Sixteen of New Zealand’s past leaders have been added so far including creator of the welfare state Michael Savage, Keith Holyoake, Robert Muldoon, Helen Clark and current New Zealand PM John Key.

We hope to complete the list of New Zealand Prime Ministers soon with only pre 1930s PM’s currently missing. Until then if you are looking for more NZ history surf over to the New Zealand history section at HistoryOrb.com or visit Today in New Zealand History by the same site.

Tomorrow at noon, Barack Obama will sworn in as the 44th President of the United States.

If you are keeping count of the hours…check out Bush Last Day.

Very simple, Obama wins and is the 44th. US president.

His campaign will be studied very hard in the future due to some very important new strategic moves. In previous elections the country was divided in blue states (democrat) and red states (republican), with a few “battleground” states. Basically, in the last elections the campaign came down to a handfull of these battleground states, each side counting on their safe states. Whoever won these battleground states, or most of them, won the election.

In this election the Obama campaign went in very hard in quite a few safe republican states, and has a good chance of picking up a few of them, even including McCain’s home state of Arizona. McCain on the other hand has been playing defense in supposedly safe states, not really fighting in blue states except for pennsylvania. So, former red states like colorado, New Mexico, Nevada and Virginia are now leaning or for Obama.

As of now the only thing uncertain in the election is voter turnout. Will the democrat voters be so confident that they won’t go to vote? Will the famous Republican “last 72 hours get out the vote” machine work? Or are the republican voters seing their party lose and therefore not bothering to turn out?

One thing is certain, due to very heavy voter registration, mainly pushed by Democrats, the voting lines will be awesome in some areas. But voters seem to be motivated by this election, so most will put up with the long lines and sundry glitches that might happen.

So, what now at less than three weeks from the election ?

Obama, barring some really unforseen circumstance, has won. All the polls give him a 6 to 10 % margin in the popular vote and even more in the electoral college. As of today Realclearpolitics.com gives Obama 286 electoral votes to McCains 158 with 94 as a tossup ( 270 is the number needed to get elected).
As far as I can see all McCain can do is to try and hold the solid republican states which Obama is trying to steal, and lose with some dignity.
More important, even though the Republicans won’t admit it, are the other races, Senator, Congress, Governor, etc. They have to try and minimize the losses. It’s inevitable that a Democratic Presidential victory will flow down to the lesser elections, so even if McCain is lost he will try to do as well as he can to help stem the bleeding.

First of all an interesting fact. The VP debate was the second most viewed debate in history, 70 million viewers ( Carter/Reagan debate in 1980 drew about 80 ). More people watched it than the 2 presidential debates. An obvious explanation for this oddity is that people are more interested in entertainment than in politics. A lot of viewers tuned in to see what new goofups VP republican candidate Sarah Palin might make. Well, they were disappointed, she might not have answered all the questions asked, but she didn’t mess up as in some previous interviews. So, back to politics.

As to the presidential debates, most polls gave Barack Obama as the winner or tie. As Obama is ahead in the national polls, a tie is a win for him. Senator McCain had to pull some rabbit out of the hat, but no rabbit.

At this time Obama has the election sown up, hes ahead in “electoral votes” and in the general national polls. How much ? The place to see polls is realclearpolitics.com, but he’s from 4 to 8 percent up. Worse for McCain, Obama is eating away at some previous “safe” republican states.
So, there being only one more debate next week and about three weeks to go, the future looks grim for McCain. Obama has only to hold, although he seems to be trying to get farther ahead, not holding.

The Republicans still might win, if in the next three weeks something unforseen happens. As Obama is a pretty cool character, it seems unlikely (but not impossible) that he might do or say some gamechanging thing. Another possibility is some outside event that would impact on popular opinion, like a 9/11 attack that might make everyone run to McCains side for supposed security ( McCain is seen as tougher in this respect). Lastly, but even more unlikely, if some harm came to Obama. There are still quite a few people in the US that have hard racist ideas. This last would be a disaster for the US democracy, but America has a very violent history regarding presidents.

