Friday, March 21, 2008
Monday, March 17, 2008
5 Years Ago, as War Neared, Hillary Clinton Was Silent, 'NYT' Archives Show
5 Years Ago, as War Neared, Hillary Clinton Was Silent, 'NYT' Archives Show: "By Greg Mitchell
… on March 14, this letter appeared in the Times, from Susana Margolis of New York City: "It's increasingly evident that the likely invasion of Iraq is only secondarily about the variously offered objectives, from weapons of mass destruction to 'liberation.' Rather, it represents a historic change in United States foreign policy: the establishment of an American garrison to carry out policy goals in western Asia by military means.
"The president should come clean on the administration's true intentions, and it is the Senate's duty to debate the issue. Yet there's not a word. New York's senators, having voted for the resolution last year authorizing the use of force in Iraq, appear to have lost their voices entirely. History will record that when the country effected a sea change in its posture toward the world, Senators Hillary Clinton and Charles E. Schumer were nowhere to be found."
(March 16, 2008) -- Wherever you stand on the Obama/Clinton race, one thing nearly everyone agrees on is this: She voted for the war resolution in 2002, has not apologized for that vote since -- but now says the resolution did not really authorize the war and calls the 2003 invasion a mistake.
But what did she do in attempting to halt the war -- which she felt she did not authorize -- in the two weeks before it began? Apparently, nothing.
With fifth-anniversary coverage now in full swing, I probed The New York Times' online archives today from March 1 to March 23 in 2003 (the war started on March 19), looking for evidence. Numerous articles involving the junior senator from New York turned up, but most related to subjects pretty far afield from the war: from abortion to the St. Patrick's Day Parade.
The only Clinton statement about the war in the Times -- as the countdown arrived -- came in a revealing roundup of local officials' views written by Joyce Purnick. She found several top New York officeholders strongly against the war (such as Rep. Rangel), and a few okaying it. But here is her summary of Hillary's views:
"The award for the most indefinite position has to go to Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton. When her press secretary, Philippe Reines, was asked her position, he sent a transcript of Mrs. Clinton's remarks last Friday on CNN and a news account of her comments on Monday during a visit to Watervliet, N.Y. (It seems that the senator, still a bit first ladylike, is reluctant to pick up the phone.)
"A skeptic might conclude that Mrs. Clinton wants to appeal to her antiwar constituents in New York now, and to a broader base later -- if she runs for president. Or maybe she remains conflicted."
"She said on CNN that the president ''made the right decision to go back to the United Nations' and suggested that the country 'take a deep breath, deal with Iraq if we have to, understand exactly what we've gotten ourselves into, because in the briefings I've received, there's a lot of unknowables.'
"In Watervliet, the senator said, 'This is a very delicate balancing act.' And, 'I fully support the policy of disarming Saddam Hussein.' She also urged the administration 'to try to enlist more support.' "
http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/columns/pressingissues_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003726268&imw=YSaturday, March 15, 2008
Obama in 30 Seconds
Obama in 30 Seconds: "MoveOn.org has a message for all filmmakers, writers, directors, actors, editors, composers, graphic artists, and animators: Whether you're a total amateur or a total pro, now is the time to use your creativity to help Barack MoveOn.org has a message for all filmmakers, writers, directors, actors, editors, composers, graphic artists, and animators: Whether you're a total amateur or a total pro, now is the time to use your creativity to help Barack"
http://www.obamain30seconds.com/?rc=homepage
Friday, March 14, 2008
Wednesday, March 12, 2008
Ferraro Speaking Freely - The Opinionator - Opinion - New York Times Blog
Ferraro Speaking Freely - The Opinionator - Opinion - New York Times Blog: Comment on the second comment.
Owen Scott III dissects and clarifies what I've come to think of as the affirmative action fallacy. He is clear and convincing. His arguments are as thoughtful as Ms. ferraro's statement was thoughtless. I expect that no one on the other side is listening.
…if you have been the target of racial prejudice or the anger of women who see all men as their oppressors, you don’t just understand, you feel the thrust of Ms. Ferraro’s tactics (much as women who have been sexually assaulted feel the thrust of a lawyer’s comments aimed at justifying a man who overrode the protests of an attractively dressed woman who said ‘No’ to a sexual come-on after she invited the man in for a nightcap).
"Here is what Ms. Ferraro’s comment appear to argue: (1) that Sen. Obama has few or no outstanding qualifications to be President; (2) that Sen. Obama’s black supporters vote for him only because he is black; (3) that Sen. Obama’s non-black supporters are only motivated by trying to show that they are not racists; (4) that Sen. Obama’s supporters of all colors dislike Sen. Clinton solely because she is a woman; (5) that white men and all women are being discriminated against by black men and their accomplices in the media; and, that (6) all women are being discriminated against by black men, guilty white people who want to assuage their misplaced guilt, and their accomplices in the media. All of this appears to me to appeal to target groups of potential Clinton voters: (a) persons who feel that blacks get unfair advantages in American society and (b) persons who feel that discrimination against women is a more destructive force in our society than racism. The main (a) target group is white workers who are disappointed by their jobs and income and are prejudiced against blacks ; while, the (b) target group is women who view men and paternalism as the source of their disappointments and frustration and feel entitled to some recompense. The message gains additional traction with members of group (b) who are prejudiced against black men.
