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The United States: Election year surrealism

It was never likely that the Clinton presidency would fade away quietly. But few were prepared for what the 2000 election – a close-run contest, though not particularly exciting until the day Americans voted – delivered as its bizarre finale. The five weeks after election day seemed like an unending flashback into the fierce partisanship and impeachment bitterness of the previous eight years. When the court battles were over, George W. Bush became the second son of an American president to become president himself, and just the third candidate in US history to win the presidency while losing the popular vote. The new chief executive offered his divided nation a more quiet, CEO-style presidency than had his predecessor: calmer conservatism at home and a somewhat lower profile abroad. But his first weeks in office were drowned out by more noise from Bill Clinton, whose administration – phenomenally successful in objective political and economic terms – ended with the bang of yet another scandal, this time setting some of his hitherto most ardent defenders into a competition to denounce him. American allies, who had been unsettled by indications that the Bush campaign planned more ‘unilateralist’ policies and at least a partial retrenchment from Europe, were reassured by the administration’s early moves. The largest uncertainty for everyone was what would happen to the amazing growth machine of the US economy, which seemed to falter in December 2000. Although impossible to predict whether it would come to a soft or a hard landing, the joyride was evidently over – bad news for the rest of the world as well as the United States.