McCain to concede around 11pm EST
http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2008/11/4/185520/135/920/653021
It's 10:59 PM EST, FoxNews has it live on their channel that Obama has 297 electoral votes.
It's over.
=//Turnquest
Showing posts with label election 2008. Show all posts
Showing posts with label election 2008. Show all posts
2008/11/04
2008/10/14
Barack Media
You'd think with just three weeks to go till THE BIG DAY I'd have a lot more posts. Well, I'm a bastard. Anyway, I haven't been entirely silent; check out some unabashedly partisan and hit-baiting posts over on DailyKos:
http://turnquest.dailykos.com/
and look at this photo:
and watch this video:
=//Turnquest
http://turnquest.dailykos.com/
and look at this photo:
and watch this video:
=//Turnquest
2008/09/12
Sharper Tone
Sen. Barack Obama & Sen. John McCain hug following a National Service conference at Columbia University in New York City, Sept. 11, 2008.No reason to 'fret.' This kind of American-made cesspool politics always rears its head as we get closer to the big day (less than two months...) The key statements are by David Plouffe and David Axelrod, Obama's mastermind campaign managers who sound as cool and under control as ever. And why should we doubt the men who beat the most formidable political family in politics and their predestined nominee (the Clintons)?
Hold it down folks...McCain is no Hillary. Obama will win.
Obama Plans Sharper Tone as Party Frets
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/12/us/politics/12obama.htmlSenator Barack Obama will intensify his assault against Senator John McCain, with new television advertisements and more forceful attacks by the candidate and surrogates beginning Friday morning, as he confronts an invigorated Republican presidential ticket and increasing nervousness in the Democratic ranks.
Mr. McCain’s choice of Gov. Sarah Palin of Alaska as his running mate and the resulting jolt of energy among Republican voters appear to have caught Mr. Obama and his advisers by surprise and added to concern among some Democrats that the Obama campaign was not pushing back hard enough against Republican attacks in a critical phase of the race.
Some Democrats said Mr. Obama needed to move to seize control of the campaign and to block Mr. McCain from snatching away from him the message that he was the best hope to bring change to Washington.
After back-to-back attack ads by Mr. McCain, including one that misleadingly accused Mr. Obama of endorsing sex education for kindergarten students, the Obama campaign is planning to sharpen attacks on Mr. McCain and Ms. Palin in an effort to counter Mr. McCain’s attempt to present himself as the candidate of change with his choice of Ms. Palin.
The new tone is to be presented in a speech by Mr. Obama in New Hampshire and in television interviews with local stations in five swing states, backed up by new advertisements and appearances across the country by supporters.
In addition, advertising themes will be pay equity for women, an issue that has particular resonance as the campaigns battle for female voters, and a more pointed linking of Mr. McCain to President Bush and Republicans in Washington.
But Mr. Obama’s aides said they were confident with the course of the campaign. They said that, other than making some shifts around the edges, particularly in response to Mr. McCain’s effort to seize the change issue from Mr. Obama, they were not planning any major deviation from a strategy that called for a steady escalation of attacks on Mr. McCain as the race heads toward the debates.
That response is characteristic for a campaign that has presented itself as disciplined and unflappable and is reminiscent of the way Mr. Obama’s campaign reacted a year ago when it came under fire from allies who said it was not being tough enough in going after Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton.
“We’re sensitive to the fluid dynamics of the campaign, but we have a game plan and a strategy,” said Mr. Obama’s campaign manager, David Plouffe. “We’re familiar with this. And I’m sure between now and Nov. 4 there will be another period of hand-wringing and bed-wetting. It comes with the territory.”
Still, Democrats outside the campaign suggested Mr. Obama should be urgently working to regain control of the message.
“The Obama message has been disrupted in the last week,” said Representative Artur Davis, Democrat of Alabama. “It’s a time for Democrats to focus on what the fundamentals are in this election.”
Phil Singer, who was a press secretary for Mrs. Clinton in her primary campaign against Mr. Obama, said, “The Obama people need to reboot and figure out ways to make the McCain-Bush argument newsworthy again.”