…if you don’t think Sen. Obama has any obvious strengths, you will tend to seek an explanation of why so many people vote for him. This may lead you to believe people vote for him because he is black or because of being bleeding heart liberals. Additionally, if you support Sen. Clinton and see her as a positive female leader, you are likely to wonder why so many people don’t like her. This predisposes you to believe it’s sheer misogyny. So far, none of this means you are a racist. … neither are you the actual target of Ms. Ferraro’s comments because you already like Sen. Clinton and do not understand the appeal of Sen. Obama. You’re just trying to understand why your candidate isn’t doing better at the polls and gets criticized in the media and by right-wing bigots (whom you have no problem identifying accurately). Because you do not have prejudice that Ms. Ferraro is trying to ignite, you don’t find her comments offensive.
…To me, those of you who are not racists but who justify Ms. Ferraro’s comments are the unwitting accomplices of an insidious and destructive tactic that goes against the heart of the progressive mission of justice and fair opportunity for all. Much of the discussion of this issue salts the wounds on both sides. Just as it offends you when Obama supporters toss out insults about Sen. Clinton and her illustrious husband, it does not help your cause when you reciprocate with sarcastic zingers involving Kool-aid and an empty suit. I’m also afraid that some of the people who have commented here really are members of Ms. Ferraro’s target voting groups. "
http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/03/12/ferraro-speaking-freely/
Monday, March 10, 2008
The Clinton Rules, All for Them and All for Them
The Daily Dish - The Clinton Rules By Andrew Sullivan: http://www.typepad.com/t/trackback/2224950/26883332
beating him by a barrage of petty attacks, by impugning his clear ability to be commander-in-chief, by toying with questions about his "Muslim past", by subtle invocation of the race card, by intermittent reliance on gender identity politics, by taking faux offense to keep the news cycle busy ("shame on you, Barack Obama!") and so on. If the Clintons beat Obama this way, I have a simple prediction. It will mean a mass flight from the process. It will alter the political consciousness of an entire generation of young voters - against any positive interaction with the political process for the foreseeable future.
"For the first time in decades, a candidate has emerged who seems able to address the country's and the world's needs with a message that does not rely on Clintonian parsing or Rovian sleaze. For the first time since the 1960s, we have a potential president able to transcend the victim-mongering identity politics so skillfully used by the Clintons. If this promise is eclipsed because the old political system conspires to strangle it at birth, the reaction from the new influx of voters will be severe. The Clintons will all but guarantee they will lose a hefty amount of it in the fall, as they richly deserve to. Some will gravitate to McCain; others will be so disillusioned they will withdraw from politics for another generation. If the Clintons grind up and kill the most promising young leader since Kennedy, and if they do it not on the strength of their arguments, but by the kind of politics we have seen them deploy, the backlash will be deep and severe and long. As it should be.
The reason so many people have re-engaged with politics this year is because many sense their country is in a desperate state and because only one candidate has articulated a vision and a politics big enough to address it without dividing the country down the middle again. For the first time in decades, a candidate has emerged who seems able to address the country's and the world's needs with a message that does not rely on Clintonian parsing or Rovian sleaze.
He has a million little donors. He has brought many, many Republicans and Independents to the brink of re-thinking their relationship with the Democratic party. And he has won the majority of primaries and caucuses and has a majority of the delegates and popular vote. This has been a staggering achievement - one that has already made campaign history. If the Clintons, after having already enjoyed presidential power for eight long years, destroy this movement in order to preserve their own grip on privilege and influence in Democratic circles, it will be more than old-fashioned politics. It will be a generational moment - as formative as 1968. Killing it will be remembered for a very, very long time. And everyone will remember who did it - and why."
http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2008/03/the-clinton-rul.html
Wednesday, March 05, 2008
Barack Obama : : Change We Can Believe In | Alfred Ingram's Blog
Barack Obama : : Change We Can Believe In Alfred Ingram's Blog:
"Sunday, on 60 minutes, I watched a guy in Ohio say he really liked what he heard from Obama, but he'd heard that Barack was actually a muslim and that he wouldn't sing the National anthem. Steve Croft, the interviewer, said ' You know that's not true,don't you?'
These things keep coming up because there's an active effort to keep these lies before the public. These attacks didn't work for most of the campaign, because the attacks came too early, giving us time to demonstrate how false they are.
The new tactic, and all they have is tactics not strategy, is to make the attacks as close as possible to election day, leaving us little or no time for an adequate response.
