For too long, the Asian American & Pacific Islander vote has been forgotten or ignored. Sen. Obama is committed to real change and giving AAPIs a real voice in this election. Join the Oregon Obama campaign's AAPI Action Team and help organize efforts in the Oregon AAPI community to:
1) Register as many new voters as possible by the Oct. 14th deadline; 2) Reaching out to undecided AAPI voters; & 3) Make sure everyone votes once ballots drop on Oct. 17th.
Sign up today on MyBarackObama.com: http://my.barackobama.com/page/event/detail/gshcd2
This year, Asian Americans have an unprecedented opportunity to make a difference in the election. With only two months left, we must act now to mobilize our community elect Sen. Obama and make an impact that the whole country will notice.
If Asian Americans are to make a difference, we must show up. You can help make sure our community shows up by doing the following today:
1. Building our Facebook group: http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=2220476126
We need to utilize our networks to build this group up as large as possible. Join the group, invite your friends, and encourage them to do the same.
2. Building our MyBarackObama group: http://my.barackobama.com/page/group/AsianAmericansforObama
This is our primary e-mail list. Please join our list and encourage your friends to do so as well. The campaign pays attention to these numbers, and we can make a big splash by boosting our membership.
Tonight I was reading/looking at The Washington Post's coverage of the Walter Reed Army Medical facilities that follows injured and traumatized soldiers coming home from Iraq and Afghanistan for treatment. Shockingly, many families languish there as their wounded loved one 'recovers' in substandard conditions--sometimes being crowded into one small room--and then face an excruciating road home.
It's horrifying to see how alone and neglected many of them are at a time when they should be the recipients of an outpouring of love and support as they struggle to regain their lives--especially as some of them who have just come to the untimely end of their careers. (You definitely must check out the stories/photos--they're very eye-opening: Walter Reed and Beyond)
Then it hit me: why aren't all of us Americans who are against the war doing something about our shamefully neglected war vets? Wouldn't it be an awesome statement if the various Obama volunteer groups started up programs to help them out? Instead of just railing about how wrong the war is, we could be doing what the pro-war administration is failing to do. (I hate to say it, but I've seen more right-wing conservatives do more to care for soldiers than we have...I'm speaking generally, but this is what I've observed.)
While we may not be able to give all they need, we could come up with all kinds of ways to show that we care. We could help with home repairs, or material needs a struggling family might have due to injury. We could even do small but meaningful things like make care packages or sponsor outings to sports events or other entertainment. We're creative; there are so many ways we could show that we genuinely care.
All this to say, I just want to encourage everyone--especially if you're a part of an Obama support group--to consider finding out where wounded soldiers (or even families whose loved one is currently in Iraq) are in your community and ask what you could do to help. How great would that be if we were able to back up our words about this "war that should never have been authorized and never should have been waged" by caring for the men and women who have sacrificed so much of their lives to do their duty.
Btw...Here are some great Obama-related volunteer networks that have started up recently:http://www.whyobamaworks.com/home.htmlhttp://www.obamabrigade.com/http://www.obamavolunteercorps.org/http://www.democratswork.org/ This is the sort of thing that shows how Barack has already sparked a movement. You could put it like this:Hillary believes in herself, her lobbyists, and her big corporate donors. . McCain believes in his lucky rubber band and a hundred-year war. Barack believes in us.
Btw...Here are some great Obama-related volunteer networks that have started up recently:
http://www.whyobamaworks.com/home.htmlhttp://www.obamabrigade.com/http://www.obamavolunteercorps.org/http://www.democratswork.org/
This is the sort of thing that shows how Barack has already sparked a movement. You could put it like this:
Hillary believes in herself, her lobbyists, and her big corporate donors. .
McCain believes in his lucky rubber band and a hundred-year war.
Barack believes in us.