The uneasiness among Democrats is the result of a confluence of factors in the week since Mr. McCain accepted his party’s nomination in St. Paul. The selection of Ms. Palin became the defining event of Mr. McCain’s convention, revving up the conservative base and drawing the spotlight away from Mr. Obama.
Mr. McCain’s increasingly aggressive campaign has sought to put Mr. Obama on the defensive in each news cycle, using any development at hand, like Mr. Obama’s colloquial comment this week about putting “lipstick on a pig,” to keep attention away from Democratic messages about the economy and the similarities between Mr. McCain and Mr. Bush.
And a series of quick polls taken after the Republican convention have suggested that Mr. Obama has lost support among white women and independent voters. Polls taken so close to major political events are notoriously unreliable, but Democrats remember what happened in 2004, when Republicans used the period right after Senator John Kerry’s nomination to undercut him with a series of attacks.
By every indication, Mr. Obama’s aides underestimated the impact that Mr. McCain’s choice of Ms. Palin would have on the race. Mr. Obama and his campaign have seemed flummoxed in trying to figure out how to deal with her. His aides said they were looking to the news media to debunk the image of her as a blue-collar reformer, even as they argued that her power to help Mr. McCain was overstated.
“Everyone was astonished that she drew 9,000 people to Lancaster the other night,” said Mr. Obama’s senior strategist, David Axelrod. “But we drew 10,000 people there last week.”
“They got a transient boost from the sort of imagery surrounding her selection,” Mr. Axelrod said. “But I think things will settle in. She will be a candidate and not just a symbol.”
Beyond that, Mr. Obama’s aides said they had been taken aback by the newfound aggressiveness of the McCain campaign under Steve Schmidt, who has played an increasingly powerful role since last summer. Even as the aides have denounced the tactics as unsavory, they acknowledge that Mr. McCain is running a more effective campaign than he was a month ago.
“They had big problems in their campaign, and they made adjustments,” Mr. Axelrod said.
To a large extent, the perception that Mr. Obama is struggling is based on national polls taken in the days after the convention. But Mr. Obama’s campaign views such measures as irrelevant and focuses on what is going on in the 18 or so swing states.
Mr. Plouffe argued that the attention being paid by national news media outlets to events like Mr. Obama’s lipstick comment was not mirrored in local news coverage. What is more, the Obama campaign has filled the airwaves in some states with advertisements that link Mr. McCain and Mr. Bush.
And for all the concern voiced by Democrats to Mr. Obama’s aides that the candidate has not hit Mr. McCain hard enough, he has increasingly assailed Mr. McCain in recent days, mocking his attempt to present himself as an agent of change and denouncing his campaign style as a break from the promise he had made to practice a new kind of politics. Yet, at least on television, Mr. Obama’s critique did not break through the lipstick debate.
Inside the campaign headquarters in Chicago, aides said, there have been no emergency conference calls or special strategy sessions to deal with the new dynamic in the race.
Still, interviews with advisers and supporters suggested a concern not seen in the Obama campaign since its most competitive days in the long primary fight with Mrs. Clinton.
“You can’t be so stubborn that you don’t react or adjust to events,” Mr. Plouffe said. “We have been given up for dead any number of times in this process, so it does stiffen your spine a little bit.”
One adjustment for the Obama campaign comes as Mr. McCain is seeking to claim the Democrats’ theme of change by pointing to Ms. Palin. For months, advisers to Mr. Obama had assumed that Mr. McCain would play up his experience; Mr. Plouffe said he welcomed what he argued would be a campaign fought out on the issue of change.
“This is a very major development,” Mr. Plouffe said. “John McCain jettisoned his message and his strategy. It is now about change. We’re going to lean into that very, very hard.”
In the midst of all this, Mr. Obama had a private lunch on Thursday with someone he battled with for much of the year but who knows how to put the Republicans on the defensive: former President Bill Clinton. Discussion topics, aides said, included how Mr. Obama might handle Ms. Palin in the days ahead.
=//Turnquest
2008/08/03
Obama's Last Hundred Days
It's always the same with our culture. Some fad or person or cultural artifact becomes disgustingly popular way too fast. He or she or it is on everyone's tongues, their name is repeated relentlessly on television until it's drilled in to our heads. Inevitably, this mass popularity translates into profit and consumerism, either by way of a tell-all book, a made-for-TV movie or of course, the T-shirt.