We have to do the same thing, not with lies, but with truths.
We must use their instinctive reactions against them, questioning their secretiveness, their financial ties, their poor management.
We must make the press feel inadequate for not following up on these items. We must ask why, if her claim to the nomination is her experience, the record of that experience is sealed.
We must show that this is a historical pattern. The Whitewater documents only appeared after the statute of limitations had run out and she was facing contempt charges.
We must show, that she doesn't trust the people she wants to support her.
We must do this as close to the next primary as possible, leaving her with only the option of releasing those records or explaining why she doesn't trust the voters.
Or of plagiarising Pontius Pilate by asking " What is truth?""
Saturday, March 01, 2008
Clinton Questions Role of Obama in a Crisis? Who is She Trying to Kid? - New York Times
Clinton Questions Role of Obama in a Crisis - New York Times: I don't know about you but I've seen how Senator Clinton responds to crisis. She puts on identities, the way other women change wardrobes. If she can't manage a campaign, how on earth will she manage the real threats we face? Her campaign for the nomination bears an uncanny resemblance to Bush's plans for Iraq after Saddam. Basically, we deserved better then and we deserve, and require, better now. How can you be ready on Day One 2009, and be so unready in February and March 2008.
Alfred Ingram
"With four days to go before voters in Texas and Ohio could determine the fate of her presidential bid, Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton on Friday all but declared Senator Barack Obama unprepared to serve as commander in chief.
Mrs. Clinton has stopped short of asserting outright that he is not qualified, lest it come back to haunt her and the Democratic Party. But she released an advertisement Friday that used the symbolic “red phone” in the White House to cast doubt on his ability to respond to a crisis at 3 a.m. And she made a withering speech here in which she pronounced him “missing in action” when he had a chance to assert himself on international matters.
“It’s 3 a.m. and your children are safe and asleep,” says the narrator in her commercial, while ominous music surges over dark black-and-white images. An undefined world crisis is brewing, and the red phone — a relic of the hot line to Moscow during the cold war — rings.
“Your vote will decide who answers that call,” the narrator says. “Whether it’s someone who already knows the world’s leaders, knows the military — someone tested and ready to lead in a dangerous world.”
The commercial drew an immediate response from Mr. Obama, as the campaign released a similar red phone advertisement highlighting Mr. Obama’s opposition to the Iraq war.
Speaking in Houston before veterans, he said, “We’ve seen these ads before. They’re the kind that play on people’s fears to try to scare up votes.”
“In fact, we have had a red phone moment,” he said. “It was the decision to invade Iraq. And Senator Clinton gave the wrong answer, George Bush gave the wrong answer, John McCain gave the wrong answer,” voting to authorize force in Iraq. (Mr. Obama was not in the Senate at the time.) "
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/01/us/politics/01campaign.html?ex=1362114000&en=e734197611ff84ff&ei=5124&partner=permalink&exprod=permalinkThursday, February 28, 2008
Presidential Inaugurations: Presidential Oaths of Office
Presidential Inaugurations: Presidential Oaths of Office:
"Each president recites the following oath, in accordance with Article II, Section I of the U.S. Constitution: 'I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.'"
Saturday, February 23, 2008
The Audacity of Hopelessness - New York Times
The Audacity of Hopelessness - New York Times:
It’s not just that her candidacy’s central premise — the priceless value of “experience” — was fatally poisoned from the start by her still ill-explained vote to authorize the fiasco. Senator Clinton then compounded that 2002 misjudgment by pursuing a 2008 campaign strategy that uncannily mimicked the disastrous Bush Iraq war plan. After promising a cakewalk to the nomination — “It will be me,” Mrs. Clinton told Katie Couric in November — she was routed by an insurgency.
"The gap in hard work between the two campaigns was clear well before Feb. 5. Mrs. Clinton threw as much as $25 million at the Iowa caucuses without ever matching Mr. Obama’s organizational strength. In South Carolina, where last fall she was up 20 percentage points in the polls, she relied on top-down endorsements and the patina of inevitability, while the Obama campaign built a landslide-winning organization from scratch at the grass roots. In Kansas, three paid Obama organizers had the field to themselves for three months; ultimately Obama staff members outnumbered Clinton staff members there 18 to 3.
In the last battleground, Wisconsin, the Clinton campaign was six days behind Mr. Obama in putting up ads and had only four campaign offices to his 11. Even as Mrs. Clinton clings to her latest firewall — the March 4 contests — she is still being outhustled. Last week she told reporters that she “had no idea” that the Texas primary system was “so bizarre” (it’s a primary-caucus hybrid), adding that she had “people trying to understand it as we speak.” Perhaps her people can borrow the road map from Obama’s people. In Vermont, another March 4 contest, The Burlington Free Press reported that there were four Obama offices and no Clinton offices as of five days ago. For what will no doubt be the next firewall after March 4, Pennsylvania on April 22, the Clinton campaign is sufficiently disorganized that it couldn’t file a complete slate of delegates by even an extended ballot deadline.It’s the Clinton strategists, not the Obama voters, who drank the Kool-Aid. The Obama campaign is not a vaporous cult; it’s a lean and mean political machine that gets the job done. The Clinton camp has been the slacker in this race, more words than action, and its candidate’s message, for all its purported high-mindedness, was and is self-immolating.
