The two US Presidential candidates are established and both have announced their Vice Presidential [VP] co-runners. Where once the VP was whoever came second in the electoral college, now it is an essential political positioning for any candidate. Obama used Joe Biden to plug any holes he had in his foreign policy legitimacy, while McCain chose a left of field candidate which no-one
is really sure why.
Portrait of a Candidate from Time Obama is leading in
the polls and electoral college currently but much is up in the air. He is a more natural politician than McCain and a better rhetorician. Additionally his campaign has been more disciplined which in the day and age of gotcha journalism allows for fewer off-message sound bites to escape.
McCain is not the same man that ran in 2000. He lived to his maverick self but was beaten by the electoral sensitivities of Bush and Rove; who are very skilled at getting elected but absolutely woeful at governance.
The McCain campaign of 2008, once becoming the front-runner, is now preaching to the evangelical base and espousing a Jacksonian foreign policy populism.
I personally think there will be another electoral blood-letting in 2008 the same as their was in 2006 with Republicans in the house and senate toppling like dominoes. I expect Obama will win in an electoral-college landslide as well even though the polls don't point to it yet.
The counter-weight is that identity politics still count. Palin is being touted as 'one of us' by evangelical conservatives who weigh in more on character identity than resumes, competency or merit. It may be that identity to McCain's evangelical message, populist foreign policy, republican party identity and maybe even latent or passive racism against a black president will get McCain across the line.
I don't see it though. I expect the Republicans to lose the Senate as well and Obama to walk in as President. The Bush Administration; through bad governance, political abuse and sheer incompetence; has, in my opinion completely broken the republican brand for at least ten years.
We shall see.
Phoenix Eats Out is the restaurant review site for
Phoenix,
Scottsdale and
Old Town Scottsdale which lists the modernist and contemporary restaurants, taverns and bars in the greater Phoenix area.
This is the list of the most popular restaurants pages from phoenixeatsout.com that have been viewed the most;
My personal favourite restaurants in Phoenix are
AZ88,
Postinos,
Bomberos with
Grazie,
Humble Pie,
Orange Table,
The Vig,
Fez and others coming close behind. View the complete list with the photo-journalistic style images on
phoenixeatsout.com
Arizona is an outdoor state and has lots of hiking in the city and around the state. Phoenix is unusual for most cities in having several large mountains in the center of the city with great hiking. Anyone who comes to Phoenix has to do the
Echo Canyon trail on Camelback and the
Summit Hike on Squaw Peak or Piesta Peak. The views of the city, suburbs and surrounding mountains are wonderful from Camelback and Piesta Peak.
For more experienced hikers there is the McDowell Mountains in North Scottsdale that has several difficult and strenuous hikes in
Tom's Thumb and
Bell Pass. Alternatively, you can hike the highest mountain in Arizona. At 12,600 feet
Humphrey's Peak is a long and difficult hike.
Between 2004 and 2009 this site,
southsearepublic.org, was a constitutional blog based on scoop which focused on Australian and global constitutional issues.
One of the strongest aspects of it was the development of constitutions by those involved in the blog. These constitutions are the outcome:
The constitutions were built using principles from Montesquieu's separation of powers, the enlightnment's universal political rights and the ancient Athenian technology of sortition and choice by lot.
South Sea Republic started in 2004 as an Australian constitutional blog in 2004 based on scoop software. It was an immigrative outgrowth of Kuro5hin. The archives for each year since then;
The articles are ordered by views.
I am an Australian living in the United States as a permanent resident.
I am a software developer by trade and mostly work in Java and jump between middleware and front end.
I originally worked in the New York area of the United States in telecommunications before moving to Washington DC and
working in a mix of telecommunications, energy and ITS. I started my own software company before heading out to
Arizona and working with Shutterfly. Since then I have joined a startup in the Phoenix area and am thoroughly enjoying myself.
I do a lot of photography which I post on this website, but also on flickr. I have a photo-journalistic website which lists
the modernist and contemporary restaurants in phoenix. I have a site on the
Australian Flying Corps [AFC] which has been around since the 1990s and which I unfortunately
lost the .org URL to during a life event; however, it is under the
www.australianflyingcorps.com URL now.
The AFC website has gone through several iterations since the 90s and the two most recent are
Australian Flying Corps Archives(2004-2002) and
Australian Flying Corps Archives(2002-1999) which are good places to start.