Step aside, Amber. This is the New Obama Girl.
http://www.angelfire.com/stars/tkchang/Obama_Girl.pdf
Post this upside-down "Fu" (Good Fortune) Chinese New Year sign on your door, and riches spiritual and material will flow your way.
http://www.angelfire.com/stars/tkchang/Obama_Chinese_New_Year.pdf
Barack has written a letter in Chinese (he has Chinese in-laws) wishing all a Happy Chinese New Year of the Rat.
Read it at http://www.angelfire.com/stars/tkchang/Obama_Chinese_New_Year_Rat.pdf
From the AAA Fund:
Vote in Our Straw Poll - and in the Primaries
There are just five days left to tell the world which presidential candidate is the favorite of the majority of voters in the AAA-Fund Presidential Straw Poll. Richardson, Obama and Clinton each have won once, so this month's results will be very important - especially with Super Tuesday coming up on February 5th. Go to http://tinyurl.com/yr6w6b and vote today!
Also, no matter where you live, check the date of your state's primary and see if you can register as a poll watcher, poll judge or other volunteer. Phone bankers, house party hosts, and neighborhood vote canvassers are also needed by every campaign.
Finally, don't forget to vote!
Honestly, I'm disappointed by this letter from this Planned Parenthood spokesperson. I understand the importance of what she’s saying, but I’m bothered by her language--I, a pro-life Democrat, use the word "pro-choice" because that is the most respectful term, and I would like to be respected as well. Calling pro-life people "anti-choice" is so narrow-minded and unfair. We are not anti-choice. Women’s rights are so, so much broader than ‘reproductive rights,’ and women who believe differently than PP’s values have just as much right to be heard. To someone from a ethnic group that has faced genocide, my idea of women’s reproductive rights are very different. I often question whether the organization really DOES care most about women in a holistic way (based on my friends' experiences of abortion through PP, insultingly manipulative polls they have sent me, and their strong-arming within the Democratic party and demonizing of pro-life Democrat leaders. Being pro-life does not inherently contradict the values of the party.
But this is why I support Obama rather than a pro-life candidate who would not be a good leader. I believe that being pro-life is not just about abortion--it's about human rights, justice, erasing poverty, dealing with the AIDS emergency. But I also support him because I believe he understands that not all pro-life Americans are angry, spewing, "Go to hell" protesters who harass and kill abortion doctors. (See this incredibly insightful speech he gave in 2006—look at the last few paragraphs: Call to Renewal Keynote Address)
I believe he understands what pro-choice and pro-life Americans can agree on (such as the 95-10 Initiative)--finding ways to reduce abortions for healthier women, healthier families, and healthier communities. I believe he can work 'across the aisle' to help bridge the deep divide that has made this issue more political than it should ever have become. And I believe that he understands that not all pro-life Americans believe overturning Roe v. Wade is the answer at this point like some of the Republican candidates do (I think that chaos would ensue!).
Pro-life is not necessarily Anti-choice
I believe that being pro-life is SO not anti-choice. In fact, I advocate for greater choice. The problem with the polarizing of this issue is that both 'sides' seem to yell for either-or. What I really advocate for is that women receive better unbiased information so that they can make a more educated choice. As it is, groups like NARAL and businesses like PP are often quite biased (make the choice—choose us!) and don't give enough information for women who are already often in a tough situation. You would not believe how many people (especially younger women and teens) I have heard tell me that they really were not informed about what abortion is--they were given only very vague details about the procedure and only found out afterward. They felt pressured on all sides. They were not cared for in the aftermath. They felt like they were numbers with cash. There are so many womens' voices that are not being heard. And I won’t blame that on one side—many extreme pro-life groups have worsened the situation by being so obnoxious that no one wants to listen to the women in the middle.
All this to say, there are MANY of us who are pro-life and support Barack. (In fact, listen to what a few of us are saying in the Pro-life for Obama group--we're not Neocon weirdos! :) Open-mindedness on the subject should be something to be proud of. While I understand the need to clarify his position on pro-choice votes that have been twisted, I just want to say that many of us believe that “a vote for Obama is a vote for women” for other reasons.