This is the candidate who keeps telling us she’s so competent that she’ll be ready to govern from Day 1. Mrs. Clinton may be right that Mr. Obama has a thin résumé, but her disheveled campaign keeps reminding us that the biggest item on her thicker résumé is the health care task force that was as botched as her presidential bid.
Given that Mrs. Clinton and Mr. Obama offer marginally different policy prescriptions — laid out in voluminous detail by both, by the way, on their Web sites — it’s not clear what her added-value message is. The “experience” mantra has been compromised not only by her failure on the signal issue of Iraq but also by the deadening lingua franca of her particular experience, Washingtonese. No matter what the problem, she keeps rolling out another commission to solve it: a commission for infrastructure, a Financial Product Safety Commission, a Corporate Subsidy Commission, a Katrina/Rita Commission and, to deal with drought, a water summit.If the press were as prejudiced against Mrs. Clinton as her campaign constantly whines, debate moderators would have pushed for the Clinton tax returns and the full list of Clinton foundation donors to be made public with the same vigor it devoted to Mr. Obama’s “plagiarism.” And it would have showered her with the same ridicule that Rudy Giuliani received in his endgame. With 11 straight losses in nominating contests, Mrs. Clinton has now nearly doubled the Giuliani losing streak (six) by the time he reached his Florida graveyard. But we gamely pay lip service to the illusion that she can erect one more firewall."
As for countering what she sees as the empty Obama brand of hope, she offers only a chilly void: Abandon hope all ye who enter here. This must be the first presidential candidate in history to devote so much energy to preaching against optimism, against inspiring language and — talk about bizarre — against democracy itself. No sooner does Mrs. Clinton lose a state than her campaign belittles its voters as unrepresentative of the country.
Bill Clinton knocked states that hold caucuses instead of primaries because “they disproportionately favor upper-income voters” who “don’t really need a president but feel like they need a change.” After the Potomac primary wipeout, Mr. Penn declared that Mr. Obama hadn’t won in “any of the significant states” outside of his home state of Illinois. This might come as news to Virginia, Maryland, Washington and Iowa, among the other insignificant sites of Obama victories. The blogger Markos Moulitsas Zúniga has hilariously labeled this Penn spin the “insult 40 states” strategy.
The insults continued on Tuesday night when a surrogate preceding Mrs. Clinton onstage at an Ohio rally, Tom Buffenbarger of the machinists’ union, derided Obama supporters as “latte-drinking, Prius-driving, Birkenstock-wearing, trust-fund babies.” Even as he ranted, exit polls in Wisconsin were showing that Mr. Obama had in fact won that day among voters with the least education and the lowest incomes. Less than 24 hours later, Mr. Obama received the endorsement of the latte-drinking Teamsters.
Fort Worth Paper: Secret Service Ordered End to Gun Checks at Obama Rally
Fort Worth Paper: Secret Service Ordered End to Gun Checks at Obama Rally:
"The order to put down the metal detectors and stop checking purses and laptop bags came as a surprise to several Dallas police officers who said they believed it was a lapse in security," reported the paper's Jack Douglas, Jr. More than 10 days remain until the Texas primary and a key vote for president.
"The Fort Worth Star-Telegram reported late Thursday that security details at Barack Obama's rally in Dallas (of all places) on Wednesday 'stopped screening people for weapons at the front gates more than an hour before the Democratic presidential candidate took the stage at Reunion Arena.
"Dallas Deputy Police Chief T.W. Lawrence, head of the Police Department's homeland security and special operations divisions, said the order -- apparently made by the U.S. Secret Service -- was meant to speed up the long lines outside and fill the arena's vacant seats before Obama came on. '"Sure,' said Lawrence, when asked if he was concerned by the great number of people who had gotten into the building without being checked. But, he added, the turnout of more than 17,000 people seemed to be a 'friendly crowd.'"."
Secret Service defends security at Obama rally in Dallas
Others said they had recently attended large political events, many for Obama, where security screening was halted. Jeremy Dibbell of Boston said in an e-mail that he attended an Obama event in Boston at which "the same thing happened there. We waited for hours in line as people were screened, and then suddenly everyone was just allowed in without going through any inspection at all."
FORT WORTH -- The U.S. Secret Service on Friday defended its handling of security during a massive rally in downtown Dallas for Barack Obama, saying there was no "lapse" in its "comprehensive and layered security plan," which called for some people to be checked for weapons, while others were not.