Just as inevitably as the snowballing rise of popularity of these fads, there comes the backlash. One moment, The Matrix is the biggest, coolest, most must-see movie ever. The next, you have eight year-olds scoring points with their friends by doing Neo or Agent Smith impressions. "What good is a...phone call if you are .... unable ... to speak?" For the media, as well as for our own sick voyeuristic pleasures, nothing's better than the rise of something new than that new thing's tragic fall. See Britney Spears.
In any case, to get to the forever delayed subject of this article, I turn to the number one celebrity in the world, the all-but-crowned Democratic Presidential candidate and junior Senator from Illinois, Barack Obama. Mr. Obama has, through his natural charms, his team of brilliant strategists and his sheer political wits, delayed a backlash against his volcanic rise to international prominence.
A mere seven months prior, Mr. Obama was a long shot for the Iowa primaries. Senator Hillary Clinton of New York (remember her?) had been pencilled in by the elites and the experts as the front-runner for President for years. He was a nobody, a guy who had made one good speech at the 2004 Democratic Convention in Boston amd who had been on Oprah a few times touting his books and who was sort of liked by the few political observers who knew of him.
Jump ahead to last week where this very American politician managed to attract a throng of 200,000 people to a speech...in Germany. Mr. Obama's tour of Europe and the Middle East involved one-on-one meetings with the most powerful men and one woman (Ms. Merkel) in the world. These supposed world leaders, from British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, Jordanian Monarch King Abdullah, French President Nicolas Sarkozy, amongst others, all seemed to jump at the chance to shake the hands of 'the One,' as Mr. Obama's opponent, Senator John McCain of Arizona, privately refers to him.
The world tour was the peak of fame for a man who would save America and restore it to its rightful place as former President Reagan's proverbial 'shining city on a hill.' And so, as with all things from Icarus to a frisbee flung by a child, what goes up, must come down.
Over the next three months, Mr. Obama faces his toughest challenge on the path to succeeding George W. Bush. How can he translate his vast media presence and his fevered grip on the imaginations of millions into political victory? It's one thing for doe-eyed reporters and twenty-something college students to love the man and wear t-shirts of his face. It's entirely another to score a victory on Election Day, November 4, 2008.
Chief amongst Mr. Obama's obstacles is to maintain his aura as Great American Hero and delay the backlash against his persona. Already, there has begun a steady patter of arrows being launched towards his direction. Accusations of elitism, of being a weak-kneed Liberal are being spoken by Obama's natural opponents, the Republican Party.
However, we're still in the stage where a lot of the accusations are still far-fetched, or just flat-out wrong. Die-hard Hillary supporters fault him for being a man. Daily followers of he news cycles have begun tagging him with the dreaded 'flip-flopper' pejorative, a term which eventually helped to do in Mr. Obama's predecessor, the Senator from Massachusetts, John Kerry. Cynics chastise him for being too 'perfect', too clean-cut and popular for his own good. Religious fundamentalists think he's really a Muslim (God forbid) in disguise. Closet racists of course, we know why they're not going to cast their ballot for him.
The question becomes, how to dispel all these potential threats when Mr. Obama has less than a hundred days left until the big day?
The answer is multi-faceted. Mr. Obama must, above all else, ensure his priority over the coming weeks is to assure the American housewife. This statement is yes, a little simplistic, but what I mean is that the vast centre of the American political spectrum is comprised of working-class Americans. It is these Americans who spend their time taking care of their families, their savings accounts, paying their bills and working endlessly who always have the last say in Presidental elections. Modern day observers like to ponder how an incompetent dreg like W won two elections for himself and secured the Presidency for eight years, but the answer is really as simple as W managed to appeal to the average American. He made the housewife feel secure. Setting aside his differences with the current Commander-in-Chief, Mr. Obama ought to take some lessons from W and learn how to appear as just a regular guy and not as he still portrayed; an exotic usurper with mysterious intentions and a sometimes off-putting personality cult.
