Do you have trouble maintaining an election?

[quarter23cd]

I think most Obama supporters would agree that substantively there's not all that much of a difference, and that at the end of the day, he would be better at uniting and inspiring folks and that in the long run this will result in more change.

This is largely true. At the end of the day, Obama offers about as close to a clean slate as you're going to get in terms of potential goodwill across the aisle. Electing Hillary will have about the same effect on the level of discourse in this country as electing another member of the Bush clan.

 

Hard to say how things would pan out in the general elections, though. Either candidate, I suppose, has the potential to "turn the opposition out in droves." I can say, however, that just in my immediate family I know more than a few die-hard Republicans who have even mentioned the possibility of voting for Obama in the generals (they don't like McCain much) but would be more than happy to smack down Hillary, given the opportunity. Don't know if this is true on a larger scale, but I'd imagine it is.

[MattZ]

Hard to say how things would pan out in the general elections, though. Either candidate, I suppose, has the potential to "turn the opposition out in droves." I can say, however, that just in my immediate family I know more than a few die-hard Republicans who have even mentioned the possibility of voting for Obama in the generals (they don't like McCain much) but would be more than happy to smack down Hillary, given the opportunity. Don't know if this is true on a larger scale, but I'd imagine it is.

 

It is interesting -- I have had the opposite experience. I know folks here in NYC that are Republicans but more middle of the road Repubs who just hate Bush and want to start over. They see HRC and the Clinton legacy as more "independent" than "liberal" and they take comfort (rightly or wrongly) in the Clintons when it comes to national defense. These folks are telling me it's HRC if she wins the nomination. And it's McCain if BO wins the nomination. They are just terrified of a liberal president.

[MrRain422]

A friend of mine on another board posted these, and she sums up very well a lot of the reasons why I support Obama over Clinton:

 

5 random reasons why I will never vote for Hillary Clinton, without even including her vote for the war in Iraq:

 

1) Not only did she encourage Bill Clinton to sign the awful awful fuck-you-progressives Welfare Reform Act (I'm sorry.... the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Act - its full Orwellian title is much more entertaining), but she joined with "Democrats" like Joseph Lieberman, Bill Nelson, and Zell fuckin' Miller in 2002 to support President Bush in increasing the work requirements for TANF without providing any additional provisions for childcare. My God, even a number of Republicans opposed this draconian bullshit, but not Hillary. Fucking DLC bullshit.

 

2) She has the audacity to go after Obama's record on abortion, as though he is somehow not really pro-choice, when she has supported parental consent laws throughout her political career.

 

3) She voted for the Kyl-Lieberman bill declaring Iran's Revolutionary Guard a terrorist organization. Has she learned nothing from Iraq?? Lieberman and Kyl are both super-hawks, we have neocons beating the drums for war with Iran, we still have Bush in office, and she votes for this scary nonsense? She is unquestionably the most militaristic of the Democratic frontrunners, and by far the most likely to take us to war with Iran. And apart from the bill laying the groundwork for a possible war with Iran, the administration has never bothered to provide one shred of compelling evidence for 90% of its allegations against Iran, and the last thing we need is Democrats supporting the unbelievably shoddy intelligence record of this criminal administration.

 

4) Hillary Clinton is the only one of any of the Democratic candidates (including those who have dropped out already) who opposed retroactivity for the Federal Sentencing Commission's recommendation of equal sentencing for crack and powder cocaine. She also totally misunderstood - or more likely willfully misrepresented (and took Rudy Giuliani's ludicrous line) the consequences of retroactivity, which would NOT simply release thousands of convicts straight to the street, but would give them an opportunity to go before a judge and make a case for their fitness.

 

5) While Obama and Edwards both support a full repeal of the Defense of Marriage Act, Clinton tries to have it both ways, advocating a repeal of section 3 but continuing to support section 1 and 2.

