Posts with the tag opinion

Debate and Opinions wanted on this vid!

EMK — Tue, 21 Apr 2009 00:13:22 EDT

This vid was one I found on a site called Deprogram.net. The vid http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BoA3wHi9iDE, is by a guy from the Center for Global Research known as Michel Chossudovsky. He argues that the current policies + TARP will eat up almost all of the US's GDP (which I've heard is more a service economy rather than a manufacturing economy).

What's your take on this vid after watching it?

Hmm...

EMK

If We Don't Fix Today, There Will Be No Future Generations

Herb Anthony — Fri, 27 Feb 2009 06:11:06 EST

Everyone seems so concerned of leaving a whopping debt to future generations. If we don't fix things in time,,,, WHAT FUTURE GENERATIONS? We are here NOW. Fix our economy, fix our ecological mess and maybe, perhaps MAYBE,,,, the generations to come will have a CHANCE to pay back whatever debt we leave them, if we fix it in a thoughtful and systematic manner.

If there IS a God,,,,,, he gave us the intellect (well some of us!!!) and dexterity to follow in "His" footsteps. "In his image and likeness." Doesn't likeness mean with the same potential?

If there is NO GOD,,,, we better get off our duffs and dig in to do the job ourselves anyway.

To me it is fairly irrelevant if there is or isn't a "God."

God gave us the tools and we used them to create this mess. Therefore,,,, isn't it up to us to fix it?

As far as enough time,,,,, well, time and space are relative, right? So if not "this time," then next.

The diversity of time line scenarios converge and intersect at intervals. Lets merge the convergence into a smooth future time line of peace and harmony rather than splitting the avenues of our future into tiny bits of fragmented DUST that will travel no longer into realms of time and space.

Thanks,,,,, for the opportunity to chime in. Irp Snerple The Rabble Rousing Pleiadian Dragon/Lion

www.jamwave.com/IrpSnerple

The President’s Honeymoon Never Started

Tom Awtry — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 00:55:46 EST

Somebody once said the first 100 days of the presidency can be regarded as the President’s honeymoon, which I took that to mean with the media journalists in our country; well stating it simply “I don’t see that happening with our newly elected President.” Furthermore, when our President took office less than a month ago, negative journalism for the most part began.

Perhaps “negative” is a bit to strong and not the exactly the correct definition, perhaps the recently created word of “spin” is more befitting of what I see coming over the airways, which includes the online news services and television.

Whatever, my feelings are when I view the RSS banner headlines I subscribe to, from what I consider two leading sources of political news, and they’re casting our newly developing administration and the presidency in a negative light with over half of their articles devoted to day after day of negativeness then I feel absolutely justified in labeling them “negative.”

One provider is the Time Warner organization, which includes CNN and Time, while the other is Politico, which I often quote in my blogs when I find there “factual” reporting available. I desire news coverage which lets me decide my opinion on the story being covered, not the commentator’s or the author’s mostly slighted opinion.

As an example, I believe in President Obama’s Economic Stimulus package, but if I followed the supposedly good advice from everything I read from the two aforementioned agencies I’d have to write my congressional representatives and request their “no” votes on the package.

Calm Waters

Mike — Fri, 30 Jan 2009 12:19:18 EST

Personal observation I have become obsessed with watching CNBC and CNN and MSNBC now that Mr. Barack Obama is our president. I will flip over to Fox News for little ten minute intervals just to remind me of how crazy they are. I just watched Obama and Biden speak with the labor force leaders and sign what I am assuming is a bill or something like that, that Biden has been put in charge of to help generate jobs and economy for this broken nation of ours. I’ve watched the ridiculous partisanship that is still going on with the republicans who seem to be quite comfortable with acting like a bunch of spoiled little brats that didn’t get their way and will make damn sure that the president doesn’t move forward on the economic crisis and we need to rename this entire event. It’s not a crisis, it passed crisis levels months ago. The goofballs that report this stuff is calling this a class war. I like that. I think it’s time for the middle class and the poor of this nation to rise up and fight for the right to live in this free nation of ours the same way or at least close to the same way the elite do. I have a problem with the fact that everything we do in this country has the word war attached to it. If we could change that verbiage and mindset I believe we would see significant change in attitudes. Barack Obama has become president during a time when the economic wasteland is at a level that may not be fixed with just more money and more rhetorical mind sets. Obama is looking at our current situation the same way FDR had to look at our nation. We are going to have to put forth programs that help those Americans that need this assistance the most and need it right now. I find it infuriating when I hear the rich and the monitors of the rich on CNBC throw their arms in the air and wail about Obama working towards helping the middle class, the elderly and the poor in this country. We need entitlements for a large section of Americans right now. Barack Obama is obviously not ok with having the attitude that there is nothing we can do about the four million Americans who are out of work. Barack Obama does not accept that we have to watch small businesses and for that matter a number of big businesses fail because of the current situation. My frustration and heartbreak comes from an elitist group of Americans that really believe that they are better, smarter and cooler than other Americans. The playing field needs to be leveled. I sincerely believe that Barack Obama is doing exactly what needs to be done right now. I also hope that they are looking to the future as to how we level the money and assistance that is happening right now so that we can become the nation that we are capable of becoming again. We are not a kingdom where only a few prosper and the rest of the peasants get what is left, but, the problem is that we are exactly that right now. I’m listening right now to CNBC argue about bonuses. How can these people sit there and argue about bonuses. Those individual’s that are getting this bonus do not deserve them and as a middle class disabled American I believe they never deserved those bonuses. How did we get to this place? How is it justifiable to give someone an outrageous bonus for doing an absolutely horrible job? I worked my entire life, until I became disabled and I was given a bonus, a raise when I did a good job and if I didn’t do my job correctly I was fired. I don’t’ have a problem with ridiculous salaries. A salary has to be worked for. These people have to do exactly what the rest of the nation does on their thirteen thousand dollar a year job. They have to work for it. And if their salaries are in the millions then they better be working real hard to make things work, to make things right. I have mixed feelings about the banking system. I believe we should let the banking systems and the auto industries either get their act together or just go away and let the banks and companies that are successful take over. We need to bring this nation and its economic insanity down to a level that is fair and moral so that the middle class and the poor feel like what they do in this nation matters. By bringing the playing field down to a more sane and level place will also guarantee that entitlements will not be needed for the middle class or even the poor, elderly or disabled. The markets have become so emotional over the entire situation that it’s painful to watch them, well, painful and also humorous. I will sit and listen with an unfair sense of happiness that they are also worried about the future or I will have to take a break and change the channel because they have said something so unbelievably stupid and selfish that it just makes me crazy. They are frantic. They are losing their nice comfortable little kingdom and I believe that this is exactly what should happen. Knock these self righteous children off of their mountain that was made out of greed and corruption. Let them find out what it feels like to work thirty years on a job, saving money for retirement and have it all go away immediately and there are no solutions. I believe that the Barack Obama team is doing exactly what needs to be done and I am a little surprised at how difficult this is going to be. I think, unlike the rich, Obama is looking toward the future and we need to put policies and incentives together to get the current problem taken care of. If this means some of the kings and queens of this nation won’t be able to buy eighty thousand dollar rugs or purchase another new jet then so be it. Let them wine and complain. We need change and we need it now. I am an old hippy that has spent most of his life watching this government and nation slowly journey on a downward spiral, actually it’s been longer than thirty years, and I find it strange sometimes to remember how old I am. The downward spiral has finally caught up and is now going down at an alarming rate. For the first time in many, many years I have a sense of hope, I believe that our nation can become what we are so capable of becoming. I was the greatest of cynics and naysayers and anyone who reads my blogs knows this but here we are with a man that is willing to make the changes that need to be made. He has surrounded himself with people who are also focused on getting things done. Unfortunately economics isn’t the only problem that Obama faces. The wars and the Middle East that the previous administration completely screwed up have to be fixed and the greatest struggle is the whole mindset that goes on in this country about winning. We lost these wars the day we dropped bombs and sent our solders there. No one can deny that Barack Obama is doing exactly what he said he was going to do. It’s pretty damn exciting. We finally have a president that cares about all of the peoples that call this country their home. It’s funny watching those who thought they were the kings and queens find out they are the same as the rest of us schmucks.Hippy Mike

confronting ideas

sj52a — Wed, 21 Jan 2009 15:14:43 EST

Out of all of the mostconfronting ideas that this election has brought to light for me personally isone that I did not expect. I am a very strongly opinionated person, to a fault,and as a result I find it extraordinarily difficult to empathise with otherswho posses contrasting opinions, failing to comprehend that there is a thinkingoutside of my own, right or wrong, that anyone could possibly, really and honestly feel that way. I have now been forced to face the notionthat as adamantly as I feel about a subject, as sure of my correctness I am, astruly positive I may be that I am in fact some how morally and intellectuallysuperior to those who disagree with me, as much as I insult them and call themnames belittling their intelligence, they might feel just the same about me. Theyare too so unmovably sure of their ideas. For whatever reason, be it apersonnel experience or the grapevine, they think differently to me.

Their headspace is notjust like mine.

They are not shirkingaway from how they really feel and know to be just to serve some minor purpose(like my irritation), that is whatthey really believe.

And there is no one tosay who is in the right. That is humbling. I may not be able to begin to comprehend the notions thatequate to their thinking (a problem im sure they face vice versa) but I mustrespect that they do feel that way that they are no more undeniably in thewrong (or right) as I.

Now I am also confronted unexpectedly withthe idea that there is no absolute right or wrong, in anything, not justpolitics. No opinion, no answer to any question, no matter who posses it orproposed it, is completely with out a doubt, 100% correct. There is no true force that has theright answer written on the back of a palm card waiting for some one to ringthe buzzer, to buy the right vowel or propose the perfect consonant. There is no grand prize at the end ofthe day accept for your own pride in your principals.

Though some people areundoubtedly racist and ignorant, I must comprehend that they feel that way, seethat that are people who really harbour those thoughts, and I must not think meundeniably right, even if no adequate thought or evidence to the contrary canbe provided, no matter who was voted president and who history hails, whosociety looks down on; there is no absolute right or wrong, no certain truthanything.

Not in anyway do I valueless my own Ideas, or doubt them, I am still passionately firm in my personnelbeliefs and interpretations of the world around me. I now have a more open mindto the idea that other peoples cogs turn in different directions, at leastacknowledging, if nothing more, that my thought process and personnelexperiences are not mutual to all or many for that matter. No matter how manyothers may or may not share my opinion, out side of maths class, there is noundeniably correct answer to any question.

Regards to previous blogs and comments

Joseph — Tue, 09 Dec 2008 19:13:40 EST

Well, the election is over and Barak has claimed victory. I think it was a fair contest; both major parties took some aggresive positions and threw a lot of mud at one another. It appears that the best man did win. Barak is young and energetic, qualities that will be of advantage as he takes on the dubious task of saving our nation from the fires of hades.

I did not vote for our president elect but I do support him now. Simply because he is our leader. It brings me joy to hear his speeches and see his handsom face on tv. However, you will not find me expressing any zeal like so many others. I am hopeful about his presidency and am motivated to participate in the rebuilding. I think I will feel comfortable under his leadership.

You see, I like Barak; I do not like his party. He campaigned as a centrist and, so far, his cabinet picks reflect that. I only have one piece of advice to offer: Why wouldn't Barak give Ron Paul a position in his White House? No doubt the Obama organization admires the Ron Paul Campaign for liberty and mimics their strategy of grass-roots involvment. Giving Paul a cabinet post would earn Barak major points from republican minded peoples. Not only would it be a good stratigic move for the democratic party but I believe Ron Paul is a true genius. He has a real vocation to public service and needs to be a part of this reform era.

Earlier I said that Barak was the product of evil. This was a miscalculation, or, rather, a misrepresentation of my opinion. The entire democratic party seems bitter over history. Many want what they think is vengeance but in reality is just plain revenge. Remember what grandma always said, "Two wrongs don't make a right."

Let's Stop helping people from the top down, change!

Albert Knowles — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 19:30:14 EST

This was a grassroots movement, and is a grassroots movement, let's put our opinions out there that those interested in the disinfranchised, homeless, working poor, disabled and blind, to the middle class, fragmented and reconnected families of middle class, who struggle to be adequate, not comfortable like some hardworking and dedicated, ernest and compassionate, ambitious and grounded, like my family. Would you like to start a blog? I've got time to play with it.

Where can I find news reporting?

Shonna from Hampton, VA — Mon, 17 Nov 2008 20:25:29 EST

What can we as citizens do to bring about real change? I believe (just my opinion) that one thing we as ordinary citizens can do is to educate ourselves. I think the news media does not do a good job of simply reporting the news. There is a great deal of commentary on the news shows which tends to color our views of what is going on in the world. It is dangerous to listen to our favorite news shows and adopt the opinions of the personalities on the show. So, how can I get straight reporting on the Who, What, When, and Where, of the news so that I can draw my own opinions of the Why? I don't know, but I wish I did.

First Monday

Mike — Mon, 10 Nov 2008 15:49:45 EST

Monday Morning Coming Down

The original title to the song was “Sunday Morning Coming Down” by Kris Kristofferson.

There’s still a buzz in the air. A national high that even the most dedicated of ignorant George Idiot Bush fans cannot shake. The country feels like it’s going to be ok. Of course the economic crisis is still getting worse. I just wish those still in charge would take responsibility for what has happened and tell the truth. We are in a recession. We have been in a recession for a while now. Gas prices are going down but thousands upon thousands of people are losing their jobs. Gas can be fifty cents a gallon and if you don’t have a job and are broke you are still not going to be able to afford it. Incrementally, everything is going down, so incrementally the status quo at least for the rich is staying the same. That middle ground is where the damage is being done. These are people that haven’t lived as the poor. It will be devastating. I went from being comfortable, safe and financially stable to homelessness so I know what it feels like. I ended up that way for a number of reasons and all of them are my fault. I am completely responsible for everything except responsibility itself. A bastardized Sartre quote. I think it was Sartre, it might have been Nitche. Either way it doesn’t even pertain to what my original thought was. Focus this morning is nonexistent.

We are all looking for a savior, even the non-believers like me. Saviors don’t have to be god like, or the second coming of Christ. Saviors can just be individual’s that seize the moment and the moment becomes a thing of beauty. This nation, the world needs that savior.

In my fifty three years of living on this beautiful planet I have been witness to some of the most terrifying of images. I remember as a young boy watching on TV the three men that were hanged down south. I remember watching the blacks of this nation marching and being beaten and hosed down. I remember thinking even as a young boy that this just wasn’t right and I remember thinking that what they were doing, marching against this government, and this nation of hate was the bravest thing I had ever seen. I remember thinking the same of the young people, the hippies as they marched and protested against a government that was failing them. I would watch Martin Luther King Jr. speak and was moved by what this man said. I was devastated when he was murdered. It was the second time in my life where I really thought that the human race was hopelessly destined to destroy itself.

I remember watching our president John F. Kennedy be gunned down and I remember his brother’s fate being the same, and as all of the stories unfolded in the arcane process that we used to think was profound technology we all watched as our nation crumbled one individual at a time.

The Viet Nam war and Tricky Dick Nixon was the final straw for me. There seemed to be no hope left for our nation.

When I was a young man my first wife and I were democrats and we were liberal democrats. I even had opportunities to run for a couple offices but I knew on some instinctual level that I was a dope fiend and drunk and that my rebellion toward government and politics would not work in conjunction with being in government or politics. Who knew they were all dope fiends and drunks themselves. I sincerely felt that I was of more value as a protestor of the wrongs and injustices. I still feel that way minus the drugs and booze.

Jimmy Carter was the last president I voted for until John Kerry. I didn’t like John Kerry. I felt from the day he announced to the end of the election that his motivation was like a spoiled rich kid that thought running for president would be cool.

I liked Jimmy Carter. I still like Jimmy Carter even with his ridiculous statements that he has made recently. I felt that Jimmy Carter was a good man and he was. This made him a terrible president. It is only fair to the Carter administration to note that Jimmy Carter was also hit with a number of things that were out of his control. The hostages, the economic situation and the general chaos going on in our country and the world. After Jimmy Carter I promised myself that I would never vote again and would start a campaign to get others not to vote. I believed that the opposite of apathy, the honest decision to not vote for the lessor of two evils was a profound and powerful statement to send to our government.

I went to the polls and voted for John Kerry feeling like I was being raped but I hated George Idiot Bush and his band of liars, thieves and murderers so much that I felt that I had to do something. That election only cemented in me the conviction that the whole process was hopeless.

I would be lying if I said I have been an Obama supporter from the beginning. I wanted Hillary Clinton to be elected president. My reasons for wanting Hillary to win are strange in that I felt it was time for a woman to finally be recognized as a viable, equal force in this nation. Being the father of a daughter, a lesbian daughter, I knew all too well the cruelty and injustice that is brought down on the women of this country and the world. I was disappointed when Obama became the hope for the Democratic Party.

I started searching out information about Barack Obama and I decided that he was a good and decent man who really wanted on a very complicated and simple level to do what was best for this nation. Barack Obama was a young man, especially for president and he embraced the new world with all of its technology and possibilities. I found myself excited but also cynical and skeptical whether he could win. The most powerful statement to be made in this country would be that the American people voted a black man into the white house. This one act would change the world forever.

Barack Obama didn’t win by a few hundred thousand votes. It was in all respects a landslide win and I sobbed as he went over the one hundred and seventy electoral votes needed to become president. I cried the next day watching the effect this had on our nation and on the world. I for the first time since I was a young man felt excited about our country. I felt hope and a tremendous sense of relief and it felt so foreign to me that I thought there might be something wrong.

I didn’t vote. I regret that decision now but I also hold to my own beliefs that, for me, to become a part of a system that I still believe is so flawed goes against my principles. Hell I regret it on a very human level. My vote would have been another vote in the mass exodus to change.

If this election would have been close like the last two we would have seen a much different turnout. We would have to relive the terrible election of Al Gore and I don’t think the end results would have been in Obama’s favor but instead we saw the American people stand up in unbelievable numbers go to the polls and vote this man in with numbers that cannot be denied. The system worked again! The system worked because there was no doubt in anyone’s mind who won the election. There was still corruption in the polling stations. There were still those evil things that go on during an election but the people came out in numbers great enough to overpower all the bad politics and elect the first president to actually be elected by the people since Lyndon Johnson.

The power of this grand nation of ours is that there are those times in history when the people decide what happens. The concept of freedom and democracy and the constitution shine through which brings even to a cynic like me a hope, a regeneration of faith in the human spirit.

Ah the buzz is still going but the buzz will wear off and we will be sitting with a wonderfully intense hangover looking through half opened eyes watching very closely what takes place and no matter how hard we try not to set unrealistic expectations on this man, we will. We don’t have a choice. We have spent the last eight years being held prisoners in our own country, our own communities and our own homes, if we were lucky enough to keep our homes.

We didn’t wake up the next day and the poor were no longer poor, our young men and women weren’t being killed in faraway lands, our economy miraculously turned itself around. We did however wake up thinking that there was a ray of sunshine shining down on us and warming our hearts to a new generation, a new destiny and a new beginning for our still infant nation. There was and is hope.

Government is not designed to succeed. No government in the history of the world has succeeded, well except for the Chinese, they have been at it for a long time, but essentially the rule of the people isn’t designed to succeed. Good government is designed with provisions that basically have the ability to look into the future and to set standards and requirements that allow this government to adjust to changing times, ideologies, concepts and beliefs and hopefully as a government grows and continues and changes each time that adjustments have to be made they will make that system stronger. The precarious element in the equation is that a government has to be on the brink of complete collapse and devastation for the adjustments and refinements to work. This makes each one of these moments in history so unbelievably beautiful when they work and so unbelievably devastating when they fail. The fall of governments almost every time is because of the melding of government and religion.

George Idiot Bush and his band of liars, thieves and murderers took our country closer to the edge than it has ever been. We were standing on the precipice of complete failure as a democratic nation. We were hated by most of the world and our respect as a nation was gone.

The history books will not be kind to George Idiot Bush as they should not be. The history books haven’t been kind to Nixon and other idiots and lunatics we have elected. I just hope we don’t allow another idiot or lunatic to bring us this close again because the history books after the fall will not be written at all. We have, this time, made a decision to make sure this doesn't happen at least for the next eight years.

I cannot imagine what it must feel like to be a black man, woman or child in this country today. After countless years of abuse, hatred and oppression they have been given a new hope, a new vision and a new sense of community and belonging. I only hope that women will also see that day for them. It is a travesty that Sara Palin became the representative for women. She was just so far out of her league and the Republican Party knew this and pulled this stunt anyway trying to play sports instead of politics. Sara Palin is obviiously responsible for her own actions during this election but she is not to be blamed completely for this.

I ask one thing of Barack Obama, “Do the best you can for the nation that you love.” Take the love and dedication that I see you have in your wife and children and bring that to the American people. You will be the greatest president ever if you can do that. I have one more request. Stop the persecution that is going on towards our gay and lesbian communities. Stop this insanity.

I want my daughter to also believe that she is an equal in this world. I want her to know that as a woman she is just as important as any man and as a lesbian she is embraced for her love to her partner and the life that they live which is so much more genuine than majority of heterosexual marriages.

All the statistics in the world don’t mean squat. My daughter as all women, gay men and lesbians should not have to be enduring the blind insane religious persecution that they are being made to endure. The whole process is beyond belief to me. It appears that those hateful, racist, prejudice and religious of this nation knew that they were losing the battles on their terrible actions toward the minorities so they searched out another minority, a different minority to throw their hate toward.

My daughter is a profoundly beautiful and successful woman in the life choices that she has made her own. She lives every day of her life in comfort and confidence in her choices. She loves and respects life and all that is living and she deserves to be treated with respect for her choices in her own life as all gay and lesbians do, as all women do, as all minorities do, as all human beings do. Stop this insanity.

We are all completely responsible for our lives and the actions and paths that our lives take except for responsibility itself.

Hippy Mike

Rebuild worldwide financial turmoil and the economic depression

not yet — Sun, 09 Nov 2008 20:31:25 EST

Rebuilding worldwide financial turmoil and the economic depression is immediately
hoped for because it cooperates with every country in the world.

President Barack Obama..

Willie from San Pablo, CA — Thu, 06 Nov 2008 00:48:54 EST

Stand proud.

Walk with your head up and your heart on your coat of arms.

Greatness is your name. Excellence is your native tongue.

Beautiful is your complexion. Powerful is your race. Stand firm in your stance.

Believe this moment has arrived.

Let your voice be heard from the burning sands of the mojave to the blowing winds in Chicago.

Let your light be seen from the lighthouses of Maine to the space needle in Seattle.

Let your seeds be planted in the plains of Nebraska and watered by the mouth of the mighty Mississippi.

Let your hammer come down on hatred and your shield protect the oppressed.

This is your day. My day. Our day.

We cried and you comforted us with your words.

We had a dream and it came true. You are the angel of hope we begged for.

More than ever we need you.

We understand your journey has been a long one thus far

But it only gets longer.

You are our commander our executive. You are the change we require.

You are our president.

Lead us President Obama.

This is your job our dream your destiny.

VOTE!

Josh — Mon, 03 Nov 2008 18:25:33 EST

Ok some of you may think oh voting that is a waste of time we already know who is going to win, Obama. Even though there is a high chance still exercise your ability as an American citizen to go out to the polls tomorrow and express your political views. Go out there and help America to have a beneficial next four years so we do not end up with another four years of the same or worse. This election is pinnacle; it will change how America stands both Domestically and our Foreign Image. The election of a great leader that can rally the people of our wonderful country together to become a shining beacon of HOPE for the future. The whole world is hurting and it is America's perfect opportunity to make a CHANGE and help the world get turned around from this current economical slump. OBAMA is the CHANGE we need! Please I urge you go out and VOTE make your opinion known. YOUR OPINION MATTERS! VOTE OBAMA '08

Thoughtful analysis of our choice in this year's election.

Chris Evans — Tue, 07 Oct 2008 13:18:34 EDT

One of my colleagues (who I think would identify himself as a fiscally conservative, undecided independent voter) recently shared the following comment on our choice in this year's election. He said it stood out to him as a calm, thoughtful analysis of both McCain and Obama. I wholeheartedly agree and would recommend sharing this with any undecided voters you may know.

The full article can be found on the New Yorker's website:

http://www.newyorker.com/talk/comment/2008/10/13/081013taco_talk_editors

And here is a small excerpt from the article's conclusion:

"We cannot expect one man to heal every wound, to solve every major crisis of policy. So much of the Presidency, as they say, is a matter of waking up in the morning and trying to drink from a fire hydrant. In the quiet of the Oval Office, the noise of immediate demands can be deafening. And yet Obama has precisely the temperament to shut out the noise when necessary and concentrate on the essential. The election of Obama—a man of mixed ethnicity, at once comfortable in the world and utterly representative of twenty-first-century America—would, at a stroke, reverse our country’s image abroad and refresh its spirit at home. His ascendance to the Presidency would be a symbolic culmination of the civil- and voting-rights acts of the nineteen-sixties and the century-long struggles for equality that preceded them. It could not help but say something encouraging, even exhilarating, about the country, about its dedication to tolerance and inclusiveness, about its fidelity, after all, to the values it proclaims in its textbooks. At a moment of economic calamity, international perplexity, political failure, and battered morale, America needs both uplift and realism, both change and steadiness. It needs a leader temperamentally, intellectually, and emotionally attuned to the complexities of our troubled globe. That leader’s name is Barack Obama."

She wouldn't have gotten away with it, if it hadn't been for those lousy debates!

A. Moses — Fri, 03 Oct 2008 14:02:59 EDT

Well McCain got lucky last night. He couldn't be there to protect Palin and she was off her leash. The mess could have been incredible. But Sarah got away with it. But how?

Oh Sarah IS as much a dim-witted buffoon as her interviews showed. What people failed to realize going in, is that she has one important skill: Sarah can repeat lines from a script very well. She just can't follow-up.

McCain knew that Sarah doesn't have an original thought in her head. She doesn't even know about most of the common things in history that have happened the last few decades. She didn't have a hope or a prayer of actually winning the debate. Her mission was to come out without looking like a drooling fool. In that she succeeded. As I feared, Biden held his tongue far too much in the face of potentially offending a very small minority. McCain's crew was counting on this. They also put out veiled threats against the moderator, that she'd be branded as a pro-Obama strong arm host, to keep her from digging below the superficial surface Sarah showed. Sarah's big weakness is that she can't decide for herself. She has no original thought. That's not being mean, its actually a part of her religious cult. There were rumors of this before, but the best confirmation must have come from when her e-mail account was hacked (Link) and an innocuous looking e-mail from a congregation member "Amy" asked for God's strength to "1. keep employment" and "2. not have to choose". Its that second part that's important here. All we had to do was not accept generic answers and ask follow up questions. Since we didn't she fails the debate (she never had any real hope of actually winning) but she comes away looking like someone with maybe enough skill to not choke in the seat (which is patently false, if given to her she'll choke every day on very mild stuff). Sometimes I want to scream because democrats are too afraid of offending or somehow get too comfortable being a point or two above in the polls and relax and get surprised when the tide turns. I don't want to be all negative. We did win the debate for logical thinking people who really were undecided. Its just that we could have taken the Republican base and gutted them. But maybe, maybe the result we got is better. Think about it. We're about 30 days away from the election. A cornered enemy is more likely to jab with everything they have as viciously as they can. The media too, would be under a lot of pressure to "make it balanced" and thus do a lot of negative stories about Obama without much real substance.

Now with things being "even" (more or less) the battle will remain only as crazy as it has been (Hey, I'm trying to be positive here). And the momentum IS in our favor, that will be hard to correct and I don't think that re-energizing the base will do much toward that.

Open Letter to Democratic Leaders

JulieG — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 01:40:51 EDT

Dear Senator Obama and all Congressional Democrats,

I am writing to you regarding the bailout package that failed today. While I am not one to support Republican behavior, I am VERY grateful they defeated such a flawed piece of legislation. I don't agree with the reasons they voted it down, but I am thrilled that they did.

I urge you to work on putting together a piece of legislation that is actually useful & responsive to the needs of middle America.

