It is time for Obama to name John Kerry the next secretary of state.  The Susan Rice situation is too distracting.  With the fiscal cliff negotiation going on, Obama should not waste energy on this.  Maybe he feels that Rice got a raw deal and that he should stand by his long time friend.  But I think most people would agree that Kerry is a more qualified choice to begin with.  Kerry would also sail through the confirmation hearings whereas Rice will be dragged through the mud and keep the disaster in Libya on the front page.  I also understand that the Republicans are hypocritical by saying that she gave false info to the nation.  Remember another Rice gave false info about WMD in Iraq.  She became secretary of state.  But this is a fight not worth fighting for Obama.

On  lighter note, I am surprised that neither Apolo Anton Ohno or Emmitt Smith made it to the DWTS final.  But I think Melissa Rycroft was the right champion even though I thought another athlete, Shawn Johnson would win due to her popularity.

With the fiscal cliff looming and the economy is still weak, it would seem that domestic issues will be most dangerous for Obama's second term.  However, I believe that there will be more difficult challenges from foreign affairs in the next 4 years.  I am cautiously optimistic that the economy will be better in the next 2-3 years.  But as the conflict between Israel and Hamas over the last few days show, the outside world will produce predictable and unpredictable headaches.  Besides the middle east, another area of likely conflict is in Asia between China and Japan over some small islands.  In both middle east and Asia, Obama should try to stay as low as possible unless there is a chance to help broker a long lasting peace.

There is really nothing much the U.S. can do about Israel and Hamas other than pressure Egypt to broker a cease fire.  This conflict has been going on for decades and rhetoric about supporting Israel, spoken by Obama and Hilary Clinton, does nothing except for political consumption back home.  I think everybody understands that if one lives in Israel and rockets are attacking them from Hamas, it is human nature to retaliate.  But that would never lead to peace.  As Gandhi said "an eye for an eye only leads to the whole world being blind."  Since there has not been any attacks from PLO controlled West Bank, the U.S. should convince Israel to recognize the government of West Bank as a legitimate state.  The U.S. and Israel should help the new Palestine state to thrive economically.  Eventually support for Hamas in Gaza will drop when the people see that a thriving Palestinian state is possible.  If Obama is bold, that is what he should try to do.  Sending a war ship to the area to show support for Israel will only anger the Arabs, it does nothing to help Israel.

As far as the situation between China and Japan, it can escalate if the U.S. interfere.  I am sure they will not go to war over these islands but the bad blood between them already have an economic impact in Asia.  Again by sending a war ship over there only gets China angry.  The government will use that to rev up nationalism against both Japan and the U.S.  The economic impact will then even be worse.  I say stay low and hope things cool down on their own.  It is really none of our business.  Interesting enough, Taiwan agrees with China about the history of these islands.  This is because China claimed that historically the islands are part of the Taiwan province, which is part of China.  Taiwan, which is closer to these islands than mainland China and Japan, also claims them for itself.  So Taiwan agrees that the islands are part of Taiwan, only that Taiwan is NOT part of China!

Mitt Romney said that Obama won because he gave gifts to Hispanics, college students, gays, and single women.  Of course that would be like saying that the incumbent should always win because he is always able to use policies to buy votes.  In this case Obama was doing what he had promised.  If one believes that college students should not get financial aid or be covered under their parents' health insurance, they can vote against him.  It is like the Republicans promise tax breaks.  Every time the government gives a tax exemption to a corporation, it is just like writing a welfare check. Is that a gift to buy votes?  Why do you think the wealthy are willing to back the Republicans?  It is why defense contractors back the Congressmen on defense budget committee.  I don't think that Romney really understands the country and that is the main reason he and the Republicans lost.

With the economy not recovering fast enough, Romney and the Republicans should have won big.  But instead of focusing on the slowness of the recovery, they blamed immigrants and unions etc. for the problems of the country.  They also focused on social issues such as abortion and gay rights, issues that they cannot win overall.  Regardless of whether you believe that illegal immigrants are a net gain or net loss to the economy, you cannot say that they had ANYTHING to do do with the financial market collapse. But Romney moved way to the right on immigration during the primary and even though he tried to come back to the middle, it was too late.  It also seems insincere.  With the demographic changing, if Romney and the Republicans don't learn from this, it would be difficult for them to win in the future.

Well, it is 2 days left.  Time for my forecast.  It is no secret that there are only a few states that are up for grabs.  They are:  Michigan, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Virginia, Colorado, Florida, Ohio, Nevada, New Hampshire, and Iowa.  Out of these I will say that Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin are going to go to Obama.  This will leave Obama with 247 votes needing 23 more.  I will give Florida and Virginia to Romney giving him 248.  So this leaves Ohio with 18, Colorado with 9 Nevada and Iowa with 6 each and New Hampshire with 4.  I predict that Obama will sweep these states and finish with 290.  So it is possible for Obama to win without winning Florida or Ohio (although not very likely).  But Romney must sweep these two and add New Hampshire to his column to win. Does my math look correct?  What is your prediction?