 

I could go on, believe me. But here's one bonus #6:

 

6) Are we so fucking scared of democracy in this country that we want dynastic government? Jesus Christ, if Hillary Clinton is elected and then re-elected, that will give us 28 consecutive years of a Bush or Clinton in office. The Clintons have a notorious political machine, I do not want these people back in the White House, and I don't want that asshole campaign strategist Mark Penn once again giving real leftists the middle finger.

 

 

8 MORE REASONS TO SUPPORT BARACK OBAMA OVER HILLARY CLINTON

 

1) POVERTY: Obama has an extensive and detailed plan to address the issue of poverty (especially concentrated urban poverty - although he also has a plan regarding rural poverty). It is quite progressive in tone and recommendations, and demonstrates an understanding of the structural and institutional conditions which contribute to poverty. Hillary Clinton has never offered any comprehensive proposal regarding poverty. As a leftist, and a former supporter of Edwards, I think this is the MOST important issue for progressives, and a candidate who can't even deign to address it as a distinct issue is not adequate for me. I strongly recommend reading this article from BeyondChron comparing the housing & urban poverty plans of Edwards, Obama, and Clinton.

 

2) ETHICS AND GOVERNMENT REFORM: You can attack Obama for failing to live up to the highest and noblest rhetoric he employs, but when you actually compare him to Clinton, well....there's actually no comparison at all. This chart compares both canddiates on ethics and transparency issues and finds that on every single issue, it's either a tie or an Obama win. This article elaborates, finding Clinton comes up drastically short in comparison to Edwards and Obama, and that Obama outshines both candidates. Concrete examples: Obama has disclosed all his post-2006 earmarks, Clinton refuses to. Obama has stopped travelling on corporate-subsidized jets, Clinton continues to do so. Obama has refused money from federal lobbyists, Clinton still takes money from federal lobbyists. Obama has disclosed his tax returns, Clinton refuses to. Obama has worked extensively in Congress on landmark transparency legislation, Clinton's legislative history shows virtually no regard for issues of ethics, government reform, or transparency. After 8 years of a hyper-secretive administration wedded to executive power, these issues are crucial.

 

3) DEATH PENALTY: Clinton supported the death penalty throughout her career, running Senate campaigns in which she touted her support. In 1996, she lobbied on behalf of two of the most loathsome pieces of legislation in criminal justice history, the Anti-Terrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act, which massively restricted the opportunity for death row convicts to appeal their convictions, and The Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act, which vastly expanded the number of crimes eligible for the federal death penalty. While I would like to see Obama come out completely against the death penalty, he has at least supported a much more restricted and cautious application than Hillary. He has stated during this campaign that he only supports the death penalty for terrorists, child murderers, and serial killers. He has also worked in the Illinois Senate for legislation protecting against wrongful application of the death penalty.

 

4) CLUSTER BOMBS: I've already criticized Hillary Clinton's militarism, but I'd like to add a major footnote to this: she opposed Amendment 4882 to a 2006 Pentagon Appropriations Bill which made it illegal to use cluster bombs in civilian areas. She OPPOSED this. Obama supported it. This is one more example of Clinton trying to prove she's tough commander-in-chief material....it was also a morally reprehensible vote.

 

5) CUBA: This issue is especially important now that Fidel Castro has stepped down. On this issue, Clinton represents the outdated, reactionary old guard, and Obama represents the recognition that our Cuba policy is irrational and backward. Quite bravely, considering the Cuban refugee population in Miami, he wrote an editorial in the Miami Herald calling for significant changes in our Cuba policy, including an immediate lifting of travel and remittance restrictions and a longer term willingness to reconsider the embargo. As we saw at the debate on Thursday, Clinton refuses to consider significant changes to our Cuba policy until after Cuba has "proven" its willingness to change - a hypocritical and misguided policy which has done nothing in half a century to change Cuba's political system.

