Politics | Chicago Addick

Nov 3

Election Day in America

‘Merica! Land of the free…. home of division. 🇺🇸

It might only be a national election, but the U.S. election has a far reaching impact on the world, and the U.K. in particular with Brexit around the corner of what has been the longest road ever laid.

My team which has some American denizen has decided to get out on the water today leaving the politics on the shore. We will be joined by others and we will drink wine, eat pizza and possibly dip ourselves into the ocean, although the current water temperature of 26 degrees maybe too chilly for some, including me who’s blood has thinned even more after being island-locked for the last 9 months.

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Sep 2

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Emotional rollercoaster

The peaks and troughs of being a Charlton Athletic fan.

For the umpteenth time we were dragged from a glimpse of a clear blue sky atop a mountain to a muddy and uncertain ditch. All within 24 hours.

It’s hard to keep up with all the shenanigans of the ciphers trying to make a few bob for themselves, but in football parlance we celebrated a goal yesterday before the VAR had been checked, checked again and then triple checked.

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Mar 25

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Coronavirus and Bermuda

The biggest adversity the world has seen in many a generation. I truly hope that you are all staying safe and healthy.

A crazy and worrying time, harrowing for some, as the Coronavirus or COVID-19 sweeps every little corner of our world taking no prisoners. A global pandemic, only previously in the deep imaginative minds of movie writers, scientists, historians and risk officers. Now part of all of us, every day, every minute.

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Jul 18

Bermuda’s turn to vote

Today it is Bermuda’s turn to vote in a general election. And unlike the USA and UK polls, the ones here think it’s going to be close, which probably means it won’t be. The One Bermuda Alliance (OBA) are the incumbent, who dramatically came to power in 2012 beating the Progressive Labour Party (PLP) by about 5% of the vote and gaining 19 of the 36 available constituencies, which in truth individually are no more than small towns, with around 1,200 or so eligible to vote in each.

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Dec 18

Bermudians vote for change

In late night drama the One Bermuda Alliance (OBA) ended the Progressive Labour Party’s 14-year rule. It was a tight race with OBA winning 19 seats to the PLP’s 17, with the deciding seat in St George’s West being decided by just 4 votes.

Margins are small here, where a handful of votes can easily swing a constituency, but after current Premier Paula Cox unprecedentedly lost her own seat of Devonshire North West the writing was on the wall that Bermudians, driven by younger voters, wanted change.
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Dec 16

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General Election in Bermuda

The oldest self-governing British Overseas Territory goes to the polls tomorrow. Bermuda’s parliament held its first session in 1620, making it the third-oldest continuous parliament in the World.

The last election was before my time here in December 2007, when the controlling Progressive Labour Party (PLP) won a third term in power with 22 seats against 14 for the opposition United Bermuda Party (UBP).

The UBP was the countries oldest party but ceased to exist officially last summer after the majority of its members joined a newly formed party called One Bermuda Alliance (OBA). Former UBP leader Kim Swan and MP Charlie Swan, both influential, have announced they will contest this election as independents, two of 14 that potentially have a big say in the outcome of the vote.

There are 36 constituencies around the island with each one having around 1,100 or so eligible voters. Only about 1,500 votes separated the two parties in 2007 in the popular vote.
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Nov 7

Greater than the sum of our individual ambitions

It wasn’t close was it? Barack Obama was returned to office just after midnight on the east coast. Obama won 303 of the electorial votes and the President also won the popular vote perhaps eventually by as much as 3% once the final numbers are counted on the west coast. Florida not for the first time has yet to be decided but is leaning towards the Democrats.

Out of the 10 major swing states, Obama won 9 of them, if I include Florida. Romney did gather together a lot of the conservative support and I am sure won back supporters that the Republican’s lost to the Democrats in 2008, however I just get the impression that this will further divide the countries conservatives and for me they have all the early symptoms of the Labour Party in the 80’s.

America is moving on and whilst old grey-haired men poo poo abortion, gay rights, immigration, foreign allainces, climate change and rely on God’s way young people, Latino’s and women in particular are taking this great country in another direction.
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Nov 5

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The US Election

I don’t actually think it’ll be that close tomorrow night. It suits the American media to talk up an Election too close to call but they don’t tell the whole story and mostly only the facts that their one-eyed audience wants to hear. As an aside I’m watching now from afar (650 miles across the pond) America becoming increasingly split. Split between the have and have-nots and very differing liberal and conservative thinking.
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Jun 3

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The Diamond Jubilee in Bermuda

Bermuda goes to work tomorrow and Tuesday, whilst sovereign states, crown dependencies and other overseas territories are off waving flags, necking Pimms, eating pork pies and celebrating Her Majesty’s 60 years on the throne.

I shouldn’t complain too much, we get more than our fair share of public holidays here on the rock, but it did interest me that the government in election year decided against observing the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee.
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Aug 10

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London riots

This post should have been a retrospective on Charlton’s League Cup game, which selfishly I am still pissed off at missing, with the added annoyance of having spent money on a hotel room and match ticket. It’s the third game that has been moved or postponed that I’ve come back for in past year…. ok, selfish rant over.

After the game Saturday my son and I stayed at my brother’s in Hackney, and when I woke on Sunday morning I truly thought he was watching some library clips from the 1985 Broadwater Farm riots. I was in Hornchurch Sunday night but my brother spent most of it stood looking out of his window with his baseball bat as groups of yobs roamed the streets outside. Fortunately the police unsettled them enough to move the low-life’s toward Bethnal Green Road.
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May 18

Three become two

It was just 18 months ago that a 3rd political party, the Bermuda Democratic Alliance (BDA) was formed (I wrote about it here). Yet yesterday BDA and the countries main opposition party, the United Bermuda Party (UBP) merged.

On the face of it, it appears a strange decision. Yes, the BDA’s hopes of getting into government within the next decade are slim if non-existent but politics is a marathon and not a sprint. From an outsiders point of view and from what I had read the BDA had some common sense ideas and they offered a different perspective outside the current prejudices.
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Oct 29

Paula Cox to be Bermuda’s new Premier

Last night in Bermuda Paula Cox was voted in by fellow Progressive Labour Party (PLP) members as the countries new Premier and will take the place of Dr Ewart Brown, who is stepping down after an eventful four years. I will write more on Brown when I get a minute.

Cox is currently Deputy Premier and her winning was about as predictable as the rabbit winning a greyhound race. Cox strolled to victory with 124 votes with Terry Lister 39 and Dale Butler collecting a rather embarrassing 2. Derrick Burgess was voted in as Cox’s new Deputy narrowly defeating Lister.

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