MetaCatholic

John Redwood, a libertarian right-wing Tory, long suspected by many in the UK to be from the planet Vulcan*, praises Barack Obama. (HT Iain Dale) I suppose, if Tony Blair can love a Republican president, then why can’t a Tory love a Democrat contender? Of course, it quickly turns into the same old Redwood record about Europe and regulation.

I must admit liking the Obama visionary mood music. What’s interesting is that Redwood does too. I suspect that shows the relative lack of policy within the music. Then again, as Obama has acknowledged, if he’s elected, a relatively youthful black man of the post-pretty-much-every historical and cultural shift that’s defined the US internally and externally, may do far more than any policy could to introduce change.

Generally, we expect too much of politicians, and they expect to promise us the earth. The media live on both hyped-up promise stories, and then the hyped-up failure to deliver them. The truth is, I think, that politicians generally have far less power than we all collude in pretending they have when an election comes round. Economics and events, history and individual whims conspire to disempower them. (One of the things I likes about the West Wing was that even in the Bartlett White House, a surprising number of stories focus on the near impossibility of making any real change.)

So perhaps mood music is more important not only to getting elected, but to being effective in power, in which case Obama may be very interesting indeed.

*Note to non-UK visitors: The attribution of Vulcan origins is a mix of his looks, a relatively cold and unemotional exterior, a somewhat (particularly in the early days) robotic voice, and his not very convincing attempt to look as though he was singing the Welsh National Anthem when he was Secretary of State for Wales)