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I'm the newly-appointed Future editor at Business 2.0 and the former San Francisco correspondent for Time Magazine.
Wow, so does this mean everything you write reflects Time Inc's opinion? Or do you perhaps have some sort of standard disclaimer to the effect that it doesn't?
Naturally, the opinions contained in this blog are not those of my employers. In fact, some opinions may be the polar opposite of my employers. Some may be the same, for all I know. Hey, it's not like I ask my employers their opinions about everything in the news, okay? Let's just say that if this were a Venn diagram with one circle marked "my opinions" and the other one marked "my employers' opinions", there would doubtless be some overlap. But neither I nor my employers are able to pinpoint exactly where that overlap is.
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An experiment for a column I wrote about blogging back in December 2001. All these years later, I haven't been able to kick the habit.
If it's called Daily Blah, how come you don't ... hey, wait, you're writing every day!
See? Told you I'd try harder.
Mister, you talk funny. Are you one of them furrners?
Why yes I am, as it happens. I was born, raised and educated in Great Britain. I've been living in the U.S. since 1996 and identify as British.
I say, old chap, you forgot the "u" in "colour."
No I didn't. I may identify as British, but I am also an American journalist writing for an American audience about mostly American issues. These two different sides of me are a constant source of tension. Nevertheless, Daily Blah will adhere to American English grammar and spelling.
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Daily Blah for... Wednesday, January 14, 2004
Handicapping the Race
One statistic sticks in my head from all this blather about Iowa. It’s this: 33% of likely voters are solidly anti-Bush, while 39% will never leave the pro-Bush camp. That surprised me. After all, in poll after poll, the President beats any Democratic opponent by a good 56% to 45% or so. You’d think his support wouldn’t be quite so soft. But there it is, that vast 28% chunk, much of it sitting nervously in the GOP anteroom, waiting to be persuaded to leave.
I’m still of a mind that pairing Wes Clark and John Edwards on a ticket, in that order, would be an irresistible way to persuade them. Two southerners, just like Clinton-Gore; the old and the young, the military and the law. And both with the right blend of patriotism and sunny optimism that seems to turn voters on. Both are gaining on Dean in their respective strongholds. I’m not one of these rabid Stop-Deaners; if he rides the left’s outrage all the way to the convention, then let him take a shot. I don’t think he’d ever win – there’s something plainly unpresidential in his DNA, it seems -- but he’d come closer than the pundits give him credit for, and go down in such glorious flames that the Dems would never be able to ignore its left flank again. They’d be transmuted into a party of idealists in time for 2008. If that’s the way it’s meant to be, damn the torpedoes and full speed ahead.
But as for Kerry, Gephardt, Lieberman, Kucinich, Sharpton and Mosely-Braun? They’re finished, and it annoys me that they can’t see it. There they are, blatantly sucking oxygen out of the race, using it to feed their egos. Every profile devoted to them, every column inch, serves to muddy the waters and confuse that all-important 28%, who no doubt still see the Democratic race as a comic battle between nine dwarves. In fact, it’s a deadly serious contest where we’re asked to spot the difference between five political pygmies and three adolescents who are just about to sprout.
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