South Bronx is just as important as Seneca Falls, Selma and Stonewall

It is lovely to watch a US President taking the oath of office and not be scared. The feeling of dread I experienced in 1981 and 2001 when Reagan and the younger Bush took office was not pleasant. While Barack Obama has not been perfect, his heart is generally in the right place. His achievements in his first term are all the more remarkable when you consider that he faced a Congress full of some of the most right wing, conservative Republicans we've seen in our lifetimes whose sole aim was to thwart his every move.

Obama's inaugural speech was stirring and inspiring to liberal ears. His main theme was that every American should have the rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness on which the nation was founded.

For our journey is not complete until our wives, our mothers and daughters can earn a living equal to their efforts. Our journey is not complete until our gay brothers and sisters are treated like anyone else under the law  –-  -- for if we are truly created equal, then surely the love we commit to one another must be equal as well. Our journey is not complete until no citizen is forced to wait for hours to exercise the right to vote. Our journey is not complete until we find a better way to welcome the striving, hopeful immigrants who still see America as a land of opportunity until bright young students and engineers are enlisted in our workforce rather than expelled from our country. Our journey is not complete until all our children, from the streets of Detroit to the hills of Appalachia, to the quiet lanes of Newtown, know that they are cared for and cherished and always safe from harm.

He talked about how the "most evident of truths, that all of us are created equal....guided our forebears through Seneca Falls, Selma and Stonewall." It's strange to think that a strong declaration in favour of gay rights by the "leader of the free world" is seen as remarkable. All of this is great stuff and he was right to mention those places were so pivotal in developing equal rights. There is another place beginning with S, though, which symbolises action required to tackle another great barrier to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. South Bronx is the poorest Congressional District in the US.

While I'm glad to hear politicians embrace the prospect of equal rights, they are relatively inexpensive for a Government or Parliament with a majority in favour to implement. Even David Cameron is in favour of equal civil marriage. Developing a strategy which will lift people from appalling poverty is so much harder because it involves a huge amount of political will to put the resources in to do it. The US and UK are, despite the talk of deficits and debts, among the most affluent countries in the world yet at the same time as Obama was speaking, the UK Parliament was debating a measure that will cut benefits for the poorest here.

To give Obama credit, he did recognise the need to tackle poverty:

 For we remember the lessons of our past, when twilight years were spent in poverty and parents of a child with a disability had nowhere to turn.

We do not believe that in this country freedom is reserved for the lucky, or happiness for the few.  We recognize that no matter how responsibly we live our lives, any one of us at any time may face a job loss, or a sudden illness, or a home swept away in a terrible storm.  The commitments we make to each other through Medicare and Medicaid and Social Security, these things do not sap our initiative, they strengthen us.

But I found this line depressing:

We are true to our creed when a little girl born into the bleakest poverty knows that she has the same chance to succeed as anybody else.

If you grow up cold, or hungry, in poor housing, you don't have the same life chances as everyone else. That's the simple truth. Why do we accept that people should be born into bleak poverty at all? While I  realise we can't change everything overnight, all politicians need to raise their sights and get more ambitious about eradicating poverty. For Liberal Democrats, this is a core part of our values. Our membership cards say that we seek to create a fair, free and open society where no-one is enslaved by poverty, ignorance and conformity. Obamacare across the Atlantic and raising the tax threshold and building more affordable housing here are good things but are nowhere near enough. The least we should be aiming for is that everyone has enough to eat and a warm home that meets their needs. Whilst it's fine to give ourselves a pat on the back for small successes along the way, we can't afford to lose a sense of urgency about the rest of the journey.

A Guide to Political Speech Making

As both Liberal Democrats and SNP candidates nervously await the results of their list selections in Scotland, I am certain that none of them will have made a speech quite like this.

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This guy has a Masters in Communication.  You can tell.

John McCain - what were you thinking?

I'd never heard of Sarah Palin until yesterday. All I really know is that she's Governor of Alaska, has been for about a year and a half, is under investigation for trying to get her ex brother in law fired from his State trooper job and that she's a "hockey mom" whatever that is.

I'm not really sure what was in John McCain's mind when he picked her to be his running mate, or why on earth she accepted. I would have thought that the best strategic thing for her career development would have been for her to give a barn storming Convention speech, kind of like the one Obama gave in 2004, and then for her to be considered for higher office in 4 years' time.

It's a shame to see a talented young politician - and to have beaten a Republican incumbent in the primaries in 06 she must have something about her - being forced forward ahead of her time. Instead, in a year or so we will have forgotten who she is as I think McCain has now seriously jeopardised his chances of winning in November.

Joe Biden is an experienced, competent man that it's easy to see assumimg the presidency if you had to. He is a safe pair of hands who is unlikely to be called upon. The opposite is true with Sarah Palin - let's face it, McCain is 72 and has had health scares.

This is not a time for the Democrats to get complacent though - this is, after all, the country that elected Dan Quayle as Veep in 1988.

Obama Biden 08

So, the secret is out. We now know that Barack Obama has chosen Senator Joe Biden to be his running mate. What has made me howl with laughter is the reaction from the McCain camp - that this shows that Obama is not ready to be president cos he's picked someone with so much experience.

Have they forgotten Dick Cheney? George W Bush wasn't fit to run a bath let alone a superpower in 2000 - nothing has changed there - so he picked ultimate Washington insider Dick Cheney to help him along.

I will be the first to admit that I am still learning to love Obama. I will obviously support his campaign for the very good reason that he is not McCain or any other Republican. He has managed to inspire hundreds of thousands of young voters to join his cause. They love his idealism and the fact that he stands for change. He has a lot going for him.

I have started reading his book "The Audacity of Hope" and so far I'm not convinced that he has the vision or the character to deliver the really radical change that would do America and the World so much good. It all seems a bit like he doesn't want to do anything that upsets anybody.

Biden may well turn out to be a good foil for him. I expect he will be the Campaign Rottweiler who will deliver the barbs while Obama does all the feelgood stuff. There are concerns about Biden's occasional lapses of Foot In Mouth disease, but that doesn't seem to be a barrier to electoral success - if Dan Quayle can get elected, after all...............

Go Hillary

I'm glad to see that Hillary has thrown her hat into the ring. Conventional wisdom says that she's too much of a polarising figure and that she won't, even if teamed up with Barack Obama, be able to lead the Democrats to victory. I think with a bold campaign she could win, as long as she ensures she campaigns on her agenda and not that of the Republicans.

Duncan Borrowman and Ed Maxfield have put it much better than I have on their blogs, which, in the absence of me knowing how to put a link here, you will need to access from the Lib Dem Blogs button below.

I am not entirely sure, though, that either Gore or Condi could put too much of a spanner in the works. Certainly Al has become a lot more user friendly and useful in the years since his 2000 victory in the popular vote, but I'm not persuaded he could carry support across the country. Condi is way too much associated with Iraq, where the situation is only going to get worse.

Anyway, I hope that two years from today we are watching the first full day in office of a Democrat President who will be a force for positive change and will finally get the US to do something about global warming.