, fired (the "retired" thing is, I am sure, a smoke screen). The reason is clear enough: it was an article published last week in Esquire, appropriately called "The Man Between War and Peace". In it, the author, Thomas P.M. Barnett, writes:

Just as Fallon took over Centcom last spring, the White House was putting itself on a war footing with Iran. Almost instantly, Fallon began to calmly push back against what he saw as an ill-advised action. Over the course of 2007, Fallon's statements in the press grew increasingly dismissive of the possibility of war, creating serious friction with the White House.
Last December, when the National Intelligence Estimate downgraded the immediate nuclear threat from Iran, it seemed as if Fallon's caution was justified. But still, well-placed observers now say that it will come as no surprise if Fallon is relieved of his command before his time is up next spring, maybe as early as this summer, in favor of a commander the White House considers to be more pliable. If that were to happen, it may well mean that the president and vice-president intend to take military action against Iran before the end of this year and don't want a commander standing in their way.
And so Fallon, the good cop, may soon be unemployed because he's doing what a generation of young officers in the U. S. military are now openly complaining that their leaders didn't do on their behalf in the run-up to the war in Iraq: He's standing up to the commander in chief, whom he thinks is contemplating a strategically unsound war.

A war against Iran? Now? Surely that's unthinkable... Yes, but most reasonable people felt more or less the same way shortly before March 20, 2003. And look where that got us.

The US Elections: The Wondrous World of Misogyny

In yesterday's Los Angeles Times, there was an article by Leslie Bennetts titled "Go Away? Why Should She?"

The "she" is, of course Hillary Clinton.

Now it is true that recently - and certainly before the Ohio/Texas primaries - voices had been raised asking whether it might be best for Clinton to call it a day. And it is equally true that whilst arguments exist for suggesting such a departure, counter-arguments are readily found.

Given the title of her article, one might assume that Bennetts had set herself the task of pointing out what those counter-arguments actually are and why they should prevail.

Instead, Bennetts only mentions the Super Tuesday II results briefly and then heads off on a totally different tack. The reason why, she argues, some people want Clinton to quit is because they're misogynists.

She isn't the only one. Time and again I've encountered quite virulent comments on the Internet asserting, in one way or another, that Clinton would have wrapped up the nomination weeks ago if only The Misogynists hadn't come traipsing in with all their rampant... well, misogyny.

Gosh. Could that actually be true?

Well, duh! Of course it is! The logic is very clear indeed. Let me spell it out for you.

Firstly, Clinton is a better candidate than Obama. This superiority is a given. From this starting point, it follows that the people who nevertheless favor Obama over Clinton are motivated not by the candidates' merits, but by something else. Since Clinton is a woman, that something else must be misogyny.

Once you understand this, everything else becomes quite clear. Yes, Obama has won more states than Clinton. Yes, he's leading in the popular vote. And, yes, he's got more pledged delegates. But none of that has to do with Obama's qualities; it's all down to misogyny. It has to be, since Clinton is the better candidate.

At this point, you may wonder why Clinton is better than Obama. You may, in other words, question the starting point.

In that case, however, you haven't been paying proper attention. The only reason Obama is in the overal lead is because of The Misogynists. Take them out of the equation, and Clinton wins hands down. From this it follows that she's the better candidate.

It all makes perfect sense, you see. You just need to get into the right groove.

The US Elections: The Monster Mash

What monster have we here?
A great Deed at this hour of day?
A great just Deed — and not for pay?
Absurd, —or insincere.

- Elizabeth Browning, A Tale of Villafrance

No sooner had I posted about Obama's small window of opportunity or it was shut, it seems, by Samantha Power, one of Obama's chief foreign policy aides.

Who's Power, and what did she do?

Well, she's a very bright, relatively young graduate of both Yale and Harvard. She's American, but was born in Ireland. And she knows a hell of a lot about foreign policy issues, including - but certainly not limited to - Darfur.

Unfortunately, she's also quite outspoken. And today, she resigned from the Obama campaign for making the following comment about Clinton to a reporter from The Scotsman:

"She is a monster, too – that is off the record – she is stooping to anything."

Hmm. Testing the virulence of American politics via the backdoor of the British tabloid press? That is not a very sensible course of action.

So it's bye bye Power. Thanks for your Pulitzer-prize winning book A Problem From Hell. Thanks for having some pretty original ideas. Thanks for being honest. Bye bye. Have a nice day, now!

But where does that leave Obama? It's obvious my previous notion of him wading into the "lost" delegate fray in decisively presidential fashion has become somewhat obsolete (in my defense: I posted that hours ago). The only decisiveness he could show was in damage control.

