Maths (or constitutional law) for learners

I've just seen BBC News: US rivals in economy crisis talks about the response of John McCain and Barack Obama to the growing financial crisis. Whilst McCain's response by suspending his campaign is an act of statesmanship, putting country about ambition, Obama's response of continuing to grub for votes is a sign that he is developing some of the worst features of Hillary Clinton.

But what really caught my eyes was the following:

Americans needed to "hear from the person who in approximately 40 days will be responsible for dealing with this mess", Mr Obama told journalists.

The next President does not take office until the 20th of January. So either Obama can't count (it's 117 days) or has forgotten that the new President doesn't take office on election night (so much for his claims to be experienced because he once taught constitutional law).

At such a difficult time for the economy, does the US and the wider world really want a learner in office?

No wonder there's so much debt...

The answer is clear. People don't understand basic maths.

From Manchester Evening News: 'Cool Cash' card confusion comes the story of how a new scratchcard caused confusion when a buyer called Tina Farrell couldn't understand why they hadn't won:

"I phoned Camelot and they fobbed me off with some story that -6 is higher - not lower - than -8 but I'm not having it.

Did they not learn basic minus numbers at the age of 11 to 12, as the article explains? They probably also think a debt of £5.00 is higher than £5000.000. No wonder there's so much debt about.

Peter Hain proves he should never be Chancellor

Peter Hain has made a surprising gaffe when announcing that he has received sufficient support to be nominated for Deputy Leader of the Labour Party:

Mr Hain said he was pleased to get such support as it was not possible - mathematically speaking - for all six declared contenders to get on the ballot paper. (BBC News: Deputy contenders claim support)

Clearly he's not very good at maths. So here's a simple maths lesson for him.

There are 352 Labour MPs.

Each candidate for the Deputy Leadership requires the support of 45 MPs (including themselves).

352 divided by 45 is 7.8222222222222222222222222222222

So it is possible for seven candidates to be nominated.

And Peter Hain has got his sums wrong. Let's hope he's never made Chancellor of the Exchequer.