Encontrei no meu Google's Reader (tenho 729 artigos e notas para inspeccionar - isto é trabalho, reconheçam), um artigo do Guardian, de Timothy Gardon Ash, Who should be the world's most powerful person?, sobre os candidatos democratas e republicanos, com o qual me revejo na (quase) totalidade - sim, eu gostaria de ver Obama, como Vice-Presidente! Ver excerto (grande):
"That leaves the Democrats. I started 2007 as an enthusiastic
Obamaite. I go into 2008 a sober Clintonian. I continue to believe that Barack
Obama is the only candidate who could change the United States' image overnight.
It is now consistently less popular across the globe than at any
time since
international polling began. Obama personifies those aspects of American society
that even some of Washington's fiercest critics admire, and he has some good
ideas too.
The trouble is, the more I watched him last year, the more
convinced I became that he is not yet ready for the job. One small moment sticks
in my mind: responding to a question in one of
the debates, he said he would
start to address the problem by calling the presidents of Mexico and Canada (the
latter does not have a president). A trivial slip in itself, but there have been
too
many like it, as well as too much waffling. Of course, an inexperienced
president can learn on the job, as the last two did. But look how disastrous
that was in Bush's first term. And Bill Clinton's was not that hot either;
witness the disgrace of inaction over Rwanda, not to mention dithering over
Bosnia. In an increasingly dangerous world, with this new year ushered in by a
nuclear-armed Pakistan trembling on the verge of anarchy, we can't afford that
blunder-time any more.
The point about the Clintons is that they know the
mistakes to avoid because they've already made most of them. They've learned the
hard way. And let's be clear about this, in choosing
Clinton, American
voters would be choosing Clintons. In reality, this would be President Clintons,
or Presidents Clinton. But that's another advantage. Hillary herself has become,
at 60, absolutely formidable. Superbly briefed on every issue, almost word
perfect, scarcely ever putting a foot wrong, tried and tested as few human
beings have been. At a cattle auction site in Ames, Iowa, the other day, she
joked that they could "look inside [her] mouth", as farmers
do with cattle,
if it helped them to make up their minds. And the truth is that if anyone in the
world has been "looked inside the mouth", it is the Clintons. Is she
simpatica? No. At least not as a public persona. The outward warmth is all with
Bill. Frank? That's not exactly what the record
suggests. Shall we say, as
honest as a lawyer. But we don't need the most powerful person in the world to
be nice. We need her to be good at the job - grownup, knowledgable, responsible,
tough, a safe pair of hands after eight years of a blunderer. And the more so
for having to assist her one
of the most articulate, well-informed and
skilful politicians on the planet. Two for the price of one. And behind the two
of them, several potential foreign policy teams of great experience to draw on,
with views closer to those prevailing in most of the world's leading democracies
- and therefore better placed to forge the indispensable alliances. Hillary's
own pitch is that the US needs someone "ready to be president on day one". Well,
she would say that, wouldn't she. But she happens to be right. There would be
the added satisfaction of seeing a woman break through what must be the ultimate
glass ceiling (unless, that is, we imagine one on the throne of St Peter). What
the return of the Clintons would not do is to work an Obama effect on America's
image abroad. Instead, millions around the world will ask: what kind of a
democracy is it in which the elected president is always called either Bush or
Clinton? So we need Obama too. Give him a few more years of hard experience,
such as Hillary has garnered, and he could make an
inspirational president.
And what better way to gain that experience than by serving as her
vice-president? Very unlikely, I know, especially if she wants to run for a
second term. But Clinton-Obama would be my dream team."
A questão de como o género está (ou não) a influenciar as eleições, irrompeu no espaço público, com um artigo de Gloria Steinem - a grande militante feminista, dos anos sessenta -, Women are never front-runners, no New York Times. Podem ver na Slate, aqui e aqui, reacções. Não aceito a tese do género estar a ser um factor decisivo, mas, que tem (alguma) importância, isso tem: - na vitória de Hillary Clinton, em New Hampshire, terá pesado, de modo determinante, o voto feminino; o comportamento eleitoral dos homens (mesmo democratas) em relação a ela, é enviesado (ver aqui). Na Europa, o genéro não será factor importante nas eleições - penso que o não foi, por exemplo, nas últimas presidenciais francesas; condiciona, é, o acesso das mulheres a elas.
As próximas primárias são: Nevada, a 19 de Janeiro; Carolina do Sul, a 26 de Janeiro. Prometo, até lá, não fazer mais referências ao assunto.
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