The polls are very close in WI. There is no way the Clintons are ceding an inch of groud there. They want it very badly otherwise they wouldn't be spending all that money there.
Remember that when you're used to Obama you're used to a higher importance of retail politics. The candidate in front of voters in person. That's not as important to a lot of candidates. They are often marketed primarily in the media. It's more controlled to run TV ads repeating the same thing over and over than it is to face actual voters and unpredictable situations. It's also a particularly effective way of putting a negative idea about your opponent into people's heads.
Remember that the candidates spent ten months campaiging in front of the same Iowans and over time there was a huge net shift towards Obama. Many people who stood in Obama's corner that night had seen Hillary speak live at some point. But they saw Barack too. Why would she choose to hunker down in a smallish state with him again and try to duke it out retail? Iowa showed us how that goes.
They might figure that just trying to chill the enthusiasm for him might be enough in a state like Wisconsin where she remains close in the polls. That's why the tone of her campaign is so lame right now. It's almost like they're angling specifically for crumudgeons. It's the 'Get Off My Lawn' campaign again. They've gone there before and they're trying to win with it in Wisconsin.
Don't be fooled by her days away from WI. She wants a win to appear a certain way and a loss can better be spun by pretending she didn't give a hoot about the place. It wouldn't be the first time.
Oh guys, don't go there please. Hillary Rodham's father was a Repuclican and she was a 'Goldwater Girl' as a teenager. It's ugly to go after what amounts to someone's heritage. We're in a serious political thingy here but we actually do worse when Obama supporters start talking like there are Purity tests opponents must face. Judge opponents by their careers. What do you think they were doing when they dug into Barack's past? This stuff is ugly and our candidate jokes about it and how OTHER campaigns do it and it's part of why this campaign is special. How can he laugh about them digging into his school papers if you're here digging on Hillary for what she did as a teenager? We won in Iowa because we were a cleaner, smarter campaign led by a really smart community organizer extrodonaire. After all that, it looks awful to me to see this mucking around in the dirt. We've gotta be better than this crap. Look at our candidate for crying out loud.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I'm with you Mary. Part of how we won in Iowa was the fact that the campaign never sounded like the stuff that is showing up here recently. Accusations of racism, misogynist comments about Hillary Clinton, digging into her childhood! What do peope think Kindergate was about? Mary, just report it if you see it and I suggest anyone else who cares about winning this thing does the same. Let's keep this blog as clean as our candidate!The reason other campaigns do and say things that seem designed specifically to frustrate and make you angry is because they want you to sound angry! That way, new people stop joining your campaign because it's getting too angry. It's cheap politics 101. Our candidate doesn't take the bait and neither should we.Isn't anyone listening to Senator Obama around here? There really is such a thing as the politics of division. One of the basic rules of it is that you agitate divisions in society, scare people, make people mad at each other so they wind up in unmixable camps. And then you just try to hold onto the factions behind your own walls. This campaign is about eliminating the walls as much as possible to bring people on board and create a genuine mandate in government (Under a civil rights lawyer!) to change some things and get some good things done for people for a CHANGE.
This was just a post I did on another site where people couldn't help reassuring each other that they understood how Obama is a tad inexperienced for the job. It's so obvious that line was fed out there so people could feel smart repeating it. "Well gawrsh, the JUNIOR senator seems like a swell guy and I really like him. He just needs more seasoning and experience. Hrmmph hmmm. More brandy?"
I actually feel embarrased when I hear people parrot that one. It's just so obvious. It allows people who know a little bit about politics talk about it like they're old chefs. "Just a tad more seasoning please."
And if you somehow read both my blog and the site this came from, you've just ID'd my super secret screen name on that site. If by one in a million this happens, don't out me over there please. There are some crazy muthas who hang out there all the time. Anyway, here's the little thingy I wrote to those guys.
I think we ought to be a little more careful about the whole 'seasoning' and experience test for our nominee. The country will be dying for change above all else in 08 and it could be argued that being a member of one of the two families who have ruled from the Executive for the past 20 years might actually make you not such a good choice to be up at the podium against the GOP's new haircut.
They turned one of the biggest negatives about her into a supposed positive by feeding that simple line out there real early so everyone could 'understand' the whole thing as simple as a job interview. Smart campaign tactic maybe not so smart for making our decision.