The World is Watching

Constance — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 20:28:09 EDT

Editorial from Jonathan Freedland of the British newspaper The Guardian on the upcoming US election.

"If Sarah Palin defies the conventional wisdom that says elections are determined by the top of the ticket, and somehow wins this for McCain, what will be the reaction? Yes, blue-state America will go into mourning once again, feeling estranged in its own country. A generation of young Americans -- who back Obama in big numbers -- will turn cynical, concluding that politics doesn't work after all. And, most depressing, many African-Americans will decide that if even Barack Obama -- with all his conspicuous gifts -- could not win, then no black man can ever be elected president.

But what of the rest of the world? This is the reaction I fear most. For Obama has stirred an excitement around the globe unmatched by any American politician in living memory. Polling in Germany, France, Britain and Russia shows that Obama would win by whopping majorities, with the pattern repeated in Africa, Asia, the Middle East and Latin America. If November 4 were a global ballot, Obama would win it handsomely. If the free world could choose its leader, it would be Barack Obama.

The crowd of 200,000 that rallied to hear him in Berlin in July did so not only because of his charisma, but also because they know he, like the majority of the world's population, opposed the Iraq war. McCain supported it, peddling the lie that Saddam was linked to 9/11. Non-Americans sense that Obama will not ride roughshod over the international system but will treat alliances and global institutions seriously: McCain wants to bypass the United Nations in favour of a US-friendly League of Democracies. McCain might talk a good game on climate change, but a repeated floor chant at the Republican convention was "Drill, baby, drill!", as if the solution to global warming were not a radical rethink of the US's entire energy system but more offshore oil rigs.

If Americans choose McCain, they will be turning their back on the rest of the world, choosing to show us four more years of the Bush-Cheney finger. And I predict a deeply unpleasant shift.

Until now, anti-Americanism has been exaggerated and much misunderstood: outside a leftist hardcore, it has mostly been anti-Bushism, opposition to this specific administration. But if McCain wins in November, that might well change. Suddenly Europeans and others will conclude that their dispute is with not only one ruling clique, but Americans themselves. For it will have been the American people, not the politicians, who will have passed up a once-in-a-generation chance for a fresh start -- a fresh start the world is yearning for.

And the manner of that decision will matter, too. If it is deemed to have been about race -- that Obama was rejected because of his colour -- the world's verdict will be harsh. In that circumstance, Slate's Jacob Weisberg wrote recently, international opinion would conclude that "the United States had its day, but in the end couldn't put its own self-interest ahead of its crazy irrationality over race."

Even if it's not ethnic prejudice, but some other aspect of the culture wars, that proves decisive, the point still holds. For America to make a decision as grave as this one -- while the planet boils and with the US fighting two wars -- on the trivial basis that a hockey mom is likable and seems down to earth, would be to convey a lack of seriousness, a fleeing from reality, that does indeed suggest a nation in, to quote Weisberg, "historical decline." Let's not forget, McCain's campaign manager boasts that this election is "not about the issues."

Of course I know that even to mention Obama's support around the world is to hurt him. Incredibly, that large Berlin crowd damaged Obama at home, branding him the "candidate of Europe" and making him seem less of a patriotic American. But what does that say about today's America, that the world's esteem is now unwanted? If Americans reject Obama, they will be sending the clearest possible message to the rest of us -- and, make no mistake, we shall hear it."

Reactions to the First Debate

Breeze Bryson — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 15:57:07 EDT

My first reaction was that I sent Obama another contribution as a way of saying thank you for Friday night. It was worth far more in entertainment than going to a theatrical production at the Music Center! What follows is more of my reactions to the presidential debate at the University of Mississippi with Jim Leher as the moderator.

Senator McCain varied from looking scared to looking contemptuous to looking silly. And that with getting off easy on the questions. I wish Leher had asked him the following:

How was the S. and L. crisis similar or different than this one and what did you learn from your role in it?

Do you not think that your role in supporting deregulation through the past 25 years or more has something to do with the situation we now find ourselves in? If you don't, who is to blame?

You make much of the fact that you are a "maverick" and have disagreed with the policies of your party and worked across the aisle and often say in your speeches that Obama has not done either. Since it is a fact that Obama has worked with Republicans in both his time in the Illinois Senate and in the U. S. Senate, does that not put your honesty in question? Could it be that Obama has not challenged his party's policies as much as you have challenged your party's policies be because your party is more often wrong on the issues than his is?

Why do you keep suggesting that your negative campaign ads would not be happening if Obama has been honoring your suggestion to join him in frequent town hall meetings? How are the two related?

Considering all the concern shown in the public's responses to Governor Palin's interviews with the press, concern that she is not ready to be president, do you regret your choice for vice-president?

Barack Obama, on the other hand debated with calmness and dignity and gave reasoned responses, while McCain seemed angry and stuck in stump speech accusations that have been proven to be lies. Naturally, this put Obama in a defense posture, frequently having to state "That's just not true!" I had the feeling that McCain's strategy was to do this so often that Obama would have to hold back his interruptions on some denials just to move the debate forward to other topics of more importance.

Obama's ability to speak directly to the camera audience and to McCain when called for was such a contrast to McCain's either looking down or at the audience in the hall, totally avoiding even a glance at Obama made Obama appear much more confident and in control. It was interesting to note that Obama often referred to his opponent as "John" while McCain always referred to his opponent as "Senator Obama." It made it seem as though Obama knew McCain better than McCain knew Obama.

Several times Obama gave McCain credit for making a correct statement, saying such things as "You're absolutely right that taxes are high on paper, you're right that earmarks have been abused, you're right on the need for more responsibility" and in every case he followed his agreement with a qualifier. You're right about this much, but not right about the rest. My favorite was when he said "You're absolutely right that presidents have to be prudent in what they say. But, coming from you, who in the past have threatened extinction for North Korea and sung songs about bombing Iran, I don't know how credible that is."

Good debating tactic to acknowledge your agreement with your opponent on some points. McCain never once gave Obama credit for getting anything right that I recall. I wish Leher had asked Obama to explain why his first response to the Russia/Georgia conflict was that he recommend both sides to show restraint and why he thought McCain or anyone would be critical of that.

All in all, I think it was a great night for Obama and I'm looking forward to the rest of the debates where I'm sure he will continue to shine!

Breeze Bryson

September 27, 2008

GWB might as well have been reading out of a script... Just my opinion open for discussion.

EMK — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 16:45:34 EDT

Watching the speech[sic] last night was showing me nothing new from anything last week. I agree more with what Suze Orman said on Oprah two days ago concerning the current situation, though I also suspect other things. (I've had several posts on the economy in my blog). And frankly, I don't think that the government buying anymore financial properties and/or mortgages (except the Fed, IMO) will stabilize anything. Buying up the stuff, including the debt will only permit another crash like this one to recur.

Besides, I have other questions as well: Assuming the bailout goes through...

What would happen to taxes?
What would happen to the programs like Medicare or the Pell Grant?
What would happen to the environment?
What would happen in the event of another natural disaster?
Would any candidates' policies, regardless of party afilliation, be implemented once electeded?
Are there any other factors besides what has been publicized that contributed to the current situation?
How would this affect someone who needs medical care for heart disease? autism? Parkinsons? major depression? osteoporosis-related injuries?
How would it benefit or hurt us? Would this affect any Constitutional issues?

Too many crazy things have been going on! I don't profess to know it all, though.

Debate, discuss, just like WE SHOULD!!!

"The society's deprivation relies/ not on our differences/ but the separation within."

--Linkin Park, "Frgt/10"

"Watch Your Rights!" (StahrT)

EMK

Bernanke Spilled the Beans!!!! (Opinions and Debate)

EMK — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 16:11:09 EDT

Even if you don't care for Ron Paul, skip over to about 5:00 min of this link:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dv6rQ0U01Yc (Bernanke talks about the origins of the Federal Reserve).

Here's the Federal Reserve Act: http://www.federalreserve.gov/aboutthefed/fract.htm

And Wilson's quote after signing it: http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Talk:Woodrow_Wilson#.22I_am_a_most_unhappy_man....22

Oh, I think we, the people (Read Article I, Sec. 8-10 of the U.S. Constitution) have an issue about the Act, Bernanke!

Read or watch the links first and bring up the debate!

Until later,

EMK

Why I support Obama for President

Brian Sharma — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 17:50:14 EDT

I support Senator Obama because I believe that he is the best candidate to solve the problems facing our country. Senator Obama has the judgment, the vision, and the leadership necessary to bring the country together and move forward (not backward, like McCain).

Senator Obama has had many experiences in his life that show me he is ready to lead our country in the right direction. He went to Columiba University on a scholarship, graduated at the top of his class, became the first black president of the Harvard Law Review, and he could've done anything he wanted with that kind of resume. What did he choose? He chose to help poor people in Chicago's South Side! Obama is the REAL DEAL!! Since then, he has gone on to become a Constitutional Law Professor, an Illinois State Senator, and US Senator. He has consistently shown inspiring vision, good judgment, and the ability to bring people together. I'm sure he would become one our country's greatest presidents.

McCain, on the other hand, has a terrible record. His only accomplishment seems to be that he was a POW. Since then, he has been a corrupt, pandering, lying politician. After his involvement in the Keating Five Scandal, he built an image (only the image) of being a "maverick". But since then, he has flip-flopped on EVERY important issue that he stood for... Bush's tax cuts, ethics reform, regulation, immigration... EVEN TORTURE! After 26 years of getting nothing done in Congress, McCain pretended to be the candidate with "experience" (he's only experienced in failure), but now pretends to be the agent of change because his party has ruined our country over the last 8 years! McCain has no principles, thinks the American people are all idiots who will believe his lies, and will do anything it takes to win.

Then, after becoming the GOP nominee, for his first major decision as a presidential candidate... he picks Sarah Palin! He could've easily picked someone who had more experience, more qualifications, or the ability to work in a bipartisan way. Instead, he chose Palin, who not only has no real qualifications to be VP, but also is the most polarizing figure in politics. She is pro-life, pro-guns, pro-war, pro-drilling, pro-creationsim, and pro-lobbyist. She has consistenly lied about her record as a "maverick" and "reformer", while the truth is she has asked for money in earmarks than any other governor in history! Rather than bring the country together, John McCain decided to pick someone who might ignite a culture war to help him get to 51% in a few battleground states so he might have a chance at winning the election. That was a purely political decision, it wasn't the best choice for the country, and it shows how McCain would make decisions as president.

Not to mention, McCain is a 72 year old man with a 1,500 page medical history. It is very possible that if he did win, Palin would become president! He met her ONCE and a had a 15 minute phone conversation with her before making this extremely important decision. That tells me one of three things about McCain - Either 1) he is insane, 2) he does whatever his lobbyists tell him, or 3) he just doesn't care enough about the country to make a better decision. Either way, he does not deserve to be the president.

So, for those reasons, and so many more, I completely support Senator Obama for president. I've been paying a lot of attention to politics and the news for many years. I understand the important issues and I know why experts say Obama has better solutions on EVERY problem facing our country. If more people would do their research on the candidates, they would agree that Obama is the best candidate to lead our country. Instead, people are busy with the problems of their own daily lives (many of which McCain helped to create) or they are easily distracted by the nonsense in the media. I'm hoping people will see the clear differences during the debates, and that Obama can help lead this country on the path where we belong, to a better and brighter future for all Americans!

TRUTH:

Timothy from Carmel, CA — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 15:18:58 EDT

The Party that Wrecked America

James Howard Kunstler writes: It turns out the real hurricane blew through Wall Street last week, not Galveston. This morning, Manhattan is strewn chest-deep with the debris of banking and at this hour (seven a.m.) nobody knows how far, deep, and wide the damage will spread. The fear, of course, is that we are witnessing a classic "house-of-cards" or "dominos-in-a-row," situation, and that the death of Lehman Brothers and Merrill Lynch will cascade into a generalized collapse of the entire consensus of value that supports mediums of exchange.

At least one thing ought to be clear: this has happened due to the negligence and misfeasance of the regulating authorities, namely the Republican Party, and that now all the hoopla surrounding Sarah Palin can be swept away revealing that group to be what they actually are: the party that wrecked America. ...

I wish I knew whether this extravaganza of ruin might settle the question as to whether America goes into hyperinflation or implacable deflation, but the net effect is that money is leaving the system in big gobs. And if not money per se, then the idea of money as represented in certificates, contracts, counter-party positions, and gentlemen's agreements. This is the day that America finds itself a much poorer nation. The capital we thought was there, is gone.

A lot of it was actually translated over the years into Hamptons villas, Gulfstream jets, and other playthings that will now go up on Ebay or some equivalent as we turn into Yard Sale Nation in a general liquidation of remaining assets. Of course, the trouble in a situation like this, where absolutely everybody is trying to pawn off assets, is that there are very few buyers on the scene, so the prices of all these things go down down down. Everything is for sale and nobody has any money. ...

We should be frightened by the political implications of this Great Implosion of presumed wealth. Some group of somebodies will have to clean up this mess. Moving toward a major election, it is hard to imagine the American people giving the clean-up task to the very group that created the mess -- no matter how many cute little faces Sarah Palin can make on TV. Both parties have so far managed to ignore the gathering crisis of banking and money, but they can't ignore the sequoia trees crashing down around their ankles and shaking the earth they stand on.

At issue now will be the question of legitimacy in all its human social dimensions. Is our money legitimate? Is the authority of our elected officials legitimate? Are our values and ideas legitimate? These are the things that will determine what kind of future we find ourselves in.

So, to begin this process, and to clarify the situation, I urge readers of this blog to identify the Republican Party by its new brand-name: the party that wrecked America. At least, then, we can reinstate one cardinal value into the juddering structure of what we claim to believe: that actions have consequences, that you can't just swindle and loot a society and walk away with the swag. (09/15/08)

Original Article by Kunstler

News for a Synergic Earth

Public image: what counts?

Unico from Europe — Sun, 14 Sep 2008 10:39:10 EDT

IT IS VERY IMPORTANT TO GET A CLEAR VIEW ON WHO MS. PALIN REALLY IS! Not the current public image of her. Europeans are very worried that America picks the wrong candidate again. Tell everybody. Send this email accross!

Mood swings in the public opinion of America
The elections in America of today remind me about the ones in the Netherlands with the rise of Mr. Pim Fortuyn (a populist politician), who in the end was brutally killed by a crazy man.
This election is not about Mc Cain versus Obama, it never has been. Obama had already won from Mc Cain looking at it from the eyes of the public opinion. This election is about Palin versus Obama.

Luckily, for Obama the carefully built public image of Palin over the last weeks looks to be untrue in many aspects. That is now being revealed rapidly. It seems that the Republicans will come in the defence again! It is important to all Europeans that the new American President is sound in its political and human ethics.

Please read: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26691018/ and
the video "the ABCs op Sarah Palin".

But even worse (for the American people) than being somebody else than pretending to be and lying is that Ms. Palin is more a look a like of Mr. Bush than Mr. Mc Cain is.

Can you really argue convincingly that you are a change agent if you pick a vice President who is a look a like of Bush, in obvious aspects of character and behaviour?

Ms. Palin is a look a like of Mr. Bush! And she has different ideas on policies as Mr. Mc Cain too. What does this mean in terms of what Americans can expect under their Presidency?

Analyse her statements on abortion (not the same position as Mc Cain), her ideas on attacking the Taliban on Pakistani soil versus Mc. Cain ideas about sovereignty, her position on fighting Russia (ABS interview), et cetera. Does she know what that would mean for us Europeans! Furthermore, a person who heavily relies on a family kind of inner circle and fight critics as clans in Africa fought each other for years (analyse the story of NY Times) can not be suitable to steer the American interests in an appropriate way. America would fall back to a kind of a totalitarian state highly isolated from the rest of the world.

But Ms. Palin and her right wing supporters including Mr. Karl Rove do influence Mr. Mc Cain heavily. Already on the issue who should be vice President! Ms. Palin was not his first choice! And I predict if the two are in office, we will see a rise of violence all over the world. That would ultimately lead to the further downfall of the USA and instability in the world.

Mr. Mc Cain and Ms. Palin have one thing in common. They are both furious fighters. Maybe she even more than he his. Confrontational fighting, to win at all costs seems to be a common approach of Ms. Palin and Mr. Mc. Cain. And being scrupulous with opponents (see interview above). That is even more prominent in her character than with Mr. Bush.
Mr. Obama has the opposite character; he would really want to build bridges between all Americans and he seems to be a wise person not going for the confrontation, rather seeking for chances to solve problems effectively for all.

You can also win for the better of all by using diplomacy and the knowledge of human relations and politics to make thinks work without starting a fight first. The public opinion about who Ms. Palin is has yet to be established and there is an absolute necessity to do so.

Europeans are really getting worried about what is happening in America. Can it be true that after 2 elections (2000 and 2004) again a campaign is won on falls accusations, untrue stories and killing characters? Would Al Gore really have been a bad leader for America in 2000? Al Gore is now a world leader of magnitude!

European would like to see the real change agents and decent policy makers to win, instead of persons with carefully but untrue launched public images!

Unico from Europe

IMHO

David Behrns — Sat, 13 Sep 2008 14:40:21 EDT

As everyone knows (hopefully) beliefs (I use the terms opinions and beliefs interchangeably) are never inherently right or wrong. They are just opinions or beliefs

An open letter

Unknown user — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 06:27:07 EDT

I too have given some thought to Mr. Obama's highroad tactics since the conventions. I am reminded of Nietzsche's quip that "when fighting monsters one must guard against becoming a monster himself." Clearly the US did not have any fear of becoming a monster after 9/11, when filled with indignant rage, the CIA was authorized 'to take the gloves off' and began their enhanced interrogation techniques. The results of this step, the results of this stepping into the gutter are well enough documented and do not require further exposition here, save to remark that, in short, the fighting of monsters ended in the torture of literally thousands. If the renditions and tortures serve as any sort of example it appears Nietzsche's remark may be modified to a tautology; one becomes a monster when fighting monsters.

Of course it could be asserted that water-boarding people is a decent into hell, but the path can be retraced and one can become human again. However, if such a return to humanity were to occur, it would require, as a necessary proposition that the people who followed orders like banal faced Eichmanns had the capacity to retrace their steps and return to the light of civilized behavior.

But here is the paradox; if one listens to stupidity, it seems one is precluded from becoming anything of a moral agent. The argument is simple; if one is stupid enough to follow orders and reduce another human to a writhing mass of pain, then already that torturer lacks the capacity, lacks the intelligence, lacks the capability of reason that would ever allow him to return to the lights of civilized behavior.

In the case of Mr. Obama's stunning silence in the face of the Rovian election tactics, a similar logic applies. If one is so stupid to believe the tripe that gushes from the lips of McCain, Palin and their surrogates like the puss from so many lanced tumors, then one is already lost. If Obama has to stoop to the level of gutter politics to get elected, then he is only being elected by a group of people who are so plebian minded that they require the most base of arguments to sway their minds. If 'bringing out a gun' is necessary to win in American politics, then perhaps the American voting public is stupid beyond redemption. Perhaps it is because Mr. Obama believes in the American people, perhaps it is because he has the notion that Americans are more than the horrors the unleashed in their darkest hour, that effectively precludes him from stooping to the level of discourse given play by the Republican party. If it turns out that indeed he is wrong in this wager on the 'better lights' of the American dream, then perhaps it is not him, but the American public, that should its head in shame.

Its Getting Dark In Here...Or Is It?

Bedtime for Democracy — Mon, 08 Sep 2008 16:25:27 EDT

The Republican National Convention is over and the McCain campaign is enjoying a significant bounce in the polls. While I personally do not trust the polls and therefore don't place that much stock in them, it does raise eyebrows to see just how far the spread between Obama and McCain has inverted. We need to keep in mind that there will always be outliers that invariably get trumpeted as the zeitgeist du jour by the attendant media. Still, it is worth noting that the Republicans have positioned themselves into the same gutter as before with the same intention to dominate the discourse in the same ways they've always done (and won with).

I know that this is making quite a lot of folks on our side nervous but there are few concrete reasons why this time the smoke may not be from fire but dry-ice.

Change

Note that in order to even try and stay competitive, McCain's handlers have positioned him, and to a lesser degree, Gov. Palin, as agents of change. Perhaps this can be thought of as "mantracentric" politics — say it enough times, loudly, and it becomes "true". This is an interesting tack (a.k.a., bluffing) but there's an almost nihilistic quality to it in that its so totally preposterous a position for them to take given both of their records. So, they're planning on bluffing and bullying their way in this time. That's different from last time, how? By attempting to co-opt Obama's core theme since the primary, they are announcing to the world the size and location of their Achillies. Hopefully Barack's typical "play it close to the vest" style will work out here.

A Bird in the Hand...

May not be worth two in the bush, as they say. As much as the McCain camp tries to sequester and script Gov. Palin's exposure on the world stage, it won't take much for her undeniable inexperience to reveal itself. What I am more interested in seeing aired, however, is her Bushian lack of interest in actual governance.

Considering that this is a person who could, by proxy, take the reins of an incredibly complex, nuanced governmental structure, I am not seeing her "sweep it under the rug" governing approach to be beneficial, even amongst the die-hard Christianists on the far-right. Its getting to the point now where all of this is beginning to take its toll on even the stalwarts of conservative punditry.

Temper Temper!

Anyone else noticed how McCain looks and acts a bit stilted? Perhaps whatever medication he's taking to keep his personality in check is at the root of this but he really looks as if he's struggling to stay sane. Obviously, he's sold his soul to Rove et al but at some point he's going to lose it and I do hope that its during the debates. Obama and the rest of the team need to not only ratchet up the pressure on the rebuttals but also to turn that dynamic on its head by getting the McCain camp on less assured footing. Get McCain to blow his stack on national teevee will certainly go a long way toward exposing the fundamental problems America will be facing if they go with the guy who flies by the seat of his pants. Until then, there's always YouTube.

Now, to be clear, I am not advocating getting into the cesspool in which McCain currently wallows. I do expect smart, targeted, and clear hits on his (and to a lesser degree Palin's) record beyond the high-level language we are becoming slightly inured to. Connect McCain to Bush all you like but he is his own worst enemy at this point and that should be used against him.

Write your local newspaper & make your opinion heard!

Beth — Mon, 08 Sep 2008 14:14:21 EDT

The Obama website has a great tool which allows you to writes a letter and select which papers, both local and national, you'd like to send it to:

http://my.barackobama.com/page/speakout/

This is so important!! Please help counter the lies being spread by the Not So Straight Talk Express!

Here is a Fact Sheet for reference:

http://obama.3cdn.net/481fc90f3b51076a56_v9m6bx8w7.pdf

Words Are Not Enough - Sara Palin is Not Simply a down home, small town hockey mom

jerder — Thu, 04 Sep 2008 11:39:09 EDT

A new celebrity herself, Palin cast Obama as a little more than a fancy speaker with a compelling biography. "Our family," she said, "has the same ups and downs as any other"

I wonder if Governor Palin has ever done without hot water or heat because her gas was turned off like I have? Until this morning, I heated pans of water on the stove to do dishes and took cold showers or hot sponge washes by heating water and putting it in the bathroom sink for six months due to high winter fuel costs As tens of thousands of other Americans did/ or have when Gas companies across the United States shut them off because the current administration has refused to hold big oil companies accountable for their record profits.

I wonder if Governor Palin has gone hungry, or if her children have gone hungry due to high skyrocketing food costs connected to shipping fees from high gasoline costs, or if she has had to settle for substandard child care because she has to choose between rent, utility bills, or keeping her job to stay off public assistance?

I wonder if Governor Palin's children have had to walk to substandard schools in high crime and gang infested neighborhoods and had pray that her children made safely to and from school?

According to Ms. Palin, Her family's mother lacked the soaring oratory skills of Obama — a man she attacked as a tax-raising, terrorist-coddling, self-indulgent liberal. "Victory in Iraq is finally in sight; he wants to forfeit," she said of Obama. "Al-Qaida terrorists still plot to inflict catastrophic harm on America; he's worried that someone won't read them their rights."

Even the Bush administration has begun talking about the possibility of a timeline for withdrawing from Iraq and the Iraqi government is pleading with the United States to consider some kind of a potential timeline because Iraqi citizens fear a never ending American occupation of their homeland. And as far as the piece of her statement about Obamas being worried that someone won't read "alleged (not proven)" terrorists their rights, even John McCain was concerned about the possible torture of prisoners in order to extract information. We want our fathers, sons, brothers, grandfathers, uncles, sisters, moms, and daughters serving in Iraq and Afghanistan to be treated fairly and according to the right afforded to them by our constitution and our founding fathers. Does Governor Palin really think that our troops will be treated fairly, with dignity and respect if we do not afford "alleged" terrorists their rights? And as far as calling Obama tax raising liberal, the only taxes I have heard Senator Obama talk about raising is for the very wealthiest Americans and the oil companies. And Ms. Palin herself raised taxes on oil revenue and oil companies in Alaska. Republicans and many Americans seem to have forgotten tax revenue provides funding to run this country and see to the needs of America, whether that money is used to rebuild our infrastructure or for programs like affordable child care so that families can provide a decent standard of living for their children.

I guess a small-town mayor is sort of like a `community organizer,' except that you have actual responsibilities," Palin said, referencing Obama's stint as a community organizer.

If it wasn't for 'community organizing', women still might not have the right to vote, the civil rights movement would have gotten nowhere, and community's across American would not be rallying to try and find solutions to high crime, drugs, and gangs, in their neighborhoods, regions, etc. And if wasn't for grassroots community organizing no political party in the United States would have any cohesion, etc. "If Ms. Palin thinks community organizing does not take any responsibility then she should give it a try because she'd soon find out it takes a lot of time and responsibility."

Some more rhetoric from Governor Palin in her VP acceptance speech stating that John McCain is, " a man who's there to serve his country, and not just his party" in another jab at Obama. Yes, at one time John McCain was there to serve his country and I admired and respected his willingness to take on Democrats and Republicans alike. I had even hoped Senator McCain would have captured the Republican nomination for president in 2000. But that was before he abandon his own principles and values recently to become a right wing conservative who obviously picked Ms. Palin for VP partly due to her lifetime membership in the NRA and her very restrictive right to life views which includes not supporting contraception to help teens and young adults avoid pregnancy, and who only recently began rallying against pork barrell spending. Except for his stance on abortion, John McCain was against pork barrell spending and special interest money long before it became popular with either party.

From Rudy Giuliani talking about Obama, "He's never run a city, never run a state, never run a business, never run a military unit. He's never had to lead people in crisis,"

Prospective VP Palin and Mr. Giuliani both forgot to mention that a governor only runs their states national guard troops when they are inactive, and then the troops are usually only being sent to help with natural disasters, potential violent situations like a riot, etc. Once national guard units are called to activite duty and sent to hot spots like Iraq or Afghanistan, they are under the command of the Department of Defense, not the state governor. So much for Ms. Palin's presumptive national security experience.

And in what way does being only half way into her first term as governor and a past mayorship quantify Ms. Palin as being "more experienced thatn Barrack Obama???"

Governor Palin and the John McCain camp, along with fellow republicans are defining her as a fiscal conservative who took on the political establishment in Alaska over pork barrell spending.

"Oops, I forgot. That was in the past, Ms. Palin has changed. The change couldn't have taken place too far in the past when she has only been governor for 22 months. I guess only Republicans change or have the right to their own opinions or political philosophies. Seems a little hypocritical to me. Not long ago Ms. Palin defended earmarking as a vital part of the legislative system.

"The federal budget, in its various manifestations, is incredibly important to us, and congressional earmarks are one aspect of this relationship," she wrote in a newspaper column. Then there was a $500,000 earmark that was approved without the normal budget scrutiny for a public transportation project in Wasilla, AK, Sarah Palin's hometown, and $1 million in a 2002 spending bill for an emergency communications center in Wasilla that that local law enforcement has said is redundant and creates confusion.

An e-mail from an Alaskan Native to a talk show called "Morning Joe"

jeffrey — Thu, 04 Sep 2008 08:32:54 EDT

From the Morning Joe Show, MSNBC ... Here's another Sarah Palin email received today. I think McCain's poor judgment is strikingly evident in his choice of Palin. On a brighter note, I'm making a conscious effort to stay in the state of joy and gratitude I felt last week when Obama was nominated. We have lived through another wondrous moment in which we see the broadening of American democracy. I pray that he and his wonderful wife and children will be safe, and I pray also that this country will have the wisdom to accept the gifts that he brings to us.

