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You are here: Home / Foreign Affairs / English lessons

English lessons

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Although the UK elections are still a few days away, one thing is already clear: whatever happens will be bad news for Obama.

It is also very likely that the elections will teach us a number of important lessons about American politics. The lesson could be that Obama needs to avoid “Gordon Brown” moments. It could be that Obama needs to move to the center. It could be that Republicans need to find their own David Cameron. It could be that Nick Clegg’s improbable rise bodes well for Sarah Palin, Scott Brown, and John Thune.

Any other ideas on what the lessons and bad news will be?

Reader Interactions

100Comments

  4. 4.

    Violet

    “Conservatives are back!” Even though “Conservatives” in Britain look a lot more like liberal Democrats here than tea partiers.

    Also, “Leftists are bigots.” If a leftist like Gordon Brown said it, it’s true for all leftists here as well.

    And, conservative concern trolls will discuss how much more difficult it’s going to be for Obama to work with either Cameron (if he wins) or a hung Parliament (if that happens) than it was to work with Blair/Brown/Labour. And how Obama is going to have a much harder time maintaining our “special relationship” than Bush did, because clearly UK voters are repudiating Obama’s policies with their votes in their own election.

  5. 5.

    DougJ

    @Violet:

    Also, “Leftists are bigots.” If a leftist like Gordon Brown said it, it’s true for all leftists here as well.

    Ding, ding, we have a winner.

  7. 7.

    MTiffany

    Obama should have identified as white rather than black, because none of the contenders for UK PM are black?

  8. 8.

    cleek

    Obama has ruined our “special relationship” by allowing a {whatever} like {whomever} to get elected. why wasn’t he twisting arms and using the bully pulpit to sway the British public ?

  13. 13.

    wag

    It could be that Nick Clegg’s improbable rise bodes well for Sarah Palin, Scott Brown, and John ThuneJoe Lieberman.

    After all, Joe supposedly represents the “Center” that the media is so fond of. Brown could conceivably fall into that meme, but Palin or Thune? Not a chance.

    Lieberman/Brown 2012! (Snark)

    Dick Greggory can dream, can’t he?

  14. 14.

    Mark S.

    I don’t know anything about British politics, but I’m trying to learn:

    Despite Clegg’s growing popularity — at the moment he is narrowly behind Cameron in the polls — the British electoral system makes it virtually impossible for his party to dominate. But the likely horse-trading would hoist Clegg into the position of kingmaker. He has already stated his price: electoral reform that allows his party to win a number of parliamentary seats more reflective of its popularity in the polls.

    While certain aspects of the parliamentary system appeal to me, I still find it quite foreign. If I lived in Britain and I really liked, say, my Labor representative but I hated Gordon Brown, should I vote for the Labor guy or should I vote for the Lib-Dem guy?

  16. 16.

    CT Voter

    It could be that Nick Clegg’s improbable rise bodes well for

    Marco Rubio. This election in Britain illustrates that Americans are ready for an outsider to come from nowhere and shake things up. And in 2012, we’ll have a Brown/Rubio presidential ticket.

  18. 18.

    beltane

    @Mark S.: That has me puzzled too. It’s like not voting for Bernie Sanders because I think Harry Reid, whom I’m not a constituent of, is ineffectual.

  19. 19.

    Joseph Nobles

    Actually I was thinking the 2012 GOP team would be Christie/Rubio, unless they’d like to hold onto that for 2016.

  20. 20.

    FlipYrWhig

    @CT Voter: See, I was thinking Media Clegg = Media Crist, not Rubio: the guy who is taking a stand against the hardened orthodoxies of both major parties, etc. In what everyone thought would be an anti-incumbent year, there turned out to be a new solution rather than swinging the pendulum back to the last party in charge, blah blah blah. I expect that the US media is going to be wildly in love with Crist’s campaign.

  21. 21.

    demkat620

    “This shows the continuing rejection of the leftist, socialist agenda. Even the English have come to realize how destructive non conservative forms of government are” Newt Gingrich, May 7, 2010.

    Mr. Gingrich continued,”This is just the precursor to a Republican sweep in the 2010 and 2012 elections that will return the “Special Relationship” towards a more healthy Reagan-Thatcher model.

  22. 22.

    Martin

    Cameron will win because he didn’t blow up oil rigs near majors cities that suffered calamities by no fault of the previous president.