 

6) FOREIGN POLICY ADVISORS: You can tell a lot about a would-be president from the advising team they select. Hillary Clinton's foreign policy advisors lean waaaaay to the hawkish side of things, Obama's lean to the dovish side of things. For Hillary, we have Madeline Albright, who famously said that bombing Iraq was a justifiable policy in spite of the fact that 500,00 Iraqi children had died, Richard Holbrooke (expect to be her secretary of state), who actively worked on behalf of marcos and suharto, and who calls mahmoud ahmadinejad "the new hitler" - hardly encouraging for those who are nervous about the prospect of war with iran. All three supporters the war in iraq. Wesley Clark is the lone exception. I do like Clark, but he's seriously outnumbered. Obama on the other hand has appointed sharp critics of the bush doctrine and notable scholars of human rights: richard clarke, samantha power, susan rice, zbigniew brzezinski.

 

7) MANDATORY MINIMUMS: Barack Obama has sharply denounced mandatory minimum sentencing, while Hillary Clinton has disingenuously denounced it in front of minority audiences, while condemning Obama for his own denunciations! This amazing bit of hypocrisy, btw, is a much worse and more flagrant kind of "dirty" campaigning than anything Obama has been accused it.

 

8) TECHNOLOGY: It's nice to hear a would-be president who understands the potential democratic power of the Internet. TechPresident has rated all the candidates according to their technology plans and proclaims that Hillary Clinton "either doesn't get it, or hasn't focused on it, yet" while Obama "not only gets it, he's put his whole technology/innovation platform into one neat package." As a bit of a tech nerd myself, I really like the extent to which Obama wants to use the Internet to allow citizens to monitor their government: establishing databases tracking government contracts, earmarks, campaign financing, lobbying reports, etc. Clinton has never mentioned anything of the sort, and even more to the point, has shown many signs of harboring the same secretive and anti-transparent impulses as the Bush administration.

 

And, to me, the definitive word on why Obama's oratory skills are important:

And last but not least, Obama. What do I like about Obama?

 

Let's be clear: I don't think Obama is some kind of avenging hero of the left. John Edwards played that role a lot more convincingly, at least rhetorically. (On the other hand, if we're going to give Mitt Romney shit for seeming to have no principles whatsoever, then we do have to note that Edwards' newfound populism repudiated pretty much ever single detail of his Senate career. The dude has had to apologize for his votes on about 20 different policies....iraq, china, bankruptcy, free trade, nuclear waste at yucca mountain, no child left behind, the patriot act, etc etc etc...the guy has changed his mind about every fuckin' thing to become mr. barnstorming progressive!) Obama is also in bed with the banks and the financial services industry, his rhetoric on welfare is ambiguous, he voted consistently to fund the iraq war, and on the whole, he's playing for the center just as hard as Hillary is. I'm not supporting him because I think he perfectly represents me. In fact, I don't think it would be possible for a Democratic frontrunner to perfectly represent me (and, in part, I blame the Clintons for that fact.)

 

So why support him? Here's where I fundamentally disagree with all of you: I think that words matter and language matters. In other words, all the talk about unity and hope and optimism is definitely bullshit - but it's important bullshit. The reason it's important is because Obama is totally right about Reagan - by earning across-the-board support for his fuzzy-but-meaningless rhetoric, Reagan managed to completely change the landscape of American politics. Of course, Democrats (like Bill Clinton) could still get elected after Reagan, but they could only do it by playing his game, by adopting his terms, by accepting the fact that there was a new game board, where you couldn't be an out-and-out liberal, where you had to acknowledge that welfare was some kind of pathological dependency and government was almost always evil and the market is God - those things became unquestionable dogmas thanks to Reagan's sweeping coalition. If we ever want to dislodge these dogmas, if we ever want to imagine a progressive future - we need someone who has the ability to pull together another broad coalition that begins to inch leftward. I don't view Obama as the leftist savior...I view him as paving the way for the possibility of unashamedly progressive politics sometime in the future. Hillary absolutely can't do that. She can't. Too many people hate her. Her support will always come from a bare plurality of the population, centered in the Northeast and California. You can't fundamentally shift American politics with a bare plurality.