From anonymous; Please don't laugh ... Subject: Fwd: sarah palin Begin forwarded message: from a friend of a friend..... Dear classmates - As an Alaskan, I am writing to give all of you some information on Sarah Palin, Senator McCain's choice for VP. As an Alaska voter, I know more than most of you about her and, frankly, I am horrified that he picked her. The most accurate description of her is red neck. Her husband works in the oil fields of Prudhoe Bay and races snow mobiles. * She is a life time member of the NRA and has worked tirelessly to allow indiscriminate hunting of wildlife in Alaska , particularly wolves and bears. She has spent millions of Alaska state dollars on aerial hunting of these predators from helicopters and airplanes, dollars that should have been spent, for example, on Alaska 's failing school system. We have the lowest rate of high school graduation in the country. Not all of you may think aerial predator hunting is so bad, but how anyone (other than Alaska wolf-haters, of which there are many, most without teeth), could think this use of funds is appropriate is beyond me. If you want to know more about the aerial hunting travesty, let me know and I will send some links to informative web sites. * She has been a strong supporter of increased use of fossil fuels, yet the McCain campaign has the nerve to say she has "green" policies. The only thing green about Sarah Palin is her lack of experience. She has consistently supported drilling in ANWR, use of coal-burning power plants (as I write this, a new coal plant is being built in her home town of Wasilla ), strip mining, and almost anything else that will unnecessarily exploit the diminishing resources of Alaska and destroy its environment. * Prior to her one year as governor of Alaska , she was mayor of Wasilla, a small red neck town outside Anc horage. The average maximum education level of parents of junior high school kids in Wasilla is 10th grade. Unfortunately, I have to go to Wasilla every week to get groceries and other supplies, so I have continual contact with the people who put Palin in office in the first place. I know what I'm talking about. These people don't have a concept of the world around them or of the serious issues facing the US . Furthermore, they don't care. So long as they can go out and hunt their moose every fall, kill wolves and bears and drive their snow mobiles and ATVs through every corner of the wilderness, they're happy. I wish I were exaggerating. * Sarah Palin is currently involved in a political corruption scandal. She fired an individual in law enforcement here because she didn't like how he treated one of her relatives during a divorce. The man's performance and ability weren't considered; it was a totally personal firing and is currently under investigation. While the issue isn't close to the scandal of Ted Steven's corruption, it shows that Palin isn't "squeaky clean" and causes me to think there may be more issues that could come to light. Clearly McCain doesn't care. When you line Palin up with Biden, the comparison would be laughable if it weren't so serious. Sarah Palin knows nothing of economics (admittedly a weak area for McCain), or of international affairs, knows nothing of national government, Social Security, unemployment, health care systems - you name it. The idea of her meeting with heads of foreign governments around the world truly frightens me. In an increasingly dangerous world, with the economy in shambles in the US , Sarah Palin is uniquely UNqualified to be vice president. John McCain is not a young man. Should something happen to him such that the vice president had to step in, it would destroy our country and possibly the world to have someone as inexperienced and inappropriate as Sarah Palin. The choice of Palin is a cheap shot by McCain to try to get Hillary supporters to vote for him. When McCain introduced her today, Palin had the nerve to compare herself with Hillary and Geraldine Ferraro. Sarah Palin, you are no Hillary Clinton. To those of you who, like me, supported Hillary and were upset that she did not get the nomination, please don't think that Sarah Palin is a worthy substitute. If you supported Hillary, regardless of what you think the media and the democratic party may have done to undermine her campaign, the person to support now is Obama, not Sarah Palin. To those of you who are independent or undecided, don't let the choice of Palin sway you in favor of McCain. Choosing her shows how unqualified McCain is to be president. To those of you who are conservative, I guess you have no choice for president. But please try to see how the poor choice of Palin tells us a great deal about McCain's judgment. While the political posturing inherent in the choice of Palin is obvious, the more serious issue is the fact that the VP is, literally, a heartbeat away from the presidency. Sarah Palin is totally and unequivocally unqualified to be vice president, let alone president. I know this is a lengthy and emotional email, but the stakes are high. I thought it might help for all of you, regardless of political affiliation, to know something about Palin from someone who has to live with her administration in Alaska on a daily basis. Sort of like letters from the Front. I couldn't bear to edit it down. "I am not a Blogger...But I play one on the internet."

The show was called Morning Joe from MSNBC

Democrats are not immoral heathens!

Jude — Wed, 27 Aug 2008 10:51:16 EDT

I am tired of Democrats being painted as immoral heathens!
Ah, that's right; that makes Republicans the angels....

I am sick of it!
Know what? God himself gave EVERY human freedom of choice!
Their choices are a personal matter; as are the CONSEQUENCES of each choice.

Take, for example, the choice between carrying a pregnancy to term and abortion.

A whole lot of Democrats are People of Faith too. Republicans don't have a monopoly on faith.

Most people, be they Democrat or Republican, don't take the choice to terminate (or proceed with) a pregnancy lightly. Nor, should they.

But, lets look at consequences.

Say a woman gets pregnant and wants an abortion; for whatever reason.
She will bear the burden of whatever she decides for the rest of her life!
SHE will; not a person with an opposing viewpoint and not the Government.

She will be the one judged by God for her choices; NOT anyone else!
She will be the one to take the punishment if she makes the wrong choice; no one else will take it for her.
She will be the one that risks her life to carry that baby to term.
Not all Mothers make it through the pregnancy!

If God gave all of us humans the power to make our own choices, who are you or our Government to makes those choices FOR us???

Abortion is LEGAL. That fact should be remembered.
Women still die in childbirth. THAT fact should be remembered.
Women can have strokes, hemorrhage to death, sometimes even end up being vegetables for the rest of their lives. THAT fact shoulde be remembered.

Are People of Faith going to switch places with her and live out her life for her if something goes wrong with the pregnancy?

No, SHE will bear the consequences of all of those things. Whether good or bad. Whether physically, mentally, emotionally or religiously....

A lot of this subject is about respect. (Or lack of respect; as the case may be) Do you respect women enough to make their own health choices? Or do you only care about the unborn?

Maybe someday, there will be a time when every pregnancy is totally safe for both Mother and Child. Or a time when no woman that doesn't CHOOSE to get pregnant; won't. THEN, would be the proper time to revisit this topic.

But, until it IS completely safe; no one else should have the right to make those kinds of decisions FOR you! THEY aren't the ones that could end up in that bed or dead because of that decision.

I respect Republican's views, but Republicans need to respect Democrat's views, too.

Bottom line; SHE is the one taking the risks. SHE should be the one making the decisions.

Just my opinion. Take it or leave it. :)

Jude B.
http://heyjude.name

My Opinion

Kay from Washington, DC — Fri, 22 Aug 2008 06:07:06 EDT

Let me start by saying am a big supprter of senator obama from day one, through the primary and until now. No matter how much McIdiot and his followers smear or attack, nothing is going to shake my support for Obama campaign till election day. But this is not the same for many middle-class voters across the country especially those who doesn't know or not familiar with senator very well.

This will be my first time creating a blog; i usually read. I decided to write this post because am starting to get worried about the way the race has gotten tighter. The reality is that obama camp has been under-performing and the polls show it. I believe the McOld camp feel very good about where they are now.

I'm very current and up-to-date with the race and i believe i have a very good suggestions and useful opinion for this campaign. I'm gonna touch on some issues which i think Obama camp can improve on.

Motivational Note

Friends of President Barack Obama — Fri, 15 Aug 2008 00:19:02 EDT

Even though it may not look like it or feel like it, you are making progress.

Continue working towards progress instead of perfection.

Nothing or no no one is perfect.

Just keep taking steps.

Keep making those phone calls.

Continue following your plan.

Remain focused on your goal.

Do what you have to do right now to get to the next level.

Complete every task.

Keep every promise and commitment.

Don't look back.

Stay on track.

Let no one weaken your walk of faith and determination.

Remain teachable.

Place yourself in a blessing position by associating with people on-the-grow.

Talk with teachers.

Walk with winners.

Climb with champions.

Study successful people.

Something great is about to happen for you!

Start giving thanks right now before you can even see the outward manisfestation of your prayers and desires.

Everything you do from this day forward will take you further away or closer to your potential for successful living.

-by Dr. Jewel Diamond Taylor, Motivational Speaker & Author

The 30 Second Candidate

A. Moses — Fri, 08 Aug 2008 14:01:12 EDT

Today's candidates find themselves in an environment of video clips and controversy. That exists for both sides, not just against Barack.

The problem is that the Media has been taken over by a new form of entertainment, News Entertainment. Its all morning show-style gossip and scandal. That's all that generates good ratings so that's all anyone ever wants to show.

Of course, this is quite a disservice to the Nation at large. People who do try to get some news in their day find all they can infer comes from unsubstantiated sources. We might as well be living in the communist block when it comes to this nation's media.

The candidates have the un-forgiving task of attempting to create events, talking points, stereotypes, and appearances that play well on the 30 second circuit.

And since scandal is way more seductive to the 30 second entertainment audience, no candidate can get away with just looking good and doing the right things all of the time. They have to hope the other candidate slips up.

Since you can't guarantee the other guy will slip up, you have the attack ads phenomenon. Nothing new, but in this kind of 30 second environment it can thrive.

Even as a clearly superior candidate, Barack is at a disadvantage here. He likes to be specific, speak intelligently, and doesn’t really like entertaining the 30-Second Media.

So, with a constant barrage of negative ads, how can he win?

He needs to make an announcement that is dramatic, to the point, and can be repeated ad- nauseum by the media that the other candidate can’t really counter. That’s tricky. Especially when trying to difference yourself from the other candidate.

So, I think Barack should make a declaration such as: “I vow not to raise anyone’s taxes for my 1st year as president.” He could condition it however he likes in the very next statement, but that wont be picked up by the media.

Something like that, however, Republican’s can’t argue with and yet doesn’t abandon the fiscal responsibility that would require us to do something about our country’s finances. And “living within our means” also gives us a reason to “make cut backs” in many of the departments currently drenched in cronies.

Most people can’t imagine beyond a single year with any clarity anyway. So, if people believe him (and there’s no reason he couldn’t keep a vow that short), he’d crush the fear that he’s a “tax and spend” democrat that is just about the only thing Republicans have against him right now.

Even if the message he chose to deliver is different, the basis behind it is the same. To get a dramatic shift in the polls, we need a dramatic event. I only chose taxes because, as a recovering Republican, I know that’s what I’d have liked to see.

So what if Barack Obama is flip-flopping? Who cares?

Ms CYPRAH — Mon, 04 Aug 2008 20:17:12 EDT

There has been a lot of talk lately of Barack Obama shifting his views on key issues like guns, Iraq and the death penalty. So what of it? The mark of an intelligent, caring, sharing human being is the ability to learn and, above all, to be flexible and willing to listen. The only person who takes the same unmoving stance throughout their life is a know-all, one who is stuck inside their own head, entrenched only in what they believe while hanging on to the past and using it to dictate the present.

Real leaders and thinkers have to do three important things to be effective in their leadership. They have to be flexible, they have to be prepared to compromise and they certainly have to make room for the unexpected.Leaders who become entrenched in their own beliefs, who do not listen to their people, who form unchanging opinions which remain stuck, despite evidence to the contrary, usually end up making the wrong decisions, being out of touch with reality and unable to deal with crises. They might have the 'experience' and unchanging beliefs, but they tend to be crap leaders, stuck in the same mode as change swirls around them.

Flip Flops Are Worn On the Beach

Marina — Mon, 04 Aug 2008 12:45:24 EDT

I am so sick of the term flip-flop!!!

In my opinion, it is the fact that Obama assesses new information, and changes his stance when that information leads him to a new conclusion, that makes him so appealing.

Flexibility is NOT a negative character trait. Contrarily, it is a sign of good character! We have had rigid for the last 7-1/2 years. Where are we now???

- Thanks to Jeannie at Phoenix Writers for Obama for spurring on this mini email discussion with me that led me to decide this thought belonged here on the blogs.

Going Home to Kentucky.

david higdon — Sat, 26 Jul 2008 09:45:24 EDT

My wife and currently live in Nashville, Tn; and things here are a little more liberal (especially in our neighborhood in East Nashville) than what I suspect they are in a small town like Leitchfield, Ky. My brother, I guess, has a different political stance than I do. He is a little more of what one might call "a good ole boy" than what I am and I am uncertain if he supports Obama and if not, what is his reasoning for such. I hope we can have a civilized conversation on the subject without pushing eachother's buttons. i seriously don't understand why someone would want to support another "war president." We need a diplomat in office, someone that can gain the respect from countries that America so desperately needs at this point. when I saw Obama in Berlin earlier this week, and the crowds of cheering, dancing, smiling spectators -- it truly put a smile on my face. Here is a man that people admire, a man that inspires hope; not only in his fellow Americans, but people on foriegn soil as well. Let's hope the trend of this week continues in the eyes of the media, and maybe it will change the opinion of non-believers in our country.

Invite - WSOD = What should Obama do? - Add YOUR voice now...

DesignPolice — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 15:55:18 EDT

Hi and welcome to WSOD: What Should Obama Do?!

Invitation to Blog. Please add to this list of ideas, opinions and topics so that Obama understands our concerns and can take action when he is in the white house. Please help out by spreading the word so that we can provide him great food for thought and a growing "to do" list!

- Boy will he be busy... TY.

So what if Barack Obama is flip-flopping? Who cares?

Ms CYPRAH — Mon, 14 Jul 2008 18:19:58 EDT

Stay Focused And Remember The Goal!

Keeping It Real — Fri, 11 Jul 2008 18:23:44 EDT

To anyone who want to see a democrat as the president of the United States please put your personal feelings aside if you have a beef with Obama and give to his campaign. I along with many will do so because he needs it for his campaign and we are tired of hearing about how McCain and his possey has raised so much money. Remember the democrats are family and sometimes we don't always agree but we have to keep our common goal in mind which is to take over the oval office. We have to make sure that Obama has the tools he needs so he can respond to the republicans swiftly. Obama will not give his money from his small donors to Hillary Clinton, he is going to his maxed out large donors for help as it pertains to her. Lets all make a big push between now and this weekend or whenever you feel comfortable. Just remember Obama will look out for the people and don't allow the media talking heads to confuse you. Keep hope alive!

Me, Barack Obama, and an undiscovered love of my country.

Meg — Wed, 02 Jul 2008 18:51:03 EDT

I was never what you would call a patriot.

The first step...

Jason from Austin, TX — Mon, 30 Jun 2008 14:20:06 EDT

Here it is. The first step. My introduction.

A little back story...
Ive been probama since the beginning of the runoff's but have always loved some of Clinton's perspectives and I'm even a fan of the Fair Tax plan... so I'm kinda all over the place. I'd consider myself more of an independent over a Democrat... as I do like to look at issues as separate rather than following a party line. I'm agnostic and tend to always lean liberal in my viewpoints, yet as a person, I'm pretty conservative.

I was born in Dallas and raised in Arlington until I was 15 when my Mom was transferred with Kraft General Foods to Atlanta. I graduated high school here at Berkmar in Lilburn and lived here waiting tables at fine dining establishments such as Brasserie Le Coze and Cabernet. I moved back to Ft Worth to get through school at the Art Institute of Dallas. I've been working in the creative industry in Dallas since. I moved to Austin to be with my girlfriend and we're opening a hair salon, Kemestry, on 6th and Robert Martinez which should be open before the close of July. After we get that open and on it's feet, I'll probably be opening my agency... or jet setting the world... whichever happens first.

Throughout my life, I have come upon situations that pushed me to have the political and social viewpoints I now carry... and I will try to offer my perspectives here in the hopes that it adds to the catalog of information that is available here for people to read and walk away with some understanding.

Hope all is well!

Till next time...

On Leadership

Diva JC — Tue, 24 Jun 2008 09:05:55 EDT

That AMERICA is a melting pot of all peoples and nationalities, globally, is becoming true and truer, daily.

Who can lead this conglomerate of human beings?

This question is all too relevant to the upcoming presidential election of 2008.

I believe Barack Obama is deigned to fill that post. Now, you tell me. . .

What does America mean to you? http://www.fyicomminc.com/america/america.htm

Love and Light,

Diva JC

www.divajc.com

I had no idea my dad was a Republican

Colleen M — Fri, 20 Jun 2008 23:46:10 EDT

Growing up, I was always taught the importance of individuality. I was taught to figure things out for myself, to think independently, to read widely, and to formulate my own opinions.

It wasn't until I began to formulate such independent opinions about politics, however, that I began to notice some friction at the dinner table.

Having graduated from college in May, I came home expecting to have stimulating, in-depth conversations about the state of the United States government. I expected my parents to welcome my ideas, to engage in authentic dialogue, and to support their ideas with logical, insightful facts.

And then, I discovered my dad watching the O'Reilly Factor.

Sure, I wasn't completely taken aback. My father had always argued for the war in Iraq, touting typical conservative justifications - Hussein is a dictator, he is a madman, this is the only way to avoid more terrorist attacks. Although I didn't agree with his reasoning, I could understand his viewpoint, and politely counter it with my own opinions - he had no WMDs, we should start focusing on domestic policy more than foreign, and there is no evidence that he was involved with Al Queda. I was equipped, I could handle such an argument.

What I was not prepared for was having to explain why I disapprove of Bill O'Reilly. Calling him names doesn't do it justice - it would be stooping to O'Reilly's level. Telling my father to "shut up and shut it off" also sounded a bit too O'Reilly for me. Saying that his show is complete elitist propaganda was pointless - my father clearly didn't want to see that.

My father is by no means dim. He is a smart, loving, and capable father. I owe all of my incredible opportunities and experiences to him - including having inherited the values of independent thought. He did vote for Bush, but when I found that out, I thought, hey, everyone makes mistakes.

But now I am faced with the question - are there millions of Americans, just like my father, who could benefit from the messages of Obama's campaign but are unwilling to listen? And if so, how do we convince them that their support of John McCain-Bush's presidency could be the second-worst mistake of the past 8 years?

I know my father's vote may not make a difference. We live in Massachusetts, which has voted decidedly Democrat since Kennedy (I think). But if there are others like him, how do we sway them, so McCain doesn't even have a chance?

Feedback I would have given...if asked

Ryan K — Fri, 13 Jun 2008 21:20:57 EDT

A few weeks ago, I received an email from the Obama campaign asking for my feedback. I was told there would be some questions to answer and, presumably, some checkboxes to categorize myself and my interests. It also said, however, that I would be able to provide some feedback to the campaign. This echoed the grassroots feel that the campaign has had throughout, so I delayed answering the survey until I could meaningfully word the feedback I wanted to provide.

Upon returning to the survey ready to cut-and-paste, there was no feedback section after all the questions on demographics, issues, and interests. Not wanting to think I totally wasted my time, here are my thoughts. Please reply to this post and voice the feedback you would give if you thought Senator Obama or his staff was monitoring. With enough replies...who knows?

For What It's Worth

Tom — Mon, 09 Jun 2008 12:46:38 EDT

I figure that maybe only 23% of the U.S. population has enough dedication to publically voice thier political views. There is no scientific basis for my 23% guess, just a gut feeling. Still that amounts to what. maybe 69 Million people or so (including all the talking heads). I know that we say every vote counts (excluding the 2000 & 2004 election that is). I guess that would mean that every voice counts, I would like to believe that. I have no delusion of granduer about my opinion, in fact there is a chance no one other than my wife and friends that I bug, will read this blog. Just the same I will voice my support for Senator Obama and expound my opinion....for what it's worth.

For Truth Justice and the American Way

Tony from Miami, FL — Wed, 21 May 2008 19:01:18 EDT

The purpose of this blog is simple.

Separate opinion from fact - and sift through rhetoric to reach the truth.

Feel free to express yourself - Let's Bring Truth to Power!

Clinton and McCain Scratching Each Other's Backs!

Mary — Sat, 19 Apr 2008 10:25:39 EDT

The bonding between Democrat and Republican party started with the first accusational finger pointed at a flap. Hillary Clinton and John McCain have made a partnership in sharing common ground over trying to push Obama out of the political race. Both nominees are in essense scratching each other's backs for their own personal interest. For Hillary Clinton who is falling behind nationally it is in her interest to use John McCain as a tool to wedge doubts in voters minds about Obama's ability to stand against the Republican party and as a means to cast further doubts in the minds of democrats and republican's who can't make up their minds. John McCain is using Hillary's verbal assualts as ammunition to cast doubt in the minds of voters about Obama because McCain isn't worried about beating Hillary in the elections and she isn't a worthy adversary even in the primaries. McCain is more concerned about Obama who has taken a lead not only over Hillary Clinton nationally but also over McCain and the Republican party. This back scratching and gifting should give voters an indicator as to which candidate is more likely to win the election which is Obama because both the Democratic and Republican nominees are working very hard to push him out of the race.

For Democrats it is discouraging to say the least to observe Hillary Clinton league with McCain and throw Obama into the water like chum to a shark. Moreover it shows a deterioration of Hillary's ability to carry the Democrats through the 2008 election as a candidate in terms of concern for the American citizen and the Democratic party in general. Her concern has turned completely to the task of winning at all costs. McCain is chuckling behind his sleeve as he garners more damage to use later down the road. In my opinion the super-delegates need to step in and move Hillary out of the race and do damage control in order to ensure a win for the Democratic Party. It will take time to quell the furor of smearing that Clinton has smeared and the Democratic Party needs recoup time before the National Election. So the question is, is it better to allow Clinton to further deminish the Democratic Party by scratching backs with McCain or should the superdelagates back Obama in hopes of saving the Democratic Party and do some damage control before it's too late?

Musings on what Matters

Kenne — Fri, 18 Apr 2008 09:01:53 EDT

My friends (And I say this out of mutual association, unlike the pandering McCain who says this knowing full well that many people who are listening to him - even his Republican party members - hate his guts), we have recently witnessed one of the most despicable entries in the political forum; the Pennsylvania Debate. Why it was called a debate is beyon comprehension. It was a Slice-&-Dice tabloid influence headline driven media frenzy.

I won't insult anyone's intellegence by reiterating any of the bane questions and the oft' grimaced responses of the candidates, but I will post here a comment that I viewed on the debate that was posted on the Chicago Tribune's article page. I only post this for those of us who watch the rantings of people who do have a voice and often influence others. Please pay a ttention as views like this, though we know they have very little merit to intellegent intuitive people carry weight with those of the populace who ofen only get their news at the supermaket checkout line.

http://weblogs.chicagotribune.com/news/politics/blog/2008/04/obama_fingers_a_gotcha_debate.html

"Obama spells doom for this country. Not only because of his dubious affiliations with mob members like Rezko and criminals like Auchi, but because of his lack of experience and bias education especially his bizarre religious affiliations. He is like silly putty; able to change his ideas for the public as needed so as to achieve his goal as supreme leader.

His intentions are unclear, but his affiliations are clear. Being surrounded with people like the violent Ayers, or the Hiteresque (sic) Wright, or his American hating wife Michelle, or his Kenyan half brother Islamic Jihad terrorist Abongo “Roy” Obama, or his Jewish/Israeli hating best friend Rashid Khalidi, or his close advisor Robert Malley who advocates supporting and helping the terrorist group Hamas, or Mr. McPeaks, Obama’s military advisor who open believes American Jews are the "problem." and “Christian Zionists were driving America's policy in Iraq to benefit Israel,” or Obama’s super delegate and major long term supporter Senator Meeks who openly hates and distrust all whites and gays or Obama’s most dangerous affiliation to Mr. Auchi who was Saddam Hussein right hand man and made billions in Iraq and has been a important supporter and behind the scene man throughout Obama’s rise to power.

And besides all this questionable laundry in Obama’s life, another serious question is why is Obama protected and promoted by the media? Is this also being directed from behind the scenes? The American public has been fooled before and I guess those in power know we can be fooled again. (Kennedy’s assassination, Martin Luther King’s assassination, the invasion of Iraq…).

The fact that Obama has made it this far demonstrates the collective lack of discriminative intelligence and education of this country. And nothing demonstrates this better than how well Obama plays his black card; which plays on our fear of being labeled a racist."

This is the mind of someone who is either truly uneducated, hateful for the sake of vindictiveness, or has an axe to grind. It is unfortunate that such people are the ones who often cast their ballots with the intent of NOT supporting someone as opposed to supporting an ideal.

great perspective from TPM

elfpix — Sun, 13 Apr 2008 09:01:28 EDT

Well, Here We Go Again.By - April 12, 2008, 2:34PM

It seems a little early for reruns. Must be because of the writer's strike.

Ever since last fall, we've seen this same cycle repeat itself, with minor variations, over and over again. Some event happens that the Clintonistas fixate on as the THE BIG ONE: the Big Bolt From the Blue (or from Howard Wolfson's Blackberry—same thing as far as the MSM is concerned) that will finally end Obama's upstart attempt to usurp the office to which Hillary is rightfully entitled.

Her surrogates squeal in feigned outrage on the cable shows while Hillary sorrowfully relates Obama's error to her slowly dwindling crowds in her most unctuous tone. And, in the most recent variation, Hillary and McCain will say the exact same things for a few days.

Bill and Harold Ickes will unleash a flood of phone calls and emails to the uncommitted superdelegates warning them of the Terrible Scary Commercials the Republicans will run against Obama in the fall as a result of this Big Awful Thing that happened. (“See? See? Here's some actual Republican scumbag consultants who say they'll destroy him with this one, see? You believe them, right? They have supernatural powers, you know. Only a Clinton can resist them. Oooohhh, scary, scary, be very afraid!”)

The MSM leaps like trained seals to tossed fish at Hillary's emails, breathlessly reporting that Obama's campaign faces THE crisis of his campaign, a potential game changer that could deliver the nomination to Hillary, regardless of that pesky math stuff that silly who don't understand good TV keep trying to talk about. Politico hyperventilates, Fox foams and raves, At ABC, Tapper sneers and Sunlen Miller circles in the sky, waiting for a meal. Halpirin transcribes and engages in vapid pontification and CNN alternates between substance, sensationalism and superficiality in a dizzying cycle.

Across the Intertubes, Hillary's trolls and sockpuppets rub their hands and cackle with glee. “At last! This time we finally have him! He is dooooomed, doooomed, I say! Buahahahahahaha!” In the Hillarite alternate e-universe of Taylormarsh.com, MyDD.com and Hillis44.org, the victory celebration begins with the obligatory bile spitting. In the real blogs, dispirited supporters of Hillry who haven't been seen in days or weeks reappear to express their confident predictions that, at last, all these deluded Obama voters will finally WAKE UP! (TM) and see what a [pick one or more of the following: (fraud) (sexist) (elitist) (empty suit) (racist) (inexperienced naïve incompetent) (snake charmer) (snake oils salesman) (muslim sleeper agent) (bad evil person misogynist of the male gender who is trying to stop America from electing the Only Woman in America Who Will Ever Have a Chance to Become President)] Obama is.

And, most depressingly of all, some of Obama's supporters will do what Democrats are always prone to do when faced with the least adversity in a campaign: they'll run around in little circles, hands in the air, crying out their anguished frightened advice to his campaign: “Ohno ohno ohno! In our heart of hearts we secretly agree with Hillary and the Republicans that the voters are dumber than we enlightened activist Democrats are. We're afraid they won't understand! He needs to make a major speech! He must recant! No, he must must stand firm! Is there somebody we can throw under a bus? Commercials! He must run many, many commercials! Maybe he should abandon state X and concentrate on state Y where they won't care about The Big Terrible Thing! And the Republicans, oh Dear God, here come the Republicans with their supernatural powers!”
And then, as always, Obama will calmly do that Akido thing he does with all these nontroversies. He'll stand his ground, talk about the Thing Which Must Never be Said that he did say, doing so again and again, as many times as it takes to make the MSM realize that he was actually making a point rather than gaffing. And he'll use the point to pivot back onto McHillary, exposing their attacks as yet another example of the petty game playing and point scoring Washington nonsense that has got to change.