Some of you may have heard that the Asian American Pacific Islander Political Action Committee, 80-20 Initiative, which aims to create a solid AAPI voting bloc in elections to increase effectiveness as a swing vote, has issued a call to defeat Sen. Barack Obama.
80-20's call is based upon Sen. Obama's supposed refusal to answer their candidate questionnaire. Sen. Obama did not in fact refuse to respond to the questionnaire. As you can see from the official campaign response posted below, Sen. Obama strongly supports the goal of fighting discrimination against AAPIs and increasing the presence of AAPIs in government, including Article III judges. However, Sen. Obama was concerned with the wording of some of the questions, and asked 80-20 to allow some modification. This was a courtesy that was extended to other campaigns, but for whatever reason, 80-20 refused to work with Sen. Obama and reacted with negative attacks. For more details, click the link below to read the full letter.
Download 80-20_Letter.pdf
For the record, Sen. Obama has had a long and admirable history of fighting for the AAPI community. It includes little things; when I first met Sen. Obama when he was a professor at my law school, I noticed that he was one of the only non-AAPI politicians I'd seen who regularly mentioned Asian Americans in speeches and discussions - something most American politicians still do not do unless speaking to an Asian American audience. This was back when Obama was polling 7th in a field of 8 Democratic primary candidates for the US Senate, and a presidential run was far from anyone's mind.
On the big things, Obama is there. Every Asian American community leader I met in Chicago told me that Sen. Obama was one of their strongest and most reliable allies in the Illinois State Senate. He is the only major candidate with an official AAPI campaign website linked off the main campaign homepage. He is the only major candidate with an active profile on AsianAve.com, the social networking website for the AAPI community. He has formed an Asian American and Pacific Islander National Leadership Council to advise on AAPI outreach. His US Senate Chief of Staff and Legislative Director are both of AAPI descent. His campaign has actively participated in AAPI political forums across the country.
I also believe that Sen. Obama is the only candidate with the background to truly understand the full range of the AAPI experience - an experience defined by immigration and the struggle for inclusion. Sen. Obama is the child of parents of different races, of different nationalities, and spent his childhood in Indonesia and multiracial Hawaii. Anyone who has spent part of their lives in a foreign country knows how that fundamentally affects your view of the world and its people. Many of us or our parents know what it's like to not be Americans and not be accepted as Americans even when we are. Respected political commentator Fareed Zakaria recently noted this quality of Obama's and discussed how his foreign background gives him a different perspective on foreign affairs from many other American journalists.
It's easy to see why Sen. Obama has earned the endorsement of the Asian American Action Fund of Greater Chicago, prominent AAPIs including former California State Assembly Majority Leader Wilma Chan , actors Kal Penn (The Namesake, Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle) and Kelly Hu (The Scorpion King), Nancy Chen, former Chicago office director of the legendary Sen. Paul Simon, Rep. Bobby Scott, the first person of Filipino descent elected to the US Congress, Council Member Sam Yoon , the first Asian American elected to the Boston City Council, Mayor Jun Choi, the first Asian American mayor of Edison, NJ, and more. His record is why he overwhelmingly won the recent Asian American Action Fund straw poll in Los Angeles, California.
In the end, you must judge for yourself if Sen. Obama is the right candidate for the AAPI community based on the facts. Posted below are two documents that lay out Sen. Obama's agenda for the AAPI community. The first talks about a range of issues, and the second focuses on healthcare, one of the most important issues for an AAPI community with some of the highest levels of uninsured or underinsured families.
Download AAPI_Dream_Agenda_FINAL.pdf
Download Fact_Sheet_Health_Care_AAPI_FINAL.pdf
After reading some of the commentary out there in cyberspace on the 80-20 issue, I wanted to follow up with a few additional points.
First, 80-20's claim that Sen. Obama argued that he had to be extra careful on minority issues because he is black and thus could not answer the questionnaire is patently false. The AAPI outreach staff for Sen. Obama are adamant that at no point in the discussions with 80-20 was this point ever brought up.