If anything, Americans are not as dumb as we like to make them out to be. Furthermore, they are generally suspicious of anyone who can summon the kinds of hyperbolic praise that Mr. Obama has done. He knows he has the young left, the Democrats and the true believers in his pocket. The real trick for the Senator is going to be how to destroy his 'messianic' media image while still calling upon the very talent and charisma that built this image to attract regular voters.
Can a Harvard-educated Constitutional Law professor come off as a barbeque-eating, beer-drinking average Joe? No. He doesn't have to. What he does have to do is to convince those who do subscribe to this stereotype that he is going to to be President just as much for them than for the marijuana-smoking liberal arts college student.
Secondly, Mr. Obama has to make a mistake. Something as simple as making a public error, and then recovering from it, would go a long way towards convincing people that the man is human. His previous problems with Reverend Wright, Hillary Clinton and Tony Rezko all involved the mistakes of others. Now he himself must learn the brittle art of fucking up on a national scale and then apologizing for it. Nothing reinforces a relationship like a little bit of make-up sex, if I may make use of such a crude metaphor.
Finally, Mr. Obama has to make the case that his opponent is not a feeble, out-of-touch old man with nary a chance of winning. Americans love underdogs and so does the press. If Mr. Obama continues to come across as the Heir Apparent before a single ballot has been cast, Americans will have yet another reason to resent him as being haughty, arrogant and presumptuous. Again, it's a tricky balance of making Mr. McCain (who doesn't have a shot in hell to win by the way) appear as if he could win and that such a possibility would spell disaster for the already beleaguered union, all the while continuing to promote his own strengths.
This election cannot remain simply a question of whether Mr. Obama is worthy of the Oval Office or not. It's got to become what elections were originally supposed to be - a contest between two individuals to decide who will be the better person for the job. If Mr. Obama and his skilled team of strategists can refocus the fickle media's attention on making a comparison between the two men rather than just on him, then there will be no contest.
A hundred days is a long time to predict a final outcome. Anything can happen in that time. On November 4th, we'll know what the next four years for the American people, and by extension, the world, will hold. Until then, go play GTA4.
=//Turnquest
Just as inevitably as the snowballing rise of popularity of these fads, there comes the backlash. One moment, The Matrix is the biggest, coolest, most must-see movie ever. The next, you have eight year-olds scoring points with their friends by doing Neo or Agent Smith impressions. "What good is a...phone call if you are .... unable ... to speak?" For the media, as well as for our own sick voyeuristic pleasures, nothing's better than the rise of something new than that new thing's tragic fall. See Britney Spears.
In any case, to get to the forever delayed subject of this article, I turn to the number one celebrity in the world, the all-but-crowned Democratic Presidential candidate and junior Senator from Illinois, Barack Obama. Mr. Obama has, through his natural charms, his team of brilliant strategists and his sheer political wits, delayed a backlash against his volcanic rise to international prominence.
A mere seven months prior, Mr. Obama was a long shot for the Iowa primaries. Senator Hillary Clinton of New York (remember her?) had been pencilled in by the elites and the experts as the front-runner for President for years. He was a nobody, a guy who had made one good speech at the 2004 Democratic Convention in Boston amd who had been on Oprah a few times touting his books and who was sort of liked by the few political observers who knew of him.
Jump ahead to last week where this very American politician managed to attract a throng of 200,000 people to a speech...in Germany. Mr. Obama's tour of Europe and the Middle East involved one-on-one meetings with the most powerful men and one woman (Ms. Merkel) in the world. These supposed world leaders, from British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, Jordanian Monarch King Abdullah, French President Nicolas Sarkozy, amongst others, all seemed to jump at the chance to shake the hands of 'the One,' as Mr. Obama's opponent, Senator John McCain of Arizona, privately refers to him.
The world tour was the peak of fame for a man who would save America and restore it to its rightful place as former President Reagan's proverbial 'shining city on a hill.' And so, as with all things from Icarus to a frisbee flung by a child, what goes up, must come down.
Over the next three months, Mr. Obama faces his toughest challenge on the path to succeeding George W. Bush. How can he translate his vast media presence and his fevered grip on the imaginations of millions into political victory? It's one thing for doe-eyed reporters and twenty-something college students to love the man and wear t-shirts of his face. It's entirely another to score a victory on Election Day, November 4, 2008.
