An extract from my soon to be published Alfred Deakin Research Institute Working Paper on American liberalism: American liberalism has been shaped by both the crises and triumphs of capitalism. In the 1970s Democratic President Jimmy Carter like Grover Cleveland in the 1890s was unable to effectively respond to an economic crisis and thus encouraged […]
Obama and Gillard’s prospects compared
2010 was a difficult year for the Australian Labor Party and the American Democrats. Media coverage goes in waves; it was slow to catch up with Labor’s woes and perhaps has overstated Obama’s difficulties. Much was made of the Democrats’ poor performance in the Congressional elections. Little attention was given to the fact that they […]
The Democrats’ defeat
How to evaluate the Democrats’ midterm defeat? It is a bad result at the upper range of expectations. It marks the almost complete collapse of the southern Congressional Democrats outside of African-American and some Hispanic districts.
Populism from Bryan to Obama
Barack Obama’s current political woes are slightly overstated, the current Democrat slump has been worsened by a panic reaction to bad economic news, even although the economic evidence viewed overall points to a continuation of the slow recovery.
The election for Americans
Wrote below for US site The Monkey Cage:
Would bank nationalization have made a difference?
In November Americans will vote in Congressional elections that will probably deliver a major rebuff to the Democrats. Is there any way the Democrats could have prevented this outcome? From an Australian viewpoint the American discussion of Congressional elections is curious as relatively little attention is given to overall voting intention, it is true that […]
Capitalist confidence and electability from Lang to Rudd and Obama
The recent debate about the Resources Super Profits Tax revives an old argument about whether or not capitalists have a veto power over governments due to the alleged linkage between business investment, economic activity and the likelihood of re-election. Critics of capitalism once favoured this argument (and conservatives opposed it) but now with the demise […]
Julia Gillard feels your pain?
Does political leadership make a difference? The rise of Julia Gillard and the downfall of Kevin Rudd remind me of the ongoing American debate. Here a variety of critics from left and right have argued that Barack Obama’s declining approval rating (and the closely related prospects of the Democrats in the upcoming Congressional elections) is […]
Labor goes back to 1997?
In many respects modern Labor has returned to the type of inward musing that it engaged in after 1996. Then there was an assortment of vaguely defined rhetoric about the party’s perceived excessive social liberalism, these critics however were very vague as to exactly what alternative policies they proposed, instead they preferred to focus on […]
Signs of hope for Congressional Democrats?
There are some signs of improving prospects for the Democrats in November. At least one poll now has then ahead in the generic ballot and the Real Clear Politics poll average has almost a dead heat. In this context Pennsylvania-12 takes on added significance.