 

Obama could fail miserably in his bid to put together a broad coalition. Actually, as a pessimist, I suspect he will fail miserably. But if he fails, his presidency won't be too different from a Hillary presidency, anyway. On the other hand, if he succeeds, you're talking about the beginnings of a political realignment. I see nothing to lose, as compared to Hillary, and the distant possibility of a real prize.

 

Now, that's not to say that issues and substance don't matter at all. They do. And Obama has made more of an effort than Hillary to co-opt Edwards' populism (just look at their web sites - Obama has an extensive discussion of poverty as its own, distinct issue, Hillary doesn't even treat it as a distinct issue). He actually proposes specific policies for dealing with concentrated urban poverty - a genuinely progressive framing of the issue. His propositions of Promise Neighborhoods, community development block grants, and affordable housing trust funds actually go some small way toward the vision of a "Marshall Plan for Cities" that Greens and progressives have called for. On criminal justice issues, he is so far to the left of Hillary, they're not even in the same ballpark. She supported the disastrous crime bill of the 1990s and basically tries as hard as possible to come off as ultra-tough-on-crime, while Obama actually speaks to some of the progressive critiques of our criminal justice system - drug treatment programs instead of jail time for drug offenders, ex-offender support, vastly diminished use of the death penalty (and here he is the ONLY remaining presidential candidate I've heard speak of institutional racism in the application of capital punishment - yeah, I'd like to hear him grow a pair of balls and come out entirely against the death penalty, but he's outflanked Hillary way to her left on this one). And, of course, it does matter to me that he was antiwar from day one. I know, I know, maybe that would have been entirely different if he was in the Senate - well, who knows. But as someone who thinks the Iraq war was the policy disaster of the 21st century thus far, it counts for a lot that he was always on the same side as me.

 

Ultimately, if experience matters that much to you, then vote for McCain. He's got way more experience than Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama. If you tell me you won't vote for McCain because you don't particularly approve of how he has actually used his experience, well - that's how I feel about Hillary Clinton. Four or eight years from now, I may be saying the exact same thing about Barack Obama.

But for now, he makes way more sense to me than Hillary Clinton simply for the fact that he actually represents the possibility of long-term, progressive change. She does not, and cannot.

[Good Old Neon]

I say this as an HRC supporter. I think most Obama supporters would agree that substantively there's not all that much of a difference, and that at the end of the day, he would be better at uniting and inspiring folks and that in the long run this will result in more change. And that HRC is so polarizing that she'd either (1) not be able to get as much done; or (2) be more easily beaten by McCain in the general electrion because she will get the right wing to the voting booths.

 

I happen to disagree with much of this -- I think HRC's health care plan is better, and I think her stance on negotiating with heads of state is more reasonable. I also think her position on NAFTA is more reasonable.

 

I also fear, that as HRC continues to win the big states, that it makes McCain's argument for him. I fear that Obama is (in the eyes of the RNC) slowly morphing into the "left-wing liberal fringe candidate who couldn't even win one big state in his own primary." I can see McCain going there already. And I don't know if that nets out the fear among Dems that HRC gets every right wing nut to the polls on election day. You dont think the right wing will turn out in droves to vote against that?

 

At this point, I just want whoever will beat McCain to win the nomination. Dangit.

 

I agree with your assessment regarding Obama

[Sweet Papa Crimbo]

apparently she only gained 4 delegates on Obama from today though

 

 

Don't think we've heard the last about the Caucuses (cauci?) in Texas.

 

There were severe irregularities in the Dallas area, including Obama supporters barring Clinton supporters from the Caucus sites. (I have a friend who's Sister was physically barred from entering a caucus site).

 

The newly politically active sometimes have to learn how to act in a civil manner (to say the least).

