So Sandy arrived right in the last act, smashing and thrashing, killing and ripping. Has this latest tempestuous eruption, following the storms Beryl, Florence, Joyce and Nadine, been the deus ex machine — or the deus ex Atlantic — to settle one of America’s most extraordinary and bitterly fought presidential elections?
It won Obama a gold-plated endorsement from one of America’s most popular Republicans, the New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg, who fears that climate change is to blame; and an embrace from another admired Republican governor, Chris Christie of New Jersey.
But will the Sandy Effect really sway votes in swing states thousands of miles away? Obama has not had a good campaign. His hugs and his rousing words after the hurricane were one thing, but his low-energy, stumbling performance in the first presidential debate left supporters aghast and Mitt Romney’s team suddenly emboldened.
It has been a savage campaign, and for good reason. America’s culture wars have never been angrier. The country remains mired in debt — $16 trillion, up $6 trillion under Obama — of which $1.4 trillion is owned by America’s new existential rival, China. The US Treasury says that the legal debt ceiling will be hit by the end of the year.
Jobs have been exported in huge numbers. The middle classes have been getting poorer for years. Only the super-rich have experienced a rise in real incomes.
As a passionate admirer of the US, I have to admit that to visitors, America no longer feels quite like the future. There are the potholed roads, tired-looking airports and malls, and what seems from a British perspective a strange dearth of wi-fi. Natural disasters aside, this is beginning to feel like a nation needing a lick of paint. Read on and comment » | Andrew Marr | Sunday, November 04, 2012
