Europe has a long wait for its Obama
Sunday, November 2, 2008 - Washington Press By ELAINE GANLEY (The Associated Press)
MONTFERMEIL, France -- Where is Europe's Barack Obama? Not only are droves of Europeans hoping for a victory by the U.S. Democratic presidential candidate, many are asking when France, Germany or Britain will get a chance to cast a ballot for a leader from their own burgeoning minorities.
The answer: not any time soon.
"Obama is rather far away. It's a bit of a fiction here, a bit of a dream," said Kadar Mkalache, tending a stand at the weekly market in Les Bosquets, a tough housing project in Montfermeil northeast of Paris.

The Change We Need
November 3, 2008 - The Wall street Journal By BARACK OBAMA
I'm proud to have the support of businessmen like Warren Buffett.
This is a defining moment in our history. We face the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression -- 760,000 workers have lost their jobs this year. Businesses and families can't get credit. Home values are falling, and pensions are disappearing. Wages are lower than they've been in a decade, at a time when the costs of health care and college have never been higher.

What We're Fighting For
November 3, 2008 - The Wall Street Journal By JOHN MCCAIN
Protectionism and tax hikes are wrong for the economy.
The presidential election occurs at a pivotal moment. Our nation is fighting two wars abroad, suffers from the greatest global financial crisis since the Great Depression, and is facing a painful recession. I believe in the greatness of America. I believe in our capacity to prosper, and to be safer and remain a beacon of light on the global stage. But we cannot spend the next four years as we have spent much of the last eight: waiting for our luck to change. We have to act immediately. We have to fight for it.

The Opening Obama Saw
Monday, November 3, 2008 - Washington Post By E. J. Dionne Jr.
A good politician triumphs by adapting to the times and taking advantage of opportunities as they come. A great politician anticipates openings others don't see and creates possibilities that were not there before.
John McCain might have been the second kind of politician, tried to be the first and enters Election Day at a steep disadvantage. Barack Obama certainly seized the opportunities created by President Bush's failures and the country's profound discontent, which only deepened after the economic crash. But by creating a new social movement, new forms of political organization, and a sense of excitement and possibility not felt in politics for three decades, he is bidding to become one of the country's most consequential leaders.

Some final thoughts on Tuesday's election
Nov. 02, 2008 - Las Vegas Review-Journal by VIN SUPRYNOWICZ
In Tuesday's presidential election, I know who I "should" vote for.
I disagree with the Libertarian Party platform's endorsement of the current congressional abdication of responsibility to control immigration. (Don't we have the same right to control access to our welfare programs as we have to block some stranger from breaking down our door and sleeping on our couch?)
I further disagree with this year's choice of standard-bearer Bob Barr -- who has violated the Libertarian platform (both the real one and the current, "airbrushed" version) by putting people in prison for exercising their constitutional right to traffic in "controlled" plant extracts and subsequently done nothing to get them out.

Una histórica elección que cambiará el destino del mundo
1de Noviembre de 2008 -Perfil (Argentina) Por Pepe Eliaschev
El próximo martes, los estadounidenses elegirán a su 44º presidente entre el demócrata Barack Obama y el republicano John McCain. Desde Nueva York, Pepe Eliaschev y Alfredo Leuco explican por qué fue una campaña que conmovió al planeta entero.
Es el típico aire frío y agradablemente ventoso que precede las penurias del invierno hostil. En las vísperas de Halloween, Nueva York convive con el otoño crispado y vital, a medida que se va abrigando, preparándose para la nieve y esas lluvias gélidas e inclementes que preceden y acompañan al invierno. Aterrizaje risueño y sensual en Manhattan. Las recepcionistas del hotel me reciben disfrazadas de diablas. Calzas rojas, blusas brillantes, tacos altísimos. La que me hace el check-in incluso tiene en una de sus manos un tridente satánico. Es Halloween, todo vale. “¿Qué preferís –se arriesga– el tridente o el toque divino?” El tridente responde, inconsciente, PERFIL. “Me lo imaginaba”, retruca.

Vote!
Monday, November 3, 2008 - Washington Post Editorial
'It will make you feel big and strong.'
THE FINAL presidential debate concluded with some stirring words, though not from either candidate. Moderator and CBS newsman Bob Schieffer said, "I will leave you tonight with what my mother always said -- go vote now. It will make you feel big and strong." Mr. Schieffer's message bears repeating, as partisans on both sides seem intent on whipping up voter anxiety over what to expect tomorrow.
Record-breaking turnout is expected, and that has voting rights advocates, political players and some officials sounding the alarm about possible problems. The warnings are dire: Long lines! Disenfranchised voters! Unreliable machines! A ballot shortage! Across the country -- but especially in battleground states -- legal challenges are being cranked up. In Colorado, a civil rights group went to court to stop a purge of voters from state rolls; in Indiana, a Republican Party lawsuit sought more scrutiny of absentee ballots. In Virginia today, a judge will hear the NAACP's bid to extend polling hours and reallocate voting machines.

