The *Official* US Election Thread

[Pete]

http://www.darkfire.net/irc/webchat.shtml

[Alexia]

Wahey... I'm in

[Mr Q]

This discussion is very intersting, but I don't actaully think any of us are in a position to make a judgment here. As non-Americans, our interests lie in preserving our own economies. So I think that's a key reason behind Mr Q's "Obama's No-Free-Trade is Bad" argument: regulated trade is bad for other countries, and debateably good for America.

Well, I don't accept that. To my mind, trade is unambiguously good for economies. Just as an example: the latest GDP figures in the US showed the economy there shrinking, but in the previous quarter (Q2) the US economy grew by 3.3%, which was significantly higher than estimated. If you broke down the numbers, about 0.1 percentage points (from memory) of that came from domestic consumption. The rest of it was due to exports. Without trade, those figures would have looked far weaker - indeed, arguably the US might already have been in a technical recession.

[barcode]

http://img.metro.co.uk/e-edition/Aulzv/ ... %2Fe-metro

In today metro there the change the colour of the both men: the strange thing is when Obama is made white he looks like a Kennedy

[aeonsource]

Personally i think that hilary clinton up there is pretty terrfiying....

[Chie]

Well I fell asleep during EastEnders and woke up bang on 4am, seconds before the announcement. How's that for timing?! But it does mean I missed the Metropol chatroom

[lukey]

Well I fell asleep during EastEnders and woke up bang on 4am, seconds before the announcement. How's that for timing?! But it does mean I missed the Metropol chatroom

Oh noes.

[Gavin Scott]

Thanks everyone who took part in the chatroom last night. That was *super*.

[marksi]

I fell asleep at 1am, having been appalled by the general quality of the BBC's Election output and by the fact that CNN felt able to extrapolate national results from about 5000 votes cast in one town in one state "Obama is now ahead by 438 votes!" and their pointless and The Day Today-style "holographic" 2-ways.

But I'm very happy with the result. Rarely does a politician inspire people, and that's something that Barack Obama is able to do in a way I don't think I've ever seen before. I just hope he can live up to at least some of the expectations.

[Pete]

I fell asleep at 1am, having been appalled by the general quality of the BBC's Election output

oh you should have kept watching. it just got worse and funnier throughout

[rob]

I was rudely awoken by the guy living above shagging his missus at 3am, so sat and flicked through the channels. I'm pleased Obama won, now we'll see a change for the better.