A report in the Star-Telegram that said some security measures were lifted during Wednesday's rally sparked a public outrage across the country, with most people saying they were shocked that a routine weapons search was lifted at the front gates of Reunion Arena an hour before the Democratic presidential candidate took the stage."This relaxed security was unbelievably stupid, especially in Dallas," Jeff Adams of Berkeley, Calif., said in an e-mail to the Star-Telegram, noting the assassination of President Kennedy in Dallas more than four decades ago.
Nick Shapiro, a spokesman for Obama in Texas, said the campaign would have no comment on whether there was a security breech in Dallas. Shapiro referred questions to the Secret Service.
"There were no security lapses at that venue," said Eric Zahren, a spokesman for the Secret Service in Washington. He added there was "no deviation" from the "comprehensive and layered" security plan, implemented in "very close cooperation with our law enforcement partners."
Zahren rebutted suggestions by several Dallas police officers at the rally who thought the Secret Service ordered a halt to the time-consuming weapons check because long lines were moving slowly, and many seats remained empty as time neared for Obama to appear.
"It was never a part of the plan at this particular venue to have each and every person in the crowd pass through the Magnetometer," said Zahren, referring to the device used to detect metal in clothing and bags.
He declined to give the reason for checking people for weapons at the front of the lines and letting those farther back go in without inspection.
http://www.star-telegram.com/news/story/489920.htmlhttp://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003714257&imw=Y
Wednesday, February 20, 2008
Wisconsin? Texas and Ohio Are Where All the Action Has Gone - New York Times
Wisconsin? Texas and Ohio Are Where All the Action Has Gone - New York Times:
Mrs. Clinton said she could not begin to explain how the Texas system worked. “I had no idea how bizarre it is,” she said aboard her plane flying from Wisconsin to Ohio. “We have grown men crying over it.”
"“These are major, major, major battleground states,” said Howard Wolfson, the Clinton campaign’s communications director. “It will be a major test of the two candidates.”
The Clinton campaign said it was deploying staff members from other states to Ohio and opening offices in every Congressional district. In Texas, it has opened 20 offices and enlisted 4,000 precinct captains, almost halfway to where it wants to be, campaign officials said.
Texas’ byzantine delegate-selection rules pose a particular challenge to the Clinton forces. Districts that produced heavy Democratic majorities in past contests get a disproportionate share of the delegates, and this favors Mr. Obama because of large turnout in 2004 and 2006 in college towns and black precincts, where he has done well in other states. Mrs. Clinton’s strength is in the cities along the Mexican border, where she is popular with Hispanic voters, but which produce fewer delegates.
Adding to the complexity, Texas holds a primary and a caucus on the same day, with the evening caucus open only to those who have already cast primary ballots, either in early voting (which began Tuesday) or at the polls on March 4. Mr. Obama has prevailed in most caucuses up to now.
Ill prepared for the series of contests after Feb. 5, the Clinton campaign in Pennsylvania had failed to file a complete slate of delegates for that state’s primary, falling 10 or 11 delegates short of the 103 delegates to be elected at the district level…
Clinton campaign officials have admitted being . Further evidence came this week when The Philadelphia Daily News reported that the Clinton campaign in Pennsylvania had failed to file a complete slate of delegates for that state’s primary, falling 10 or 11 delegates short of the 103 delegates to be elected at the district level. Under party rules, however, those delegates could be restored later. Phil Singer, a campaign spokesman, said, “We expect every one of our slots to be filled after the Pennsylvania primary.”
After winning 23 contests before Tuesday, the Obama campaign is intensely competing in Texas and Ohio. Television advertisements started running in both states last week, including Spanish-language advertisements in Texas.
In Ohio, two advertisements focus on the state’s battered economy and promise job-creation programs and an end to corporate tax loopholes; another is biographical, and a fourth paints Mrs. Clinton as an embodiment of the past.
The Obama campaign has opened 10 regional offices in Texas, aides said, and plans to open more before the primary.
Their strategy for Texas, Obama aides said, includes appealing to African-Americans in Dallas and Houston, as well as building upon the senator’s popularity in Austin, where a rally last year drew 20,000 people. But Mr. Obama’s first appearance in the state on Tuesday, in the heart of a Hispanic neighborhood in San Antonio, underscored his effort to compete with Mrs. Clinton for Hispanic supporters.
Adrian Saenz, the Texas director of the Obama campaign, said 125,000 volunteers in the state had signed up to help the campaign when the operation formally began three weeks ago.
“We’re not giving up any part of the state, regardless of where folks may say the Clintons have deep roots,” Mr. Saenz said in an interview, adding that the campaign intended to find support among younger Hispanic voters. In the fight for Ohio, Mr. Obama has dispatched his top operatives, including Paul Tewes, the Iowa campaign manager, to run the state effort. Teams of organizers from states that held contests on Feb. 5 have also been dispatched to Ohio and Texas."