The MSM will then feel foolish and some will turn on McHillary for having made them feel foolish. The scandal will die everywhere but on Fox News and the wingnutosphere, where they'll keep ranting and raving about it for weeks on end until the next thing comes along, but no one who'd ever vote for a Democrat will be listening.

Then Hillary and her supporters will sullenly try to keep the thing going long past the point where it does harm to anyone but themselves, in complete denial that, once again, their plan to take back that which is rightfully Hers have failed. Finally, Bill will throw one of his patented tantrums in public which will announce the formal end of the nontroversy cycle.

And all the wavering Obama supporters will find themselves, once again, saying “damn, yeah, that's the reason I'm for him, hey never doubted you for a moment” and calm back down.

So, to those among the Obama contingent in the comments here who are talkin' all jittery, have a little faith in Obama's repeatedly demonstrated ability to turn these things back around on the other side and come out stronger and stop all the moaning. Sheesh, we've still got a ways to go on this trip and getting all panicky every time we hit some turbulence is not productive.

As to the Clintonistas and Republitrolls, hey, keep doing what you're doing. I love watching you get yourselves worked up into the these celebratory frenzies, only to have your hopes (heh!) cruelly dashed once again. It fills me with that same sense of impending comic pathos I feel as Wyle E. Coyote, snickering nastily, opens up yet another shipment of fine Acme Company products and begins implementing his next brilliant plan.

MSNBC says Dems "Biting the Hand" about NAFTA, I say... and your opinions.

EMK — Wed, 02 Apr 2008 02:15:43 EDT

MSNBC decides to repost an article concerning NAFTA, so I've decided to post the article as well as my response to it, which I have mentioned on one of the "Open Thread" links (final post).

Although Obama is definitely more stongly opposed to NAFTA than HRC, the article lumps them together. Also, whether or not the DNC is for or against NAFTA in general, this article, in my opinion, reads more like a threat, as I have addressed in my reply.

----BEGIN ARTICLE----

Biting the hands that feed you; Democrats' facing free trade challenge
Political connections By Ronald Brownstein
updated 4:18 p.m. ET, Fri., March. 21, 2008
MIAMI - Young professionals poured from sleek office buildings at lunch-time on a humid afternoon last week as sunshine glinted off the nameplates of the global law firms and the European and South American banks that cluster here in the international financial district along busy Brickell Avenue.
A few minutes later, just to the northeast, a line of trucks rolled into the Port of Miami as giant cranes unloaded red and blue containers from freighters bearing some of the nearly 8 million tons of cargo that annually crosses these docks. In midtown, patients from Latin America sought world-class medical care at renowned Jackson Memorial Hospital. Further to the northwest, in Hialeah and Doral, small manufacturers churned out medical equipment, engine parts, and dozens of other products destined for Brazil, Costa Rica, or Venezuela.
Those are only some of the ways that the world economy nourishes this bustling city's prosperity. "International tourism and banking, international trade, international services, international trans-shipments, health-related services: Our economy is inextricably tied to all of these," says Tony Ojeda, executive director of Miami-Dade County's International Trade Consortium.
This is the side of the international economic story that Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton obscured in Ohio with their spiraling denunciations of free trade. But many of America's most vibrant communities are benefiting enormously from their connections to the global economy. What's more, most of these communities, the places that would suffer most if America tried to wall out the rest of world, are becoming Democratic strongholds. This means that in seeking to retreat from globalization, Democrats are threatening the interests of voters and communities increasingly central to their electoral coalition. "The Democrats are in all the globally connected places," says Robert Lang, director of the Metropolitan Institute at Virginia Tech University. "They are biting the hands that feed them."
Lang and his colleagues, in a paper dated March 21, identified the 20 American metropolitan areas most thoroughly integrated into the global economy. The researchers ranked the cities along four dimensions: the presence of global service firms (such as advertising, law, and financial services); whether the area has a major port; whether it has an international airport; and the value of exports that pass through it.
At the top of the list stand New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Miami. They are followed by Atlanta, Washington, Boston, Dallas, and Houston. The second 10 start with Seattle and Philadelphia and end with Phoenix and San Jose, Calif.
These globally connected cities retain many differences. But they generally share an expansive outlook marked by receptivity to foreign markets, foreign investment, immigration, and ethnic diversity. "They are the places where when you walk into a building, they have clocks set all around the world," Lang says. In the 1980s, as Hispanic immigration surged, a popular South Florida bumper sticker read, "Will the last American to leave Miami bring the flag?" Today, notes Ojeda, most Miami leaders of all races recognize "that our international [population] base has given us the economy we have."
Such attitudes help explain the Democratic advantage in the global cities. Lang found that in 2004, 15 of these 20 metropolitan areas backed John Kerry over George W. Bush . In nine, Kerry ran at least 10 percentage points above his national average. Those results reflect a larger political evolution: Whether measured by attitudes toward immigration or international alliances, Republicans are attracting more support from Americans who are skeptical of global influences, and Democrats are gaining strength among people (especially professionals) most open to the world. Over time, those voters may recoil from the hardening Democratic hostility to free trade.
That doesn't mean Democrats should ignore the economic distress in battered industrial communities such as Youngstown, Ohio. But the party is steering by the rearview mirror when it targets its policy solely at manufacturing workers who are leery of free trade. For Democrats, the challenge is to expand opportunity for those workers without undermining it in the communities that are thriving as America's bridges to the world. Obama and Clinton both failed that challenge in Ohio. Trying to revive Youngstown by damming the global currents lifting Miami and our other global cities has long been bad economics. Now, for Democrats, it's also bad politics.

----END ARTICLE----

And my response:

Media supporting NAFTA as "free" trade?
By EMK Mar 24th 2008 at 12:58 am EDT
Is the media now threatening the DNC with the anti-NAFTA rhetoric currently going on? They are now pitting cities like Youngstown with cities like Miami? This is the MSNBC article Link .

This part is the most irking:

"...But the party is steering by the rearview mirror when it targets its policy solely at manufacturing workers who are leery of free trade. For Democrats, the challenge is to expand opportunity for those workers without undermining it in the communities that are thriving as America's bridges to the world. Obama and Clinton both failed that challenge in Ohio. Trying to revive Youngstown by damming the global currents lifting Miami and our other global cities has long been bad economics. Now, for Democrats, it's also bad politics."

Now, you can read the entire article, but indicating that "obscuring" the "international economic story" by "[Obama's and Clinton's] spiraling denunciations of free trade [I think the reference is to NAFTA, as the debate in Ohio was concerning NAFTA.]" using cities of Miami as an example of "Our economy is inextricably tied to all of [the 'International tourism and banking, international trade, international services, international trans-shipments, health-related services,' [etc.]]" as an excuse to support NAFTA, directly or indirectly, is inaccurate.

If workers can't get a decent job with a decent wage, imports won't be affordable in a bad economy. Youngstown is in bad shape, and that impacts Miami because if the people of Youngstown cannot afford to live since they cannot work, eventually, the people of Miami will be affected because they won't have as many imports to bring in, affecting their local economy. So what if we are in a global economy if the country cannot support itself and its citizens?

To the media, stop making threats! NAFTA is not "free" trade at all.

Again, I don't have a party affiliation, but these parties can unite by bringing in people from different parties to help solve the economy and the trade issue: Link . Just take a look.

(Note: Clinton has been more supportive of NAFTA, but the article links Obama and Clinton.)

I apologize for anything crazy, but please discuss this, even if its with supporters of other candidates.

"The society's degradation relies/ not on our differences/ but on the separation within." Linkin Park "Frgt/10."

EMK

Questions? Comments? Reactions? Suggestions?

EMK

My view about "The View"

Candace N. - V.O.B — Fri, 28 Mar 2008 23:42:17 EDT

Senator Obama did a great job today during his appearance on "The View." I think all of the host's except Elizabeth stayed neutral. I think people have a right to their own opinion but she tends to beat an issue into the ground when expressing her opinion about someone. I am glad that the other's kept her at bay today. Ms. Walters proclaimed that Senator Obama was sexy. It was good he was able to have a serious talk in lighthearted environment. All-in-all I think it went well.

Sen. Obama Voiced His Opinion on Mich. & Fl. in Aug. 2007, Not Sen. Clinton

David Waddle — Mon, 24 Mar 2008 16:50:27 EDT

The New York Times

Democrats Take a Tough Line on Florida Primary
Published online August 26, 2007
by ADAM NAGOURNEY

In that article in which the DNC takes all delegates away from Florida if Florida goes ahead and holds
Their primary early as they state they will. In that same article from August 2007, I found the following quote of interest.
"There are 30 days for this to get worked out, and our hope is it gets settled in a way that Florida is contributing delegates to the nominating process," said David Plouffe, the campaign manager for Senator Barack Obama of Illinois. "If they don't come into compliance, that means they won't be contributing any delegates to the contest and this will be nothing more than a straw poll."
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I can find no early position taken by Sen. Clinton. Maybe because she was leaving open the possibility of exactly what has happened? Then why didn't she take that position last August? Could it be that Sen. Obama could have just as easily found himself in Clinton's shoes? Therefore, by taking no position she could take the position that fit her situation when the time came.
Once again, Sen. Obama proves himself a leader, not afraid to take a stand and end up with the correct decision. Whether it was correct by party leaders at the time it was made is irrelevant; Sen. Clinton made no vocal complaints, at the time, only Florida and Michigan were upset. Now they have Sen. Clinton on their side, upset will not be heard. I have one question: where was Sen. Clinton's opinion last August when Sen. Obama agreed with the DNC ruling.

Poll: Majority of Democrats prefer Obama

Soldierette!! (CENSORED) — Tue, 18 Mar 2008 00:52:23 EDT

Poll: Majority of Democrats prefer Obama

Story Highlights
CNN/Opinion Research Corp. Poll finds enthusiasm for Obama's candidacy
52% of registered Democrats say they'd like to see Obama get the nomination
About a quarter of Democrats say they would be dissatisfied if Clinton won
Poll also examines superdelegates, Michigan and Florida primaries

From Paul Steinhauser
CNN Washington Bureau

(CNN) -- A majority of Democrats would like to see Barack Obama rather than Hillary Clinton win their party's presidential nomination, according to a national poll out Monday.

Fifty-two percent of registered Democrats questioned in a new CNN/Opinion Research Corporation survey say the senator from Illinois is their choice for president, with 45 percent supporting Clinton.

The poll also suggests Democrats are more enthusiastic about an Obama victory (45 percent) than for a victory by the senator from New York (38 percent).

The two remaining major candidates for the Democratic presidential nomination are locked in a fierce battle for their party's presidential nomination, with Obama holding a slight lead both in delegates and the overall popular vote in the primaries and caucuses to date.

"The same patterns that we have been seeing in recent exit polls are holding true for Democrats nationwide as well. Obama's biggest support comes from men, younger voters and independents who lean Democratic," CNN polling director Keating Holland said. "Clinton does best among women, older voters and whites. One interesting difference, unlike the exit polls in many states, there is no difference in the national poll between college-educated Democrats and those who never attended college."

The nomination could hinge on two major matters: superdelegates and the possibility of do-over primaries for Florida and Michigan.

The two states broke national Democratic Party rules by moving up the dates of their primaries to January. None of the major Democratic candidates campaigned in the two states, and Obama's name wasn't even on the ballot in Michigan.

The national Democratic Party also banned Florida and Michigan's delegates from attending the party's national convention this summer. But with the fight for the nomination nearly deadlocked and the reality that winning both Florida and Michigan is crucial for the Democrats to take back the White House in November, there's now a movement toward letting both states vote again.

Sixty-three percent of Democrats said the two states should hold new primaries, with 19 percent saying delegates from Florida and Michigan should be seated at the national convention based on the results of the January primaries, and 15 percent saying no delegates should be seated at all.

If Clinton and Obama finish the primary season with close to an equal number of pledged delegates, then superdelegates could decide which candidate wins the nomination.

There are nearly 800 superdelegates, mostly Democratic members of Congress, top elected state officials and leading members of the Democratic Party. Fifty percent of those polled say that it's a bad idea for the party to have superdelegates, with 42 percent supporting the system.

Since the party is not going to scrap the superdelegates, the big question is how they should base their vote for the nomination.

Democrats appear split on this question -- 49 percent say that superdelegates should base their votes on their view of who would be the best candidate; 46 percent say that superdelegates should base their votes on the results of the primaries and caucuses.

The CNN/Opinion Research Corp. poll was conducted by telephone March 14-16, with 1, 019 Americans questioned, including 463 registered voters who identify themselves as Democrats or independents who lean Democratic.

The survey has a sampling error of plus or minus 4.5 percentage points.

The Bigger picture on Rev Wright

Abigail — Mon, 17 Mar 2008 19:28:56 EDT

As I was walking around Philly today with my OBAMA pin on my jacket- I kept thinking- what would I say if someone on the street saw my pin and asked me about Obama. And what would I say if they brought up the rev Wright information from this past week?

So I am going to list some ideas to clarify my thoughts -for me, and to share some ideas with fellow OBAMA supporters.

First there is the bigger picture:

OBAMA is winning, and his odds of winning the dem nomination are very good. Obviously Hillary and her people are- freaking out and therefore doing EVERYTHING in their power to stop this- we have seen their kitchen sink get bigger and greasier over the past weeks.

The biggest smear and "fear" thus far was the belief that Barack is actually a Muslim, which we know is not true. And although this smear might have worked with some- with those who choose to believe everything they read and not research for a second opinion- Overall the Muslim smear has failed, in that it just wont stick. Let me say that EVEN if Barack was MUSLIM it shouldn't Matter!! My god, are we that sad!

And furthermore- why does it even matter what Our President's religion is!? Did this christian qualification come with the Religious right and their backing of George W?

Since the Muslim smear seemed to cool off- the media, or whoever moved on to another aspect of Barack while still in keeping with the topic of his faith and the source of this faith. Because as mentioned above the President's faith is apparently a qualification! (doesn't sound like a separation of church and state to me!)

Also- let us remember this is a slow news "week" until PA in April- and lets just look at what went down last week.

1) Ferraro quotes, and then stepping down

2) The Spitzer thing- which could have had a larger impact on Hillary- with her connection to him and her own experience with her Husband fooling around followed by an Impeachment

3) Rev Wright 20 yrs experience boiled down to 2- 30 sec clips.

At the end of the week people seem to be freaking out over #3.

I think Barack's statement on the matter was great, and I would agree- with the point that I too would want people to judge me by MY actions and not those of my church, or religious lead, or family members. For example I love the men in my family, but I sure as hell would not want their "speeches" to speak about my character. I agree with Obama that Wright is coming from another generation that expereinced turmoil during the 60's and as a result many people within the community have been hurt and are still resentful- However this was not his experience. We must look at the bigger picture of Obama- he is the example of America- he is a melting pot!!! This is Awesome.

The good from all this:

I know many in the MSM and any closeted racist who was just jumping to find a reason to not vote for Obama that appeared "legitimate"- would agree with me on this next point- BUT I think that Obama's attendance in the church speaks to his approach on working with people. Like Lincoln, who surrounded himself with people he disagreed with from both parties- he did so in order to make the best informed decision. To have all sides of the argument known, to not turn a blind eye to such beliefs and opinions that are in fact a large part of how some of today's African American's feel.

if you ask me, we don't listen enough, or communicate enough with those who differ from us. Hence- WAR.

How are you suppose to help a man if you have not put yourself in his shoes?

Here are some interesting articles on the Wright issue from the Huffington Post:

Enjoy.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/denise-clapsaddle/obamas-rejection-of-past_b_91662.html

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/scott-kurashige/obamas-crisis-and-mlks-_b_91807.html

Obama's pastor (my thoughts on the clips I saw tonight on AC 360)

sofia — Sat, 15 Mar 2008 03:12:39 EDT

I cannot disagree with the truth. The truth being that America IS controlled by rich white men. I defy you to disagree with that statement. I also agree with the pastor that because of America’s constantly erring leaders and leadership we have incurred the wrath of other countries by constantly forcing our Western beliefs and politics upon these cultures. Our constant warring, and by constantly planting ourselves in other countries like a fat entitled child. I agree with both of those things the pastor said.
HOWEVER, I don’t believe it has it’s place in a religious sermon. It is my belief that in a place of worship- a pastor, priest, or rabbi is to be a vessel of “the word” and not personal political opinion. I also believe Obama should not be condemned for attending this church even if he had heard sermons similar to the two we saw tonight. Any human being of imagining, mind, and heart should be able to listen to an opinion and take what they want from it. To dissect the truth as they know it from someone else’s thoughts and interpretations.

Divide and Conquer

Fahim — Thu, 13 Mar 2008 13:14:35 EDT

In the aftermath of the Ferraro hate melee, there is one question that continues to bother me. What are we, as a united culture, afraid of? There is no question that Barack Obama is an African-American. Just as there is no question that Hillary Clinton is a woman. These are indisputable facts. To say that Mr. Obama is in the position he is because of this indisputable fact is wrong, but not racist. To say that being African-American works in his favor is the same as saying Mrs. Clinton being a woman works in hers. These are indisputable facts. Blacks came out to support “their” candidate, just as woman came out to support “theirs”.

To be up-in-arms because someone reminded us of this is, as Mr. Obama said, ridiculous. At first, I too was ready to crucify the ex-vice presidential hopeful for her comments, but we must look past certain things if the change that Mr. Obama is fighting for will ever be achieved.

This election is about more than melanin and chromosomes. This election is about bringing our family home from a war that should never have taken place. It is about fixing the economic debacle our hard-working citizens face every day. Falling economy, rising gas prices, stagnant wages, higher cost of food, astronomical health care costs for individual polices, deplorable educational structures in inner city facilities, homeless Americans and the influx of foreclosed homes, moral turpitude, big business monopolies within every facet of America to include the news we see and read, the music, movies and television programs we watch thus controlling what view we have of ourselves and the world around us. This election should be about bringing attention back to America, where it belongs.

Do we realize that Ferraro’s comments echo a feeling in America? Bill Clinton’s comments in South Carolina were not racist, they appealed to a certain climate. Remember, these people are politicians. A politician’s job is to communicate to the people. All these politicians were doing was exactly that. To see the “uproar” is to say that America is still blinded by sight and not lead by its collective heart.

This works directly in the favor of the Republican Party. While the Democrats bicker over color and body parts, the Republicans are formulating platforms to further divide their voters and conquer the White House.

I have heard people say “If Obama doesn’t get the nod, I’m not voting…” or “Because of all this race stuff in the Democratic Party, I’m going Independent”. The divide and conquer scenario is playing out perfectly and the Republicans haven’t had to do anything.

Is what Mrs. Ferraro said true? Perhaps. But for the same reasons Mr. Obama is where he is right now are the same reasons Mrs. Clinton is in the position she is. This election will be a historic one. That much is already true. For the first time, we have an African-American AND a woman Presidential hopeful. BUT, it can also be historic in the fact that we let cosmetics allow another republican regime to kill off more of its younger population through war, economic starvation, and total lack of understanding of what AMERCIANS need.

We are happily engaging in segregation and that is NOT the America I want for my son. So please, vote with your eyes closed and your minds open. Vote for the policies and procedures you think will get our soldiers home, re-boot our economy and save America for our children.

Enough separation. Enough Black versus White. Enough of the Republican Regime. We’re running out of time.

Noonan from Sat WSJ & hrc Killing Magic & us saving it.

Plum Elements — Mon, 10 Mar 2008 13:08:53 EDT

If you have not read this suggest you do.

Be-forewarned it is not all pro-Obama.

It is however all Anti hrc.

Well crafted and poignant.

What mattered to me most were her open and close...

Her line about magical beings and the line about Mamet rewritten by Pesci are brilliant and poignant.

The key point...hrc has taken us OFF the possibiltiy of a magical moment with Barack. In her drive for power and due to ego she has taken away what could have been truly wonderous and magical. I will not forgive her for that...for our world needs more magic.

In the same breath I say...we are magic if we choose to be...she can not stop that. So let us again build with hope and positive thought and deed the power and audacity of the magic we long to feel in this moment with this man.

JWZ

Over the Top
March 7, 2008; Page W14

An overview:

From the first voting in Iowa on Jan. 3 she had to prove that Clintons Are Magic. She wound up losing 11 in a row. Meaning Clintons aren't magic. He had to take her out in New Hampshire, on Super Tuesday or Junior Tuesday. He didn't. Meaning Obama isn't magic.

Two nonmagical beings are left.

What the Democrats lost this week was the chance to paint the '08 campaign as a brilliant Napoleonic twinning of strategy and tactics that left history awed. What they have instead is a ticket to Verdun. Trench warfare, and the daily, wearying life of the soldier under siege. The mud, the cold, the dank water rotting the boots, all of it punctuated by mad cries of "Over the top," bayonets fixed.

M.E. Cohen

Do I understate? Not according to the bitter officers debating doomed strategy back in HQ. More on that in a minute.

This is slightly good for John McCain. Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama hemorrhage money, exhaust themselves, bloody each other. He holds barbecues for the press and gets rid of a White House appearance in which the incumbent offers his dread embrace. Do it now, they'll forget by the summer. The president does not understand how unpopular he is and after a year on the trail with the faithful neither does Mr. McCain. Mr. Bush confided to a friend a few months ago, as he predicted a Giuliani win, that he'll eventually come out and campaign for the nominee big time. Talk about throwing the drowning man an anvil.

But it is not good for Mr. McCain that when he officially won this week it barely made page three. The lightning is on the Democratic side. Everything else seems old, like something that happened a year ago that you forgot to notice.

How did Hillary come back? Her own staff doesn't know. They fight over it because if they don't know how she carried Ohio and Texas they can't repeat the strategy.

So they figure backward. She won on Tuesday and did the following things in the weeks before, so . . . it was the kitchen-sink strategy. Or Hispanic outreach. Or the 3 a.m. ad. (The amazing thing was not that they lifted the concept from Walter Mondale's '84 run, but that the answer to the question "Who are you safer with?" was, The Woman. Not that people really view Hillary as a woman, but still: That would not have been the answer even 20 years ago.)

Did she come back because Mr. Obama's speech got a little boring? Was he coasting and playing it safe? Or was it that he didn't hit her hard enough? "He hasn't been able to find a way to be tough with a woman opponent," they say on TV. But that's not it, or is only half the truth. The other half is that it has long been agreed in the Democratic Party that one must not, one cannot, ever, refer to the long caravan of scandals that have followed the Clintons for 15 years. "We don't speak of the Clintons that way."

But why not? Everyone else does. Yes, the Obama sages will respond, that's the point: Everyone knows about cattle futures, etc. Everyone knows that if you Yahoo "Clintons" and "scandals" you get 4,430,000 hits.

But what if they do need to be reminded? What if they need to be told exactly what Mr. Obama means when he speaks of the tired old ways of Washington?

But voicing the facts would violate party politesse. So he loses the No. 1 case against her. But by losing the No. 1 case, he loses the No. 2 case: that she is the most divisive figure in the country, and that this is true because people have reason to view her as dark, dissembling, thuggish.

* * *

One Obama supporter on TheRoot.com apparently didn't get the memo. That is the great threat to the Clintons, the number of young and independent Democrats who haven't received the memo about how Democrats speak of the Clintons. Writer Mark Q. Sawyer: "If Obama won't hit back, I will. Why aren't we talking about impeachment, Whitewater and Osama?"

What do I think is the biggest reason Mrs. Clinton came back? She kept her own spirits up to the point of denial and worked it, hard, every day. She is hardy, resilient, tough. She is a train on a track, an Iron Horse. But we must not become carried away with generosity. The very qualities that impress us are the qualities that will make her a painful president. She does not care what you think, she will have what she wants, she will not do the feints, pivots and backoffs that presidents must. She is neither nimble nor agile, and she knows best. She will wear a great nation down.

In any case the Clinton campaign, which has always been more vicious than clever, this week did a very clever thing. They pre-empted any criticism of past scandals by pushing a Democratic Party button called . . . the Monica story. Mr. Obama is "imitating Ken Starr" by speaking of Mrs. Clinton's record, said Howard Wolfson. But Ken Starr documented malfeasance. Mr. Obama can't even mention it.

* * *

Back to Verdun. There a bitter officer corps debated a strategy of pointless carnage—so many deaths, so little seized terrain, all of it barren. In a bark-stripping piece of reportage in the Washington Post, Peter Baker and Anne Kornblut captured "a combustible environment" in Hillary Headquarters. They cannot agree on what to do, or even what has been done in the past. And the dialogue.Blank you. Blank you! No blank you, you blank. Blank all of you. It's like David Mamet rewritten by Joe Pesci.

These are the things that make life worth living.

As for the Clinton surrogates, they are unappealing when winning. My favorite is named Kiki. When Hillary is losing, Kiki is valiant and persevering on the talk shows, and in a way that appeals to one's sympathies. "Go, Kiki!" I want to say as she parries with Tucker. But when Hillary is winning they're all awful, including Kiki. By memory, from Tucker, this week: Q: Why won't Hillary release her tax returns? A: It's February. Taxes are due April 15, are your taxes done? Q: No, no, we're talking past years, returns that have already been prepared. A: Are your taxes done? Mine aren't.

Wicked Kiki! This is my great fear, in a second Clinton era: four, eight years of wicked Kiki.

I end with a deadly, deadpan prediction from Christopher Hitchens. Hillary is the next president, he told radio's Hugh Hewitt, because, "there's something horrible and undefeatable about people who have no life except the worship of power . . . people who don't want the meeting to end, the people who just are unstoppable, who only have one focus, no humanity, no character, nothing but the worship of money and power. They win in the end."

It was like Claude Rains summing up the meaning of everything in the film "Lawrence of Arabia": "One of them's mad and the other is wholly unscrupulous." It's the moment when you realize you just heard the truth, the meaning underlying all the drama. "They win in the end." Gave me a shudder.

Noonan From Sat WSJ & hrc killing magic

Plum Elements — Mon, 10 Mar 2008 13:07:33 EDT

If you have not read this suggest you do.

Be-forewarned it is not all pro-Obama.

It is however all Anti hrc.

Well crafted and poignant.

What mattered to me most were her open and close...

Her line about magical beings and the line about Mamet rewritten by Pesci are brilliant and poignant.

JWZ

Over the Top
March 7, 2008; Page W14

An overview:

Two nonmagical beings are left.

M.E. Cohen

Do I understate? Not according to the bitter officers debating doomed strategy back in HQ. More on that in a minute.

How did Hillary come back? Her own staff doesn't know. They fight over it because if they don't know how she carried Ohio and Texas they can't repeat the strategy.

But what if they do need to be reminded? What if they need to be told exactly what Mr. Obama means when he speaks of the tired old ways of Washington?

* * *

These are the things that make life worth living.

Wicked Kiki! This is my great fear, in a second Clinton era: four, eight years of wicked Kiki.

politics

Russ Morisi — Fri, 07 Mar 2008 09:12:20 EST

I want to start out by saying I've never been involved in anyone's campaign for any office. I have voted in all the elections since I was old enough to vote. I have never felt the want or need to be involved in politics.

I'm not into the pop cultures' "Bush Bashing." I think using tired old statements and programmed answers to discuss issues is a waste of time. I have never trusted any politician. Who spends so much money to get a job that will only last four years? How many back-room deals has he made to get to the point where he is running for President? There must be a reason. Bush detractors automatically assume it is because he is serving the oil companies, Bush supporters believe he is saving our country from the liberal weak kneed demon. Altruists in general will believe it is because 'their' candidate has some sort of lofty goal. And each group of analysts will come up with documentation, statistics and conspiracies that will support their points.

So then, what is my point? We, as the American public, need to find out for ourselves what makes the candidates tick. Do we trust him/her (or at least as far as you can trust a politician)? Are his/her political/economic and social ties going to interfere? Yes they will. We can make this choice and we can do it without all the rhetoric that is clouding the political atmosphere. So, my points are to stick to understanding the issues that need to be addressed and stay away from trying to put down the other candidates or parties and is the guy you are supporting going to do what needs to be done.

It's your opinion, which is as valid as the next guys, and you vote for the best man for the job. If he fails to acheive his goals, it is not your fault...you were fooled. Vote for a better man/woman the next time.

