The traditional hand-wringing, po-faced analysis of the US mid-term elections is clogging the airwaves – ‘seminal moment’, ‘deeply important’, ‘epoch-changing’ etc etc.

Will George Bush be a lame duck if the Republicans can’t hold onto control of the House and the Senate?

To be honest it barely matters, every President of whatever colour, is a lame duck after his last set of mid-terms and this is because everybody else is so busy planning the next presidential election in two years time.

Bush has perhaps made it slightly worse for himself this time, by being hamstrung in the middle east too, but the idea that his future is going to be massively affected by these elections is just nonsense.

Looking at it optimistically, it’s also rather an encouraging time for people who don’t believe in the kind of policies that this administration has promoted. The wonderful statute law that the US has for limited terms of service as President (eight years maximum) means you can always see the end coming!

Anyone fancy a bit of that here?