During a bizarrely varied journalistic career - highlights included unprofessionally dancing on a desk in the press box at the end of the 2003 Rugby World Cup final and holding an umbrella for David Trimble outside the Ulster Unionist Party HQ in Belfast - one of the best assignments I ever had was driving around New England and upstate New York interviewing newspaper editors about their endorsements for the 2000 Presidential election.
I trawled up through Westchester towards Troy and Albany before cutting across New Hampshire and Vermont into Massachusetts and down to Rhode Island where, if memory serves, I spent the weekend watching college football. The poll I took of editors was hardly scientific. I talked to whoever agreed to meet me, about 8 in all I think. And of course, I was in largely blue states (only NH voted for Goerge W Bush.)
Nonetheless, to my surprise, I did find Bush supporters and endorsers and to my even greater surprise found them to be articulate, coherent and rational - unlike the man they endorsed. And I met one memorable character, James Rousmaniere, the editor of the Keene Sentinel, who very kindly gave me his copy of the seminal US political work, Why Americans Hate Politics by EJ Dionne, which I subsequently passed on to the man who is now editor of The Times. (I note that the Sentinel, which endorsed Al Gore in 2000 has endorsed Obama.
It seemed to me like a great respoonsibility, endorsing candidates. I would happily have endorsed Gore in 2000, Kerry in 2004, and probably did in any number of bars, internet chat rooms and water cooler environs. But this time around, as I have an actual platform, albeit not with quite the influence of the Keene Sentinel or The Times, I have decided to do so formally.
First a discIaimer: I do not have a vote, being a UK citizen. I do have an interest, however, both as a keen longtime student of American history and politics, and in a different sense as an individual who believes that the US has and will continue to have a profound impact on the rest of the world, and if governed the right way that could be a positive impact again after 8 years of almost incomprehensible behaviour on the world stage.
If I did have a vote I would cast it for Barack Obama. There are a number of reasons for this, not all of which I will go into. First is that he appears to offer a new and fresh direction, at a time when such is most needed. While his plans and policies appear somewhat vague and unsubstantiated - such is the way in modern politics - his fresh perspective, calm demeanour and clean campaign (in relative terms) suggest a different type of politician. His response to the charge of inexperience - that the alternative is more of the same - is a powerful message. Look what the insiders and the dynasties have done to and for America. Not much good lately. He will be well received by America's allies and perhaps offer a new relationship with some of her enemies.
Another reason Mr Obama is the outstanding candidate is that the alternative is appalling. Put bluntly, I could never vote for a ticket which included the appalling Sarah Palin. The more she speaks the apparent it becomes just how clueless she really is. Does anyone really believe she could be President if, and let's not beat about the Bush, the septuagenarian heartbeat of John McCain were to cease? What a grim prospect.
And what of Mr McCain himself? In previous years I have been an admirer of his fearless and principled brand of independent political thought. It takes guts to support unpopular policies, such as the Iraq surge, and yet Mr McCain held true to his beliefs throughout the primaries and won through. And the surge seems to have worked.
But that John McCain seems to have disappeared and been replaced by a poltician prepared to do absolutely anything to succeed, running one of the most vicious and vitriolic political campaigns I have witnessed, one which appears to be based on promoting fear and uncertainty and which is underpinned by lies and half truths. It is a truly dispiriting sight.
And so Mr McCain seems to have litte to offer other than a vision of America that says the future is frightening and unpredictable and Americans should shy away from it and stick with the conservative politics of the past, while Mr Obama claims that this brand of politics has failed and must be replaced by a new discourse, even if he has not really articulated what that discourse is.
So it is a choice of hope over fear, the future over the past. And the choice should be Barack Obama.