Second, 80-20 attacks Sen. Obama for mentioning his brother-in-law, Conrad Ng [sic] (actually spelled Konrad), who is Chinese American. Now 80-20 does not come out and say that Obama proffered this fact as a response to the questionnaire issue (he did not), but the way this point is presented certainly seems to imply that Sen. Obama is going around saying the equivalent of "Some of my best friends are Asian American."
There are at least a couple of problems with this line of attack.
First of all, I find it poor form in general to drag people's family members into arguments unless they bring them up first. In this case, Obama did not.
Second of all, Konrad Ng is not just Sen. Obama's brother-in-law. Konrad is a close adviser to Sen. Obama and his campaign on AAPI issues. Konrad has a long history of involvement in the Democratic Party and is a veteran fighter for AAPI issues in politics. It stands to reason that Sen. Obama would consider Konrad a truly valuable asset to his campaign. In other words, having a brother-in-law such as Konrad really does make a difference in how a candidate understands and addresses AAPI issues.
From Annabel Park and Eric Byler, a couple of awesome Asian American activists (alliteration!) who played a big part in Sen. Jim Webb's victory in Virginia by organizing voters to unite against racism after former Sen. George Allen's infamous "macaca" comment, who are organizing a volunteer campaign trip to Las Vegas for the Nevada Caucus:
This year, Asian Americans are predicted to be the swing vote. Especially in Nevada where Asian Americans comprise nearly 7% of the population and 5% of the voters.http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0507/4213.htmlA group of very cool Asian American artists, celebrities, filmmakers, and activists will be converging in Vegas to work on Obama's Asian American outreach for the Nevada Caucus on Jan 19th. Let's be part of the change and have a great time in Vegas while we're at it. Canvas during the day then gamble and karaoke the night way. Kelly Hu (X-Men 2, Americanese) and Eric Byler (Charlotte Sometimes, Tre) are in Los Angeles now recruiting folks from the entertainment industry. They are teaming with Yul Kwon (Survivor) to shoot a YouTube video about Asian American empowerment and how it both infuses and draws inspiration from Obama's historic candidacy. Eric and Annabel arrive Monday. Kelly arrives Wednesday. Yul arrives Thursday to document the experience for the world to see. Many of us are not arriving till Thursday or even Friday -- just get there! We have extra beds and floorspace at the hotel. This is it. Our revolution. Time to get off the fence and join us.Get in touch with Eric or Annabel for details.
Time and Place
Start: Monday, January 14, 2008 at 11:00amEnd: Saturday, January 19, 2008 at 9:00pmPlace: Las Vegas, NV
Contact Annabel Park at 703.944.9661 or parkinstein@gmail.com for more information.
Click here to RSVP on the Facebook event page.
What I still don't understand is why is seems that no one is talking about the limited demographic pollsters actually reach. The majority of my friends and acquaintances under 35--both married and single--don't have landlines; just cellphones. I have a landline for my phone and DSL as a weird archaic non-cellphone/non-cable TV user, but I have caller ID, like most middle-class folks under 70 in 2008 (who own a phone less than 8 years old)--and I only answer the phone when I recognize the caller due to the number of telemarketers who call me every day. (If I don't, and the caller is someone I actually want to talk to, when they start leaving a message, I pick up. A pollster would not leave a message.) But I don't know many people who would answer a random call if they do have caller ID. On top of that, pollsters call at a time when a certain demographic is more unlikely to be home. That's 3 strikes against many, many people. So would it not be more accurate to say that polls reflect a demographic that 1) owns a landline, 2) either do not have caller ID or, if they do, actually answer calls from unknown callers, or 3) are home at the time pollsters call? Looking at recent demographic figures [http://www.pollster.com/blogs/polling_on_the_dark_side_of_th.php], this would make a lot of sense--someone who fits the bill with these three tenuous requirements would be my 94-year-old neighbor (who doesn't have a high school education, in reference to the mentioned article's categories). She's still undecided within her party, but according to these figures, it would seem that she, who is in the demographic that pollsters would actually reach, fits into the category most likely to vote for Hillary. Doesn't that tell us something?
