In 2004, when John Howard's Liberal Party put Mark Latham's quixotic search for high office to an abrupt and perfunctory end, I sent a gloating message to a Labor friend of mine. We of course disagreed on the merits of the candidates and the parties, but I knew how heartfelt her unhappiness with Howard was and how heartfelt her belief in Labor was, and how deeply she felt the loss. So it's fair to say that sending that message was amongst the most crass things I've done, and that's a selection made from a crowded field.
The unpleasantness was not returned when, in 2005, I was working at CCHQ when loss loomed here, or in 2007 when I was working for the doomed Liberal campaign in Australia. Indeed, quite the reverse - even in the midst of their triumph in Oz, in a moment just as momentous for them as Obama's is for the Democrats in the USA, several of my friends on the left were decent enough to drop me notes of condolence. For they knew only too well how unpleasant it is to sit amongst the detritus of a party you feel you haven't earned, staring at results which tell of your failure.
At times like that, there is, I think, a certain bond between those in the arena - both victors and vanquished - which separates them from those who pay scant attention to the process. So my point really is this... even if you are one of these strange (and recently multiplying) figures, an "Obamacon", spare a thought for those who slogged their guts out for McCain. The footsoldiers who persevered in the face of consistent, horrifying polls, the volunteers who just kept plugging away for their beloved Party, and will now be feeling as wretched as can be. I am certainly thinking of them with sympathy myself.
