The campaign seems to have been going on for ages, but there are still six months to go before the election for the Presidency of the United States. The candidates may well aver, with the old Civil War general, that they have "Not yet begun to fight". There is still, as yet, a "phoney war" going on, the two main parties having not yet begun to go head-to-head, as the Democratic front-runners continue to battle it out for the nomination. There are only eight primaries left, strung out between now and early June.
The senator from Illinois, Barack Obama, got off to a flying start in the early months of this year, carrying such unlikely states as Iowa. He has been losing ground of late to Senator Hillary Clinton, whose bid was given a tremendous boost by her substantial victory last week in Pennsylvania, winning the votes of rural and small town voters. It is reported that her campaign fund received an injection of $10 million since that victory, and she has vowed to keep right on to the end of the road.
According to the Democratic Party rules, 2,025 delegates have to be garnered for a candidate to secure the nomination: Obama has notched up 1,726 such votes and Hillary Clinton has 1,592. Unless there is an unforeseen calamity for one of the candidates, neither is likely to make the quota, and the candidacy will then be decided by the 796 super-delegates, party officials, state governors, ex-Congressmen and the like, who are totally independent and free to make their own judgment. They are now being wooed by both camps and senior party figures have been calling for a resolution as soon as possible after the last primary in June. They see no need for the infighting to go on until the Nomination Convention to be held at Colorado in August. The internal battles are very wasteful of dollars, exhausting for party workers, and likely to leave a residue of resentment amongst the losers, leaving wounds that are not likely to be healed by the time of the November election. Worse still, it gives great glee to the Republicans to see the Democrats gutting each other, and weakening their respective positions, without the Republicans having to lift a finger.
At the start of the year, there were four or five prospective candidates in competition for the Republican nomination. The only survivor is Senator John McCain, the Vietnam veteran, who has seen off all his rivals and is the undisputed standard bearer for the Grand Old Party. The only final detail left for McCain is to name his running-mate. This is no mere formality, for, should he be elected, he will be the oldest president ever to move into the White House, and great scrutiny will be focused upon the vice-president who will automatically step into the top job should the president become ill, or indisposed, or die in office. In my lifetime, three vice-presidents have taken over the post of presidency: Truman on the death of Roosevelt, Johnson on the assassination of Kennedy and Ford on the resignation of Nixon.
The process of selecting presidential candidates is a complicated, tiring, and an expensive one. It does, however, give the electorate a good idea of the mettle of the candidates. It is also a very democratic process, which is why candidates make a point of visiting every little one-horse town in a given state to meet the people face to face. Already the strains are beginning to show: Mrs Clinton threatened to obliterate Iran if it attacked Israel; Obama spoke of the folks in small towns turning to religion and guns in their bitterness and alienation. He may well have a point, but it was an unwise remark to make, even if he believed that he was off-the-record. Hillary spoke of arriving in Bosnia in the 1990s in a hail of bullets, a circumstance which no one except herself seems to be able to recall. She has since admitted that she had been 'misspoken'. Her husband Bill pointed out that folks over 60 can sometimes get a little confused.
As the long and tortuous contest goes on, the super-delegates are faced with a great quandary. Senator Obama taking the party vote in a given state is no indication of his being able to carry the state in a battle against McCain and the Republicans: there are several key states where it would take Hillary Clinton to vanquish the Republicans. They ponder if America is ready to elect a black president; or a woman president for that matter! If Barack Obama collects a majority of the popular vote in the primaries, and without reaching the threshold of 2,025 delegates, can the super-delegates over-ride the will of millions of registered voters?
There is also the vexed questions of the delegates from Florida and Michigan. These two states held their primaries before the 'off' as laid down by the Democratic Party HQ. These states favoured Mrs Clinton and she is hell-bent in insisting that their views, as reflected in delegate strength, be acknowledged. Neither Senator Clinton nor Senator Obama show the slightest hint of standing down in favour of the other, with the loser taking the consolation prize of the vice-presidency and the longer the deadlock goes on, the greater the chance of the Democrats losing the third presidential election in a row.
In evidence, the court heard that the defendant had had, for several years, an account with a firm of gentlemen's tailors. However, he had in recent years failed to honour his obligations in settling his accounts, despite several attempts to ask him to pay up. He had taken delivery of several pairs of trousers, bespoke to his own requirements but, contrary to the promises he had made, there was no attempt to make good what he owed. In the circumstances, the suppliers felt that they had no option but to take court action. "What you might call," said the presiding judge, "breeches of trust."
In today's jittery economic climate, a rumour is enough to drive banks and finance companies to the brink of bankruptcy. In the 1980s a rumour that President Ronald Reagan had suffered a heart attack caused a plunge in shares and a run on banks.
There had been a heart attack, sure enough. But the victim was Lonnie Donegan, the Glasgow-born musician, whose mother's people came from Omagh.
A minibus was stranded after a satellite navigation system guided it into a river near King's Lynn, Norwich. It was owned by a taxi firm called Streamline.
From guest commentator Rio Ferdinand on recent Radio 5 Live soccer commentary: "Gary Neville was the captain, and now Ryan Giggs has taken on the mantelpiece."
A Museum of Laziness opened in Bogota earlier this year and closed within a week.
Bertie Ahern became the first Fianna Fáil leader to address the US Congress this week. An Opposition TD quipped that the Americans wanted Bertie to give an address years ago, but they were not sure if he had one.