[MattZ]

A friend of mine on another board posted these, and she sums up very well a lot of the reasons why I support Obama over Clinton:

 

I think most (if not all) of the criticisms listed by your friend are fair, but I also think they take on an unfair flavor when they are used by people supporting a candidate that just doesn't have a long enough public record to analyze. If Obama had 8 years in the Senate, there would certainly be opportunities for folks to run off lists of instances when Obama tried to have an issue both ways. Or when he was forced to vote a certain way for political expediency purposes. It happens. It's politics. The NAFTA fiasco from last week proves that Obama will do it too. And that's what frustrates me most -- many Obama supporters seem to be starting from the premise that he is somehow different on this score, and then there just isn't the background one way or the other, to back it up.

[MrRain422]

I think most (if not all) of the criticisms listed by your friend are fair, but I also think they take on an unfair flavor when they are used by people supporting a candidate that just doesn't have a long enough public record to analyze. If Obama had 8 years in the Senate, there would certainly be opportunities for folks to run off lists of instances when Obama tried to have an issue both ways. Or when he was forced to vote a certain way for political expediency purposes. It happens. It's politics. The NAFTA fiasco from last week proves that Obama will do it too. And that's what frustrates me most -- many Obama supporters seem to be starting from the premise that he is somehow different on this score, and then there just isn't the background one way or the other, to back it up.

 

Sure, but if I know that I'm going to be unhappy with a Hillary Clinton presidency, then why not take a chance on Obama? There's a chance I'll be unhappy with what he'll do, but it's guaranteed that she'll disappoint me. So why should I choose certain disappointment over at least some semblence of hope?

 

I also dispute that Obama doesn't have a public record to scrutinize. Is time in the federal government the only thing that we can consider? If you look at Obama's time in the state legislature plus his time in the U.S. Senate, his public record is as long as Clinton's, unless you count her time as First Lady, but that's a pretty big stretch. And I don't see why his time as a community orgnanizer shouldn't count for him as well, as it certainly shows where his priorities lie.

 

And furthermore, if you just look at Clinton's record only in the time that Obama has been in the Senate, his record beats hers easily, IMO.

[MattZ]

Sure, but if I know that I'm going to be unhappy with a Hillary Clinton presidency, then why not take a chance on Obama? There's a chance I'll be unhappy with what he'll do, but it's guaranteed that she'll disappoint me. So why should I choose certain disappointment over at least some semblence of hope?

 

No argument from me on that.

 

EDIT: I don't get why it's the two extremes though (ie, guaranteed disappointment vs. semblance of hope). Substantively, I think we can all agree there's just not that big of a difference. Do you really think there's even a semblance of hope that Obama won't be talking out of both sides of his mouth when he's elected? He's doing it already on NAFTA. It's politics.

 

And guaranteed disappointment - if HRC wins and is able to get universal healthcare, and appoints two justices to the Supreme Court, are you really guaranteed to be disappointed?

 

So, I guess I take back my "No argument from me on that" point.

[Edie]

Tremendously disappointed in the results last night, but I don't think for a second that the tide has turned for Hillary.

 

I was watching MSNBC (for some reason) and Tim Russert read off of a memo from the Obama campaign that was generated some time ago, predicting almost exactly what has transpired in the campaign thus far. This included predicting who was going to win which states, which was dead on with the exception of Obama losing ME (he won ME). They also predicted he would lose OH and TX, while picking up enough delegates in each to stay ahead (seemingly correct).

 

It also mentioned that even with those losses and a loss in PA, he will win the delegate battle. I didn't catch this part, but I don't think that FL and MI are included in the calculation. This is of course the wild card that is going to have to be figured out fast -- either make up elections in June or leave them out.

 

Articles today (I won't quote them; they are easy to find) reported her hinting at a combined ticket with her at the top. Pluuueeze. How presumptive. Obama is ahead in the popular vote in all states (granted 300K less now than yesterday) and he is still winning the only race that matters -- delegates.

 

I have supported HRC all along, and I was half rooting for Obama last night. A Clinton sweep of Texas and Ohio means the Dems will spend the next 3 mos beating each other up while McCain waits in the wings. And then, (i) we get a nominee who is hated by half the party because she forced her way in at the convention; or (ii) a nominee who did not win one of the following states: NY, CA, TX, OH, NJ, etc.