Tuesday, February 12, 2008
Monday, February 11, 2008
The Content of Their Character
Forty years ago the opportunity to transform America fell under the unexpected impact of bullets, the rifle bullet that took the life of Dr. King, the pistol round that slaughtered Robert Kennedy.
For forty years we've been recalling the dream of judging people by the content of their character rather than the color of their skin.
Dr. Kings last major speech was not about his dream, but his assurance to us that he'd been to the mountain top and had seen the promised land. Assurance that, though he might not get there with us, we would make it to the promised land.
Moses didn't get to the promised land. He too, had to glimpse it from the mountain top. The children of Israel wandered forty years in the wilderness before they got there. Yet it was such a short distance. You'd think they would have made it there much sooner, but they didn't until they were ready as a people.
America has been wandering for forty years now. The people seem, not just ready but, determined to select their candidates for the content of their character.
That isn't sitting well with some. It doesn't seem fair to them. It feels like all their accomplishments are being ignored, while their character is questioned.
They don't understand what character has to do with politics. Their reaction has been countless attempts to muddy their opponent's character, while complaining that scrutiny of theirs is unfair.
They've even begun to complain that the opponent is responsible for a campaign of hate against them. At the same time, they claim their opponent is naive, unprepared to fight evil with its own weapons. They've forgotten how not to swiftboat. They don't seem to know how not to distort. When they play the race card, somehow it's their opponents fault.
Well, whining is a character trait. Dishonesty is a character trait. Cynicism is a character trait. Inability to admit mistakes is a character trait. Like it or not, americans are making their judgments, and day by day, more and more of them are judging character.
When the people look at proposed policy on opposing web sites, they see that claims of no substance just aren't true. They aren't inclined to condemn a candidate for things he never said. They look for evidence backing claims of experience, only to find that they're not allowed to see it until 2012.
They know exactly where one candidate's money came from. The other won't release that information, but, instead tries to tie their opponent to contributers in ways they can't bear any scrutiny at all. (If the Hsu fits, they should stop trying to make others wear it.)
Americans are ready to stop wandering in this wilderness. Americans are tired.
They're tired of being separated, by tribe or race, by faith or politics.
We will choose a President with character, who calls us to express our best character, as one America, united, and after forty uncertain years, finally whole.
A Video on McCains 100 Years - The Caucus - Politics - New York Times Blog
Sunday, February 10, 2008
Next Up for the Democrats: Civil War - New York Times
Next Up for the Democrats: Civil War - New York Times:
"For a campaign that began with tightly monitored Web “chats” and then planted questions at its earlier town-hall meetings, a Bush-style pseudo-event like the Hallmark special is nothing new, of course. What’s remarkable is that instead of learning from these mistakes, Mrs. Clinton’s handlers keep doubling down.
Less than two weeks ago she was airlifted into her own, less effective version of “Mission Accomplished.” Instead of declaring faux victory in Iraq, she starred in a made-for-television rally declaring faux victory in a Florida primary that was held in defiance of party rules, involved no campaigning and awarded no delegates. As Andrea Mitchell of NBC News said, it was “the Potemkin village of victory celebrations.”
The Hallmark show, enacted on an anachronistic studio set that looked like a deliberate throwback to the good old days of 1992, was equally desperate. If the point was to generate donations or excitement, the effect was the reverse. A campaign operative, speaking on MSNBC, claimed that 250,000 viewers had seen an online incarnation of the event in addition to “who knows how many” Hallmark channel viewers. Who knows, indeed? What we do know is that by then the “Yes We Can” Obama video fronted by the hip-hop vocalist will.i.am of the Black Eyed Peas had been averaging roughly a million YouTube views a day. (Cost to the Obama campaign: zero.)
Scattered black faces could be seen in the audience. But in the entire televised hour, there was not a single African-American questioner, whether to toss a softball or ask about the Clintons’ own recent misadventures in racial politics.
Two days after her town-hall extravaganza, Mrs. Clinton revealed the $5 million loan she had made to her own campaign to survive a month in which the Obama operation had raised $32 million to her $13.5 million. That poignant confession led to a spike in contributions that Mr. Obama also topped. Though Tuesday was largely a draw in popular votes and delegates, every other indicator, from the candidates’ real and virtual crowds to hard cash, points to a steadily widening Obama-Clinton gap. The Clinton campaign might be an imploding Potemkin village itself were it not for the fungible profits from Bill Clinton’s murky post-presidency business deals. (The Clintons, unlike Mr. Obama, have not released their income-tax returns.)
In an effort to scare off white voters, Mr. Obama was ghettoized as a cocaine user (by the chief Clinton strategist, Mark Penn, among others), “the black candidate” (as Clinton strategists told the Associated Press) and Jesse Jackson redux (by Mr. Clinton himself).
