Wow, the Guardian really did hit a nerve with its arrogant attempt to suborn American democracy by co-ordinating a letter writing campaign to influence voters in Clark County, Ohio. Unfortunately, it wasn't quite the nerve it expected to hit, and has now, er, closed its campaign down prematurely. On National Review Online, it gets slated for 'clueless elitism'. One Ohioan currently based in London who is quoted in the piece puts it like this:

'"It's typically condescending of European leftists," responded Jackie, an associate at The Big Blog Company, a new enterprise that creates commercial blogs. "Sadly, Brits in general — with a few refreshing exceptions — tend to have something of an inferiority complex when it comes to America...I guess if your empire used to dominate the globe, and then an upstart bunch of colonials soundly trounced your nation as world superpower, it might leave you feeling a bit impotent.

' "So I find it wholly unsurprising that a left-wing paper like the Guardian thinks it only natural that Britons have a say in the U.S.'s elections," she continued. "What I do find quite shocking is that they think the voters who have had their personal contact details distributed on the Internet by this media outlet are going to be at all happy to receive letters from foreign strangers." '

I shouldn't laugh. So I won't.