But what's the damage?

I think quite a lot of people - and not just the Clinton bashers - will recognise something in what Power said. I also think quite a lot of them may take some note of it - it was, after all, an obviously heartfelt remark not at all meant for public consumption. It was a remark by someone in the know. And, too, it was a remark made by a woman. In the end, perhaps, there is some truth in the adage: it takes one to know one.

In short, if someone like Samantha Power feels this way about Clinton, the question arises: could she be right?

To hark back to the Browning quote: what Clinton have we here?

I truly don't know.

The US Elections: Rise and Fall... and Rise?

Here's what I expected, just before the primaries got underway: Clinton would win by Super Tuesday, and Obama would have put in a strong innings, setting himself up nicely for 2012 0r 2016.

My expectations changed after South Carolina. Obama won the state by a landslide, and listening to his victory speech, I found myself thinking: "That guy's actually going to win".

Fast forward to the day before Super Tuesday II, and there was Clinton waving a memo on the meeting that took place between Canadian officials and Obama's senior economic advisor. Somewhere in the background, a phone was ringing. And I thought - for want of a better word - "Oops".

It's now three days after Texas and Ohio, and whilst the delegate math might suggest otherwise, everything's changed again.

In an article in today's New York Times, David Brooks put it like this:

Barack Obama had a theory. It was that the voters are tired of the partisan paralysis of the past 20 years. The theory was that if Obama could inspire a grass-roots movement with a new kind of leadership, he could ride it to the White House and end gridlock in Washington (...)

Yes, but that didn't take into account actually losing important states. Brooks goes on to say:

There are a few ways to interpret the losses in Texas and Ohio. One is demographic. He didn’t carry the groups he often has trouble with — white women, Latinos, the less educated. The other is tactical. Clinton attacked him, and the attacks worked.

The consultants, needless to say, gravitate toward the tactical interpretation. And once again the cry has gone up for Obama to get tough.

And Brooks points out that, this time, Obama's heeding that advice. He's going after Clinton. The result?

These attacks are supposed to show that Obama can’t be pushed around. But, of course, what it really suggests is that Obama’s big theory is bankrupt. You can’t really win with the new style of politics. Sooner or later, you have to play by the conventional rules.

So, is Brooks right? If so, Obama's finished. Yes, he won more states, got more delegates, and he's ahead in the popular vote. But if Tuesday's result unearths the fact that Obama doesn't believe in his own theory, no-one else will, either. He'll go limping towards the Democratic convention with an ever dwindling advantage, and upon his arrival the superdelegates will snuff him out like a spent candle. And they'd be right to do so

So, it's up to Obama to prove Brooks and those like him wrong. And he'll have to do it quickly, before Clinton entagles him further into the web of old-fashioned political shenanigans.

He needs to revigorate his campaign. And since his campaign is basically about himself and his ideals, no atttack on Clinton, however effective, can suffice.

Can he do it? Yes, I think he can. In fact, I think the answer might be fairly simple.

Think Florida. Think Michigan. Think about all the horrendous wrangling over the "lost" delegates in these two states. It's a classic example of just about everything that's wrong with American politics. Does anyone actually believe in the sincerity of Governors Crist and Granholm when they say the disenfranchisement of their voters in "unconscionable"? For God's sake, they're the ones who signed the legislature that led to that disenfranchisement in the first place! And does anyone have any doubt as to Clinton's motives in trying to seat the "lost" delegates?

So what does Obama do? He does the exact opposite of what everyone expects. At a rally, a press conference - somewhere, in any case, where he can look presidential - he gently criticises the current state of affairs and firmly requests full new primaries for both states.

Sounds crazy? Think about it a minute.

If Obama were to take such a step, he'd be showing leadership. He'd be seen stepping in to end what already is an very unattractive spectacle. And he probably would end it, too, showing not just good judgement but effectiveness as well. Just as importantly, he'd be seen as someone willing to act in the public interest and not just his own. After all, Florida and Michigan are not states he's currently expected to win.

And here's the kicker: he'd probably be doing himself a big favour, as well. Some sort of re-vote is going to take place anyway, and what better way to woo the voters than to actually stand up for them?

Finally, will he do anything like this? Unfortunately, he won't. He's still got a small window of opportunity, but I just don't see him jumping through it. After all, that would take real guts. And American politics - indeed, American life - is not about guts. In the end, it's not about ideals, or justice , or doing the right thing.

It's about winning.