US Presidential Election 2004: Democratic defeat or defeat for Democracy?

I am still a little surprised that John Kerry did not succeed in ousting George W Bush from the White house last month. One would have thought, for example, that extremely long queues of voters forming multiple rings around polling stations would have helped the Democratic Party: did the many first time voters involved really give this much support to an incumbent rather than a challenger?

And Mr Kerry looked vastly more presidential in the camera frame...

Watching the BBC's results program, it seemed a given early on that Mr Kerry had done it. Professional pollsters were in broad agreement that we would be waking up (or staggering around like a zombie?) with a Democratic President. Democratic pollsters were jubilant; their Republican counterparts were in dialogue with David Dimbleby with nails bitten and heads sunk.

Then the results began to come in. Towards the end of the flow it was clear that there was almost no change. Indeed, on every key indicator the Republicans were comfortably ahead. Tom Daschle was ousted by a Republican challenger, and the Republicans took the Senate.

Naturally, a number of conspiracy theorists are still theorising - especially in respect of the crucial swing state of Ohio, where in the aftermath it seemed for a while that the Democrats might well demand a review of the whole process in the state. Apparently there was a significant discrepancy between strong indications from exit polls and the final result. A good link to check out is "Proof of Ohio Election Fraud Exposed":

http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/121604Z.shtml

Of course we were all underestimating the importance of national security issues in America, as well as the strength of the Christian Fundamentalist vote, which is difficult for the Democrats to chip in to. At the end of the day, John Kerry was a Liberal Democrat from the Liberal North East of America and a European-style politician in a country which does not have a European-style mentality. Maybe the Democrats cannot win in this day and age without a southerner with true folksy appeal? Maybe they need someone with massive popular appeal to whom the Democratic label can quietly be attached?

On the other hand, maybe the theorists are right and Mr Kerry did actually win?

A friend with considerable political experience has speculated that the result, if it can be conceptualised as such, is the most dangerous produced by any Western democracy in the last seventy years. We'll see.