The Politics Club will not run this Friday as it is the last day of the half-term.  I hope that you have a relaxing and well deserved rest!  Keep your eyes out for all things political to discuss after the one week break. 

Mr. Mithen

Senator Hillary Clinton has scooped over twice as many votes as her rival Barrack Obama in the Democratic Presidential Primary held in West Virginia.  She was widely predicted to win by a large margin, even by Obama himself.  But is this win enough to stabilise a declining campaign?  After all, Obama still leads the race. 

Here is a BBC article detailing the Primary: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/7399794.stm

Mr Mithen

Hey guys,

The Politics Club will still meet today in the library but will start a little later as I am going to a Training Day for English teachers and will then head straight over for the club.  We will meet from 4.20-5.00 will lots to discuss!

Mr. Mithen

OK, so the pun on Shakespeare is cheesy but it worked because you’re reading this.  Gordon Brown’s premiership has sustained another blow after plans to scrap the 10p tax band was announced recently.  Since the controversy, Chancellor of the Exchequer Alistair Darling has stated that he ‘can’t re-write the budget’. 

So, what does this policy actually mean?  What is the controversy? The BBC has written a very good article outlining the ‘winners’ and the ‘losers’ and what the proposed changes involve. 

Here’s a link to the BBC’s coverage of the story today: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7359966.stm

Thanks to www.royalmint.com for the shiny picture. 

Mr Mithen

Who said that you can’t mix politics with wrestling (or ’sports entertainment’ if you follow the WWE)?  Well, I’m not even sure if anybody has said that, but it’s certainly not true.  The only question is, how effective can it be? 

For a number of years now, World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) – formerly the World Wrestling Federation (WWF) have been running ‘Smack Down Your Vote’ – a campaign to encourage it’s key demographic (15-39 year olds) of the issues, policies and personalities of the candidates putting themselves up for election.  The minimum legal age to vote in the USA is 18 years old. 

By-and-large the WWE’s programme has been non-partisan.  Top WWE personalities have lent their names to the campaign including Rey Mysterio Jr and Shelton Benjamin.  Here is a link to the official site: http://vote.wwe.com/. 

Last Monday night, candidates from both the Democratic and Republican parties recorded messages for the audience of WWE’s flagship programme, Monday Night RAW.  The excerpts that I have seem are coup-worthy for the WWE and border on cringe-worthy for the candidates.  Each candidate involked various catchphrases of famous wrestlers past and present in order to connect with the estimated 5 million viewers (according to WWE).  Unfortunately, the link that I was using to view the excerpts no longer carries the clips and has now been removed from this post.   

What do you think?  Clever ploy or cheesy stunt?  How effective do you think such appeals can be?  How might such an effort be received between Gordon Brown, David Cameron and Nick Clegg at, say, an England international at Wembley?  Let me know your thoughts! 

Keep an eye on the competitions page – more to come shortly! 

Mr Mithen

Thanks to www.king5.com for the picture.  This is a third-party site. Politics Club blog takes no responsibility for its content.