 

I agree with the first part, and it scares the CRAP out of me but if memory serves, in the general election, Bush lost NY, MA, CA, NJ, IL, WA, OR, MN, and WI in both elections (I am sure I am missing a couple), lost the popular vote in the first, and still won the presidency (if you agree with the 2000 FL results; don't get me started).

 

Of course, McCain can still go after him on not winning the states in the primary, but of the democratic voters on election day in Nov, I'll bet that there would be more potential Obama supporters than potential Hillary supporters in those states. I hope I am making myself clear.

 

Sure, but if I know that I'm going to be unhappy with a Hillary Clinton presidency, then why not take a chance on Obama? There's a chance I'll be unhappy with what he'll do, but it's guaranteed that she'll disappoint me. So why should I choose certain disappointment over at least some semblence of hope?

 

I won't be unhappy with a Clinton presidency, just a whole lot happier with an Obama one.

[MrRain422]

And guaranteed disappointment - if HRC wins and is able to get universal healthcare, and appoints two justices to the Supreme Court, are you really guaranteed to be disappointed?

 

Yes, because there are many more issues than just those two that concern me. Any Democrat will appoint better justices than any Republican. But I have no faith at all that Hillary can get a health care package put through. I think Obama has a better chance of getting this done than her. And as great as health care and some better judges would be, I am guaranteed to be disappointed with Hillary's hawkishness, her refusal to completely reevaluate our policy in Iraq, our global relations, her complicitness with business as usual in Washington. The claim that Obama and Clinton are identical on the issues is a huge falsehood. There are important differences between them, especially in regards to Hillary's hawkishness, that I can't ignore. And those claims also depend heavily on what issues you look at -- they have HUGE differences when it comes to poverty, which is one of the most important issues to me. But since no one in Washington has given half a shit about poverty as a distinct issue in decades, no one even talks about it as a real issue, and so their differences get ignored.

 

And as I quoted from my friend earlier, language does matter, and I think long term an Obama administration can make greater strides towards moving the political center in America leftwards back towards a true center rather than skewed way to the right as it is now. Clinton is progressive only in our fucked up current paradigm where anyone to the left of Joe Lieberman is a Stalinist or something. Obama frames the issues in ways that are more likely to pursuade people to move to the left, and years from now that could lead to a more viable genuinely progressive party.

 

If Clinton gets the nomination, I'll likely vote for her, as I don't think I can stand another Republican administration at this point, but I will not be happy about it and I will not be optimistic about what a Hillary Clinton administration will do.

[bjorn_skurj]

We in New York have learned something from the Spitzer gubernatorialness. It's one thing to say you're going to completely reform everything and no longer conduct business as usual, it is quite another to actually do it. Presidents aren't dictators; they have to cooperate with other sources of power (Congress, the private sector) to get things done. To really substantively change things up in here, Obama's election will have to be accompanied by the election of a great number of allies in Congress, and will have to be backed up by the continued participation and outrage of his supporters.

[MrRain422]

We in New York have learned something from the Spitzer gubernatorialness. It's one thing to say you're going to completely reform everything and no longer conduct business as usual, it is quite another to actually do it. Presidents aren't dictators; they have to cooperate with other sources of power (Congress, the private sector) to get things done. To really substantively change things up in here, Obama's election will have to be accompanied by the election of a great number of allies in Congress, and will have to be backed up by the continued participation and outrage of his supporters.

 

I don't expect any massive change right away, and maybe not even over the course of two terms as President. I'm talking about a gradual shift that would make a bigger impact long term. The political center in this country has moved too far to the right in the last 2 or 3 decades to overhaul everything immediately, but I think a shift in language, no longer deferring to the talk radio framing of issues, can have a huge long term impact in shaping the future of progressive politics.

[bobbob1313]

I think to think an Obama election will absolutely garauntee anything other than business as usual is wishful thinking. He is, after all, a politician. Sure he's kind of young, and he's black, and the kids love him, but he's not all that different from the rest. Sure it's possible we see a lot of change during his presidency if it happens. But I wouldn't bet a whole lot of money on it.