All for one, and One for all. =)

K.M. Dailey — Wed, 05 Mar 2008 14:10:30 EST

Once again college has gotten in the way of me having time to work on helping out this campaign! Luckily some of my classes shall be ending soon, and at the very least I can find time to write in to several newspapers around here! I love college, but I sometimes do not love that it is in modesto (can anyone say "conservative haven")? I cannot tell you how many odd looks I get when walking around campus, black blazer, fedora, rainbow earrings and scarf, with my messenger bag, and long black skirt. But that's just normal, what's really getting all the looks is the obama button I have pinned to my bag, and fedora. Yes, yes, this semi out there conservatively dressed, lesbian, pro gun, NRA supporter, and avid Anime fan, with wiccan/christian, beliefs, transcendental views, and somewhat of a feminist agenda, supports Obama! I just thought I'd also add that because you, among many many others all have different backgrounds, beliefs, and cultures. Even the way you dress, or the music you listen to, the people you associate with, what part of the class system you are in society, even what level of education you've had......dosn't matter when we talk about one man: Obama.

I shall leave you with that thought for today, and I do believe I'll be back to write quite a bit more later. For now, I bid thee farewell, peace out, god bless, merry part and merry meet again, or for others who text like me ttyl.

-K.M. Dailey

What is it about him-

Lee — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 22:51:06 EST

There is one reason why, in the end, I will most likely vote for Obama. It will not be because of his policies. In the end, I am a moderate republican at heart. I like low taxes and low government interference. It will not be because of the politics surrounding his race. In my soul, I believe the worst is yet to come for him because of his skin tone. It will not be because of his rhetoric to bring change. I am a cynic at heart and have little faith in politics.

Obama's "For the Record," and my take on it with advice.

EMK — Fri, 29 Feb 2008 02:02:29 EST

Here is the latest about Obama from CBS's new segment: For the Record. Now, anything that is my opion or from another source will be in [boldfaced brackets].

----

For The Record: Barack Obama

A Closer Look At The Candidate's Background - From Local Church To State Senate To Capitol Hill

(CBS) When talking to reporters, Sen. Barack Obama used to have to spell his name.

Now he doesn't have to spell that out anymore - but he does have to spell out his record.

In the CNN debate Jan. 21, he said: "On issue after issue that is important to the American people, I haven't simply followed, I have led."

From votes for abortion rights to lessening penalties for marijuana use to raising doubts about capital punishment, Obama is a traditional liberal, CBS News correspondent Dean Reynolds reports.

"I can't think of a tax increase that he didn't embrace," said state Sen. Bill Brady, R-Ill.

Still, Brady considers Obama a friend who was able to work effectively with both parties in Springfield, pushing social welfare and justice legislation.

"Republican, Independent or Democrat, he was very willing to ask anyone for help on an initiative he may be pursuing," Brady said.

That includes a bill requiring police to videotape interrogations. Obama overcame opposition from the governor, the police and members of both parties to pass the bill.

But there was something else about his time in Springfield.

In more than 4,000 votes, Obama voted "present" - that's the yellow button on the right of a state Senate voting apparatus - some 129 times.

That's a cop-out, say his critics.

"That's not 'yes,' that's not 'no,'" said Sen. Hillary Clinton while debating Obama. "That's 'maybe.'"
Obama even voted "present" on a bill involving sexual abuse that he had sponsored himself - saying he discovered legal questions after its introduction.

And yet voting "present" in Illinois can be used to avoid making a choice.

[That is debatable. According to some bloggers on barackobama.com (Please let me know who you are because I don't remember when this was blogged), a "present" vote is similar to a "no" vote when you are essentially in favor for the subject matter of the bill, but you are concerned about a particular aspect of the bill.]

"It's not that unusual for this to occur," said Chris Mooney, a political scientist at the University of Illinois.

His rise in the current campaign is consistent with what has to be considered a charmed political life.

"The hopes of a skinny kid with a funny name that America had a place for him too," Obama said.

His speech at the Democratic Convention in 2004 brought even Hillary Clinton out of her seat. And his Senate race took off just as his Republican opponent fell apart.

"The Obama phenomenon. A wave that just can't be stopped … it just continues to crest," said David Mendell of the Chicago Tribune and author of the book, "Obama: From Promise to Power."

Once in Washington, Obama fought to cut dependence on foreign oil, provide relief for wounded soldiers and he led a successfull fight to limit the influence of lobbyists.

"A lot of the detail in terms of the disclosure provisions for lobbying really came from Obama," said Norman Ornstein of the American Enterprise Institute.

But there are some questions.

In a February debate, he said: "I said very early on I would not take PAC money. I would not take money from federal-registered lobbyists."

Not now - but he did accept at least $1.2 million from special interest political action committees for his U.S. Senate campaign. And that helped elect him.

He takes credit for battling the nuclear industry, but a plan to improve reporting of radiation leaks was watered down - by him - partly due to industry or opposition. And it never passed.

[This MSNBC.com article describes the story concerning the bill. Although it never passed, it did result in voluntary disclosure of the plants the Illinois locals affected, for now.]

Employees and officials of Exelon - one of the companies involved - contributed almost $270,000 to his presidential and Senate campaigns.

Obama is a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee - and but he's been absent a lot. He has yet to meet British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, for example, or the leaders of Germany, Russia or even Canada according to his staff.

Because he is so new to the national scene, questions persist about Obama's identity - who he really is; questions that political opponents will be only too happy to answer in the fall.

No flag pin on his lapel? No hand on his heart that once? Opponents call it unpatriotic. Is he a Muslim? The whispering persists no matter how often Obama responds.

"I've been going to the same church for 20 years, praising Jesus," Obama said.

That church is the Trinity United Church of Christ. Self-described as "unashamedly black," with an emphasis on African culture, the church has been targeted by critics who call it separatist, racist and anti-Israel.

Obama has been a member for 20 years.

"I consistently have not only befriended the Jewish community, not only have I been strong on Israel, but, more importantly, I've been willing to speak out even when its not comfortable," Obama said.

Obama has said the church's former pastor - and his spiritual leader - Jeremiah Wright, is "like an old uncle who sometimes will say things that I don't agree with."

Among Wright's pronouncements: that "racism is how this country was founded and how this country is still run."

A church-related publication saluted Nation of Islam Minister Louis Farrakhan - a well-known anti-Semite, who in turn has praised Obama's candidacy as recently as last Sunday.

It's a gesture Obama rejected Tuesday night, after some prodding.

"There's no formal offer of help from Minister Farrakhan that would involve me rejecting it," he said. "But if the word 'reject' Sen. Clinton feels is stronger than the word 'denounce,' then I'm happy to concede the point, and I would reject and denounce."

[Obama himself has explained the numerous attacks on the symbolic gestures/religion issue numerous times, most recently at the debate on February 26.]

But Obama's long association with a now-indicted developer named Tony Rezko could be a liability. An Obama fundraiser from the early '90s, Rezko goes on trial fraud next week. But his unsavory reputation was well known for years.

And it raised eyebrows when Obama and Rezko's wife, Rita, bought property next to each other on Chicago's south side on the very same day in 2005 - even though by then, Tony Rezko was on federal investigation.

No one has charged Obama with wrongdoing, something he has been quick to point out.

"Nobody has indicated that in any way ... was I connected with any of the things that he did," Obama said.

For good measure, Obama gave some $150,000 in Rezko-related campaign contributions to charity. But government watchdogs scratch their heads.

"So, what we're left with is a question of, you know, really, what was he thinking? The warning signs to stay away were very clear," said Cindy Canary of the Illinois Campaign for Political Reform.

And Obama didn't heed them?

"Sen. Obama was very slow to walk away from Tony Rezko," she said.

[This dailykos article debunks the Obama/Rezko connection, and I have included it as part of the extended post for this blog.]

Could it come back to haunt him?

"If we have problems in this campaign, I suspect it's not going to be because of mistakes I've made in the past. I think it's going to be the mistakes that I make in the future," Obama said on 60 Minutes.

His opponents will be waiting.

----

Now, concerning the Excelon/nuclear contributions, Obama really doesn't need them, and he needs to prepare himself for those attacks. McCain, Hillary, and Nader would love to attack him on that. Furthermore, he'll need to make sure that his foreign policy is not just about Israel. Middle Eastern stability requires Palestine and the rest of the Middle East to be stable; and, he needs to consider non-Middle Eastern affairs, like Kosovo/Russia/Serbia, China, North Korea, etc.

Oh, and as for Hillary's upcoming CBS: For the Record story, I'll be chiming in on that one as well! Feel free to read my extended post below.

Sorry for the long blog.

EMK

Barack Won!!!!!!!!!!!!

Scott Batchelar — Wed, 27 Feb 2008 14:23:56 EST

Last night hung out with some fellow pdx obama supporters at Claudia's Sports Pub & Grill to watch Barack and Hillary debate.

My 1st impressions this being my 1st obama/clinton debate:

A. Hillary is definitely getting frustrated and showed it last night.

B. Barack is one cool customer he did not get rattled once.

After this debate I am completely convinced that I am making the right choice in voting for Barack as we were watching the debate I realized three things,

1.) Barack as the press has said "Feels Presidential" to me that means that he speaks directly to his audience it felt like he was speaking just to me and the other individuals in our party felt the same way.

2.) As I said before and Patch pointed out Hillary felt like she was very frustrated she rarely addressed herself to the audience it seemed to me that the only audience she cared about was Barack and the moderators she became a policy wonk and didn't even try to address the audience as I watched she would sit and glare at Barack or the moderators it felt like that old Star Trek scene of daggers flying every time she looked at Barack.

3.) I have a really strong feeling that Hillary is preparing to withdraw after this debate because her body language is saying that her strategy is to keep attacking Barack, to me that is not the way to win this primary and she is using a nationally televised debate to attack Barack rather than get what she want's to do across it's all barack said this, barack said that rather than here's my ideas and what I will do.

After tonight's debate I am really happy to be a Barack Obama Supporter and I am really looking forward to the next few months working to get him into the White House.

Primary Plus

Many Hat Mom — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 07:46:26 EST

Today is the day for Wisconsin. I hope all of you Wisconsitites get out there between 7a and 8p to cast your vote... ideally for Obama, but if not, at least make your voice heard.

I will be performing two tasks this afternoon when I vote. I'll be letting my state, and the nation, know what my opinion is with regard to who I believe will be the best candidate for the future of America. In addition, I'll be considering the time a mini field trip for my teenage daughter.

Field trip, you ask? Correct. One of her subjects of study this year (we home school) is Government, and for class she has been following the Presidential process as it unfolds. So this afternoon, she will tag along with me to observe the actual voting process for our state.

If you have children, consider taking them along to observe as well. Mr. Obama has managed to spark a movement in this nation--a motivation that, as I eluded to in a previous blog entry, seems to have vanished over the years since the 1960s. I, for one, happen to feel its about time we all began voicing our thoughts again and standing up for things we believe in. We CAN make a difference!! What better way to engage our children and teach them that they DO have a voice, than taking them along with us to get a taste of how this process works.

"Vote like you OWN the place!!"

Why I feel Obama's the right person for America

Joseph from Highland Park, MI — Fri, 15 Feb 2008 04:22:56 EST

It is so nice to see so many supporters of Obama. Many which are from all backgrounds. We see people already uniting just to support him because he is supporting us. Obama is views are shared dreams of us all who want change. Life is not easy today. It's not fare! To see him so inspired in what he say I see hope. So to see the support I see hope ahead. It will not be easy but we know our voices are atleast heard.

What Obama seems to bring is peace,unity,fareness,respect,honesty,trust,forgiveness, and strength. The list gose on. He has mentioned his faults and the media ran with it trying to knock him into dispare but what dose Obama do? He bounce back spite everything. That's strength showing already. He admits faults and that shows honesty! No ones perfect and we learn from our mistakes. He sure didn't go downhill from his past use of drugs. Now to admit that and not hide it knowing it may hurt you later, shows truth! Obama also would like to see people come together on a common ground, shows the man wants unity! We are the United States with so many people of all backgrounds etc. So to unite the people unite the states then later and who knows?? Things like this help prevent problems.

Obama is not making grouped statements like Hillary saying she is a "Champion for women"! This is not a gender thing for one! We are talking about people in general! Is she just fighting to be the first women to be president or for the people???Obama sounds like a Champion for all people! He has not said he is doing it all for self! He is of both worlds! So it is not abot being the first African American to run the White House! Obama respect women and mentioned it publicly! His mother raised him after his father left when he was young. His mother is white and father black but he respect both and honored both because they brought him into the world from the love they had for each other! He is for all people and not a curtain type of people or whatever some may want to think that is against him.They make color an issue is some papers.

Why Obama for me

Ron — Wed, 13 Feb 2008 13:38:17 EST

first of all, if you want to have a better idea of who you are voting for, I would highly recommend this website:

http://www.youdecide2008.com/2007/06/13/full-2008-debate-schedule-from-dnc-and-gop/

from this site you can watch any debate from the GOP ("Grand 'ol Party" - Republicans) and the Democrats. if you are truly interested in spending a little time getting to know the character and policies of these candidates i would recommend the last two debates from the Democrats and the last GOP debate.

Obama and Clinton are very similar in policy, but their records differ, their judgment differs, and their ability to gather a working coalition of people to affect change differs. Very obviously, i support Barack; i'll tell you why, starting with policy, concluding with character.

On Policy: HEALTH CARE
He has better ideas than Clinton on Health Care, his plan is not only more economically secure for the people it is intended to help, but also, the money that would be needed to implement his plan is accounted for and, unlike Clintons plan, would be immediately available to stay out of the red (Clintons plan accounts for the costs over time, her plan would start out in the red and would stay there for a few, if not more, years).

FOREIGN POLICY
On foreign policy, Hillary is similar to Barack except he would use up close diplomacy, she would moderate from a safe distance, talking via advisors or staff. as we know in the real world in almost any situation, info is better straight from the source, it also increases credibility and effectiveness for all those concerned.

IMMIGRATION
On immigration they are similar on as well, both have nearly identical and well thought out plans, but they differ here: Barack would allow illegal immigrants drivers licenses, a "judgment call", he said in the debate on Thursday night. He feels, and i agree, that this would lessen occurrences like hit and run car accidents, and would give a name to the nameless (for all you die hard conservatives, this is not amnesty, this is humanity and common sense). everyone living here needs a means of identification and to not grant that is to say, "we're reforming the system so you can eventually become a citizen, but until then just remain nameless and faceless." on average it takes a legal immigrant from 10-16 years to receive citizenship, how long do you think this illegal immigrant would be here without identification? as both Barack and Hillary have laid out in their plans, we will put people on "a pathway to citizenship", there is no reason to not allow these people to be identified. it's simply a matter of safely coexisting in a progressive and transformative time and promoting honesty in all levels of humanity.

QUICKLY, ON CHARACTER:
I support Barack Obama because he has the uncanny and elusive political ability to get people who don't normally want to work together, to work together. For some reason, he has not only inspired me and people like me, but also his peers democrat and republican, and people of all different backgrounds from rich to poor, old to young. He is the only one who will be able to get together the great minds of this country and tackle the problems that face it in an intelligent and tactful way. He has good judgement, he will listen to the american people and to both the critics and the advocates of each issue and make good decisions based on balanced perspective, always with the idea in mind of making the system better.

he has inspired me to be better, to reach out to people in a way that i wouldn't normally, inspired me to reach higher. I can't say this is true of any other candidate, sports star, famous actor, or musician. because of this, Barack Obama has become my first hero. the realization he has given me that i too, can bring about change, that through an effort no matter how big or small, any one of us can make a big beautiful difference in the lives of those around us.

that's all i'll leave you with for now... :)

Thoughts on the American Governmental Dillema: Why Obama Matters

Owen Watson — Tue, 12 Feb 2008 00:19:36 EST

Modern American politics is in shambles. The carefully designed checks and balances that were once proudly seen as a hallmark of an incorruptible system have become the very reason why nothing gets done in Washington. The monopoly of power that the executive branch embodies has squeezed the indispensable need of dialogue between the three branches out, and partisanship has reached a point where party comes before country, where the loyalty and acceptance of one’s peers is more important than the loyalty to one’s own morals and beliefs. The system is broken. Anyone who seeks to venture across the aisle and work with members of the other party are called naive - misunderstanding of the way things work. In a government that for many years has ceased to function in the way it was intended, progress is at a premium, and hope more than often turns into hopelessness.

Therefore it comes as a surprise that there has risen a voice echoing those of John F. Kennedy, Bobby Kennedy, and Martin Luther King Jr. He is Barack Obama, and by this time next year he very well may be the President. That he is compared to some of the most seminal figures in American politics is no coincidence; speaking with a steady hopefulness and verve, Obama harkens back to a time when politics was more than just an arena for the bandying of empty words and promises. Preaching the empowerment of the individual citizen, he aims to revitalize the democratic process by way of the inclusion of “us”. It is an acceptance of a politics of idealism instead of cynicism, a notion that the people of this nation still have the power to affect meaningful change in our government. As he so often puts forth, “There is no conservative America, there is no liberal America, there is only the United States of America”. Such a vision may seem naive, but with leaders that for seven long years have told us only what we cannot do, it is refreshing to have one that tells us what we can. With America in dire need of sound judgement and a positive stance on foreign policy, Obama is one of the few that has stepped up to meet that call.

Before change became the buzzword of both parties’ fierce nominating races, the Obama campaign was purveying a message of hope. In terms of his differences with Hillary Clinton, the main one lies in their ideological approaches: policy wise, the two both have strong health care plans, strategies for withdrawal from Iraq, and comparable ideas on the economy. It is the way these policies are construed that strongly separate the candidates - Clinton, though a good public speaker and servant, simply cannot convey the message of (here it is again) change and hopefulness that Obama can.

An Obama presidency will steer this nation back to a place where the dreams and determination of a few can fuel the possibilities of the many, where the government is responsible for its actions and aides in methods of transparency, and where America can once again be respected in the eyes of the world’s leaders. In a political realm that too often emphasizes differences, Obama touts our collective similarities. America as a nation has no better chance for change than now, and so many feel that waiting even four more years could be too long. Speaking to a packed civic center in Hartford on February 4th, Obama quipped about his decision to run in 2008 and invoked Martin Luther King Jr’s. idea of “the fierce urgency of now” to the 17,000 assembled there: “They will tell you that ‘we have to season and stew him a little bit more and boil the hope out of him’”. Knowing Washington right now, he might be right - any longer in the Senate, and that hope that America so dearly needs could be gone.

My Support for Barack Obama Goes Beyond Party Lines: Why Obama, Why I Blogged, and Which People Could Be an Asset to His Cabinet.

EMK — Thu, 07 Feb 2008 19:17:22 EST

One important note before I begin: I am an independent with no party affiliation.

My support for Obama began when I first saw him on Oprah when she was trying to convince Obama to run for president on her show. This was even before he announced his candidacy. In essence, he had my vote before he even started campaigning. I could sense an "aura" about him on that show. When I did the "Candidate Matrix" on MSNBC, I had to read the websites to rate the candidates; and, that was how I came to realize the hollistic, well-described points Obama had made, as well as the source of that "aura." After regretting not voting for Al Gore in 2000 (because my parents said that "voting was against our religion"), and not being able to get my voter registration in on time for the 2004 elections, I felt that I had to vote to stop more injustice.

After having a ominous feeling concerning the NH results, I saw blog posts concerning potential election fraud, confirming my concern, as well as spport for suspect issues concerning NV. That was when I logged on to the Obama webpage, blogging, and emailing.

I wouldn't care if Obama ran as an independent, so I am willing to vote for him in this situation, but I don't want him to be Hillary's VP choice because all that will do is to make him a puppet of the Billary campaign, and weaken his message of change since it will make him subservient to Billary.

Furthermore, I would like to see an Obama cabinet with a mix of political parties (not just Democrats and Republicans). So mixing his cabinet members with people like Dennis Kucinnich, John Edwards, Ron Paul, Al Gore, Ralph Nader, and some open-minded third party and independent people will help alter the tracks of this country and the world.

Call me crazy, but this could be the start of something interesting. Got opinions?

EMK

Super Tuesday!!! IMO

Bigpoppa4674 — Tue, 05 Feb 2008 21:28:21 EST

I am sitting here pretty nervous.... I am watching the states split and and deligates go all over the place. I have worked pretty hard speaking the issues and getting fence people to lean on the Obama side. I consider myself a facilitator of sorts for hope. I am a Cheerleader for Obama(wait that didn't sound right). Ok, I am one of those Manly musclebound guys who catches and throws the girls up and around (ok, that's better). If Hillary cries anymore she will need to hire a tissue keeper to follow her around, wait she already had Bill, nevermind. I want strong confident leadership that knows what they want for their constituancy! The people is what Barak wants successful, HOW CAN YOU NOT VOTE FOR THAT CANDIDATE!! I digress.... I sometimes tend to get off track. A.D.D. slightly, If you still have the oppertunity to vote GO...Go NOW!! My states votes don't count, so I need you to make it up! Let's do this thing. Hope is alive again and his name is.....Barak Obama!

Experience that Matters

Paul from Washington, DC — Mon, 04 Feb 2008 23:07:56 EST

Pundits argue that while Senator Obama’s message of “change” is stirring, his message lacks specificity. Frank Rich offered an insightful commentary on this criticism in today's New York Times. He pointed out that once upon a time, John F. Kennedy faced the same criticism in his bid to become President of the United States.

Quoting Kennedy’s speechwriter, Richard Goodwin, Rich juxtaposed Kennedy’s and Obama’s messages. Rich quoted Goodwin as saying that Kennedy “-had to touch the secret fears and ambivalent longings of the American heart, divine and speak to the desires of a swiftly changing nation — his message grounded on his own intuition of some vague and spreading desire for national renewal.”

Yet Obama is not really taking a stab in the dark with his “change” platform. Senator Obama offers common sense answers to a set of very glaring questions Americans are asking. In this Presidential election cycle, Americans are asking: which candidate will best inspire a nation long detached from its national sense of itself and its common sense, and traumatized and disillusioned by a politics of fear and cynicism, to take control of its destiny and its government, and work together to restore that nation’s prosperity, security, and prestige? Americans are also seriously asking whether Senator Obama is the right candidate for the job.

Voters realize that experience is only useful if it is shaped by a positive and highly functioning political milieu. Experience in managing a broken system is not the kind of experience America needs to move forward. The American voter is looking for a new kind of leadership, shaped by the experiences of grassroots Americans and anchored by a fundamental realization that, once united, the American people are the best caretakers of America’s prosperity, security, and prestige.

Voters realize that America is not beset by an external threat. Government is the problem and fixing it is the answer. Government lacks transparency and our leaders have, as Alexander Hamilton once wrote, “abused the confidence they possessed; and assuming pretext of some public motive, have... scrupled to sacrifice the national tranquility to personal advantage or personal gratification." Coextensive with this era of division, obfuscation, and manipulation has been the steady decline of the political and economic power of the American middle class.

One overarching systemic solution Senator Obama proposes is to use our nation’s technological genius to provide transparency in government and public access to the legislative and policy-making apparatus in Washington. In that vein, he also proposes to reduce the burden health care costs and taxes on the American people, to not only stimulate investment, but to also foster activism.

However, the critical and urgent need of our time is not a set of policy proposals or a Washington insider to devise these. Good ideas and solutions abound in America’s policy circles. The fundamental problem the American people face is that our leaders divide us to eke out enough support to win elections, but not enough support to reach a working majority and consensus to get things done in Washington. Senator Obama expresses and lives the solution to that problem.

WALL STREET JOURNAL: Decline of the Angry Left

Dr. Susanne Hussein Freeborn — Sat, 02 Feb 2008 04:17:59 EST

CommentaryBy DAN GERSTEIN
February 2, 2008

Last Saturday's South Carolina Democratic primary will probably be remembered as the day when the party's emotional dam burst and many of the personal grievances and tensions that have built up over the past generation spilled out into the open -- unleashing a cascading series of freighted squabbles starring a who's who of post-Reagan Democrats (Ted Kennedy, Jesse Jackson, John Kerry and of course Bill Clinton).

That's a shame, not just because it undermined the feel-good storyline of party unity, but more because it overshadowed a fateful statement South Carolina's Democrats made by embracing Barack Obama and exiting John Edwards out of the race. Indeed, at the exact moment their party leaders were loudly replaying the psychodramas of the 1990s (and to some extent the '60s), voters of both races were quietly resolving the pre-eminent conflict of the party's present -- between the politics of hope and the politics of Kos. (That being the Daily Kos, the nation's most influential liberal blog and the left's poster child for partisan pugnacity.)

This conflict is not about ideology but about style. The truth is, over the past several years Democrats have bridged or buried most of the major issue splits that hobbled the party in the past, as evidenced by the absence of big policy debates in this campaign. That's left us to stew, particularly in the wake of John Kerry's embittering loss in 2004, over how we fight the other side. There is a clear generational split.

The Kossacks and their activist allies -- who skew toward the Boomers -- believe that Republicans are venal bordering on evil, and that the way Democrats will win elections and hold power is to one-up Karl Rove's divisive, bare-knuckled tactics. Their opponents within the party -- who skew younger and freer of culture war wounds -- believe that the way to win is offer voters a break from this poisonous tribal warfare and a compelling, inclusive vision for where we want to take the country.

The country got an initial taste of this tactical tussle in 2006 when the Lieberman-Lamont Senate campaign in Connecticut went national -- and an initial test of the relative merits in the general-election portion of that race (in which I was Joe Lieberman's communications director).

With a discredited Republican candidate in the race, the choice came down to two Democrats who actually agreed on most issues outside of Iraq, but differed on the kind of change we need in Washington. Mr. Lieberman called for a new politics of unity and purpose; Mr. Lamont mostly called for Messrs. Bush's and Lieberman's heads.

The hope candidate soundly beat the Kos candidate -- Kos actually taped a commercial for Lamont -- by 10 points. More importantly, Mr. Lieberman won independents (the biggest voting bloc in the state) by 19 points, which is all the more remarkable because they opposed the war by a margin of 65%-29%.

This year's Democratic nominating battle is a far better barometer of the respective generational approaches within the party. That's because it is happening within the context of a true intra-party competition, there is no real disagreement on Iraq or any other core issue, and there is no incumbent. Not least of all, the two young attractive change candidates (Edwards and Obama) running against the establishment candidate (Hillary Clinton) have been offering opposite conceptions of change.

Mr. Edwards, after running as the sunny son of a mill worker in 2004, returned last year as the angry spear carrier of the hard-line left, running on a dark, conspiratorial form of populism and swapping in corporations for Republicans as the villain in his us-versus-them construct. Mr. Obama, on the other hand, has not just been selling possibilities and opportunities, but reconciliation and unity -- and, god forbid, promising to work with Republicans to meet the country's challenges. (Not surprisingly, throughout 2007, Mr. Edwards was the runaway favorite in the regular Kos reader straw poll -- besting Mr. Obama by 21 points as late as Jan. 2, 2008.)

Now that Mr. Edwards has formally dropped out of the race, we can say it's official -- hope and unity crushed resentment and division.

Iowa was perfectly set up for Mr. Edwards -- caucus format instead of primary, tilted heavily left, overwhelming white and rural, and a two-year head start in building an organization. But he lost by a healthy eight points to a black candidate, who, despite his rhetorical gifts and Oprah endorsement, came in less tested and less known. In New Hampshire, another overwhelmingly white state, he lost to Mr. Obama by 20 points.

The outcome in South Carolina was the most telling -- and arguably put the last nail in the coffin of Kos-ism. This was the state where Mr. Edwards and his drawl were born. This was the state he won by 15 points in 2004, even after losing Iowa and New Hampshire to John Kerry. And this was a state that was ostensibly most amenable to his arguments about being the most electable Democrat in red states. Yet Mr. Edwards was rejected by voters across the board, failing to win even a majority of the white vote (40%).

There is no question that Mr. Obama's margin in South Carolina was due in part to the racial makeup of the electorate. But to judge the relative strength of their respective messages, it pays to look at how the candidates did with voters of the other race.