Fickle voters and other frights that pollsters dread
November 3, 2008 - The Times by Daniel Finkelstein
An old newspaper photograph haunts the dreams of every US pollster. A grinning Harry Truman, having won the 1948 presidential election despite every prediction, is holding up a copy of the Chicago Tribune. It reads: “Dewey defeats Truman”. Could it happen again? Every pollster is predicting a victory for Barack Obama. Might a grinning John McCain be pictured on Wednesday triumphantly holding a pile of incorrect polling data? There are two things that say that he might.
The first is that American pollsters have not yet experienced what happened here in 1992 – when the polls pointed to a Labour victory but John Major won. The conventional wisdom is that 1992 was great for the Tories but terrible for the pollsters. In the long run, the opposite turned out to be true. Victory in 1992 turned to ashes for the Conservatives, whereas the pollsters used the debacle to get themselves sorted out.

The 2008 presidential campaign has been like no other
November 3, 2008 - Los Angeles Times By James Rainey
The country was a very different place when the 2008 race started. Here's how we got from there to here. How long has the presidential campaign been going?
When it started in spring 2006, America's voters worried most about the war in Iraq, consumer confidence had reached a four-year high and the Dow Jones industrial average bumped along comfortably above 11,000.
A former small-town mayor named Sarah Palin faced four others in a debate for governor of Alaska. The forum: Comfish, a fishing industry trade show in Kodiak, Alaska.

McCain, Obama and national security
Monday, November 3, 2008 - The Washington Times Editorial
When it comes to defense and foreign-policy issues, Sen. John McCain is by far the superior choice to become the next president of the United States.
It is no exaggeration to say that much of Mr. McCain's adult life has been dedicated to defending the United States and advancing U.S. security interests in one form or another. Whether it was his service as a fighter pilot (including five and a half years as a prisoner of war); his subsequent service as a U.S. military liaison; or his 26 years in Congress, national security has been a top priority for John McCain.

In the age of transformation, Obama's time has come
November 3, 2008 - The Independent by Johann Hariç
By 2040, white people will be a minority in America. It will look more and more like auniversal nation
Can it happen? Are the Bush years going to end with the election of a cerebral, liberal black man born to a Muslim goat-herd from Kenya and an atheist farm-girl from Kansas? Will we witness it in less than 48 hours? Whisper it: yes we can. At the midnight hour tomorrow night – unless opinion polls are wrong; more wrong than they have ever been – the era of President Barack Obama will begin.

Je me souviens de Kennedy
03/11/2008 - Le Figaro. Le regard de Philippe Labro
Ils n'étaient pas très nombreux en cette fin de journée grise et froide. Le ciel était charbonneux, comme il convenait à la région, pays de mineurs, dur, peuplé de «petits Blancs» aux préjugés ancrés, curieux d'écouter le beau jeune homme riche venu d'ailleurs, porteur d'espoir, celui qui ouvrait la porte d'une nouvelle décennie, les années 1960.
Une fine bruine arrosait le tarmac vide du minuscule Logan County Airport en Virginie-Occidentale, l'État le plus difficile à conquérir pour John Fitzgerald Kennedy, qui s'apprêtait à monter dans le petit coucou privé baptisé Caroline. Le meeting avait été difficile. Les tractations en coulisse pour obtenir les soutiens des bureaux locaux avaient plus compté que le discours. Kennedy se battait pour obtenir la nomination de son parti. Ce n'était même pas encore la vraie course à la présidence. Pourtant, ce soir-là, on sentait déjà toute la différence.

The Change We Need
November 3, 2008 - Wall Street Journal By BARACK OBAMA
I'm proud to have the support of businessmen like Warren Buffett.
This is a defining moment in our history. We face the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression -- 760,000 workers have lost their jobs this year. Businesses and families can't get credit. Home values are falling, and pensions are disappearing. Wages are lower than they've been in a decade, at a time when the costs of health care and college have never been higher.

What We're Fighting For
November 3, 2008 - Wall Street Journal By JOHN MCCAIN
Protectionism and tax hikes are wrong for the economy.
The presidential election occurs at a pivotal moment. Our nation is fighting two wars abroad, suffers from the greatest global financial crisis since the Great Depression, and is facing a painful recession. I believe in the greatness of America. I believe in our capacity to prosper, and to be safer and remain a beacon of light on the global stage. But we cannot spend the next four years as we have spent much of the last eight: waiting for our luck to change. We have to act immediately. We have to fight for it.

Media Credibility
November 2, 2008 - The New York Times By Douglas MacKinnon
Douglas MacKinnon was a press secretary to former Senator Bob Dole. (Full biography.)
After the presidential election is over and the dust, animosity, glee and shock settle into something manageable, the nation will need to tackle the subject of “media bias” in a sincere and honest manner.
As an “independent conservative,” I’m expected to see liberal media bias lurking everywhere, but it’s not just me — and it’s not just conservatives. I know liberals, including newspaper editors, who think the “news” pendulum had swung dangerously far to the left.
Beyond recent studies by the Pew Research Center and the Project for Excellence in Journalism, other research shows that the media has tilted to the left; indeed journalists themselves have openly admitted as much.