[Good Old Neon]

I think to think an Obama election will absolutely garauntee anything other than business as usual is wishful thinking. He is, after all, a politician. Sure he's kind of young, and he's black, and the kids love him, but he's not all that different from the rest. Sure it's possible we see a lot of change during his presidency if it happens. But I wouldn't bet a whole lot of money on it.

 

I'm in complete agreement with you here.

[MrRain422]

I think to think an Obama election will absolutely garauntee anything other than business as usual is wishful thinking. He is, after all, a politician. Sure he's kind of young, and he's black, and the kids love him, but he's not all that different from the rest. Sure it's possible we see a lot of change during his presidency if it happens. But I wouldn't bet a whole lot of money on it.

 

Not sure if this was in response to me, but I never said that an Obama victory would guarantee anything. All I said was, Hillary will almost certainly be business as usual, and that with Obama, there's a chance that things might change.

[Reni]

I think to think an Obama election will absolutely garauntee anything other than business as usual is wishful thinking. He is, after all, a politician. Sure he's kind of young, and he's black, and the kids love him, but he's not all that different from the rest. Sure it's possible we see a lot of change during his presidency if it happens. But I wouldn't bet a whole lot of money on it.

 

Well, as my Senator I know I have sent Obama an abundance of "thank you for your support for _____ bill" letters and not one "I am disappointed with your vote on ______" letter. I have called his office a few times asking him to vote a certain way on bills. I can't remember a time where he didn't line up with my position. He sure is a change from the senators I used to deal with in Missouri. *groan*

 

However, I can't say the same for my representative, who has stopped sending responses to me, because I send so many angry letters his way.

[Good Old Neon]

Not sure if this was in response to me, but I never said that an Obama victory would guarantee anything. All I said was, Hillary will almost certainly be business as usual, and that with Obama, there's a chance that things might change.

 

And that, it seems is the crux of his campaign, selling the appearance, the promise of change

[Edie]

And that, it seems is the crux of his campaign, selling the appearance, the promise of change

[MattZ]

Hillary will almost certainly be business as usual

 

I dont mean to pick on you here -- and I admit, the HRC supporters are coming out of the woodwork (i.e., where was I last week?) -- but talk to me about NAFTA. How is that not business as usual? Campaiging in Ohio and telling voters that you want to withdraw from NAFTA while senior campaign aides behind the scenes tell Canada not to worry? You want to tell me he didn't know his aides were doing that? Ok, fine. Either he should have known or he did know. Both scenarios are bad in my eyes. Both scenarios are business as usual, no?

 

I don't have so much of a problem with it -- it's politics (as I've said many times) -- but Obama is running with a clean slate and has convinced folks that these are the types of things that separate him from other candidates. I think (A) that's just wrong -- no candidate can survive in DC without selling out (you have to compromise to get things done) and ( B ) we dont have 8 yrs in the Senate to base any decision one way or the other.

[Good Old Neon]

What bugs me about your answer is that if this was Nader or another third party candidate talking about change, you'd just about cream over yourself.

 

No, not really, because a genuine third party candidate would start with a clean(er) slate, and then, if, from that point forward, they conducted themselves as just another business as usual sort of candidate, I

[Good Old Neon]

This pretty much sums up our current predicament (Noam Chomsky (a personal hero of sorts) being interviewed by David Barsamian.):

 

DB: You also cite the twentieth-century philosopher and educator John Dewey in a kind of link with Jefferson. What did Dewey have to say about this subject?

 

Chomsky: Dewey was one of the last spokespersons of what you might call the Jeffersonian view of democracy. Of course, he was writing a century later. Jefferson himself, some years before the remarks I quoted, warned of the danger that the government would fall into the hands of what he again called an aristocracy of "banking institutions and monied incorporations," what we would nowadays called corporations. He warned that that would be the end of democracy and the defeat of the American revolution. That's pretty much what happened in the century that followed, far beyond his worst nightmares.