    By the way, has anyone seen Gordon Brown’s birth certificate? I didn’t think so…

  24. 24.

    Ravi J

    @Mark. S
    You won’t vote for ‘prime minister in U.K. you would vote for your local guy. If you didn’t like Brown, you can force your rep to force brown out of office.

  25. 25.

    Andre

    The coalition government in the UK shows that Obama needs to start living up to all those promises of bipartisanship that he made.

  26. 26.

    MikeJ

    @Mark S.:

    If I lived in Britain and I really liked, say, my Labor representative but I hated Gordon Brown, should I vote for the Labor guy or should I vote for the Lib-Dem guy?

    It’s directly analogous to “what if I don’t like Nancy Pelosi.” You get your rep to get her replaced or elect someone of a different party. Of course then you have to weigh what is more important: getting rid of the speaker(PM) or handing control over to evil fuckwits (Republicans, Tories).

  29. 29.

    Mark S.

    @Ravi J:

    If you didn’t like Brown, you can force your rep to force brown out of office.

    How? By voting for a non-Labor candidate? In my hypothetical, I like my Labor MP but I don’t like Brown. I assume my Labor MP is going to support Brown.

  30. 30.

    Joshua Norton

    Brits are simply looking for a change because they are fed up with the Tories and Labour. Hence Clegg’s sudden Lib-Dem bounce which appears to be based on only 2 debates. If this country had a third party with any actual sort of political sway, you’d see the same thing here.

  31. 31.

    Citizen Alan

    @cleek:

    Obama has ruined our “special relationship” by allowing a {whatever} like {whomever} to get elected. why wasn’t he twisting arms and using the bully pulpit to sway the British public ?

    To expand on this a bit: Since Obama ruined our “special relationship” with Great Britain, it is more important than ever that he preserve our “special relationship” with Israel be groveling before Netanyahu and begging his forgiveness for ever showing any consideration to the Palestinians.

  32. 32.

    gnomedad

    @Cat:

    Reagan was our last president who didn’t goto harvard/yale

    Didn’t realize that. I guess I finally found a reason to like him.

  33. 33.

    Joseph Nobles

    @FlipYrWhig:

    Please let the Republican Party run a Confederate History Month stealth wingnut against Barack Obama in 2012. Please please please please please. In fact, make it Palin/McDonnell 2012! The only way that ticket could be better is if Michael Steele manages to hang on only to be fired mid-2012 election cycle.

    I see McDonnell as being the best male Dukakis candidate for the GOP in 2012. My Christie/Rubio proposal is something I thought might give Barack some problems, especially if Christie actually does clean up the New Jersey state budget in any appreciable amount. That does remain to be seen, though.

  35. 35.

    somethingblue

    The results will show that we need an Earl Grey tea party of the radical center, and some of those little cucumber sandwiches.

  38. 38.

    frankdawg

    @demkat620:

    I just threw up in my mouth a little – I hope you are happy.

    I on the other hand am sad, not just because I read that dreck but also because it is so easy to predict exactly what these morons will say for every event.

  39. 39.

    thejoz

    Everything Obama does is “proof” that “the” (some) “American” (mostly insane) have completely rejected his “socialist” (not in the mold of Saint Reagan) policies.

    If Obama announced tomorrow he was joining the Tea Party, the righties would immediately talk shit about him.

    They will never embrace him, no matter what happens in the world, this country, or this reality. So fuck it. They could elect a blue-footed booby to be PM in England and that would be Obama’s fault, so really it just doesn’t matter with the Asylum crowd.

  40. 40.

    YAFB

    English lessons

    I know it wouldn’t make such a catchy post title, but it’s a British General Election. Some of us (Welshman living in Scotland here) are a bit touchy about the conflation of “English” and “British,” so I guess that’s lesson number 1.

    If I lived in Britain and I really liked, say, my Labor representative but I hated Gordon Brown, should I vote for the Labor guy or should I vote for the Lib-Dem guy?

    The metrics are complex over here since we’re not stuck with just two more or less viable choices of parties. We’re used to the idea of tactical voting, so it would depend how marginal the seat was, between which parties, yada yada yada.

    Everything else being equal, since your MP–who presumably has earned your trust by good constituency work etc.–is much more likely to have a direct impact on your circumstances, I’d say you vote for the individual and let the PM dice fall as they will.

    Not least because you’re going to need all the help you can get once whoever wins the election sets about the program of swingeing public service cuts and tax rises that are inevitable.

