If Only Britain Had the Problems That Beset American Democracy

The Telegraph ^ | November 4, 2004 | Stephen Robinson

[quidnunc]

In the end, it was the sheer preppie courtesy of election night that hit home. When John Kerry defied the logic of the first results and declined to concede the election early yesterday morning, the engines of George W Bush's motorcade were revving and ready to whisk the re-elected President to a public stage to claim victory.

But aides told him it would look bad, and might seem "divisive", and perhaps not the sort of thing one Yale man does to another. So Mr Bush held back, and gave his opponent more time to ponder the irrefutable arithmetic of the Ohio vote, before conceding in his own time yesterday evening.

Say what you will about George W Bush, it was exceedingly elegant of him to allow Mr Kerry a bit of private time to come to terms with a closely fought contest, even though everyone else instinctively understood the result at breakfast time.

But how disappointingly well mannered the climax to this election proved to be. Pundits on both sides of the Atlantic had decreed in advance that this was the most "divisive" poll in modern times. When conga lines of voters wrapped themselves around polling stations in South Africa in the first post-apartheid election of 1994, teary-eyed observers intoned about the healing powers of the ballot box.

When the same grassroots enthusiasm is witnessed in Florida, Pennsylvania and Ohio this week, it is regarded as evidence of a "divided nation".

At your expense, the BBC sent 188 members of staff to America to cover the election, and in almost every respect, they called it wrong. Those of us who harboured a little private hope that Mr Kerry would win must take consolation where we find it. …

-snip-

[tkathy]

They are hindered by their idiotic monarchy and arrogant class system.

[Westerby]

The British MSM is not disimilar from the U.S.MSM. - a steaming pile of agenda driven, leftist drivel with a small bit of rational thinking, common-sense, and even conservative values poking its head up every now and then.

And once in a rare while, even exhibiting a sliver of pro-Americanisn.

Don't judge the Brits by their media. Or their "intellectual" elites. We got exactly the same problem.

[Westerby]

The monarchy is not idiotic. For Americans maybe, but not for the Brits.

And their "arrogant class system"? The old system is long gone - what's left of the aristocracy is made up of inheritors who are forced to exhibit the stately family home to the tourists.

The one you refer to is made up of entertainment types, media elites and "intellectuals" with a political bent. Sound familiar? It should.