All this to say, it seems that the polls can only be credited for accurately representing People Home in the Evening Who Have Landlines and Answer Calls from Unknown Callers.
Maybe I'm in the dark, here, but why don't we talk about this more?
This past weekend I saw a relative I hadn't seen for awhile, and she said she was voting for Hillary. Mostly because she'd met Hill back when she was campaigning for New York, but she said, "Wouldn't it be great to have a woman president? It's about time, isn't it?" Then I read someone in Time magazine (Nora Roberts, that romance writer...woo hoo) saying the same thing. That got me thinking...a true feminist would NEVER vote for the woman candidate merely because 'it's about time' that we had a woman president. A true egalitarian would rather see a woman candidate as no different than a male and judge according to her attributes and performance, not her gender.
I wholeheartedly agree that it's about time we had a woman running, but that doesn't make Hillary the right woman.
Hopefully all us women can address this sentiment--this valid desire to see a woman become president--in our friends and gently help them realize that blind voting isn't going to help women in the long run. At all.
God bless him, CNN Contributor Roland Martin has finally pointed out that Hillary's math is completely...weird.
I keep wondering why no one from the Clinton camp claims (just to be consistent) that Laura and Barbara Bush have all this experience that would've made them capable of being the best senators ever. Why is actually working on ground level with normal non-elite-type people (in other words, real Americans) for years and years without much credit and then working with the nitty-gritty of state government not as important as attending bruncheons with gold-rimmed china and flying in private jets and engineering failed health care plans? The math says that Barack has been in government office 4 years longer than Hill. If she denies that state government counts as Experience, she's saying Bill didn't really have enough experience to be president of the US of A.
Of course, I personally count Obama's unsung years of experience as a community organizer as being just as important as his years in Congress, and I'm glad that he does, too. What other candidate has had the generally invisible experience of working in the trenches with a community, for a community? None. That's why they have no clue what its value is--the value of rolling with the punches day in and day out, trying to unify people who think they're enemies, learning step by step to empower a unique group of individuals to find solutions and bring about the change they need for themselves. But really, would it be so risky for us to have a president who actually has lived like a normal American and worked for communities without any other motive than to actually (gasp!) empower a community to bring about change for themselves...all without even looking for a photo op?! Heaven forbid!
Next thing we know, Hillary will be claiming to be the Second Black President of the United States just because she's eaten junkfood and McDonald's with Bill and listened to him playing the sax (you know, since Maya Angelou claimed that those were the prerequisites for being a bona fide black person).
I console myself by assuming that the voices who are regurgitating the whole Experience Mantra have just not had the chance to really hear from Obama beyond the usual sound bytes. (Or sit down and do the math.)
And then there's the whole I Have the Most Foreign Policy Experience contest. Rudy Guiliani already revealed the pointlessness of this dehydrated peeing contest by claiming the title for himself due to his Ground Zero photo ops that put him in close vicinity to the 9-11 terrorists. Perhaps this whole Most Experience thing without the missing, ever-important qualifier (i.e. what kind of Experience?) is just the Wrong Question, period. After all, everyone knows that John McCain has more notches on his belt in terms of years in this category than Hill or Rudy or Barack.
So...new question: Who has the Most ______Experience?
I choose "Insanely Practical" as the qualifier.
Does someone who's only visited other countries in the context of staged tours or talks with a country's elite really know the outside world better than someone who has lived as an integrated foreigner outside the US--and has lots of family members living on other continents?
Here's a little example. My boss recently visited a country I once lived in. It was a staged tour and she met with elite-government types who wanted to give certain impressions of their country. This wasn't at all an invalid experience. In fact, she got more experience than I did within the realm of Powerful People with Agendas--who are also a very real part of the country. This can be genuinely helpful experience. But did she get a broad picture of the public and their worldview or culture? Does she understand how the common person in that country thinks? She'd have to go back for another visit to get a taste of that.