Mr. Obama won 24% of white voters in this former bastion of the Confederacy -- 12 times the 2% share of black voters Mr. Edwards claimed. And the clear majority of those white Obama voters were under 30, a sign that the tide is turning toward Mr. Obama's cross-cultural politics even in the Old South.

Moreover, it bears noting that as late as mid-December, Mr. Obama was running even with Mrs. Clinton among black voters in South Carolina. He ended up beating her 78%-19%. That kind of seismic shift does not happen because of a few off-putting remarks by Bill Clinton or because Mr. Obama is a "celebrity" (Mr. Edwards's favored rationalization). Mr. Obama had to affirmatively sway a good chunk of that vote.

This analysis will likely be seen as a bit of grave-dancing on my part, given that I have been an occasional target of the wrath of Kos. But while I am troubled by their hostile, hyper-partisan tendencies, I think the Kossacks have at their best made enormous contributions to the party over the last few years -- most noticeably by stiffening the Washington establishment's spine in confronting President Bush and energizing and organizing the base. One could credibly argue, in fact, that Mr. Obama would not be in the position to inspire the base if Kos and his allies had not first helped to get them "fired up, ready to go."

In this, you might say that Mr. Obama did not kill Kos-ism so much as co-opt it -- by harnessing its most powerful forces and channeling it in a more constructive, convincing direction for a new political moment. He recognized early on that the primary electorate was changing in the wake of Mr. Bush's departure, and that it was hungry (post-Boomer voters in particular) for something bigger and better than the same polarization wrapped in a blue ribbon.

The signs of change are unmistakable. Over the last year, the Kossacks themselves seemed to be waning -- the number of monthly page views on the site is down dramatically.

Moreover, in the last few weeks they and their avatars have been flocking to the great reconciler. First Ned Lamont endorsed Mr. Obama, a mentee of Mr. Lieberman in the Senate. Then on Wednesday, in the first Daily Kos straw poll after Mr. Edwards left the race, Mr. Obama beat Mrs. Clinton by 76%-11% (a result inflated by the Netroots' unbreakable contempt for Hillary). Just yesterday, MoveOn.org gave its formal blessing to the "post-partisan" candidate.

The best evidence that Kos-ism is about kaput, though, comes from Kos's mouth himself. Yes, the most delicious irony of this campaign is that the supposed hatemonger is supporting the hopemonger.

Seeing the writing on the wall, as well as on his own blog, Markos Moulitsas -- Kos himself -- rejected the candidacy he himself helped spawn and announced (albeit grudgingly) on Dec. 12 that he would be voting for Mr. Obama via "a process of elimination."

Not exactly the most graceful concession, but the import is undeniable: Hope trumped Kos for Democrats. Now let's see what it will do for the rest of the country.

Mr. Gerstein, a senior adviser on Sen. Joe Lieberman's vice presidential and presidential campaigns, is a Democratic strategist and political commentator based in New York.

Leaders and their word...

Paul from Washington, DC — Tue, 29 Jan 2008 22:48:22 EST

During the 1988 Republican National Convention, George H. Bush pledged that he would not institute new taxes. In 1990, Bush raised taxes and alienated his base, resulting in part, in his defeat in the 1992 Presidential election to Bill Clinton.

Senator Hillary Clinton, along with Senator Obama and John Edwards agreed with the Democratic National Committee that Florida and Michigan would not receive any delegates for the national convention because of scheduling disputes. The Democratic candidates agreed not to campaign in Florida and Michigan.

Reeling from losses in Iowa and South Carolina, Senator Clinton skirted the meaning and spirit of the Democratic Party’s sanction on those states. She spun the results as victories, recently arguing that Florida’s delegates should be seated at the convention later this year.

Throughout the primaries, Senator Clinton demonstrated an inveterate inclination to straddle the boundaries of propriety and truthfulness. Surely the voters on Super Duper Tuesday will have to ask: can we trust her?

Barack Obama: The Best Candidate for U.S Foreign Policy

Barbara C. — Mon, 28 Jan 2008 22:29:16 EST

Most people would probably agree that any President of the United States needs skills in foreign diplomacy. The urgency of this necessity today cannot be overstated. Our relations with the world have been damaged by the current administration. We can no longer take the “bully” approach that the present administration has often exerted when it didn’t get its way. This is precisely one of the reasons that we have lost respect in the eyes of many from other countries. The “bully” approach doesn’t work: it alienates us from nations that once were our allies, creates new enemies, strengthens existing anti-American sentiments and creates fear and intimidation which can lend itself to more conflicts, including war. We clearly need a leader with the strength to negotiate, lead, inspire and work effectively with the diversity of today’s governments and their leaders. We need a leader who can bring back respect to our country, while pursuing the resolution of conflicts, and promoting peace through cooperative and collaborative efforts. We need a leader who can communicate effectively with cultures different from our own. I believe that the best leader for our country is Barack Obama.

I’ve heard some people claim that Barack Obama’s has less foreign policy experience than his opponents. I strongly disagree with this sentiment. In my opinion, Barack Obama is the only candidate with the experience that counts when it’s needed the most: in times of disagreements, conflicts and misunderstandings.

So what are the characteristics and qualities that Barack Obama has to lead us in foreign affairs? First of all, he has a willingness to sit down and listen with those who are on opposing sides. This is a giant first step in opening a door that has been too often closed by the current administration. He will not try to “bully” the parties into accepting the notion of “our way or the highway” notion of politics. This will help restore respect for our country by starting a dialogue, which is a necessary first step.

Secondly, he has the experience in effectively bringing together diverse points of view for a common cause, His leadership as one of the sponsors of a bipartisan bill in the Illinois State Senate on the Gift Ban Act (a major ethics bill) is no small accomplishment! In addition, his campaign clearly shows that he is able to deliver a message of hope for people from diverse walks of life: young and old, rich and poor, across all the major political parties, racial and ethnic lines, urban and rural, and the working class and the elite.

Third, he has the cultural competencies needed to diplomatically lead our country and the world. As an international educator for over 25 years, I know that a significant experience living, studying or working abroad can open our minds and hearts to others so very different than ourselves. It can introduce us to new views, behaviors and attitudes while developing skills that can effectively communicate with these differences. Strong, significant experiences abroad develop strong cultural competencies in a person that allows one to communicate effectively across cultures. This paves the way for diplomatic leadership. The same can be true for people growing up in bicultural and biracial families. Barack Obama has all of these life experiences.

It is precisely the area of significant cross-cultural experience where I believe that Barack Obama stands out from the other Presidential candidates. Barack’s foreign experiences and with diverse cultures here in the U.S. was gained as he was growing up and over significant periods of time. This is different than someone who has visited a lot of foreign countries, perhaps in the political or touristic context. While exposure to other countries and cultures can be instrumental in helping us to truly see another person’s point of view, the context and the length of time in a foreign country help determine one’s ability to learn the skills to effectively deal with the situations that arise due to differences. Living in a foreign country exposes a person to the everyday life of that place, even if one lives in homes with other Americans or with other foreigners. It forces us to be exposed to other points of views and to learn valuable cross-cultural skills that can improve our perceptions about what is really happening, improve communication and overall understanding. Barack’s experience in this area truly shines above all the rest.

His father was from Kenya, married to a white woman from Kansas. Barack grew up in Hawaii, and spent several years in Indonesia. While there, he attended school, where significant social skills are developed. In addition, he is bicultural, biracial and his stepfather was Indonesian as well. All of these life experiences truly make him stand out from the usual political candidates we are used to seeing and are one of the main reasons I believe he is the best candidate for the U.S. Presidency. He has demonstrated skills in cross-cultural competencies, which give me hope for real change.

Finally, Barack Obama supports causes that are in sound agreement with international diplomacy and understanding. He was against the war in Iraq from the beginning, at a time when it was not so politically popular to do so. Currently, he is one of several co-sponsors of the bipartisan Senator Paul Simon Bill Foundation (S. 991) in the Senate. The bill seeks to establish a foundation in the late Senator Simon’s name to promote study abroad programs for U.S. students.

As an international educator, it is well known in the field the importance that both bringing foreign students and scholars to the U.S. and sending U.S. students abroad play in our U.S. foreign policy. Many of the foreign students and scholars develop positive images of the U.S. and go home to be leaders in their fields, if not their countries. U.S. students learn valuable cross-cultural skills and knowledge from their study abroad experiences which make them valuable and competitive leaders. We need more international educational exchange for the future of our planet, and the younger, the better.

As one of the co-sponsors of this bill, Barack understands the importance that international educational exchange plays in our planet’s future. I am proud to see his name attached to that bill, and know deep in my heart that he truly understands the importance of international education as part of a sound, foreign affairs policy.

We need more leaders like Barack Obama: leaders who can lead diplomatically, intelligently and respectfully in all kinds of conditions. Won’t you join me in supporting him on February 5th?

The American Political Equation...

Paul from Washington, DC — Mon, 28 Jan 2008 20:56:16 EST

What exactly are the competing visions of the Democratic and Republican Parties? What defines the parties? What is the American political power equation? What is the difference in social, political, and moral potentiality between the Democratic Party and the Republican Party? Are these questions even relevant if, as a nation, we cannot move forward on the basis of our competing identities?

We presume to define the parties according to their essential qualities (liberal and conservative), but it's not at all clear that these qualities are accurately attributed. Upon close examination, it appears that Democrats and Republicans are not absolutely liberal or conservative respectively.

Conservatism is exclusively a Republican motif and liberal is not exclusively a Democratic stigma. Conservatism is a political movement that checks or constrains challenges to the status quo. Liberalism is a political movement to cultivate change through a dialectical process. Historically, both sides have been conservative and liberal when it suited them.

What truly define us are not these labels. What define us are our interests, and what makes our nation strong is our willingness to find our shared interests and to form coalitions to solve problems and make progress. We will not solve our shared problems or make progress, if we let our identities negate our potential to unify.

HUFFINGTON POST: Bill Clinton: Take a Vacation

Dr. Susanne Hussein Freeborn — Sat, 26 Jan 2008 03:48:31 EST

Robert Guttman

If ever someone needed to take a vacation and leave the campaign trail it is the former president of the United States Bill Clinton.

If the Democratic Party wants to have any hope of being a united party in November party leaders -- other than the leader of the party -- Bill Clinton -- need to tell Hillary's husband that he is doing much more harm than good to the Democratic Party by his remarks against Obama.

If the two term former president wants to keep his excellent post-presidency reputation intact he should go back to his philanthropic activities and his business at his presidential library and the Clinton Initiative programs.

If the first serious woman running for president of the United States wants to prove she can win the White House on her own merit she should tell her husband to move to Sweden or some other country far away from upcoming primary states.

If the Democratic presidential contest is not to drift down to its lowest level about who was friends with what slum landlord or who was on this or that board of directors of unpopular corporations then Bill Clinton should find a hobby other than politics.

If Democrats don't want to give away their high ground -- after all they are not the party with the unpopular president currently in the White House -- they should all encourage Hillary's husband to exit stage left.

The overall tone of the Democratic presidential campaign has gone downhill since the 42nd president of the United States started taking such an active--and mainly, negative role--in the campaign.

The discussion has gone away from the key issues of the day from Iraq to solving the housing crisis and other economic ills to name calling and arguing over really nothing at all in order only to score political points.

William Jefferson Clinton is an astute politician, probably one of the best political minds in the past fifty years, who appears to have lost his exceptional skills campaigning for his wife.

It now looks as if President Clinton's remarks and actions are helping his wife's main opponent, Senator Obama. It is very unfair for Obama to have to respond to two Clintons these days. After all, it is Hillary that is the one running for president. This is rapidly being lost as the former president continues to give talks discussing the "glory days" of his presidency.

If Hillary and the others are using the the word "change" in every other sentence having your spouse talk about going back to the days of his presidency in the 1990s certainly is not change. And, it is not experience to talk about your husband's presidency either.

Hillary is being overshadowed by her husband on the campaign trail. We are not going to be voting for a return to a Bill Clinton presidency. Hillary has to explain how she will provide "change" for the country. Having a spouse talking about the past isn't going to do it for her.

And, having a spouse who is taking away from her message on the economy and foreign policy issues is petty and demeaning for a former president of the United States.

Watching the Clintons one wonders how much they really want power to help the country or how much they really want power to have power again.

Now that the former president has interjected himself front and center in the campaign of his wife it is time for voters to ask what role will he play in her White House if she is elected.

America actually can survive without a Bush or Clinton in the White House. Voters realize it is time for a change -- hopefully both Clintons will wake up to the fact that we aren't voting for a restoration of Bill's presidency but voting for a candidate with new ideas of his or her own.

Bill, go to Sweden or Hong Kong or somewhere far away from the campaign trail and let your wife run for president on her own. The other candidates seem to be doing just fine running on their own. Hillary, go out on the campaign trail without Bill and battle Obama and Edwards on your own.

Hillary, if you can't win against your Democratic opponents on your own how do you hope to beat your Republican opponent in the fall if you get the nomination.

As a voter, I want to vote for only one person for president--not a husband and wife team to occupy the Oval Office!

WASHINGTON POST: Now or Never for Obama, David Broder

Dr. Susanne Hussein Freeborn — Wed, 23 Jan 2008 05:40:51 EST

By David S. Broder
Wednesday, January 23, 2008; A19

COLUMBIA, S.C. -- South Carolina has become a must-win state for Barack Obama.

Whatever the outcome of Saturday's Democratic presidential primary here, the Illinois senator has the money and the organization to compete in the nearly two dozen states voting on Feb. 5.

But as his first and only victory, in Iowa on Jan. 3, slips further into history, his strategists concede that Obama badly needs to demonstrate broad enough support to slow Hillary Clinton's progress toward the nomination.

Having trailed her in popular votes in both New Hampshire and Nevada, where he was favored, Obama finds himself more in need of help than he perhaps expected from the voters here.

This state offers him many advantages he will not enjoy automatically when the competition moves to California, New York, New Jersey and other delegate-rich states next month.

The African American vote is a larger percentage of the Democratic electorate here -- perhaps half the total -- than in any of those states, and even Clinton supporters credit Obama with having the best field organization on the ground. Clinton has switched her South Carolina leadership several times, while Obama has had steady and impressive local management.

This is also the state where John Edwards won in 2004 -- and is perhaps the last place where the native son can be expected to siphon off a significant number of white votes this year, simplifying the math for an Obama victory in a state where racial polarization often prevails.

For all these reasons, anything other than an Obama victory on Saturday would represent a significant setback to his long-term prospects, while Clinton has built-in alibis for a possible loss.

The stakes may explain why tensions became so obvious during the Monday night debate in Myrtle Beach, with Clinton and Obama accusing each other of distorting the record and falsifying their own voting histories.

Their exchanges were personal and angry. He referred to her as a corporate lawyer who had served as a director for Wal-Mart, a company with an anti-union reputation. She shot back that he had been a lawyer for a reputed Chicago slumlord. Any thought that these two might someday team up as a Democratic ticket vanished into the night.

Edwards seemed stunned by the ferocity of the other two but took advantage of the situation by landing some punches of his own on both. He sided with Clinton on health care but reinforced Obama's contentions on campaign finance, special interests and Social Security, only to switch and join Clinton in questioning why Obama had voted "present" so often in the Illinois legislature.

No one came out unscathed, but Edwards probably fared best, raising the possibility that he could split the white vote with Clinton and, ironically, thereby help Obama.

But all that is down the road from South Carolina. For now, Clinton and her husband, the former president, have gotten inside Obama's head and rattled his composure. Obama seemed unusually defensive in his speech here Sunday evening, launching the final burst of campaigning in the state.

He deviated from his standard "time for a change" and invocation of hope to deliver a point-by-point rebuttal to the arguments that have come from the Clinton campaign since they recognized his threat in Iowa. He ripped Clinton by name for her hypocrisy in supporting a bankruptcy bill and then saying she hoped it would not become law. That, he said, is the kind of double-talk his critics would like him to learn -- but which he said he scorns.

He also accused her of distorting his position on Social Security, by describing his support for raising the ceiling on payroll taxes above the current $102,000 a year as "a trillion-dollar tax increase." He said that it would hit only the top 4 percent of earners.

And he also sought to dispose of complaints from both Clinton and Edwards about his favorable comments to a Nevada newspaper about Ronald Reagan -- disclaiming any idea that he embraced Reagan's economic or social policy and arguing that he wanted only to emulate Reagan's ability to win support from voters aligned with the other party.

While he was on his defensive spiel, Obama also urged people to ignore "crazy" rumors that he was Muslim, not Christian, or ever failed to recite the Pledge of Allegiance or take his oath to uphold the Constitution.

Many of those same points came up again in the Monday night debate, where the audience seemed sympathetic to Obama's answers. He has to hope that he is not misreading the South Carolina electorate, because a rejection here would be bad news indeed for Obama.

davidbroder@washpost.com

Hearing is not Listening (Rooted in the Reality of Now)

Matthew Fiori — Wed, 23 Jan 2008 01:33:26 EST

Apology to the Obama organization for breaking the rules on day one.

This is for me. It is a way to help me understand my mind. If anyone else gets anything out of it great. It's nice to have the luxury i.e. not to be in the position that Mr. Obama is in where everyone without exception is expected to get something out of everything that he has to say. Thank you to the Obama campaign for making this space possible.

Part I Looking is not Seeing, Hearing is not Listening ('my opinion' is not 'our reality' or 'The TRUTH' either)

Have we as a society come to be so blatantly abusive of the English language that we no longer see any distinction between the 'truth of my opinion' and the truth as a description of anything which is observable by other human beings? In this particular instance, in the campaign for the job of president of the United States of America, if something is to be labeled as true or the truth, it must be true for 300 million Americans, not half of them and certainly not for one of them as we shall see evidenced below.

The grand furor of the last four or five days as far as i can see, relates to this distinction and the ability or lack thereof for some of the individuals involved in this campaign. Of course, any opinion that i hold on any subject is going to be true for me. When it comes to the 300+million Americans that will depend on the winner of this election for leadership on the other hand, the truth, when the word is used must be used in reference to observable reliable repeatable evidence equally valid for all.

If you look back at the record, you should be able to find evidence that the definition of individual words in the English language is something that Mr. Clinton delights in creating to fit the moment. The beauty of the internet is that if you take enough time, you can find the truth or at least you can find out that what is claimed to be the truth is often opinion. Here are a couple of links to publicly posted accounts of things that apparently either have slipped the collective mind of America or have fallen into that crazy classification of selective memory removal. Either way, it should be clear to anyone who can read, that what appears to be the truth for Mr. Clinton is not always true in the sense of the most commonly accepted definition of true.

Well, please do not accept what I have to say as the truth, find out for yourself. Let me just take a moment to say that in all likelihood, every one of us has had this experience where we confused our opinion with the truth. I know that I certainly have on occasions too numerous to mention or remember. Let me also offer a possible explanation for how it may become a 'blind spot' just as real as the one that we all have in our true vision which is filled in by the amazing fact correcting mechanism of the brain.

Learn about that here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blind_spot_%28vision%29

Perhaps when one spends most of one's time 'visioning' a future which is radically different from the reality of now, the pseudo-apparent reality of those visions takes on the appearance of reality. The vision becomes a thing that can be believed just as vividly as any other thing for which there is no proof of non existence is believable. Clearly there is no fault in practicing the art of creating a vision of the future which is executable in a positive way for the benefit of mankind. And clearly, in order to change anything, one must possess as much factual information about how things actually are right now before any real beneficial change can begin to take place. So I offer this as a thought experiment, Is it simply this blurring of a visioning of a future with the reality of the past that has caused the downfall of so many in history who have attained power and then either self-destructed or in the worst cases, caused an incredible amount of destruction before self-destructing? That, I believe is an important issue for the American people to begin to understand.

I will close this up with a couple of comments below the links on how it appears to me (aka the truth in my mind) that Mr. Obama can use the coming days and months of energy expended by the Clinton campaign to his advantage.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clinton_impeachment

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lewinsky_scandal

A Zen Theory of Bill Clinton's Meltdown

Paul from Washington, DC — Tue, 22 Jan 2008 20:32:49 EST

Attachment is a path to anger and suffering. First you want something. People, competing interests, or even you, get in the way of you getting what you want. You become angry with people, competing interests, or even yourself. You strike out against people, competing interests, or even yourself and initiate a hurtful cycle of conflict.

Contrasted with Senator Obama’s shared journey to the presidency with the American people, the Clinton’s current push for the White House is a “personal” journey to redemption. President Bill Clinton’s personal stake in the outcome goes beyond spousal devotion. His passion seems fueled by anger over what he has lost for himself, Al Gore, and more significantly, his wife.

While he has done well in reshaping and rescuing his legacy after leaving office, President Bill Clinton lost much of the goodwill he should have had. His presidency should have been the bedrock of a Clinton-Gore dynasty, culminating in the election of his wife as President of the United States in 2008. Instead, it was the spark that fueled the last hurrah of the Republican base.

President Clinton wanted a great presidential legacy but had to settle for something less. The so-called “vast right-wing conspiracy” exposed his moral failings and likely damaged the presidential aspirations of his political associates, and worse, may have compromised his wife’s aspirations for the White House. The Clintons' many controversies were seriously damaging to the Democratic Party and the presidencies of both Al Gore and John Kerry.

President Bill Clinton is angry with his political opponents and with himself for jeopardizing what he and his wife deeply want: a political dynasty. Bill Clinton's anger should be a clear warning to the American people that a Hillary Clinton Democratic Party nomination would be another glorious chapter in the political life of the Clintons, and not a benchmark in America's march to healing, unity, and full democratization.

Looking to the future…

Paul from Washington, DC — Sun, 20 Jan 2008 12:08:39 EST

If you believe in the primacy of reason over fear and bigotry, you believe that the realization of our greatest hopes and aspirations is found in the future. The loci of discreet forms of bigotry are found in the past even as new forms are created in the present.

The tentacles of past bigotry can reach into the present and pull us back. Those who are frozen in the past find their voice in the past. Their experiences validate their lives and give their lives potency and meaning. They do not easily let go, and they like company.

Senator Obama wants to forge a new hopeful future. The Clinton campaign, however, invokes memories of Bill Clinton’s Presidency and reminds us of our old identities and loyalties.

Old identities and loyalties have a tendency to run down according to their dissonance with reason, because all social phenomena exist within a reality bound by reason. Therefore, the divisive environment the Clinton campaign intends to maintain will wane because it feeds on irrationality.

The Clinton campaign’s platform is discordant with the values and interests the American people want to prevail in their lives. We know that Cesar Chavez and Martin Luther King and the civil rights platforms they championed were founded on the same values and interests. Their beneficiaries will ultimately realize their common heritage and reject the Clinton campaign's identity politics.

Those of us who believe in the primacy of reason over fear know that this truth is not self-executing. Standing against old and deeply entrenched political dynasties with powerful machines, those who believe, have to search our souls and realize our yearning to breathe free. We have to find our voice in the present and work with others to build a new America that will be better than ever.

Why Senator Obama's Candidacy Strengthens the Democratic Party

Paul from Washington, DC — Fri, 18 Jan 2008 12:33:06 EST

Senator Clinton intends to win the Democratic nomination by dividing the Democratic Party along lines that have scarcely been visible among Democrats in a long time. Perhaps she believes that the only way to defeat Senator Obama’s unifying message and platform is to stoke division.

If Senator Clinton fails to divide her way to victory, she hopes that she can rely on the argument that Senator Obama is a great orator but lacks experience in getting results.

Senator Clinton consistently complains that she has been “vetted” and Senator Obama has not. Washington Post columnist Robert Novak wrote in a recent Op-Ed that the frequent use of the word “vetted” by the Clinton campaign has a meaning “distinct from "experienced." Novak opined that, in the Democratic primary, with its cadre of relatively inexperienced candidates, vetted “connotes investigating nominees for vice president, the Cabinet and the federal judiciary to uncover anything disqualifying. Its introduction in the presidential campaign by Clinton is tied to reminders -- overtly and by insinuation -- of Obama's teenage use of illegal drugs, which he confessed in his first book.”

Clearly, Senator Clinton's primary strategy is fundamentally negative. Whereas she has unquestioned public exposure as the First Lady and the sympathetic wife of a flawed husband, her vetted status does not actually qualify as 35 years of relevant experience.

Senator Clinton points over and over to her connection with SCHIP in the late 1990s, which was sponsored by Senators Ted Kennedy and Orrin Hatch. But while she may have been a proponent of the legislation, she did not push it through Congress and get it passed into law. The fact is that Senator Clinton has a scant policy record. She was a lawyer, a spouse, and First Lady of Arkansas and the United States. She chaired boards and commissions such as President Bill Clinton’s Task Force on National Health Care Reform. That task force’s proposal was to mandate that employers provide health care to their employees through HMOs. Democrats and Republicans alike spoke out against the proposal as coercive, naïve, and unrealistic, and the plan failed to garner support or results.

However, close review of Senator Clinton’s public life reveals that she has substantial political campaign experience. She knows how spin her lack of policy-making experience and to distort her opponents’ record. She knows how to win elections, but she does not have a platform or many ideas about how to govern.

Senator Clinton’s strategy of division and distortion is very damaging to the long term goals of the Democratic Party. Senator Obama’s strategy, however, enhances the appeal and long term strength of the Democratic Party. If he is successful, he will congeal the scattered hopes, ambitions, and enterprises of a diverse and integrated grassroots Democratic movement into a new Democratic creed that connects people to power rather than alienating people from each other and from power.

Undoubtedly, Senator Clinton has been a passionate advocate for important social issues. But she could never have imagined or conceived the transcendent and yet existential movement Senator Obama is heralding. Senator Clinton’s platform is familiar and soothingly achievable. Senator Obama’s change platform is refreshing and new, but also fragile and daunting. With Senator Obama, we know that now is the time for his message and his platform. We know that we are now reaching for something precious in a maelstrom and against all odds; hence our “fierce urgency of now.”

Why Clinton's MLK Comment is Problematic...

Paul from Washington, DC — Tue, 15 Jan 2008 18:20:48 EST

Today, on Martin Luther King's Birthday, I read a commentary by Joseph A. Califano Jr., President Lyndon Johnson's Special Assistant for Domestic Affairs from 1965-1969, in the Washington Post (Page A13 or http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/01/14/AR2008011402079.html).

From my reading, it was clear that Mr. Califano, like Senator Clinton, missed the point about why her Martin Luther King Jr./Lyndon Johnson and Obama/Clinton analogy is problematic.

Senator Barack Obama is not running as a civil rights leader, and we are not living in the 1960s. Leaders who happen to be black are not, as a rule, best suited for leading marches and protests. Today, Senators Obama and Clinton's and Governor Bill Richardson's primary candidacies announce that race and gender are no longer disqualifiers for the highest office in the United States .

But whereas Senator Clinton embraced the social relevance of her historic candidacy, she recently seemed to diminish the social relevance of Senator Obama's candidacy.

Senator Clinton recently stated that it took President Lyndon Johnson to realize King’s dreams, arguing by analogy, that she was a better choice for the Democratic presidential nomination than Senator Obama. The analogy here is that she is Johnson and Obama is King, and that she, and not Obama is equipped to operate successfully within the ashen halls of power.

Senator Obama is not running for the leadership of the NAACP. He is running for the presidency with a message closely echoed by John Edwards. Yet Senator Clinton offers a false analogy, implying that Obama, who happens to be black, is somehow better suited for leading marches and protests outside of the halls of power. Here, Senator Clinton insulted every single American who believes that what a person looks like should not define who they are or shape their destiny.

Obama's Message...

Paul from Washington, DC — Mon, 14 Jan 2008 19:56:14 EST

I love Obama's platform of "change" that message is the culmination of a hopeful and democratic narrative long shut out of our national conversation about politics and governance. What is Obama's platform? What does he mean by change? Obama's platform is about (1) looking to the future; (2) knowing our interests; and (3) getting involved.

The American people have to let go of our past political affiliations (liberal, conservative, Democrat, Republican, Libertarian, etc.) and congeal a new coalition of common sense and common interests because party affiliations do not always serve the core social, economic, and political interests many Americans share.

The American people have to realize our true social, economic, and political interests actually are because knowledge of our interests will inform our participation and activism.

The American people have to get involved and stay involved in the political process because democracy requires constant vigilance and activism.