The campaign’s other most potent form of currency remains its thick deck of race cards. This was all too apparent in the Hallmark show. In its carefully calibrated cross section of geographically and demographically diverse cast members — young, old, one gay man, one vet, two union members — African-Americans were reduced to also-rans. One black woman, the former TV correspondent Carole Simpson, was given the servile role of the meeting’s nominal moderator, Ed McMahon to Mrs. Clinton’s top banana. Scattered black faces could be seen in the audience. But in the entire televised hour, there was not a single African-American questioner, whether to toss a softball or ask about the Clintons’ own recent misadventures in racial politics.
The Clinton camp does not leave such matters to chance. This decision was a cold, political cost-benefit calculus. In October, seven months after the two candidates’ dueling church perorations in Selma, USA Today found Hillary Clinton leading Mr. Obama among African-American Democrats by a margin of 62 percent to 34 percent. But once black voters met Mr. Obama and started to gravitate toward him, Bill Clinton and the campaign’s other surrogates stopped caring about what African-Americans thought. In an effort to scare off white voters, Mr. Obama was ghettoized as a cocaine user (by the chief Clinton strategist, Mark Penn, among others), “the black candidate” (as Clinton strategists told the Associated Press) and Jesse Jackson redux (by Mr. Clinton himself).
The result? Black America has largely deserted the Clintons. In her California primary victory, Mrs. Clinton drew only 19 percent of the black vote. The campaign saw this coming and so saw no percentage in bestowing precious minutes of prime-time television on African-American queries.
Last month a Hispanic pollster employed by the Clinton campaign pitted the two groups against each other by telling The New Yorker that Hispanic voters have “not shown a lot of willingness or affinity to support black candidates.”
That time went instead to the Hispanic population that was still in play in Super Tuesday’s voting in the West. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa of Los Angeles had a cameo, and one of the satellite meetings was held in the National Hispanic Cultural Center in Albuquerque. There’s nothing wrong with that. It’s smart politics, especially since Mr. Obama has been behind the curve in wooing this constituency.
But the wholesale substitution of Hispanics for blacks on the Hallmark show is tainted by a creepy racial back story. Last month a Hispanic pollster employed by the Clinton campaign pitted the two groups against each other by telling The New Yorker that Hispanic voters have “not shown a lot of willingness or affinity to support black candidates.” Mrs. Clinton then seconded the motion by telling Tim Russert in a debate that her pollster was “making a historical statement.”
It wasn’t an accurate statement, historical or otherwise. It was a lie, and a bigoted lie at that, given that it branded Hispanics, a group as heterogeneous as any other, as monolithic racists. As the columnist Gregory Rodriguez pointed out in The Los Angeles Times, all three black members of Congress in that city won in heavily Latino districts; black mayors as various as David Dinkins in New York in the 1980s and Ron Kirk in Dallas in the 1990s received more than 70 percent of the Hispanic vote. The real point of the Clinton campaign’s decision to sow misinformation and racial division, Mr. Rodriguez concluded, was to “undermine one of Obama’s central selling points, that he can build bridges and unite Americans of all types.”
If that was the intent, it didn’t work. Mrs. Clinton did pile up her expected large margin among Latino voters in California. But her tight grip on that electorate is loosening. Mr. Obama, who captured only 26 percent of Hispanic voters in Nevada last month, did better than that in every state on Tuesday, reaching 41 percent in Arizona and 53 percent in Connecticut. Meanwhile, the Clinton campaign’s attempt to drive white voters away from Mr. Obama by playing the race card has backfired. His white vote tally rises every week. Though Mrs. Clinton won California by almost 10 percentage points, among whites she beat Mr. Obama by only 3 points.
The question now is how much more racial friction the Clinton campaign will gin up if its Hispanic support starts to erode in Texas, whose March 4 vote it sees as its latest firewall. Clearly it will stop at little. That’s why you now hear Clinton operatives talk ever more brazenly about trying to reverse party rulings so that they can hijack 366 ghost delegates from Florida and the other rogue primary, Michigan, where Mr. Obama wasn’t even on the ballot. So much for Mrs. Clinton’s assurance on New Hampshire Public Radio last fall that it didn’t matter if she alone kept her name on the Michigan ballot because the vote “is not going to count for anything.”"
Friday, February 08, 2008
Mrs. Clinton has been an advocate for transparency in campaign finance. Just not her campaign finance
Mr. Obama, speaking to reporters, zeroed in on Mrs. Clinton’s loan and said that her decision not to disclose her income tax returns raised questions about the loan.
“I’ll just say that I’ve released my tax returns,” he said, responding to a question about tax returns. “That’s been a policy I’ve maintained consistently. I think the American people deserve to know where you get your income from.”
Mr. Obama stopped short of issuing a call for Mrs. Clinton and former President Bill Clinton to release their returns.
“I’m not going to get into the intricacies of their finances,” Mr. Obama told reporters as he flew to a rally in Nebraska. “That’s something that you’ll have to ask them.”