As for me, my experience was limited, too. I was a younger adult then, and I didn't live there long enough to start thinking like the average citizen even though I was immersed in their culture; I was, of course, always going to be a foreigner. But I lived in a non-expat mixed-income neighborhood (the mix all being on the low side)--and had close relationships with my neighbors. I knew what it was like to not enjoy civil liberties that the country claims are given and, while I was a foreigner with more freedoms than others, I had friends who had to deal with human rights abuses on a daily basis. Did my boss see any of that--did this tour allow any of those real life issues to be pondered or understood close-up? We both had limited experience, but I don't think anyone would say, "Oh yeah, your boss' week-long trip gave her a better understanding of the country's culture and needs and worldview."
In this sense, I give Hillary's claims way less credit and Barack's WAY more.
People who are saying to Obama's statement (about his family and his childhood years in Indonesia outranking his senate trips), "Oh puh-leeze, I visited Paris, and that doesn't make me a foreign policy genius" don't get his point only because, like most Americans, they haven't really lived outside the country in an integrated way (i.e. not the same thing as study-abroad, yo.). Having grown up outside America in yet another part of the world, I know that living somewhere before the formative age of ten is absolutely huge in shaping your worldview, and everyone I know who, as a child, has had to be a cultural outsider trying to fit in another culture gets this. (And sorry, being an insulated military dependent doesn't compare to Obama's childhood experience, as has been ignorantly suggested. The kid was in put local schools, for goddness' sake!)
No matter what sort of cultural dissonance you struggle with as a child, your appendages stuck in different worlds like a seemingly impossible Twister pose, you learn to respect people different from you--and learning real respect like this as a child gives you priceless experience that shapes the rest of your life. You learn to recognize that not everyone thinks like you and that they deserve to be understood within their own context--just as you'd want them to try to understand you. For that matter, a Third-Culture Kid's intimate knowledge that more than one valid context (not just your own) actually exists is, in and of itself, experience that a majority of Americans have the luxury of avoiding. But as deceptively simple as this kind of experience may appear to the kind of American that Hillary was shaped to be, we'd all have to agree that this is way more experience than our last few decades of presidents could hope to claim.
At the end of the day, all this talk of Experience alone will continue to be pointless (and weird) unless we--average Americans that we are--start caring more about the missing fill-in-the-blank qualifiers preceding this ever-needful quality. And at the end of the day, the kind of experience we choose in a leader will largely determine what kind of experience we will have of the world outside our borders--and the kind of experience that outside world will have of us.
WASHINGTON - The GOP presidential race can be summed up this way: three strong contenders and a hunger for someone else. "There's no question that there's a very open field," said Ken Mehlman, a former Republican National Committee chairman. Unlike in 1980, 1988, 1996 and 2000, "there's not a presumptive front-runner," he added.
The nomination fight has become even more fluid since the year began, which is unusual for a party that typically has a clear heir apparent.
For now, former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani has the lead in national popularity polls. Ex-Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney has the most money. Arizona Sen. John McCain (news, bio, voting record) may have the superior national political operation.
But none has a clear advantage in all three areas — polling, fundraising and organization — that are traditional measures in determining which candidate is in the best position to become the nominee. Perhaps more telling, Republicans say, is that none has articulated a message or offered an agenda that a majority of the party supports.
"What's missing so far is a clear down-the-line conservative champion, an establishment candidate," said Greg Mueller, a GOP consultant.
Nine months before the leadoff Iowa caucuses, the fragmented field and disenchantment with the top candidates may present an opportunity for a fourth contender to emerge.
That could be an underdog such as Sen. Sam Brownback (news, bio, voting record) of Kansas or two former governors — Mike Huckabee of Arkansas or Tommy Thompson of Wisconsin.