Republican Blues
November 3, 2008 - The New York Times By ROGER COHEN
Fazal Fazlin has an American story. Raised in Karachi, Pakistan, he came to the United States in 1969 with an engineering degree and little else. Now he lives on a five-acre estate in the waterfront mansion that once belonged to Nelson Poynter, luminary of the newspaper business.
Poynter, who died in 1978, was the owner of The St. Petersburg Times, a bastion of journalistic excellence and liberal tradition. Liberalism was never Fazlin’s thing. For most of his rags-to-riches American life, he was a Nixon Republican.
“I felt Nixon was a great President,” Fazlin, a dapper 58, told me. “He opened relations with China, and that’s what kept inflation down. He had a really good command of the world.”

The Republican Rump
November 3, 2008 - The New York Times By PAUL KRUGMAN
Maybe the polls are wrong, and John McCain is about to pull off the biggest election upset in American history. But right now the Democrats seem poised both to win the White House and to greatly expand their majorities in both houses of Congress.
Most of the post-election discussion will presumably be about what the Democrats should and will do with their mandate. But let me ask a different question that will also be important for the nation’s future: What will defeat do to the Republicans?
You might think, perhaps hope, that Republicans will engage in some soul-searching, that they’ll ask themselves whether and how they lost touch with the national mainstream. But my prediction is that this won’t happen any time soon.

Time to decide on America's future
Tuesday, November 4, 2008 - Washington Times by Christina Bellantoni and Joseph Curl
JACKSONVILLE, Fla. | The presidential nominees made their closing-argument dash to the finish line of the marathon campaign for the White House, as millions of Americans prepared to vote Tuesday in the most-watched election in decades, thousands of lawyers fanned out across the country to monitor polling places and an army of volunteers deployed to drive turnout.
Democratic Sen. Barack Obama, who learned that his grandmother died before finishing his historic bid for the presidency with a swing through Northern Virginia, and Republican Sen. John McCain both played it safe on the campaign trail, avoiding reporters and sticking to their stump speeches.
Democratic Sen. Barack Obama, who learned that his grandmother died before finishing his historic bid for the presidency with a swing through Northern Virginia, and Republican Sen. John McCain both played it safe on the campaign trail, avoiding reporters and sticking to their stump speeches.

Polls Show Obama With Clear Advantage
Tuesday, November 4, 2008 - Washington Post By Dan Balz
McCain, Hampered by Bush and Economic Crisis, Must Win Virtually Every Close State
Democrat Barack Obama, seeking a history-making victory in a presidential campaign that has captivated the country as few others ever have, maintained a clear advantage over Republican John McCain yesterday as the two made final appeals in battleground states and readied massive get-out-the-vote operations in advance of today's balloting.
State and national polls released yesterday underscored the steep hill McCain must climb in the final hours to reach the 270 electoral votes needed to win the White House. Burdened by President Bush's unpopularity and an economic crisis that redrew the race in September in Obama's favor, the senator from Arizona sprinted through a series of critical states yesterday -- all but one of which Bush carried four years ago -- exhorting his supporters to help him defy the odds.

Amazing race of '08 arrives at finish line
November 04, 2008 - USA TODAY editorial
Little more than a year ago, America was in a different place. The Dow Jones industrial average had broken 14,000. The war in Iraq seemed sure to dominate the presidential race. The big political guessing game was which Republican — Rudy Giuliani? Mitt Romney? — would face inevitable Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton in the general election. John McCain was all but out of funds and steam.
If a week is a long time in politics — meaning that assumptions can be upended in an instant — this past year has been an eternity. Surprise after surprise has shattered calculations. Today's election looks nothing like that handicapping of a year ago. Back then, a choice between a McCain-Sarah Palin GOP ticket and a Barack Obama-Joe Biden Democratic ticket seemed about as likely as a World Series between the Philadelphia Phillies and Tampa Bay Rays.
(Sam Ward / USA Today)

Only in America (Part I & II)
03 - 11 - 08 - Open Democracy by KA Dilday & Anthony Barnett
In the first segment of a multi-part exchange, KA Dilday reminds Anthony Barnett of how Barack Obama's rise is very un-European. (Kay's first lette)
In the second part of an exchange with KA Dilday, Anthony Barnett argues that the novelty of Obama's candidacy places the Democratic nominee in the company of leaders across the Americas. (Anthony letter)

En esta página se recogen los artículos de opinión relacionados con las elecciones estadounidenses publicados en los medios de comunicación internacionales más relevantes en la última semana. Los artículos de opinión de los investigadores del Real Instituto Elcano están disponibles a través de la sección de prensa de nuestra página web.