Chief amongst Mr. Obama's obstacles is to maintain his aura as Great American Hero and delay the backlash against his persona. Already, there has begun a steady patter of arrows being launched towards his direction. Accusations of elitism, of being a weak-kneed Liberal are being spoken by Obama's natural opponents, the Republican Party.
However, we're still in the stage where a lot of the accusations are still far-fetched, or just flat-out wrong. Die-hard Hillary supporters fault him for being a man. Daily followers of he news cycles have begun tagging him with the dreaded 'flip-flopper' pejorative, a term which eventually helped to do in Mr. Obama's predecessor, the Senator from Massachusetts, John Kerry. Cynics chastise him for being too 'perfect', too clean-cut and popular for his own good. Religious fundamentalists think he's really a Muslim (God forbid) in disguise. Closet racists of course, we know why they're not going to cast their ballot for him.
The question becomes, how to dispel all these potential threats when Mr. Obama has less than a hundred days left until the big day?
The answer is multi-faceted. Mr. Obama must, above all else, ensure his priority over the coming weeks is to assure the American housewife. This statement is yes, a little simplistic, but what I mean is that the vast centre of the American political spectrum is comprised of working-class Americans. It is these Americans who spend their time taking care of their families, their savings accounts, paying their bills and working endlessly who always have the last say in Presidental elections. Modern day observers like to ponder how an incompetent dreg like W won two elections for himself and secured the Presidency for eight years, but the answer is really as simple as W managed to appeal to the average American. He made the housewife feel secure. Setting aside his differences with the current Commander-in-Chief, Mr. Obama ought to take some lessons from W and learn how to appear as just a regular guy and not as he still portrayed; an exotic usurper with mysterious intentions and a sometimes off-putting personality cult.
If anything, Americans are not as dumb as we like to make them out to be. Furthermore, they are generally suspicious of anyone who can summon the kinds of hyperbolic praise that Mr. Obama has done. He knows he has the young left, the Democrats and the true believers in his pocket. The real trick for the Senator is going to be how to destroy his 'messianic' media image while still calling upon the very talent and charisma that built this image to attract regular voters.
Can a Harvard-educated Constitutional Law professor come off as a barbeque-eating, beer-drinking average Joe? No. He doesn't have to. What he does have to do is to convince those who do subscribe to this stereotype that he is going to to be President just as much for them than for the marijuana-smoking liberal arts college student.
Secondly, Mr. Obama has to make a mistake. Something as simple as making a public error, and then recovering from it, would go a long way towards convincing people that the man is human. His previous problems with Reverend Wright, Hillary Clinton and Tony Rezko all involved the mistakes of others. Now he himself must learn the brittle art of fucking up on a national scale and then apologizing for it. Nothing reinforces a relationship like a little bit of make-up sex, if I may make use of such a crude metaphor.
Finally, Mr. Obama has to make the case that his opponent is not a feeble, out-of-touch old man with nary a chance of winning. Americans love underdogs and so does the press. If Mr. Obama continues to come across as the Heir Apparent before a single ballot has been cast, Americans will have yet another reason to resent him as being haughty, arrogant and presumptuous. Again, it's a tricky balance of making Mr. McCain (who doesn't have a shot in hell to win by the way) appear as if he could win and that such a possibility would spell disaster for the already beleaguered union, all the while continuing to promote his own strengths.
This election cannot remain simply a question of whether Mr. Obama is worthy of the Oval Office or not. It's got to become what elections were originally supposed to be - a contest between two individuals to decide who will be the better person for the job. If Mr. Obama and his skilled team of strategists can refocus the fickle media's attention on making a comparison between the two men rather than just on him, then there will be no contest.
A hundred days is a long time to predict a final outcome. Anything can happen in that time. On November 4th, we'll know what the next four years for the American people, and by extension, the world, will hold. Until then, go play GTA4.