Other prominent Republicans are flirting with a run, including former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, and could shake up the field. The latest to express interest is Fred Thompson, the actor and former Tennessee senator who, friends say, is seriously considering a bid. He is running third in a few national polls without doing anything more than acknowledging he was thinking about running.
Such buzz is evidence of the degree to which GOP voters are seeking alternatives to Giuliani, Romney and McCain. Conservatives who dominate the Republican primary see all as flawed.
In Iowa, Susan and Roger Rowland of Clive are attending campaign events to find someone to embrace. Last week, they saw Giuliani one night and Romney the next. But they were not impressed enough by either to commit. They have not seen McCain and are open to learning more about others, too.
"There are a lot of candidates out there, but I don't really know what I'm looking for," Susan Rowland said, sighing. Her husband said, "If I had to pick today, I'd probably pick Romney, but I'm really glad I don't have to pick today."
The Rowlands are not alone in their uncertainty.
"Significant numbers are really undecided," said David Redlawsk, a University of Iowa political scientist. Short of someone else catching fire or entering the race, he said, "in a year where Republican caucus-goers are focused on electability, they may ultimately hold their nose and pick one of the three."
It is Giuliani, McCain and Romney among the nearly dozen Republican presidential hopefuls who appear best positioned to capture the nomination.
Projecting invincibility, McCain spent more than a year meshing loyalists from his failed 2000 bid with some of President Bush's top political operatives to build what he hoped would be an unrivaled organization. Despite its depth, McCain gradually has faltered.
Last week, he announced raising a disappointing $12.5 million in the year's first three months. During a visit to Baghdad, he made upbeat comments about security only to have Iraqis mock his characterization. He told CBS' "60 Minutes," in an interview to be broadcast Sunday, that he misspoke.
To get back on track, McCain ordered an overhaul of his fundraising operation and better controls on spending. He scheduled policy speeches, including the first this Wednesday in which he will defend his support for Bush's policy in Iraq. Other speeches and an official announcement tour are set for this month as he seeks to regain momentum.
Once he made clear he was serious about running, Giuliani jumped to a double-digit edge in national polls. His built-from-scratch political operation is not yet on par with the others. Still, Giuliani ended the January-through-March fundraising period with a respectable $15 million raised.
He continues to lead in national surveys but his advantage has softened as he has come under increased scrutiny. He has faced questions about his business dealings and about his ties to Bernard Kerik, the former New York City police commissioner against whom prosecutors reportedly are pursuing multiple charges.
Giuliani also has had to answer for his abortion-rights stance and clarify statements suggesting his wife would play a significant role if he were president.
Romney set out to prove he was a threat by ensuring he had a stellar fundraising start. He succeeded, collecting a surprising $21 million in the year's first three months.
Yet he remains significantly low in national polls. He continues to be dogged by his reversals on abortion and gay rights, and his equivocations on other issues. He resumed television advertising in Iowa and New Hampshire to define himself. His campaign is eager to start debates, where aides believe he will shine.
Ok, so Santa crashes Tulsa's MLK Parade yesterday with the PIMP AMERICA VOTE OBAMA sign. One brothaa VEHEMENTLY insisted Santa DEEP-six "PIMP" from the sign. At first, Santa refused, trying to explain "PIMP" is a good thing in the WHITE neighborhood he hails from, North Pole.
Brothaa PERSISTED and compared the term, PIMP, to that other N-word. At which, Santa wholeheartedly agreed to the said measure of 86'ing 'PIMP.' Ok, maybe it's OK for brothaas to use the word between brothaas, but, it's NOT ok for non-brothaas to use the word.
Whatever. So, the NEW sign: BARACK AMERICA VOTE OBAMA. Just to keep the peace and NOBODY gets confused on Santa's intention at first blush, as the sign rolls in July on its way to New Hampshire for the BIG primary.
And, what is the meaning of giving "dep?" It seems it's ok with the brothaas, but, NOT law enforcement types. To Santa, it's just a good way to press a whole lotta FLESH, without passing kooties.