As President, Mr. Obama will continue the work he started as a young grassroots organizer. He will work to cultivate innovative technologies and models of activism to create a social context and infrastructure that supports grassroots activism over lobbying, and citizen participation over hopelessness, cynicism, and apathy. Like never before the American people will be informed and empowered to play a central role in shaping the nation we share into a more perfect union.

NEW YORK TIMES: Emotion Without Thought in New Hampshire

Dr. Susanne Hussein Freeborn — Fri, 11 Jan 2008 17:44:31 EST

January 10, 2008, 10:12 pm

By Judith Warner

On the morning after the New Hampshire primary, CNN’s John Roberts interviewed Marianne Pernold Young, the woman whose coffee shop question — “How do you do it? How do you keep upbeat and so wonderful?” — is largely credited with setting into motion Hillary Clinton’s surprise victory on Tuesday.

“When you asked her the question, what were you looking for?” Roberts asked the middle-aged freelance photographer from Portsmouth, N.H. “Because when [Hillary] talked to me . . . right after you had asked her the question,” he continued, “she said she was so genuinely taken aback and touched by the fact that someone cared about her. Is that the angle that you were coming at the question from?”

“No,” Young said.

There was an awkward millisecond of silence as the genial host let this sink in. “I was asking her as a friend,” Young went on. “As a woman to woman I wanted to know how she does it.”

In other words, the question about how Hillary “does it” had nothing to do with Hillary at all.

It was all about Marianne.

Searing political questions resided behind what Young called her “simple, honest, genuine” query. Could she “relate” to Clinton? Was she likely to find a “friend” in a woman with a camera-ready helmet of hair? Could she learn from Hillary? Could they share beauty tips? Would her gesture toward female bonding be well-received and perhaps met with the kind of positive mirroring of which Best Friendships Forever are made?

“As a woman,” she prefaced her question, “I know it’s hard to get out of the house and get ready…”

“You know, I think, well, luckily, on special days I do have help,” Hillary volleyed in return.

There was something disquieting about this televised prodding of an almost entirely cerebral woman by an emissary of the “Girlfriend” posse. There were shades of voyeurism, of a perverse kind of exoticism akin to the fascination with which 19th-century European crowds once pressed around the cage of the Hottentot Venus, trying to figure out if she was fully human.

Yet Hillary managed to survive it – and thrive. She gave the people what they wanted, with one notable exception in Young, who went on to vote for Barack Obama.

She proved her humanity; “I’m a person, much to some people’s surprise,” she broke with her new soft-voiced humility to tell Diane Sawyer, rather rancorously, after her almost-tears made big news.

How absurd. How depressing and disheartening and just plain dumb this whole business is.

The lesson from the coffee shop interlude – if that interlude is indeed mainly the thing that led the 37 percent of voters who were undecided or lukewarm about their choices in the final days of the campaign to ultimately go for Hillary – ought to be summed up in a new slogan.

“It’s the Economy, Stupid,” was the famed James Carville adage that kept candidate Clinton on message in 1992.

“It’s Not About You, Honey,” could be the new slogan for Clinton redux.

It’s all about how you make voters feel.

Feeling – not thinking – becomes all-important when you have a field of candidates who aren’t really all that different from one another politically. It’s particularly important for not-so-political voters; the ones who, for example, aren’t super worked up about Hillary’s Iraq vote, or the lack of universal coverage in Obama’s health plan, or the finer points of Edwards’ billion-point plan to Build One America. I’m not sure if these really are the voters who created the upset in the New Hampshire primary — after all, according to exit polls, the lion’s share of the people who said they made up their minds prior to this past month voted for Hillary — but they’re certainly the ones who stole the headlines. And in a general election, it’s the undecided voters who, in the end, make all the difference.

In New Hampshire last weekend, I saw candidate after candidate – with the exception of Hillary – milking their crowds’ feelings with exquisite mastery. While she talked health care and education reform (and her husband, unbelievably, stunned an audience into silence with a lecture on the molecular makeup of obscure biofuels), Obama reached right into his youngish fans’ hearts, magnified their desires to Feel Something Big, and rocked their worlds. Mike Huckabee even had me shedding a tear for his rise from a town called Hope (“If I can do it, then your kid can do it, too”), almost had me raising a fist as a heckler was dispatched (“The great thing about this country is we’re not going to take him out and shoot him. We’re not going to take him out and beat him up”), and almost choking down a sob as he exhorted all of us former scouts in the audience, on behalf of America, to “leave your campsite in better shape than you found it.”

If I did not have trouble believing that there were dinosaurs on Noah’s Ark, I might follow this man – and the very pleasant Chuck Norris, of course – to the ends of the earth.

But then, as a young Hillary Rodham once put it, “Emotion without thought … is pitiful.”

I don’t for a moment begrudge Hillary her victory on Tuesday. But if victory came for the reasons we’ve been led to believe – because women voters ultimately saw in her, exhausted and near defeat, a countenance that mirrored their own – then I hate what that victory says about the state of their lives and the nature of the emotions they carry forward into this race. I hate the thought that women feel beaten down, backed into a corner, overwhelmed and near to breaking point, as Hillary appeared to be in the debate Saturday night. And I hate even more that they’ve got to see a strong, smart and savvy woman cut down to size before they can embrace her as one of their own.

THE WASHINGTON TIMES: An Obama surge?

Dr. Susanne Hussein Freeborn — Wed, 26 Dec 2007 03:11:58 EST

December 26, 2007

By Grace Vuoto - What part of "anyone but Hillary" Clinton do Democrats not understand? The surest and best path for Democrats to defeat conservatives in 2008 is to elect Sen. Barack Obama as their nominee. Mr. Obama is leading in Iowa, and the race is now a dead heat in New Hampshire and South Carolina. In response, the Clinton camp has insisted that Mr. Obama is not electable by the general population. They maintain that his opinions are too liberal, that Republicans will use the issue of his past drug use against him and that he has insufficient experience. Yet this negative approach has thus far failed to resonate with Democratic voters.

Moreover, it is Mrs. Clinton, not Mr. Obama, who cannot be elected. In last week's Fox 5-The Washington Times-Rasmussen Reports poll, 40 percent of Americans state they will vote to prevent Mrs. Clinton from becoming president. She gets the largest "anti-vote" of any candidate in both parties: 64 percent of Republicans, 42 percent of third-party or independent voters, and 17 percent of Democrats insist they will vote against her. Hence, the Clinton camp's recent attempt to malign Mr. Obama as unelectable is pure farce. It is like telling Democrats to be afraid of a toy pistol while ignoring a bazooka which is being aimed at them. In a general campaign, Republicans will go nuclear against Mrs. Clinton.

Barring the nomination of Mrs. Clinton, the Democratic Party is poised to capture the White House in 2008. This is mostly because there is no Republican candidate on the horizon who can unite the right. Thus, any Democrat but Mrs. Clinton, can peel away enough conservative, Republican and independent voters to win the next election.

Once Mr. Obama secures the Democratic nomination, he will enter the general election with the liberal base highly mobilized. With a running mate who has good foreign-policy credentials, he can convince moderates that he will be effective in international affairs. Also, Democrats generally attract 88 percent of the black vote: Mr. Obama may make even greater inroads as these voters embrace the prospect of electing America's first black president. Finally, he will capture the two vital swing-voter groups: women and Hispanics.

Mr. Obama need only rely on Oprah Winfrey to capture the majority of the female vote. He will secure an even larger segment of female voters by suggesting policies — as Mrs. Clinton does — which directly affect female interests. By contrast, leading Republicans have ignored women's issues. Moreover, many Hispanics, who were essential to the election of George Bush in both 2000 and 2004, have turned away from the Republican Party: Hispanics are repulsed by the anti-immigrant rhetoric which resulted from the failed immigration bill. The majority of women and Hispanics will therefore gravitate to Sen. Obama's corner.

Furthermore, Mr. Obama can tap into the division within the Republican Party. As the Wall Street Journal has reported, some businesses are recoiling at the enforcement of anti-illegal immigration laws. Hence, the GOP's anti-immigrant platform will secure the allegiance of one part of their usual constituency while alienating some members of the business sector who would otherwise vote for the GOP.

Also, if Democrats nominate Mr. Obama rather than Mrs. Clinton, conservative dissatisfaction re-emerges as a major campaign factor. There will be many conservatives and Republicans who will vote for a Democrat as a means of giving their own leaders a black eye: This will be payback to the Republicans for the previous abandonment of conservative principles on key issues. And woe to the Republicans if the nominee is chosen at the expense of the evangelical conservative base: If Rudy Giuliani wins the GOP nomination, evangelicals have stated they will vote for Mr. Obama rather than pull the lever for a thrice-married man.

Mr. Obama also has personality traits which have widespread appeal. The gentle, mild-mannered leader is a devoted family man, a sincere and consistent politician, an eloquent idealist — and a pal of the much-loved, much-admired, Oprah. He is perceived by many on the right as a breath of fresh air, as one who will spare us an ugly campaign season and potentially an even uglier four years after that.

The secret among conservatives is that many are rooting for Mr. Obama — and many will even vote for him in a general election no matter how liberal he is. Why? He will be heroic for defeating Hillary; he is authentic, and he is likeable even in disagreement.

In essence, all the stars are aligned in favor of a remarkable American story: Barack Obama's historic march from Iowa straight into the White House in Washington, D.C. If only Democrats had enough sense to get Hillary Clinton out of his way.

Grace Vuoto is executive director of the Edmund Burke Institute for American Renewal. The opinions expressed are her own.

NEWSWEEK: Why Krugman Is Wrong

Dr. Susanne Hussein Freeborn — Thu, 20 Dec 2007 15:21:21 EST

Why Obama's approach to health care isn't naive.

By Jonathan Alter

Newsweek Web Exclusive

Updated: 10:41 AM ET Dec 19, 2007

Paul Krugman is a brilliant Princeton economist and fine columnist for The New York Times who was far ahead of the pack in asserting that George W. Bush is a total disaster as president. His clarity in explaining what academics call "political economy" is without peer. But his attack on Barack Obama on December 17 was wrong on history, wrong on politics and wrong on what the future holds for Obama's "big table" idea.

Krugman calls Obama "naïve" and an "anti-change candidate" because he favors bringing all of the players in the health care debate around a "big table" and rejects the populist message of John Edwards, who is apparently Krugman's choice for president. "Anyone who thinks the next president can achieve real change without bitter confrontation is living in a fantasy world," Krugman writes, endorsing Edwards's view that the insurance and drug industries should be excluded from any talks on health care reform because they stand to lose profits.

The columnist and his candidate both believe that Franklin D. Roosevelt succeeded by being a polarizing figure. I studied FDR for four years while writing a book about him, and this is simply untrue. It's also untrue of other successful Democratic presidents and for a simple reason: "Bitter confrontation" simply doesn't work in policy-making.

Bear with me for a brief history lesson: The so-called "First New Deal" of 1933-34 came after Roosevelt won a landslide victory over Herbert Hoover in 1932 in a campaign devoid of any populist message despite an unemployment rate of at least 25 percent. First, FDR worked with Hoover treasury officials from the other party to rescue the banks under a conservative plan that included steep budget cuts. The rest of his famous "100 days" agenda-which included unprecedented jobs programs, agricultural reform, labor rights, and regulation of financial markets—was achieved with much more compromise than Krugman recognizes. Social Security came in 1935 after a big Democratic mandate in midterm elections and was enacted piecemeal and cooperatively (to the disappointment of many New Deal liberals) with everyone at the table.

During and after his 1936 reelection campaign, FDR—angry at the ingratitude of the rich Americans whose fortunes he had saved—adopted class-based politics. In 1937, with a big victory under his belt, he tried confrontation with his court-packing scheme. It failed badly. So did his effort to "purge" the opposition in 1938. The rest of his second-term was far less productive legislatively than his first. By the end of it, he turned to foreign policy. FDR's third-term success, dominated by World II, was dependent on his unifying the country.
Similarly, Woodrow Wilson's big legislative triumphs over entrenched interests in 1913 (for example, an income tax), Lyndon Johnson's in 1965 (Medicare and the Voting Rights Act) and Bill Clinton's in 1993 (painful tax increases) were achieved with legislative skill, not brute force and a populist message.

Krugman is a populist. He writes that if nominated, Obama would win, "but not as big as a candidate who ran on a more populist platform." This is facile and ahistorical. How many 20th Century American presidents have been elected on a populist platform? That would be zero, Paul. You could even include Al Gore, who won the popular vote in 2000. Instead of exploiting the peace and prosperity of the 1990s, Gore ran on a "people vs. the powerful" message. It never ignited.

Krugman says that pundits like me who reject sharp anti-corporate rhetoric and prefer cooperation are "projecting their own desires onto the public." We'll see. But last time I checked, millions of Americans still work for corporations or aspire to do so and bashing them wholesale is a loser politically. It works sometimes in Democratic primaries with a heavy labor vote (though not for Dick Gephardt). But not in general elections. The last two Democrats elected president-Jimmy Carter in 1976 and Bill Clinton in 1992-also campaigned during recessions. Both were smart enough to reject populism in favor of a responsive but upbeat message.

Krugman is an economist and I trust his forecast that things are going to get even worse for working-class Americans in the months ahead. The middle-class squeeze is real. Predatory lenders and CEO greedheads should be called out. So should insurance and drug companies. But it needs to be done in a way that produces results, not just spleen-venting.
How? Just after Clinton was elected, he convened a meeting of economists, CEOs, labor leaders and many others in Little Rock. The purpose of the meeting was to argue out what should be done about the ailing economy, with many of the ideas expressed there later becoming part of Clinton's successful 1993 economic recovery package. The whole thing was on television.

Sound familiar? This is essentially what Obama is proposing for health care after he's elected. If Hillary Clinton had done this on health care in 1993—instead of convening a secret task force—she might have been able to build a stronger public case for reform.

Edwards and Krugman think that's naïve. They want the evil drug and insurance industries excluded from any of these conversations. Edwards surely knows better than this. The drug industry that he seeks to bar from a seat at the table is the same industry working to save his wife Elizabeth's life and that of anyone else with a serious disease, including me. The answer to price-gouging is to force these companies to negotiate drug prices with the government, a reform any Democratic president would quickly enact.

Ideally, health insurance companies should be eliminated altogether. But a single payer plan isn't viable politically, as Edwards readily admits. The only option is to curb their power and expand coverage through more regulation.

When I asked Edwards how any agreement could be reached without at least talking to these players in the system, he said he would offer a seat at the table to members of Congress who represent their interests. In other words, it's OK to have the congressional stooges there, but not the interests that pull their strings?

Obama's idea is a better one: Get every special interest out in the open on television, where the new president can cross-examine them and expose their phony rationalizations for charging $100 a pill or denying coverage to sick people (and Edwards, the former trial attorney, would be especially good at this). Then, having triumphed over the drug and insurance companies in the court of public opinion, the legislative victories will follow. It is, indeed, a fantasy to think these interests will roll over entirely, but they will get a much worse deal.

The Edwards alternative-to simply overrun them-is unrealistic. Even a 1932-style mandate at the ballot box (highly unlikely) wouldn't make them capitulate. Look what happened when New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer, elected in 2006 with a huge mandate, tried to "steamroll" a bunch of hacks in Albany. He got his head handed to him.

To call Obama "anti-change," as Paul Krugman does, is anti-common sense. Leadership requires a mixture of confrontation and compromise, with room for the losers to save face. "They have to feel the heat to see the light," LBJ liked to say. That heat is best applied up close. In public. Across the big table.

URL: http://www.newsweek.com/id/80882

The Des Moines Register: Youthful Obama Calls for Hope

Dr. Susanne Hussein Freeborn — Thu, 20 Dec 2007 15:09:44 EST

By CHUCK RAASCH • GANNETT NEWS SERVICE • December 20, 2007

Political skills

Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., learned grass-roots political organizing in Chicago, as both a civil rights lawyer and director of the Developing Communities Project, which worked with the poor and families whose breadwinners had lost jobs in the declining steel industry.

He also served as a state senator from 1997 to 2004, where he earned a reputation for bipartisanship.

In his biography, "Obama: From Promise to Power," David Mendell portrays Obama as committed to making a difference, occasionally cocky and thin-skinned in private, and a man in a hurry.

To the man who introduced him to organizing and grass-roots politics in Chicago's tough South Side in the mid-1980s, Obama "was extremely idealistic."

Says veteran Chicago organizer Jerry Kellman: "He identified very much with those who were on the outside of things."

Obama's idealism soon met street reality, and some viewed him as an interloper lacking in the authentic experiences of the poor he represented.

He upset some people in Chicago's black community by challenging or confronting established leaders. That included a 2000 primary challenge of Rep. Bobby Rush, D-Ill., which Obama lost badly.

Kellman said in a Dec. 4 interview that as a community organizer, "Barack was effective, and people who had something to protect in terms of turf, in terms of an established power base, would look for ways to discredit him. And the best way to discredit him was to portray him as an outsider."

But both Kellman and Mendell describe an Obama who eventually became more pragmatic, more accepted and, in 2004, triumphant in one of the most effective first steps on the national stage in American political history.

Obama became a protege and key ally of Illinois Senate President Emil Jones.

In a Nov. 16 interview with Gannett News Service, Jones described the young Obama as a "very effective legislator" who gathered bipartisan support for legislation "by working with legislators and getting to know them and not being dogmatic in debate, even though their views may have been different."

Jones saw similar political instincts when Obama said in a debate in July that he would be willing to meet with the leaders of Iran, North Korea, Syria, Cuba and Venezuela.

Obama's critics, most notably Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., called his answer naive.

The implication: that Obama's grandiose "let's talk it out" vision might end up with him caving in to or being used for propaganda purposes by enemies of the United States.

"I am not afraid of losing a propaganda battle with some petty dictator," Obama told a University of Virginia audience in October.

Obama - who's been in the Senate less than three years - faces Clinton and a field of Democrats who have much longer resumes on everything from health care policy to the Middle East.

His relative freshness helps him drive home that he is the true change candidate in 2008.

Communication skills

The nation was introduced to Obama when he gave a dynamic, 17-minute speech at the Democratic National Convention in Boston in 2004.

He focused on his story - an update of Horatio Alger - recounting the different worlds of his white mother from Kansas and his black father from Kenya.

His father, Obama said, had grown up herding goats and going to school in a tin-roof shack.

That speech foreshadowed some of the style and substance voters would be seeing more of: his message of inclusiveness and his self-effacing humor, referring to himself as the "skinny kid with a funny name."

Obama often says his wife, Michelle, a Chicago native and, like him, a graduate of Harvard Law School, keeps him humble, and in check.

Obama's campaign rallies are designed to pump up a rock-star persona.

Along the way, Obama has picked up many celebrity backers, none more powerful than media mogul Oprah Winfrey.

Her recent rallies for Obama in South Carolina, Iowa and New Hampshire drew thousands of people.

In debates, however, he is not as smooth, and it is in these free-for-alls that his lack of experience shows.

Policy vision

Obama's overall theme is inclusiveness, change, and what he calls "the audacity of hope."

On race, Obama has a vision designed to inspire fellow blacks on traditional civil rights fronts and honor civil rights pioneers whose sacrifices opened doors for him. He has given strong speeches about being black in America, telling biographer David Mendell, "When I see young African-American men out there and the struggles they go through, I connect with that."

Some have questioned whether Obama's upbringing - which included living with a mother who sometimes struggled economically, living overseas and going to an exclusive Hawaii boarding school - made him "black enough" to understand the problems facing average blacks.

Emil Jones, the Illinois Senate president, discounts that argument and says it is irrelevant for a man who wants to be president of all Americans. "When you run for president of the country, you are not running for the presidency of the black community," Jones says.

Ron Walters, a political scientist at the University of Maryland, says Obama has gone a step further than just offering himself as a president who aspires to bring people together. He says Obama has addressed poverty and offered "clearly articulated" positions on national health care and on the Iraq war.

Decision-making style

Obama, 46, is an avowed collaborator. Aides often try to portray him as the opposite of President Bush, who has famously described himself as "the decider" in an attempt to show resolve, consistency and toughness.

"The Bush administration is an insular circle of like-minded people that nod their head every time the boss says something," says Robert Gibbs, Obama's communications director. "The White House needs somebody who is not going to sit around the table agreeing with everything he says."

Gibbs, who has been with Obama since he ran for the Senate in 2004, describes him as "somebody with a tremendous amount of intellectual curiosity who will talk to people who know more about things than he does. He is somebody who makes up his own mind, but he is not going to go out and say he is 'the decider,' meaning he doesn't listen to the viewpoints of anybody else."

The downside of Obama's reflective, collaborative style is that it can make a leader look indecisive.

One example occurred in early November. Several Obama campaign aides anonymously criticized the candidate's reluctance to get tougher with Sen. Hillary Clinton in simultaneous stories in the New York Times and the Washington Post.

The result: Not only did it telegraph what Obama would do in an impending debate, it opened the window to internal dissent and showed that Obama's inner circle was willing to go outside to force changes.

As an example of his willingness to stand alone with resolve, Obama cites his decision to speak out against going to war in Iraq just days before Congress voted to give President Bush the authority to do so. Obama says he spoke out even though friends warned him he might be hurting his political career.

Management skills

More than anything, Obama has been on the defensive about a lack of management experience. Four of the past five presidents were previously governors.

Obama likes to point out that he has had two decades of experience: as a community organizer, civil rights lawyer, law professor, Illinois state legislator and now as a U.S. senator.

In the debate in Philadelphia, he added: "I think the next president has to be able to get people to work together to get things done, even when they disagree. And I've done that."

Biographer David Mendell writes of several instances in which Obama played middle-of-the-road negotiator in contentious situations, from his time at Harvard Law School, where Obama was the first black president of the Harvard Law Review, through eight years in the Illinois Senate.

At Harvard in the late 1980s and early 1990s, in the midst of a debate over whether the term "black" or "African American" was appropriate, Mendell writes that Obama told fellow law students that the argument was irrelevant. Obama said, "How we use our education in these next three years" to improve the lives of blacks was more important.

After being elected to the Illinois Senate in 1996, representing Chicago's South Side, Obama gained a reputation among Republicans as a Democrat they could work with. His first bill, a campaign finance reform measure, passed 52-4.

Obama also got Republican support for legislation that clamped down on racial profiling by police and for a children's health care measure.

Obama's advisers include several policy wonks from President Clinton's administration.

On the web at: http://www.desmoinesregister.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20071220/NEWS09/712200407/-1/caucus

NEW YORK TIMES: Managing a Post-Feb. 5 Campaign

Dr. Susanne Hussein Freeborn — Mon, 17 Dec 2007 14:48:08 EST

December 17, 2007By ADAM NAGOURNEY

COLFAX, Iowa – For most of the year, two working assumptions have guided the strategic decisions of the major presidential campaigns. The first was that a Republican and Democratic nominee would for all and intents purposes be known after Feb. 5, when there are primaries and caucuses in more than 20 states. The second was that there will only – as the line goes – be three tickets out of Iowa; just three candidates from each party would survive the caucuses here on Jan. 3 and move on to New Hampshire, with the rest of the field being eliminated.

As campaigns try to keep up with this fast-paced, multi-layered campaign, there is growing sense among Republicans that for their contest at least — and perhaps for Democrats — Feb. 5 may not be the end of the line. And at the same time, Democrats are looking at a scenario where only two of their candidates emerge out of this state.

Consider Feb. 5. The conventional wisdom is that a candidate must do well enough in the contests that take place in January — starting with Iowa and New Hampshire — to roll into Feb. 5 with enough force to sweep the table. Even if the candidate doesn’t actually accumulate enough delegates to claim the nomination, the pressure from party leaders to coalesce around a nominee, combined with the obstacles facing other candidates who might want to fight on, would carry the day.

Except that it is now entirely possible that no Republican will be moving very quickly going into Feb. 5. In fact, it is entirely plausible that Mike Huckabee of Arkansas will win the caucuses here; that John McCain of Arizona will win New Hampshire; that Mitt Romney of Massachusetts will win Michigan, Fred Thompson of Tennessee will win South Carolina and Rudolph W. Giuliani of New York will win Florida. In those circumstances, with no obvious front-runner, and with many of the candidates having adequate resources and varying bases of support, they could just divide the prize on Feb. 5 and move on to the next primary.

“Which means the race might not be over until the convention,” said Peter Robinson, a fellow with the Hoover Institution and a speechwriter in the Reagan White House. “I know there comes a time every year when journalists say this is going to be decided at the convention. I won’t say it’s probable, but it is possible: This race just won’t close.”

Still, there are considerable obstacles to a protracted nominating battle. For one thing, if Democrats have a nominee and Republicans do not, there will be considerable pressure from Republican leaders to try to end what could be a debilitating primary fight in the form of pressure on weaker candidates to drop out.

An extended contest seems possible on the Democratic side, but less so, because there are fewer strong candidates to divide the Feb. 5 take. The Republicans have four seriously viable candidates: Mr. Romney, Mr. McCain, Mr. Huckabee and Mr. Giuliani. The Democrats have three, Hillary Rodham Clinton, Barack Obama and John Edwards.

Mrs. Clinton, Mr. Obama and Mr. Edwards are engaged in a remarkably tight fight here, and any one of them could win on Jan. 3. But here’s one thing to keep in mind: Unless they are all bunched up together on caucus night, someone has to come in third, a fact that the campaigns do not like to think about a lot. And that could test the three-tickets-out-of-Iowa rule as never before.

That is particularly true for Mr. Edwards — who has almost lived in Iowa for the past two years, almost won here in 2004, and is trailing in polls in New Hampshire. It seems safe to say that a third-place finish for Mr. Edwards would be the end of the line for him, no matter how many times his aides might invoke the “three tickets out of Iowa” line that night. Barring an unexpected showing from one of the other Democrats in the field, that would set up a two-way contest between Mrs. Clinton and Mr. Obama going into New Hampshire.

If Mrs. Clinton comes in third, she would no doubt go on. But she would be heading into New Hampshire, where polls suggest Mr. Obama is already rising, and where she would only have five days to turn things around. Not easy.

Mr. Obama would also no doubt continue should he trail Mr. Edwards and Mrs. Clinton. But he would be damaged goods, particularly after a month here in which he seems to have gone a long way to ease any Democratic doubts that voter concerns about his experience or his race would hurt him at the ballot box.

There was a time when many Democrats did not think Mr. Edwards could survive even a second-place showing here. But with one caveat — he would need to raise a lot of money, and raise it fast — Mr. Edwards’ advisers argue that he in fact could weather a second-place showing because that would almost certainly mean that he had beaten either Mrs. Clinton or Mr. Obama, no small feat this year.

CNN: Commentary: Drug rumors about Obama playing on stereotypes?

Dr. Susanne Hussein Freeborn — Mon, 17 Dec 2007 13:25:41 EST

By Ruben Navarrette Jr.
Special to CNN

SAN DIEGO, California (CNN) -- Ever since Barack Obama began to pierce theinevitability that we were told surrounded the presidential campaign of Hillary Clinton, I've wondered how the Clintonistas would react. Now we know: not well.

For one thing, as we learned in the 1990s, the Clintons don't like to be challenged. And when they are, they don't just try to beat you. They set out to destroy you.

Which makes recent events even more poetic. The harder Team Clinton tries to destroy Obama, the more damage they wind up doing -- to Hillary and her campaign. Just when you thought that the former first lady couldn't come across any more unlikable, desperate, and vindictive, the floor collapses and we find ourselves on a new level.

Last week, Billy Shaheen, Clinton's co-chairman in New Hampshire, resigned from the campaign after floating the rumor that Obama, in his youth, may have been not just a drug user but a drug dealer. Shaheen speculated to a Washington Post reporter that Obama's past could make him unelectable if the Illinois senator wins the nomination and those dastardly Republicans, who are famous for their dirty tricks, decide to make an issue of Obama's admitted past drug use. Shaheen suggested that Republicans might want to know if Obama, in addition to using drugs, ever sold them?

First, Republicans notwithstanding, apparently Democrats know some dirty tricks of their own. Secondly, Shaheen needs to get real. Given that -- according to his biography -- he went to college in the 1960s, and law school in the early 1970s, do you suppose he knows anyone who ever used drugs? Through his association with the Clintons, he knows at least one person who used them but "didn't inhale."