  41. 41.

    FlipYrWhig

    @Joseph Nobles: I don’t see the appeal of Christie. To me that seems like the Republican Dukakis: “I managed a state well and I’ll apply those lessons to the nation.” Whereas McDonnell might be able to show off both wingnut cred _and_ managerial cred. I don’t see Christie doing anything for the wingnuts.

    But I agree that Rubio is someone to watch out for. He’d be the closest parallel the GOP can muster to Obama ’08: the new guy who has something of an interesting life story, some accomplishments at the state level, and hasn’t been around long enough to be tainted as part of the broken system.

  43. 43.

    benjoya

    The lesson is: the Liberal Democrats are not in any way liberal and this is the sole basis for their popular appeal.

  45. 45.

    Cacti

    A victory by (fill in blank) will be “Obama’s Katrina”.

    And whatever happens, it will be good news for John McCain/The GOP.

  47. 47.

    KG

    @FlipYrWhig: the Tea Party is already turning on Rubio because of his opposition to the Arizona Papers Law. As an example, take a look at the comments here

  48. 48.

    eemom

    something on this site keeps telling me I’ve been selected to receive a $100 Walmart gift card. Fortunately, it then shuts up.

  49. 49.

    licensed to kill time

    It will teach us that Obama should create a Ministry of Silly Walks, even though his walk is not silly enough and funding is short.

  50. 50.

    Cacti

    @KG:

    I was thinking the same.

    Rubio will get tarred and feathered by the nativists of his party.

  52. 52.

    IM

    Fun fact: the only prime minister of the twentieth century who neither was a Oxford or Cambridge alumni was John Major, who never did go to a university at all.

    Bonus question: What member of the british elite had neither university nor school education?

  53. 53.

    KG

    @Cacti: Rubio is probably sensible on immigration, but one would expect that since he’s the son of immigrants. Plus, he’s got to walk that fine line among Cubans and wet foot/dry foot. It won’t bode well for him with his base if the issue turns to immigration.

  55. 55.

    Maude

    @eemom:
    I think it’s a pop up. I don’t hear it. I have pop up blocker on K-Meleon, a Mozilla browser.
    It’s hot and humid here, Supposed to have T storms at around midnight.

  56. 56.

    IM

    Well, that was to easy. Fine. Who was the non-anglican prime minister of the twentieth century? (Blair doesn’t count)

  59. 59.

    d.s.

    I remember the conserva-cheers that occurred when Nicholas Sarkozy came to power.

    It was pointless trying to explain to them that for decades the main French left-wing party was the French Communist party, and that the “right wingers” there make Bernie Sanders look like the Heritage Foundation.

    This is way worse, because Cameron’s party is explicitly called the “Conservative” party. Every right wing pundit is going to calling this a massive European repudiation of Obama’s policies, and an endorsement of the Palin/Bachmann ticket.

    Best to just turn the TV off at that point.

  60. 60.

    IM

    @OOmnes Omnibus

    After I wrote this, I wasn’t sure anymore. Macdonald was methodist or so, right. I was thinking of Chamberlain, who was, i think, a Unitarian.

    So he is still the only non trinitarian prime minister and one of the few members of a political dynasty.

  62. 62.

    rikyrah

    don’t know who will win, but I find limiting the OFFICIAL campaign to 6 weeks, downright amazing.

    I hope the guy outta nowhere takes it.

  63. 63.

    Mike in NC

    Although the UK elections are still a few days away, one thing is already clear: whatever happens will be bad news for Obama.

    According to the wingnuts, wasn’t one of Obama’s very first “scandals” about dissing Gordon Brown over some meeting. Or was it about giving the queen some bauble that they felt was inappropriate?

    In any case, the outcome of the UK election will be Obama’s Waterloo Underground.

  66. 66.

    IM

    But in this case he was still a member of an established church, if only in Scotland. Chamberlain was a true dissenter! Now I think about, Lloyd George was a nonconformist too and welsh.

    But being non-anglican is still a bit unusual for a tory prime minister.

  67. 67.

    DougJ

    @freelancer:

    No post on Bill Moyers? His final broadcast was last Friday.

    You know, I like the guy but I never watched the show. John and Anne Laurie probably should handle this one.

  72. 72.

    maus

    @PaulW: They’re self-perpetuating, like the T-1000. Unless we destroy the system that sustains them, they’ll just keep re-forming.