And what exactly is the 'experience' threshold that qualifies you for the Oval Office? The implication seems to be that you've already worked in an administration. But that is dynasty and stagnation. Democrats might feel like Hillary represents change, but to people outside our little fight with the Bushies, they're going to associate her with the past ten years more than that new haircut.
I think I'll take the smart as hell charismatic young guy who already shows an ability to draw independents and jaded Republicans who know they got jacked by Bush. There is a reason Obama's right with her in Iowa where they run head to head and it's not because he's drawing more of the established Democrats than she is. Those folks are so used to Hillary's fight with the right that they don't know there's a nomination campaign. All the new folks showing up for Obama will be long gone in Nov 08 if Hillary's on the ticket. The only ones impressed by her 'seasoning' seem to be the old hands. But that won't get the White House even if it could get her the nomination.
Listen to what Democrats supporting Hillary are saying and it sounds like they're asleep. Even reading their words I hear this dull, defeated drone, "I just think she has the experience to lead from her first day in office. I like Obama (brightening) but I just think he isn't ready yet (thud). They think they are playing it safe by nominating her. Of course, they're sleep-walking right to the edge of the basement stairs and they're dragging us with them.
There is nothing safe about nominating the person in your party with the highest 'negative' ratings of any candidate or indeed anyone alive in the party. It's actually really dumb and you would have to be functioning based on a fallacy to believe it's a good idea.
So there it is, the main argument. Hillary has the experience necessary to be president. But her experience is exactly why giving her the nomination instead of Barack Obama is such a bad idea. In 2008, the main thrust of the campaign is going to be voter dissatisfaction and a desire for change.
... If anyone reads this tonight, sorry, I have to lay off and get back to it tomorrow.
The point of this coming out in the debate was that Hillary is trying to skate by a lot of issues as the front-runner and not take positions that could be seen as a gaffe. Barack was using it to highlight the fact that he has no intention of skating around issues. The importance of this for the Democratic nomination goes way beyond the issue of immigration. The modern GOP political machine has been designed in the wake of Bill Clinton's presidential wins in '92 and '96 to defeat Clinton politics. It's the Clinton style of politics to not take positions that could alienate any particular group of voters if it can be avoided. It becomes this whole way of talking without saying anything. The thing is, it doesn't work anymore. For one, no one does it as well as the master himself, the seducer, Slick Willie. But the other thing is, the opposition has adjusted for it. Now the ambiguities provided by Democrats who leave too many logical holes in what they are saying are the very spaces the GOP uses to redefine them for the voters in a negative light. Double-talkers aren't just elusive and clever as Hillary's supporters like to believe. They become sneaky and untrustworthy in the eyes of the voters, sadly even the voters who would be better served by the policies of that candidate.The country is hungry for something straight-forward so they don't have to guess what someone stands for. That's why so many went with Bush, mistaking him for someone honest because he was simple. Barack Obama jumped into the drivers liscense issue BECAUSE it's a tricky 'gotcha' type of issue. Usually a polician would stand there like a kid in the back of the class hoping not to get called on. He's showing that there aren't questions that he needs to avoid. If the honest answer is tough for people to hear, he's still going to give the honest answer.
If the Democrats don't nominate him, the Republican candidate will again be able to pretend to be the 'straight-shooter' and we will get the new George W Bush in office instead of someone who can start straightening the mess out and helping people get the jobs done that we need to do. That's why Barack Obama chose to jump right into that issue.
Obama Democrats.
It's time to start using that term. Because besides the nomination and the White House, that is what is at stake.
The early front-runner in this race is relying on the more established Democratic party base to supposedly run away with the nomination. But Hillary Clinton has not been able to blow Obama away. They tried it with money, using all those solid connections within the party that came from two successful Presidential runs in the 90's. But from somewhere, Obama has been able to match them almost dollar for dollar without turning to any special interest groups for a dime. Clearly some Democrats want him in the race. And I believe, as much as it is Obama at stake, it is those Democrats who are at stake. Because they are here for him.
So much of Obama's support in terms of donors and volunteers comes from essentially new people. In a place like Iowa, we see a new generation of young voters, formerly party-less independants and a surprising number of former Republicans registering as Democrats specifically in order to support Barack Obama. Because this is one of the places where people know him now.
In Iowa, we are doing our job. We are telling the party what it needs to know. If you want to grow the Democratic base and tilt the scales in the general election we have a way of doing that now. The new people we need will show up if we run the right candidate in 2008.