Finally, despite Shaheen's insistence that he just made a mistake and assurances by a spokesman for the Clinton camp that his comments weren't "authorized or condoned by the campaign in any way," that's a stretch. Shaheen is no political rookie. He is a veteran political operative whose work on presidential campaigns goes back to Jimmy Carter's re-election bid in 1980, and who has worked on numerous campaigns since then -- including those of his wife, former New Hampshire governor Jean Shaheen. Besides, this is the Hillary Clinton campaign we're talking about. It doesn't make many mistakes.

But could it be that this story is even worse than many in the national press will say? Isn't it interesting that Shaheen, or whoever is behind this, opted to invoke the image of a drug dealer in referencing the first top-tier black candidate for president? That's quite a coincidence. This wouldn't be an ugly Willie Horton-type tactic intended to harvest fear and play on stereotypes about who is a criminal and who isn't, or -- in this case -- who uses drugs and who sells them?

Nah. Liberal Democrats would never sink that low. Why if they did, how could they continue to package themselves as a kinder and gentler -- and more enlightened -- alternative to Republicans? Certainly not with a straight face.

Ruben Navarrette Jr. is a member of the editorial board of the San Diego Union-Tribune and a nationally syndicated columnist. You can read his column here.

The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of the writer.

NEW YORK TIMES: Iowa’s Student Vote

Dr. Susanne Hussein Freeborn — Sun, 16 Dec 2007 19:51:09 EST

December 15, 2007Editorial

College students are legally entitled to vote where they attend school. That makes perfect sense given that they often live in their college communities for four years or more and become eligible to vote for the first time while living there. But not everyone likes this arrangement, and political operatives often try to suppress the student vote. We recently got a glimpse of this process in Iowa, where the presidential caucuses are just weeks away.

Political campaigns and elected officials have used a variety of tactics over the years to keep students from voting. There are often too few voting machines, so lines stretch for hours. Sometimes, students are falsely told that they will lose financial aid, health care or even car insurance if they vote while attending school.

In Iowa, the suppression has been rhetorical. With Barack Obama’s campaign, in particular, urging students to come out for him, other campaigns have tried to put up roadblocks. Earlier this month, Hillary Clinton said during a campaign stop that the process should be reserved for “people who live here, people who pay taxes here.” Chris Dodd seemed to imply that people who were “paying out-of-state tuition” and participating in the process were somehow being deceptive and unfairly casting themselves as Iowan.

Student are rightly up in arms about these statements. The law in Iowa is crystal clear: students who attend school in the state are entitled to register to vote in the state as long they are not registered anywhere else. The two parties’ rules say registered voters may participate in caucuses in the precincts where they are registered. Students have the same right to do so as any other Iowan. But statements challenging their right to vote may intimidate some students into staying home.

Hammered by student groups, the candidates have reframed their statements. But the episode has left a bad taste in the mouths of many students and of the groups that have been working feverishly to bring more of them into the electoral process. Anything that undermines student voting is bad for politics and bad for the nation.

LOS ANGELES TIMES: Air of inevitability escaping Clinton

Dr. Susanne Hussein Freeborn — Sat, 15 Dec 2007 03:38:13 EST

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/politics/la-na-clinton15dec15,1,517727.story?track=crosspromo&coll=la-news-politics-national&ctrack=1&cset=true
From the Los Angeles TimesCAMPAIGN '08The Democratic presidential front-runner is stepping up her efforts as she appears to be losing traction.By Peter Nicholas
Los Angeles Times Staff Writer

December 15, 2007

WASHINGTON — She was a disciplined candidate atop a polished campaign, but Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton is now mired in the most serious crisis of her 11-month bid for the White House, as a rolling series of missteps threatens to topple her as the Democratic front-runner.

The large crowds that once came to see her have thinned. Trusted campaign surrogates have veered wildly off message. And a campaign operation that had built seemingly impregnable leads over the summer appears to be faltering, prompting former President Clinton to amp up his role as a public spokesman and campaign advisor.

Clinton's chief rival, Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois, has wiped out her lead in the crucial early states of Iowa and New Hampshire, according to some polls. Should she lose those contests, gone would be the notion that she is the party's inevitable nominee -- one basis of her appeal as a candidate.

Former Democratic Sen. Bob Kerrey of Nebraska plans to publicly endorse Clinton next week. But, he says, the momentum may belong to Obama. Kerrey spoke about the "phenomenal pride" black voters felt when Obama made joint appearances last weekend with media titan Oprah Winfrey.

Obama, Kerrey said in an interview, has "either peaked, or he is on a trend line that is going to make him the nominee of the party."

In Hillaryland, as her team calls itself, the message is that there is no cause for worry.

"Politics now is a 24/7 cycle. You go up, you go down," Clinton told reporters in Iowa on Friday. "I think that's all part of a vigorous, dynamic election cycle."

Her campaign began airing a 30-second television spot Friday in Iowa and New Hampshire that showcases Clinton's daughter, Chelsea, and her 88-year-old mother, Dorothy Rodham, an effort to strengthen her connection to female voters. A Des Moines Register poll published this month showed that Obama was doing better than Clinton among women likely to vote in the Jan. 3 caucuses.

Also Friday, Clinton's husband sent out a fundraising letter that sought to debunk perceptions that the New York senator would not be a catalyst for real change if she were to win the White House.

More and more, her message is being overwhelmed by unforeseen events.

On Thursday morning, she had to apologize to Obama on the tarmac of Reagan National Airport as they were leaving for a Democratic debate. At issue were the remarks of a New Hampshire campaign advisor, Bill Shaheen, who made public his concerns about Obama's drug use in his youth. Shaheen quit the Clinton campaign later in the day.

The episode followed two instances of volunteer aides to the Clinton campaign forwarding e-mails that falsely claimed Obama was a Muslim, possibly intent on destroying the United States. Both of the aides resigned.

Just as confounding to some was Clinton's own attack on Obama's character. As recently as last month, she had said at a dinner for Democratic activists in Des Moines that she was "not interested in attacking" her opponents.

On Dec. 2, she stood before reporters in Cedar Rapids and did just that. She accused Obama of hypocrisy by preaching ethics and then "skirting" campaign finance rules in the way he doles out funds.

Her campaign released a statement the same day that was instantly mocked. Eager to rebut Obama's assertion that the presidency had not been a consuming ambition in his life, the Clinton campaign cited, among other things, an essay he had written in kindergarten titled, "I Want to Become President."

The ploy boomeranged. Embarrassed by pointing to an opponent's childhood writing, the Clinton campaign said it had been joking. But the news release was still on her website, with nothing to indicate that the reference was not serious.

For much of the campaign, Clinton delivered a positive message that seemed to be resonating. Trouble began with her subpar performance at an Oct. 30 debate in Philadelphia, when she waffled on several questions -- among them whether she favored driver's licenses for illegal immigrants. Her rivals, sensing an opening, became more aggressive.

Clinton soon came to believe she needed to strike back, but she has struggled to find the right tone.

Not only has Obama weathered the attacks, he is using them to raise money. In a solicitation letter Thursday, his campaign manager asked for $25 donations, writing: "The only way to stop these kinds of tired, desperate attacks is to demonstrate very clearly that they have a real cost to Sen. Clinton's campaign."

Robert B. Reich, a Cabinet member in President Clinton's administration who has not endorsed a candidate, said it was a mistake for her to swipe at rivals: "It's a very risky strategy for her. I wish it weren't the case that in addition to everything else, women candidates -- like women in society generally -- are judged more harshly than men when they go on the attack. And I think she has to deal with that burden, as well as the burden of her own history with regard to being characterized as a polarizing figure."

With the race tightening, former President Clinton reentered the picture last week, determined to address an issue that seems to have dogged his wife from the beginning.

Surveys confirm that voters believe the country is headed in the wrong direction, a call for change that plays to Obama's strength. Hillary Clinton rates higher in polls when it comes to experience, but polling has shown that more voters in Iowa would prefer a candidate who can set the country on a new path.

President Clinton's mission in a series of campaign stops Monday in Iowa was nothing short of redefining his wife in the minds of voters. Seven times in the course of a speech at Iowa State University, he called her a "change agent."

Popular as he is among Democrats, the former president has created a separate problem. On the campaign trail, he likes talking about himself. The Iowa State stop was no exception. He touted his wife, but also gushed about his plans to help create "thousands of new jobs" in New York City by retrofitting public housing.

Last month, he said on a campaign stop in Iowa that he was against the unpopular Iraq war from the beginning. That touched off a public debate about whether the statement was true, a needless distraction for his wife's campaign.

He is a magnet for crowds, though -- something the campaign can use.

At a Des Moines high school visit Dec. 7, as Obama was preparing for his high-profile appearance with Winfrey, Sen. Clinton introduced an important woman in her own life: her mother.

But the crowd was thin. Before the event began, aides were seen removing metal folding chairs from the school cafeteria so that the cameras would not pan a row of empty seats.

A group of young people stood on an elevated ramp near the stage, holding up Clinton signs and helping create good TV images for the campaign. But many were not from Iowa. They were part of a high school group that had come from Chicago to see the candidates.

Dallas Wright, an 18-year-old senior, said after the Clinton event that he was inclined to vote for former Sen. John Edwards of North Carolina. Of Clinton, he said: "I think if she were to win the nomination, she'd have my vote."

peter.nicholas@latimes.com

WASHINGTON POST: Attacks Add

Dr. Susanne Hussein Freeborn — Fri, 14 Dec 2007 15:43:05 EST

By Dana Milbank
Friday, December 14, 2007; A14

When a Boy Scout sees an older woman, he helps her cross the street. In the race for the Democratic presidential nomination, Barack Obama is no Boy Scout.

The 46-year-old freshman senator from Illinois, trying to topple the 60-year-old front-runner, never once utters the words "Hillary" or "Clinton." But the target of his stump speech is unmistakable -- and his derision is brutal.

"Triangulating the poll-driven positions because we're worried about what Mitt or what Rudy might say about us just won't do," he says.

Take that, ol' girl.

"I'm sick and tired of Democrats thinking that the only way to look tough on national security is by talking and acting and voting like George Bush Republicans."

And there's more where that came from, granny.

"I don't want to spend 2008 fighting the same fights that we had in the 1990s -- that's exactly what Mitt and Rudy want."

Wonder who he's talking about there? How about here: "I'm not in this race to fulfill some long-held ambitions or because I believe it's somehow owed to me."

Obama began his campaign with a slogan about "the audacity of hope." But he has, predictably, settled on a more conventional theme: the audacity of audacity. Americans may say they want upbeat candidates with gauzy rhetoric, but voters actually respond to negativity. He dresses up the attack with a light touch, a hip presence and lofty phrases. "Fired up!" was the first sentiment out of his mouth after "Thank you" when he spoke recently to the Democratic National Committee in Virginia.

Obama is arguably the best speaker in the presidential race, and his stump speech the most lyrical. "Our nation's at war, the planet is in peril, the dream that so many generations fought for feels as if it's slowly slipping away," he reports.

On the other hand, the achievements Obama has to tout are thin. "I've done more than any candidate in this race to actually take on lobbyists, and I've won," he boasts. Well, yes, he championed ethics reforms in the Senate but left much of the heavy lifting to others while he campaigned.

"I expanded health care in Illinois by bringing Democrats and Republicans together, by taking on the insurance industry," he asserts. Actually, his signature legislation as a state senator, the Health Care Justice Act, merely set up a panel to craft a plan.

Obama also sounds a bit green when he vows that "I will finish the fight against al-Qaeda" -- a battle nobody expects will wrap up in the next four years.

The candidate mixes a diet of red-meat policies (a higher minimum wage, more pay for teachers, universal health coverage) with a somewhat contradictory promise to change the political arithmetic by winning over Republicans. There's the obligatory Bush-bashing. But Obama's real target is Clinton.

"When I am this party's nominee, my opponent will not be able to say that I voted for the war in Iraq, or that I gave George Bush the benefit of the doubt on Iran, or that I supported Bush-Cheney policies of not talking to leaders we don't like," he charges. "I don't want to see more American lives put at risk because no one had the judgment or the courage to stand up against a misguided war before we sent our troops in to fight."

Obama also has a pointed rejoinder to Clinton's "I'm in to win" slogan. "I'm in this race to take away those tax breaks to companies that are shipping jobs overseas," he answers. "That's why I'm in it. I'm in it because I want to stop the outrage of 47 million Americans without health care."

But make no mistake: Obama, too, is in to win. Otherwise he'd be helping that nice lady cross the street.

Economist.com: The triumph of hope over experience?

Dr. Susanne Hussein Freeborn — Thu, 13 Dec 2007 13:05:02 EST

Barack Obama

The triumph of hope over experience?
Dec 13th 2007
From The Economist print edition

Definitely not the finished product; but at least Democrats now have a hard choice to make

AP

ONLY two months ago, Hillary Clinton looked unbeatable. Her lead in the race to capture the Democratic nomination widened by the day. Some polls put her as much as 30 points clear of Barack Obama, and she led in every one of the early-primary states. All was sweet in Hillaryland.

No longer. Mr Obama is now ahead, by a slender margin, in Iowa, which in less than three weeks will be the first state to vote. This week he seemed to have eliminated the gap in New Hampshire, which will vote five days later (and where independents crucially can vote in the Democratic primary). Some polls now even show him ahead in South Carolina, the third important Democratic race, where until very recently Mrs Clinton was leading by more than 20 points. But Mrs Clinton still has a formidable machine behind her. For Mr Obama to sneak past her, he needs everything to go right (whilst she just needs him to trip up once); but there is now a real contest.

In principle, this is a good thing. Democrats deserve a choice. Even if Mrs Clinton prevails, it is better that she has been tested. But what about Mr Obama himself?

His rise is partly due to that familiar part of any presidential race: the front-runner's wobble. First, Mrs Clinton prevaricated during a debate; then she panicked—attacking Mr Obama personally, which has gone down very badly, and tacking abruptly to the left with a startling disavowal of the free-trade policies so effectively promoted by her husband. Meanwhile, though, Mr Obama has been picking up speed.

The bad news for Mr Obama is that he will now fall under the same degree of scrutiny that Mrs Clinton has endured for ages. But there also seems to have been a change in mood. Two months ago, this newspaper hazarded that the quality Americans most wanted was competence, and this remains the point on which the formidably intelligent and hard-working Mrs Clinton remains ahead. (If she has much less experience than she claims, she still has more than Mr Obama.) But the campaign is starting to focus on softer issues. Weary of “Bush-Clinton” partisan politics, Americans may prefer someone who can bring their country, and the world, together.

The audacity of hope—and its limitations

This plays to Mr Obama's strength: he has always been the candidate of “hope”. As America's first black president, he would show a new face to the world. As someone who was educated in Indonesia and has an understanding of Islam that no other candidate shares, he could do much to bridge the deadly gulf between Christian and Muslim states. He admits, bluntly, that “the world has lost trust in our purposes and our principles”—though he still reserves the right to use unilateral force. At home, he would put an end to America's depressing and vicious version of medieval England's dynastic Wars of the Roses. He appeals to Republican voters far more than any other Democrat, especially the detested Mrs Clinton.

This is not just spin. A President Obama would turn preconceptions upside down: indeed he might be able to achieve far more both at home and abroad than any other candidate. But hope does not balance budgets, craft alliances or reform schools. It certainly does not prove that Mr Obama would be the best, or even a good, president.

Mr Obama cannot change his experience deficit; but he can change his substance deficit. His economic policies (like those of the other Democrats, it must be said) are crowd-pleasing stuff. He is iffy about free trade. He wants health insurance for all—and expects the rich to pay for it. He wants schools to get better, but he panders to his leftist base by eschewing merit pay for teachers and independent charter schools. On Iraq, he affects not to have noticed that the “surge” in and around Baghdad is producing palpable successes, and clings to the idea, beloved of his party base, that all troops should be withdrawn even before he putatively takes office.

There is something rather timid and unhopeful about all this. Mr Obama is not prepared to break ranks with his party in the same way that John McCain divides Republicans over immigration or Rudy Giuliani does over abortion. Where he has produced novel policies, they have sometimes been bizarre, such as his plan to fine mortgage-lenders who allow borrowers to get into debt, and to give the money to the “victims”.

Offering America a chance to heal its divisions is a powerful selling point. But like Mrs Clinton's competence, it is not enough. Mr Obama still needs to do more to show how he defines change, as opposed just to personifying it. If he can somehow do that, though, he will be a hard man to beat.

Find this article on the web at: http://www.economist.com/opinion/displaystory.cfm?story_id=10286391

WASHINGTON POST: Oprah the Believer By Eugene Robinson

Dr. Susanne Hussein Freeborn — Tue, 11 Dec 2007 02:49:20 EST

Tuesday, December 11, 2007; A21

Is it foolish to think that a nation stained by centuries of slavery and racism is prepared to elect a black president? Rarely phrased so bluntly, that's the central question posed by Barack Obama's candidacy -- especially for many African American voters, whose doubts are informed by having seen many an oasis turn out to be a mirage.

Oprah Winfrey, as is her wont, cut to the heart of the matter. Campaigning on Obama's behalf this weekend, she echoed the words of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. in offering permission to believe.

"Dr. King dreamed the dream," Winfrey told a predominantly black crowd of 29,000 in Columbia, S.C. "But we don't have to just dream the dream anymore. We get to vote that dream into reality."

There are many in the African American establishment who consider Winfrey's exhortation a bit of starry-eyed nonsense. There are senior black Democrats who can barely hide their exasperation at Obama's success, which they see as a mortal threat to a Democratic victory in November. Andrew Young is the latest to go public with his pique, saying in remarks reported over the weekend that he wants Obama to be president, but not until 2016. If Obama somehow managed to win this time, Young said, he couldn't possibly be effective: "To put a brother in there by himself is to set him up for crucifixion."

Others of comparable stature have griped privately to me that this whole Obama thing is madness, that he can't possibly win and that with a known quantity such as Hillary Clinton in the race, this is no time to go chasing rainbows. They point out that in the nation's history we've elected only two black governors -- Douglas Wilder in Virginia and Deval Patrick in Massachusetts. If Americans, in all these years, have only elected two black men to run a state, are they really going to elect a black man to run the whole country?

It's hard to dismiss such cold-eyed logic. Yet many people appear to believe, as Winfrey said, that "disappointment doesn't have to be normal anymore."

Even before Oprahpalooza stormed the country, there was considerable evidence that black voters had been moving toward Obama. The most recent Mason-Dixon poll, based on interviews conducted last week, shows Obama with a 16-point lead over Clinton among black Democrats in South Carolina -- a complete reversal of where things stood in the summer.

Just months ago, political reporters were asking whether Obama was "black enough," as if there were some sort of chromatic-cultural gauge that could measure his blackness. Now they are asking whether the senator from Illinois has somehow "transcended race," which I find an equally absurd question. Soon, if Obama continues his rise in the polls, we'll all be asked to ponder whether he's "too black" for America's tastes.

I don't know what will happen when Iowans go into their caucuses or when voters in New Hampshire and the other primary states go into their voting booths; if all the people who told pollsters they would vote for black candidates actually did so, Tom Bradley would have been elected governor of California. But I'm pretty confident that little or no overt racism is likely to show up in the opinion polls. If I'm right, and Obama continues at or near the top of the field in overwhelmingly white states such as Iowa, then black voters who are so inclined will be more likely to take the leap of faith.

There's an old conundrum within the African American community: Push or be patient? Winfrey addressed it head-on.

"There are those who say it's not his time, that he should wait his turn," she said of Obama. Then she asked the crowd: "Think about where you'd be in your life if you'd waited when people told you to. I wouldn't be where I am if I'd waited on the people who told me it couldn't be."

Obama is still a long way from the presidency, but anyone who follows politics knows that there is no guarantee that he'll ever get this close again. No one can ask him not to try to seize the moment.

I'd be lying if I didn't acknowledge that the whole idea of America electing a black president still seems improbable to me. But no longer impossible.

The writer will answer questions at 1 p.m. today athttp://www.washingtonpost.com. His e-mail address iseugenerobinson@washpost.com.

NEW YORK TIMES: Obama’s American Idea

Dr. Susanne Hussein Freeborn — Tue, 11 Dec 2007 02:40:30 EST

By ROGER COHEN

I asked Senator Barack Obama if he’s tough enough for a dangerous world. Sometimes the Democratic candidate treads so carefully, and looks so vulnerable to a gust of wind, that the question of whether his legal mind can get lethal arises.

“Yes, I’m tough enough,” he responded during a half-hour conversation. “What I’ve always found is people who talk about how tough they are aren’t the tough ones. I’m less interested in beating my chest and rattling my saber and more in making decisions that build a safer and more secure world.”

Obama, speaking less than a month before the Iowa caucus on Jan. 3, continued: “We can and should lead the world, but we have to apply wisdom and judgment. Part of our capacity to lead is linked to our capacity to show restraint.”

That was striking: an enduring belief in U.S. leadership coupled with a commitment to, as he also put it, acting “with a sense of humility.” Skepticism about the American idea and American global stewardship has grown fast during the Bush years.

There are many reasons: the failures in Iraq; the abyss between U.S. principle and practice (Abu Ghraib); the rise of other nations (China); startling displays of American incoherence (Iran); economic vulnerability (the dollar as declining store of value); and general resentments stirred by any near hegemonic power.

All this has led some to conclude that the world would be better off if America slunk home. As Joyce Carol Oates wrote in The Atlantic: “How heartily sick the world has grown, in the first seven years of the 21st century, of the American idea!” It has become a “cruel joke.”

If a global survey were taken, that might prove to be a minority opinion, but I doubt it.

Still, Obama stands by the universality of the American proposition: life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness under a constitutional government of limited powers. “I believe in American exceptionalism,” he told me, but not one based on “our military prowess or our economic dominance.”

Rather, he insisted, “our exceptionalism must be based on our Constitution, our principles, our values and our ideals. We are at our best when we are speaking in a voice that captures the aspirations of people across the globe.”

It is dangerous, of course, to speak of being exceptional; people tend to resent it. If the United States said its ambition was to be normal, few would object. But Obama is right to retain a belief in America’s capacity to inspire; it remains unique. And I still see no credible stabilizing alternative to the far-flung American garrisons that act as the offsetting power to old rivalries in Asia and Europe.

Pax Americana, being neither perfect nor peaceful, is not popular. Only its absence would convince its detractors of its worth.

Obama’s main Democratic rivals, Senator Hillary Clinton and former Senator John Edwards, have joined him in calling for a shift from fear, militarism and unilateralism toward interaction, including with enemies. But Obama’s global engagement seems visceral in unusual ways.

“If, as president, I travel to a poor country to talk to leaders there, they will know I have a grandmother in a small village in Africa without running water, devastated by malaria and AIDS,” he said. “What that allows me to do is talk honestly not only about our need to help them, but about poor countries’ obligation to help themselves. There are cousins of mine in Kenya who can’t get a job without paying an exorbitant bribe to some midlevel functionary. I can talk about that.”

Referring to the time he spent in Indonesia, Obama said: “I have lived in the most populous Muslim country in the world, had relatives who practiced Islam. I am a Christian, but I can say I understand your worldview, although I may not agree with how Islam has evolved. I can speak forcefully about the need for Muslim countries to reconcile themselves to modernity in ways they have failed to do.”

Al Qaeda attacked the West in Kenya, Bali and New York. Obama’s father was Kenyan. The senator was schooled partly in Indonesia. He attended college in New York. The parallels are strange. They can also be a source of the toughness married to intuition for which he still seeks complete expression.

Nowhere in American history has the gulf between ideals and sordid practice been greater than on questions of race. It is precisely the gulf between high principle — not least habeas corpus — and unprincipled actions that has done the most damage to America’s image in recent years. Once again, Obama appears to bridge and reconcile.

“We can’t entirely remake the world,” he told me. “What we can do is lead by example.”

On the web at: http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/10/opinion/10cohen.html?em&ex=1197522000&en=1245b0f7b143f0d7&ei=5087%0A

Share Your Thoughts: Don Imus

Asher Heimermann — Mon, 03 Dec 2007 23:29:19 EST

Please e-mail me at asher@asherheimermann.com with yout thoughts about Don Imus returning back to the air. Your e-mail maybe posted on my website, http://www.ASHERHEIMERMANN.com!

Thanks,

ASHER HEIMERMANN / www.ASHERHEIMERMANN.com

Why I want a Generation Obama

hopeful visions — Sat, 01 Dec 2007 23:37:19 EST

I am a young person for Obama because the polar-extremities of the 60’s do not exist for me. They are the hot-cold arguments of my parents, which I will gladly take the benefits of: like Civil Rights for black America and later for people with disabilities, but I cannot nod my head to their red-blue song of cynicism, because plainly, that is NOT the America I see. When I deny that vision, it seems I see another.

I see a small town in front of a cluster of sleek windmills under an expansive sky, where one energetic teacher infuses a whole school building with new life, challenging underestimated students, engaging creativity, proving professionalism. I see a town where grown kids like me will want to return make a life in, having expanded their horizons at least once. I see a morphed vignette of the “typical American community” from backwoods Oregon to the block in Trenton, whose values are accessible to all.

Try. Look through the glass isolation or the shoves of racism, and there you will see it: after 232 fraught years, the final birth of an American culture. It is without a historic template or a qualifying prefix; but more than anything it is a fresh term, one that does not turn the stomachs of groups, why,

HOW I FEEL TODAY

Joyce R-H — Fri, 23 Nov 2007 13:15:21 EST

There are just a little over 60 days here in South Carolina until the Democratic Primary. It just seems like April when I was deciding upon the candidate that I would support. At that time one of the front runners was HRC, I'd rather not waste time with the full name. However, I realized after investigation that HRC did not have a list of issues on her website. And it seemed apparent to me that she would be running on last name recognition only. And just as I suspected it seems that she is running on familarity of name and not on character or experience. If she were running on experience she would realize and admit that Senator Obama has more political/office experience than she does. She would also be more solid in her decisions and less mean spirited. In this election it is obvious that she is a dragon lady. Beside HRC, I was investigating Richardson. Governor Richardson is still impressive to me, however, I believe that the person for this job is definitely Senator Obama. I know that Senator Obama does not want to jump the gun, however, a Obama/Richardson ticket works for me. Let me just state that I have learned there are many good people in the world of all races and backgrounds who want a president that will help to bring us back to being the United States of America. The only stubborness, I want to see in my president is the stubborness to make policies that benefit the citizens of this country and not their own egos. It is now time that we all work the early states results victorious.

Opinions by Barack: Mortgage Lenders and Iran

Lisa Beyer — Sat, 01 Sep 2007 19:36:09 EDT

Financial Times: Fine Unscrupulous Mortgage Lenders By Barack Obama, August 29, 2007

NY Daily News: Hit Iran Where It Hurts: Democratic Presidential Hopeful Takes A Get-Tough Stance Against Tyrant Of Tehran By Barack Obama, August 30, 2007

Boston Globe: Obama Brings His Pen On Vacation, August 30, 2007

Foreign Policy. How it should be done?

Bosnian Sniper Fox — Thu, 26 Jul 2007 00:32:42 EDT

It seems like the pundits like to turn things inside out, especially with the latest election debate about how Obama and Hillary responded, when a Youtube suscriber asked the question, whether or not they would go into talks with foreign countries currently labeled as enemies, without any pre-condition.

First of all. I'm glad that this is pretty much the only issue that the Hillary tribe can attack out of the entire debate, because it shows that their opponent -Obama- is hard to nitpick and they grasp onto this, because they got nothing else to criticize.

Democratic Debate

Sarah Kelly — Fri, 27 Apr 2007 13:59:45 EDT

What did you think about the debate last night?

I just wrote a long post with my opinion of each candidate, but it disappeared once I clicked "Publish Post". Oh well! Maybe I'll rewrite it later.

Until then, tell us what you thought!

Letter Published in Daily News Journal

Tanmack — Fri, 23 Mar 2007 16:25:11 EDT

Here is the letter Link comments published in today's Daily News Journal. It's not one of my best letters, but I got my point across.