 

Dewey was writing in the early part of the twentieth century. His view was that democracy is not an end in itself, it's a means by which people discover and extend and manifest their fundamental human nature and human rights, which is rooted in freedom and solidarity and a choice of both work and other forms of participation in a social order and free individual existence. Democracy produces free people, he said. That's the "ultimate aim" of a democratic society; not the production of goods, but "the production of free human beings associated with one another on terms of equality." He recognized that democracy in that sense was a very withered plant.

 

He described politics as "the shadow cast on society by big business," namely by Jefferson's "banking institutions and monied incorporations," of course vastly more powerful by this time. He felt that that fact made reform very limited if not impossible. Here are his words: As long as "politics is the shadow cast on society by big business, the attenuation of the shadow will not change the substance." So reform may be of some use, but it's not going to bring democracy and freedom. These are undermined by the very institutions of private power, which of course he recognized, as did Jefferson and other classical liberals, as absolutist institutions. They're unaccountable. They're basically totalitarian in their internal structure. They're powerful far beyond anything that Dewey dreamed, for that matter. He also spelled out exactly what they were. He made it quite clear that as long as there is no democratic control of the workplace, of the banking institutions and monied incorporations, there will be only the most limited democracy."

 

Now, if you think Obama and the rest of his cohorts within the democratic party are the solution to this problem, by all means, vote for him/them, but me, I see no evidence to suggest they are anything but perpetuators and beneficiaries of this system, and, for that reason, will no longer receive my vote.

[Mr. Heartbreak]

I love this quote from Bush's endorsement-of-McCain speech today:

 

"If my showing up and endorsing him helps him, or if I'm against him and it helps him, either way I want him to win."

 

I'm gonna miss him SOOOOO much.

[Reni]

that press conference was f'in hilarious

[bobbob1313]

Bush has been awesome lately.

[MrRain422]

I dont mean to pick on you here -- and I admit, the HRC supporters are coming out of the woodwork (i.e., where was I last week?) -- but talk to me about NAFTA. How is that not business as usual? Campaiging in Ohio and telling voters that you want to withdraw from NAFTA while senior campaign aides behind the scenes tell Canada not to worry? You want to tell me he didn't know his aides were doing that? Ok, fine. Either he should have known or he did know. Both scenarios are bad in my eyes. Both scenarios are business as usual, no?

 

I don't have so much of a problem with it -- it's politics (as I've said many times) -- but Obama is running with a clean slate and has convinced folks that these are the types of things that separate him from other candidates. I think (A) that's just wrong -- no candidate can survive in DC without selling out (you have to compromise to get things done) and ( B ) we dont have 8 yrs in the Senate to base any decision one way or the other.

 

Well, I actually meant as far as our actual policy, not campaign tactics, but it's a fair question. As far as I can tell though, the NAFTA debacle is pretty isolated -- you point to one very valid instance of either not knowing what his advisors were doing when he should have or being dishonest about it. This incident only resonates, as far as I can tell, because it is so rare. The exception to the rule in his case rather than how he generally does business. I can get past it because, to me, it seems to be an isolated incident so I can give him the benefit of the doubt. I never claimed him to be perfect, just striving to be in a way that I don't think Hillary Clinton is. She's content with things the way they are, and he seems to be trying to transform the system from the inside, which of course could fail, but seems worth trying to me.

 

And again, why does his pre-Senate record not count? People keep mentioning that we don't know anything about him because he's only been in the Senate for a short time. But why can't we get any insight into him from his record as a state legislator, community organizer, attorney, law professor, etc.? He's been more open about pre-Senate life than any other candidate in my memory at least. His record as a community organizer and Illinois State Senator seems a lot more relevant to me than what Hillary Clinton did as First Lady, and yet that is frequently credited as relevant experience for her while Obama is talked about as if he was not involved in politics until 2004. The fact that his experience was outside of Washington and that he's mostly removed from the Washington politics of the last 20 years is a big plus for me.