And if we choose to go with our establishment canididate, with Hillary Clinton, we not only run the candidate who is relying on a more fixed, limited number of voters in the general election, we lose many of those potential life-time Democrats in the process. We lose the Obama Democrats. Nominate Obama and see a nationwide movement. Nominate Clinton and further isolate the party within the same 45% piece of the electorate that has failed to deliver the White House. Nominate Clinton and it will be like puncturing a tire in terms of energy on the Democratic side.
In 2004, we ran with a candidate who in many people's eyes supported the Iraq war and then proceeded to criticize the way it was conducted. Why would we choose to do that again? Who is going to vote for Hillary Clinton that didn't vote for John Kerry? And isn't it potentially worse with Hillary in '08? George Bush won't be running against her, even if that's who she pretends to run against now. All the GOP has to do is run up a new face and the independants and swing voters will associate Hillary with the mess of the past decade more than that new Republican. It's unbelievable that we would choose that scenario. Karl Rove couldn't have written a better comic book for himself to chuckle over in retirement.
What is needed in '08 is the infusion of new energy that the candidacy of Barack Obama brings. What we need are the Obama Democrats. They are already here, making their presence felt by keeping a newcomer in the race when it was supposed to be all over. Offer that man to the country as our nominee. Put him on the big stage and watch that fledgling movement turn into a groundswell that will redraw the electoral map on a scale like Ronald Reagan in the other direction.
Many of the Obama Democrats don't yet even think of themselves as Democrats. They signed on to help Barack Obama. Some aren't sure who is on their side at all, confusing Hillary Clinton with the worst of this generation of Republicans.
This is a real sign that the country needs the Democratic Party to take us out of this era and into a more productive, less combative phase. And that is possible and even necessary now. We don't back down, we beat them with candor instead of the smooth-talking assurances perfected by Bill Clinton. We actually have a candidate who could do this in 2008. Barack Obama has the charisma and intelligence of Bill Clinton but that clear element of candor that distinguishes him from Clinton. The entire GOP machine is designed to combat the politics of Clinton. That doesn't mean that is what we should fight them with. No one new is going to sign on to join us in more of that. The Obama Democrats have no interest in sticking around for that.
They will stick around if enough of the established party recognizes this new infusion of energy for what it's worth and nominates Barack Obama. And when that trusty 45% is joined at the polls by those new Obama Democrats we will have neatly turned the page on so much of what has been holding us down.
Paid by a campaign? That would be nice. No, I've just been suffering in the trenches for a couple of decades. Been fighting for Democrats in presidential elections since before that sweet year when the gov from Arkansas took out the Reagan machine. Your post just genuinely confused me. I don't understand the correlation to holding Clinton accountable for the Iraq vote and then calling her the most credible. I think the politics of the day have become incredibly cynical. I think the Democrats have fed into that by trying to play along with the GOP and beat them at their own game as it were. But their game is crooked and wrong. And the longer we play it, the worse it gets. Because by doing things like "Being shrewd and playing it smart" by voting yes on things like the Iraq resolution, we are ultimately vindicating their violent and criminal behavior. They clearly wanted to invade Iraq. What they were doing was inherently racist in that they confused people about Middle Easterners on purpose. Attacking Iraq made sense to people because they are Middle Eastern like the 9-11 bombers. That is hideous. The Bush administration took advantage of it. We, millions of us, marched in the street and our 'leaders' like Hillary Clinton left us high and dry. The pundits laughed at us on television and wrote us off as irrelevant liberals simply out of step with the country. But we were right. And Hillary knew we were right. And she left us hanging. If that's 'shrewdness' or 'seasoning' I don't want any part of it. Barack Obama was warned by the party that he could jeapordize his shot at the Senate by criticizing the war before it was launched as it was so disgustingly popular. "Euphoria" I actually heard a newscaster say as we started bombing our fellow human beings. Obama went ahead and said we shouldn't start "stupid" wars and pretty much warned about everything that has in fact happened. So when I start hearing about 'seasoning' and who is naive, it actually feels kind of personal to me.
I've been around these candidates face to face, shook their hands, heard their speeches and watched them work the crowds. I've also read their books. And calling Barack Obama "naive" or not a leader is simply beyond belief to anyone who knows these candidates. It reminds me of a line Bush would have used. Absolutely ridiculous.