Obama focused Wednesday on the next primaries and his fund-raising. The $32 million in January, aides said, came from 275,000 people who gave $100 or less. Ninety percent of the money came from online donations. The disparity between his contributions and Mrs. Clinton’s, he said, demonstrate a gap in enthusiasm.
“I think there’s no doubt that she has not generated the kind of grass-roots enthusiasm that we have,” Mr. Obama said. “It’s not for lack of trying. She’s got a former president actively fund raising for her, as well as people like Terry McAuliffe. But what we’ve done is created this base where people send $25 checks, $50 checks on an ongoing basis.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/08/us/politics/08clinton.html?ex=1360213200&en=f8e853e037eeeb3c&ei=5124&partner=permalink&exprod=permalink read more at NYTimes digg storyLawrence Lessig on Barack Obama
Lessig gives a 20 minute talk on why he supports Obama for president. Informative, lucid, comprehensive, and a must see.
http://lessig.org/blog/2008/02/20_minutes_or_so_on_why_i_am_4.htmlThursday, February 07, 2008
Obama: The Shock of the Red
Barack Obama’s red-state victories on Tuesday suggested that change is afoot in the Wild West, writes Timothy Egan.
In my lifetime, voting rights for african americans drove white men from the democratic party. Now, the opportunity to vote for one, extraordinary african american is bringing them back.
“Take a look at what happened on Tuesday in the nearly all-white counties of Idaho, a place where the Aryan Nations once placed a boot print of hate — “the international headquarters of the white race,” as they called it.
The neo-Nazis are long gone. But in Kootenai County, where the extremists were holed up for several decades, a record number of Democrats trudged through heavy snow on Super Duper Tuesday to help pick the next president. Guess what: Senator Barack Obama took 81 percent of Kootenai County caucus voters, matching his landslide across the state. He won all but a single county.
The runaway victory came after a visit by Obama last Saturday, when 14,169 people filled the Taco Bell Arena in Boise to hear him speak – the largest crowd ever to fill the space, for any event. It was the biggest political rally the state has seen in more than 50 years.
“And they told me there were no Democrats in Idaho,” Obama said.
Okay, so Idaho is the prime rib of Red America. Ditto Utah, where Obama beat Senator Hillary Clinton 56 percent to 39 percent on Tuesday, including a 2-1 win in arguably the most Republican community in America – Provo and suburbs, a holdout of Bush dead-enders. Tom Brady will date a nun before these states vote Democratic in a general election.
But those numbers, and exit polling across the nation, make a case for Obama’s electability and the inroads he has made into places where Democrats are harder to find than a decent bagel. Yes, Hillary-hatred is part of it. But something much bigger is going on among independents and white males, something that can’t all be attributed to fear of a powerful woman in a pantsuit.
Having gone through their Hope versus Experience argument, Democrats are moving on to the numbers phase, looking for advantages in the fall. If they want to parse the Geography of Hope, they can do no better than study what happened in red counties on Tuesday.
Now broaden the picture and look at the vote among white males, traditionally the hardest sell for a Democrat. While losing California, Obama won white men in the Golden State, 55 to 35, according to exit polls, and white men in New Mexico, 59-38.
Overall, Obama won some big, general election swing states: Colorado, Missouri, Minnesota, and a tie in New Mexico, where they may still be counting votes from the 2004 election. All will be crucial in deciding the next president.
His victory in Colorado, by a 2-1 margin, defied most predictions. Four times as many Democrats turned out as were expected, typical of the passion level elsewhere. In Anchorage, Alaska, for example, traffic was backed for nearly a mile from people trying to get into a middle school to become part of an Obama avalanche.
But back to Colorado. Obama won the liberal enclaves, as expected, but then he nearly ran the table in the western part of the state – ranch and mining country — and he did it with more than Brokeback Mountain Democrats. In booming, energy-rich Garfield County, for instance, Obama beat Clinton 72 percent to 27 percent.
Obama has made cynics wilt, and stirred the heart of long-dead politicos in places where Democrats haven’t had a pulse in years. Cecil Andrus, the eagle-headed eminence of Idaho, a former governor and Democratic cabinet member, nearly lost his voice introducing Obama in Boise on Saturday. He recalled a time when he was a young lumberjack who drove down the Clearwater Valley to see Jack Kennedy speak in Lewiston, a day that changed his life.
“I’m older now, some would suggest in the twilight of a mediocre political career,” Andrus said. “I, like you, can still be inspired. I can still hope.”
“We won in places nobody thought we could win,” an exultant Federico Pena, the former Denver mayor, told a victory crowd on Tuesday night. Obama’s audience a few days earlier – more than 18,000 — was so big that thousands who couldn’t get in huddled on a frozen lacrosse field to hear him. ”
President Dwight Eisenhower's granddaughter, Susan Eisenhower, made a small bit of family history on her own. She said that if Obama is the nominee, “this lifelong Republican will work to get him elected.”
http://egan.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/02/06/obama-the-shock-of-the-red/
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