Gore Vidal talks Obama, dictatorship, Bush and 2010 elections

Poltical activist and novelist Gore Vidal recently sat down with Times Online and provided his insights into the current state of affairs in the United States and he doesn't believe it looks too promising.

Gore Vidal, who has been well known as a public intellectual throughout the 20th century, believes the United States is headed towards a military dictatorship. Vidal, 83, famous for his public debate against William Buckley, is now in a wheelchair and his leg is titanium-built. He was a Hillary Clinton supporter but changed his support to Barack Obama because he felt Obama to be the most intelligent political figure in a long time. Nevertheless, the short story writer told Times Online that he was hopeful about the new President but understood that Obama was inexperienced. "He has a total inability to understand military matters. He’s acting as if Afghanistan is the magic talisman: solve that and you solve terrorism," explained Vidal, who is an anti-war activist and believes the United States should withdraw from Afghanistan. The New York native touched upon his notion that the United States has failed in every aspect in "conquering" the Middle East, "The War on Terror was made up." The writer of "The City and the Pillar" realizes that now Secretary of State Hillary Clinton should have won the Presidency in 2008 because "she understands the world more" and came to the conclusion that when women run things they're really good at it. "Elizabeth knew Raleigh would be a good man to give a ship to." In what is shaping up to be very interesting mid-term elections in 2010, Vidal foresees the Republicans winning again but doesn't see much difference between Democrats and Republicans anymore. The Republican Party to him is "Hitler youth, based on hatred — religious hatred, racial hatred. When you foreigners hear the word ‘conservative’ you think of kindly old men hunting foxes. They’re not, they’re fascists.” In the end, however, Vidal believes the United States will have a military dictatorship, "Obama would have been better off focusing on educating the American people. His problem is being over-educated. He doesn’t realise how dim-witted and ignorant his audience is." Adding that the US has no "intellectual class" Vidal doesn't have much faith in American intelligence by asking do people really care what Americans think. "They’re the worst-educated people in the First World. They don’t have any thoughts; they have emotional responses, which good advertisers know how to provoke." Near the end of the interview, the interviewer concludes by asking what Vidal is most proud of, and he responds, "My usual answer to ‘What am I proudest of?’ is my novels, but really I am most proud that, despite enormous temptation, I have never killed anybody and you don’t know how tempted I have been." Is he a happy man? Vidal quotes Aeschylus, "Call no man happy till he is dead’."