misanthropos

FATIGUE ON THE ELECTION TRAIL
WHAT'S THAT YOU SAID?
A packed schedule has presidential candidates saying funny things

(This was an article from my local newspaper that I thought was rather amusing)

NO one's infallible. Especially when the US presidental election trail hots up.

It's nerve-sizzling season for each party's candidates.

And the factor that has everyone on an even playing field?

Fatigue and the sleep monster, reported the New York Times.

And it's sleep deprivation that has the candidates muttering words that warrant a 'say what now?' reaction from bewildered audiences and journalists.

Take it from Republican candidate Mitt Romney's forgetfulness in a speech: 'I won't remember Iowans,' Mr. Romney declared in Altoona the other day before his wife, Ann, corrected him. (He meant that he would 'never forget' Iowans.)

Another Republican candidate, Mr. Mike Huckabee, offered his 'apologies' last week over the killing of former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto of Pakistan. (He meant 'sympathies', his campaign clarified.)

So, is he getting enough sleep?

'Obviously, I could use more than I am getting,' said Mr. Huckabee, who is down to about four hours a night.

With candidates appearing as less guarded and sleepy beings, it can be fun to watch.

In Iowa City on Tuesday, Democrat Hillary Clinton thanked a local organiser, 'Betti O', who screamed: 'Oh, thank you, Senator!'

To which Mrs. Clinton replied: 'From one diva to another, Betty, I'm so happy to see you!'

It can also have serious consequences. Republican Rudolph Giuliani of New York partly faulted a lack of sleep for the 'severe headache' that put him in the hospital last month.

Fatigue-related missteps are legion in political campaigns.

'When a person is fatigued, they will make a mistake,' senator and Republican John McCain said Wednesday in an interview.

Mr. McCain said he tries for five or six hours of sleep a night.

There's a reason for the blurry-eyed behaviour. Presidential campaigns today start earlier than ever and involve endless news cycles, relentless fund-raising demands and coast-to-coast travel.

Senator Barack Obama, Democrat of Illinois, blamed fatigue for his drastically overstating the death toll from tornadoes in Kansas in May. He said 10,000 people died. (In reality, 12 died.)

'There are going to be times when I get tired,' Mr. Obama said. 'There are going to be times when I get weary.'

Although Mrs. Clinton, unlike Mr. Obama, never mentions her fatigue at campaign events, she is particularly sensitive to it, her aides say, especially at evening appearances.

Her husband and former president Bill Clinton was famous for requiring just two or three hours of sleep a night, a practice that Mrs. Clinton says she would want no part of in a White House of her own.

But former President Night Owl himself has said sleeplessness is partly to blame for the dysfunction of Washington. That is a little bit like Paris Hilton's blaming overexposure for the problems of Hollywood.

With the caucuses upon them, candidates like to comfort themselves with the notion (or lie) that the end is in sight - notwithstanding that New Hampshire holds its primary in all of five days.

'I am hoping things will improve a little bit in the schedule so I can catch a few more winks,' Mr. Huckabee said Wednesday, dreaming aloud.