  74. 74.

    Brachiator

    @YAFB:

    Everything else being equal, since your MP—who presumably has earned your trust by good constituency work etc.—is much more likely to have a direct impact on your circumstances, I’d say you vote for the individual and let the PM dice fall as they will.

    But wouldn’t this be the same MP living high on the hog claiming excessive expense allowances?

    Although the UK elections are still a few days away, one thing is already clear: whatever happens will be bad news for Obama.

    Doesn’t this depend on whose got the David Beckham vote.

  75. 75.

    grass

    @IM: Gordon Brown went to the University of Edinburgh. James Callaghan and Churchill also didn’t go to university. Neville Chamberlain went to the Mason Science College, which was the precursor to the Uni of Birmingham, Ramsay MacDonald went to Birbeck in London. Bonar Law didn’t officially go to university, but did attend classes at the Uni of Glasgow. David Lloyd George didn’t go to uni, but became a solicitor by apprenticeship.

    But other than them, you’re right that all the rest went to Oxford or Cambridge except John Major. ; )

    (Information gleaned from wikipedia, mistakes highly likely)

  76. 76.

    Calouste

    @IM:

    Fun fact: the only prime minister of the twentieth century who neither was a Oxford or Cambridge alumni was John Major, who never did go to a university at all.

    Nope, Winston Churchill also didn’t go to university. On the other hand, his uncle was a Duke, his father an MP and he himself went to Eton, so it’s not like he had a crappy start in life.

    Overall btw, since the office of the Prime Minister started in the 18th century, only 7 or 8 of them haven’t been Oxbridge graduates.

  77. 77.

    Allison W.

    Rubio is no match for Obama – no matter how interesting his story may be. No matter what you think of Obama, he has got “IT!” and “IT!” does not come around very often.

  78. 78.

    Martin

    @Mike in NC: The Obamas gave the Queen a cassette tape of Public Enemy’s Fear of a Black Planet. I was deemed inappropriate on many levels.

  79. 79.

    Faux News

    No matter who wins on Thursday the result will be “a grim foreboding for President Obama and the democratic party. The victory of (fill in the blank) clearly means the democrats will lose control of both the House & Senate in the November election”.

    This will be uttered by some shit stain like Beck or Limbaugh.

  83. 83.

    Violet

    @KG:
    Wow! Just read through those comments. They really are turning on Rubio. This immigration issue could be excellent popcorn fodder as the tea partiers turn on anyone who isn’t “pure white.” Sad, though.

    Sample comments:

    This law needs to be made into a NATIONWIDE law. Get those scumbags out of our country. The Statue of Liberty needs to have an additional sign in her hand….A STOP SIGN.

    Rubio must go. Have you been into a Wal Mart lately in Orlando or any further south in Florida. Pretty scary. It feels like you are the one in somebody elses country.

    Yes, Rubio is one of them. We have laws that need to be enforced, but now the illegals and obviously Rubio thinks it is their right to have rights in our country when they are the one breaking the law by being here without legal status.

    The Florida Senate race is going to be interesting.

  84. 84.

    Mike in NC

    @Calouste:

    Winston Churchill also didn’t go to university. On the other hand, his uncle was a Duke, his father an MP and he himself went to Eton, so it’s not like he had a crappy start in life.

    Today’s paper had an article entitled “Bush’s Reputation May Be Ready For Rebound” with lots of input from assorted toadies and assholes.

    But give him his due: his grandfather was a ditch-digger, his uncle was a shoemaker, his father was an auto mechanic, and his mom was a waitress. He himself worked three jobs to graduate from community college and had a distinguished career in the National Guard. It’s not like he had a special start in life.

  85. 85.

    KG

    @Violet: yeah, I particularly like the Statue of Liberty comment. So much for “give me your poor, your tired, your huddled masses yearning to breath free”; now it’s more like, “Fuck you.”

  87. 87.

    Violet

    @KG:
    Yeah, no kidding. Typical case of IGMFY. “My ancestors got here, maybe even illegally, but FY to anyone trying to do the same thing now. Go the hell away.”

  88. 88.

    fasteddie9318

    I, for one, look forward to President McCain taking office as Prime Minister of the UK. There are a lot of synergies our two countries can generate under the same leader.

  89. 89.

