US election 2008

Yes, it's been a long time since I posted. How did you all manage?

This one will be just 3 things about the US election, 2 of which are already old news, but I think represent a pattern I've heard before and may hear again.

I. During the primaries, there were exciting stories of the horse race and occasional feud between Hillary Clinton and Barrack Obama, the Democratic party's final two candidates. Most Japanese I know thought the election was between the two of them, and had no idea there were other candidates, from either party. I'm not faulting them, the US election system is complicated and it's not their country. Just stating the situation. I personally saw no mention of (Republican) McCain until after Obama had clinched the Democratic nomination.

My guess for this is:
a. as said above, it's hard to understand the US election system, especially in 20 second news snippets that take place somewhere else, exotic locales like Minnesota and Iowa.
b. It was an unusually dramatic race, long, twisty with many historical firsts, most of which were centered around the Democratic nominees.
c. And even for the better informed, they applied what they knew about Japanese politics to the American information they had. There is usually no drama in the selection of Japanese Prime Ministers. It's a parliamentary system, so the major party chooses someone without a public vote. And the major party is always the LDP. This process occurs behind closed doors, and whatever drama manifests, it is fighting within the party, much like what was happening with the Democratic Primaries. Japanese guy A says he wants to be Prime Minister, his rival in the same party Mr. B says he deserves a shot, they take a few shots at each other indirectly over the airwaves, then one of them gets chosen.

II. Whenever talk of Hillary Clinton came up, few dismissed her because she is a woman. But many dismissed her out of hand because she would be "bad for Japan." Apparently she had made a comment that China would be America's most important trading partner in the new century. Many commentators and thus a malleable public converted this into Hillary = not good for Japan. I was often surprised in classroom discussions about how information like this spread. In a group of 8, 6 people might say "Oh, Hillary is interesting." then another person would say matter of factly "yeah, but she is bad for Japan" then the original 6 would be embarrassed for being so naive and say "oh? Really? oh, I didn't know that" then there were six more people who would spread the word to their friends. The best reason most people could come up with was that the proverbial Guy on TV had Said So. Anyone who has spent time here cringes when they hear about this amorphous figure. (I'm not a big Hillary supporter by the way, just writing this stuff down.) I was here for Bush / Gore and heard similar word about Bush being good for Japan, because Bill Clinton had put emphasis on engaging China.

III. The election is a few days away now, and it's tilting in Obama's favor. Again and again, the conversations go like this
"So Kirk, the election is soon, huh?"
"Yeah, it's exciting. Hard to believe."
"Looks like Obama might win."
"Hmm, it's hard to call but things seem to be going his way, for sure."
"Wow. Obama as president. Too bad he'll get assassinated."

Boom just like that. Just like saying "Too bad direct flights between Kochi and Okinawa will stop next month." It's a fact. Everbody knows it, The logical sequence is 1. obama looks to win 2. wow, that's big news, he' s black and we happen to like him 3. he'll get shot. end of story. Young people, old people I talk to say the say thing and are taken aback when I don't agree.

I understand where people are coming from. There are some Americans who say so. But for me it's the sheer certainty with which people make the statement that surprises me. Everyone is so certain that even though millions of Americans think he's great, he's been traveling around the country as the front runner for months, he's the first minority (unless you count women as a minority) in any major country to be freely elected to the highest office that I can think of, he's already won loads of elections (Democratic primaries and State and Senate elections), he's a successful citizen who graduated from a famous and selective university, there is no way Americans could stand for that and surely some nutcase would get past the security, maybe even with the help of the security, and shoot him in the head. And again, the standard explanation is because some guy on TV, who presumably has a time travel machine, knows for sure that Obama will be assassinated.

Recently 2 young nutjobs got arrested for saying they wanted to kill him and lots of other blacks, and they were hoarding weapons. Fine. But I could post messages on the net saying I'm gonna kill the emperor, go rent a truck and fill it with containers of gasoline. I'd probably be arrested but that wouldn't make me a credible threat, just a nut. Would Americans then be able to say, oh, the emperor is gonna get assassinated.