Next week we have the third and last presidential debate, we’ll see what that brings. My bet, not much.

Of course, there are differences in the selection  of these two groundbreaking choices ( previously in the case of a woman candidate, the democrats had proposed Gerladine Ferraro as VP to W. Mondale in 1984 ) : Obama was chosen through the primary system, while Palin was chosen directly by Senator McCain, not by popular vote. Still, it’s a measure of american society that the two major parties have each chosen an afro-american and a woman as candidates.

Now, whats the electoral situation to date? As usual as in previous elections, the country is about evenly divided between Republicans and Democrats. At least in the popular vote. Just about every poll shows a statistical parity. But the US electoral system is not about the popular vote. A candidate can win more votes and yet lose the election as elections are defined by electoral votes, winner take all in each state.
As of today, the Democrats with Obama are ahead in electoral votes but that’s just for now.
CNN for example has Obama with 243 electoral vote (271 to win) between safe and leaning states, and McCain with 189.
RealClear Politics has Obama 217, McCain 174 and 147 undecided.
McCain’s intention of vote has risen after the convention and especially with the selection of governor Palin as running mate. Most polls to date show he’s catched up to and even passed Obama in the popular vote.
So, with less than two months to the election the race is definitely going to heat up, both sides are going to go on the offensive and negative politics are going to be the norm.

Truth to tell it’s going to be a terrific election!

The phrase “white mans burden” referred to the burden of taking “care” of Africans in the british colonies in the 18th and 19th centuries.

Idi Amin Dada was a  dictator who took power in Uganda. He was president from 1971 to 1979. He was a cruel and ruthless tyrant, who nevertheless had a perverse sense of humour. Having taken over most English businesses in Uganda he gave himself the CBE medal ( Conqueror of the British Empire).

In 1975 at a meeting of the Organization of African Unity, Idi Amin (wheighing 300 pounds) arrived carried in a chair by four Englishmen of the business community, with another white man carrying a parasol to shade him. Idi Amin then said that “this was the true white man’s burden”.

I think Chavez is trying to replace Fidel Castro (former leader of cuba) as the windiest speaker. As far as I know Castro’s longest speech was 7 hours and 10 minutes in Havana, in 1986. So, if chavez does make good on his threat, then he’s got Castro beat hands down.

This is a list of world presidents who were awarded the nobel peace prize:

• In 1906 Theodore Roosevelt (U.S. President from 1901-1909) was awarded the peace prize for helping to end the Russian-Japanese war of 1904.
• In 1919 Thomas Woodrow Wilson (U.S. President from 1913-1921) in recognition for his work to establish the League of Nations, a forerunner of the United Nations.
• In 1978 Muhammad Anwar Al Sadat (President of Egypt from 1970-1981) and Menachem Begin (Prime Minister of Israel from 1977-1983) for jointly negotiating peace between Egypt and Israel.
• In 1987 Oscar Arias Sanchez (current President of Costa Rica), before he became president, received the peace prize for his work for peace in Central America, efforts which led to the accord signed in Guatemala on August 7 this year.
• In 1990 Mikhail Gorbachev (Presidents of the USSR from 1990-1991) for his leading role in the peace process which today characterizes important parts of the international community.
• In 1993 Nelson Mandela (President of South Africa from 1994-1999) and Frederik Willem de Klerk (president of South Africa from 1989-1994) for their work for the peaceful termination of the apartheid regime, and for laying the foundations for a new democratic South Africa.
• In 1994 Yasser Arafat (Palestine President from 1996-2004), jointly with Shimon Peres and Yitzhak Rabin were awarded the peace prize for their efforts to create peace in the Middle East.
• In 2002 Jimmy Carter (U.S. President from 1977-1981) was awarded the peace prize for his work to promote peace and democracy in the world.