    IM

    Well, ok. Of course I have a defence: I learned that semi-truth back when major was prime minister, so I could not have learned anything about Brown and Edinburgh. Brown, as well as Callaghan and Chamberlain were never elected prime minister, so there.

    I will never trust the economist again.

  90. 90.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @IM: If the economist is Milton Friedman, I would say you have the right idea.

  91. 91.

    IM

    I was talking about the magazin, but that is probably a meaningless distinction in this case.

  92. 92.

    Brachiator

    @grass:

    Churchill also didn’t go to university.

    Uh, Churchill was a descendent of John Churchill, 1st Duke of Marlborough, one of the most famous and dazzling figures in British history. Also, Churchill attended The Royal Military Academy Sandhurst, where he graduated eighth out of a class of 150 in December 1894.

    By any measure, Churchill was a member of the upper class. His mother, Jennie, was the daughter of an American millionaire. In the 19th and early 20th centuries, hard up British aristocrats made a thing of marrying rich Americans. The Americans benefited by getting a step up in social status to add extra dash to their wealth.

  93. 93.

    YAFB

    @Brachiator:

    But wouldn’t this be the same MP living high on the hog claiming excessive expense allowances?

    I was just making lemonade out of the lemons Mark S. provided:

    If I lived in Britain and I really liked, say, my Labor representative but I hated Gordon Brown, should I vote for the Labor guy or should I vote for the Lib-Dem guy?

  94. 94.

    Viva BrisVegas

    @YAFB:

    Everything else being equal, since your MP—who presumably has earned your trust by good constituency work etc.—is much more likely to have a direct impact on your circumstances, I’d say you vote for the individual and let the PM dice fall as they will.

    If you want to have a say in who becomes PM, you join a Party and become an officeholder. You can then influence various preselections (=primaries) in safe seats to get your kind of guy elected, making sure that they know who got them their jobs. Those guys form a clique in one of the three voting blocs, (right, center or left, although preferably right) and with enough influence and your guidance, they (you) will determine who becomes PM.

  95. 95.

    Brachiator

    @YAFB:

    I was just making lemonade out of the lemons Mark S. provided: “If I lived in Britain and I really liked, say, my Labor representative but I hated Gordon Brown, should I vote for the Labor guy or should I vote for the Lib-Dem guy?”

    I see your point. I think the strangest thing I’ve seen related to the election is the opinion piece from conservative pundit Peter Hitchens advising his readers to vote for anyone but the Tories because he sees Cameron as a liberal in conservative clothing.

    Here, I guess, Cameron is viewed the way that some American conservatives viewed McCain as being not sufficiently sincere.

  96. 96.

    YAFB

    @Viva BrisVegas:

    Yes, that’s more or less how it’s done in the longer term, but the election’s just less than a week away.

    @Brachiator:

    I think Hitchens is still mourning Thatcher’s demise.

    But there’s a broad swathe of opinion among the right-wingers that the prospect of winning this election is a poisoned chalice:

    Whichever party wins this election will have to inflict such painful austerity measures on the British population that they will soon find themselves out of power for a generation. Not my words, the words of Mervyn King, Bank of England Governor.

    I think I recall similar ideas being expressed over Obama’s win (along with the idea that the Repubs opted for McCain because they didn’t really want to win). It’s working out well for them so far.

  97. 97.

    d.s.

    @YAFB:

    In general, once a party starts saying they’re better off losing than winning, they keep losing for a very long time.

    In the UK, elections happen only once every 5 years. There are no midterms. You can be incredibly unpopular the first four years, turn it around in the fifth, and cruise to an easy reelection victory. That’s what happened in Margaret Thatcher’s first term.

  98. 98.

    Ian

    Sully’s cheerleading for a party that includes in its rising stars somebody who believes homosexuality is caused by demons that need to be cast out astounds me (except of course, as a Brit, it doesn’t, because he’s a Thatcherite through and through and would support the Tories no matter what, but it does contrast quite a bit with his treatment of the GOP).

  99. 99.

    bob h

    The only thing that I find striking about British politics is how sane everyone is.

  100. 100.

    YAFB

    @d.s.:

    “In the UK, elections happen only once every 5 years.”

    Not true. We have no fixed terms here (which brings its own problems). Five years is the maximum gap between elections, but the governing Prime Minister can call one whenever seems advantageous, or indeed be forced to call one by a vote of no confidence in the House of Commons.

    If this next one does end up being a hung parliament, we could see another general election as early as this Autumn.

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