=//Turnquest
2008/06/13
Excerpt from the Economist
The Economist ran a good story briefly bioing (newword) all the various bigshots in President-Elect Obama's master campaign. The key figures seem to be a Mr. David Axelrod, strategist and Mr. David Plouffe, campaign manager who have overseen a stunning victory over the practically-anointed Mrs. Clinton, as well as the masterminding of a movement that rose from nothing and has become quite literally, the mainstream in every walk of American life. Anyway, concerning that movement, I found this closing paragraph particularly insightful and thought-provoking:
Read the whole article here:
http://www.economist.com/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11551686
=//Turnquest
The ambition of Mr Obama's team is exciting, but in office it could be dangerous. In 1993 the clever Clintons tripped up very quickly. What if Congress doesn't care for the finely-tuned policies of Mr Obama's top-notch economists? Or if Mr Obama finds he can't pull out of Iraq as planned? Or if Americans tire of his charisma and he stops being able to attract adoring crowds tens of thousands strong? The lynchpin of his campaign has been a faith, almost messianic, in his personal excellence. If that fades, then the whole operation could collapse in frustration and disillusionment.That is perhaps the best question the media's offered since it crowned Obama the President-Elect. What happens when this wave of good will and national adoration for Mr. Obama breaks on the shores of a country facing global scorn, irrelevance, economic and military castration and climate change?
Read the whole article here:
http://www.economist.com/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11551686
=//Turnquest
2008/03/21
Three Links
Three Articles
Hillary's Math Problem -
http://www.newsweek.com/id/118240
(shows you why there's no way in hell she's going to win the nomination)
Party Like It's 1929 -
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/21/opinion/21krugman.html
(Krugman's columns about the economic crisis are all excellent and he knows what's up)
Will Canada Catch What's Ailing U.S. ? -
http://finance.sympatico.msn.ca/savingsdebt/johncaspar/article.aspx?cp-documentid=5663227
(Laymen's terms on the crisis from a Canadian perspective)
=//Turnquest
Hillary's Math Problem -
http://www.newsweek.com/id/118240
(shows you why there's no way in hell she's going to win the nomination)
Party Like It's 1929 -
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/21/opinion/21krugman.html
(Krugman's columns about the economic crisis are all excellent and he knows what's up)
Will Canada Catch What's Ailing U.S. ? -
http://finance.sympatico.msn.ca/savingsdebt/johncaspar/article.aspx?cp-documentid=5663227
(Laymen's terms on the crisis from a Canadian perspective)
=//Turnquest
2008/02/22
The Iraq Question
From the transcript of Thursday night's debate between Senators Clinton & Obama.
Analyze closely the difference between the two candidates' answers. I'll let you read first, then share my thoughts.
(APPLAUSE)
BROWN: All right. We're going to stay with this and stay on Iraq.
John King?
KING: I want to continue in this vein, and hone in on the very point you just made. Because one of you, unless this remarkable campaign here takes another wacky, unpredictable turn, is going to be running against a decorated war hero, who is going to say that you don't have the experience to be commander in chief.
And you have both said, it's not about that type of experience; it's about judgment.
You both had to make a judgment, a short time ago, in your job in the United States Senate, about whether to support the surge. And as that was going on, Senator Clinton, you had the commanding general in Iraq before you. And you said, "I think that the reports provide to us really require the willing suspension of disbelief" -- your words to General Petraeus.
KING: I want you to look at Iraq now and listen to those who say the security situation is better. Ideal, no, but better -- some say significantly, in recent days, even some steps toward a political reconciliation.
Is Iraq today better off than it was six months or a year ago because of the surge?
CLINTON: Well, John, I think you forget a very important premise of the surge. The rationale of the surge was to create the space and time for the Iraqi government to make the decisions that only it can make.
Now, there is no doubt, given the skill and the commitment of our young men and women in uniform that putting more of them in will give us a tactical advantage and will provide security in some places, and that has occurred.
CLINTON: But the fact is that the purpose of it has not been fulfilled. The Iraqi government has slowly inched toward making a few of the decisions in a less than complete way, but it hasn't taken advantage of the sacrifice and the losses of life and billions of dollars that have occurred since the surge began.
That is why I have said, upon taking office I would ask the secretary of defense and the Joint Chiefs of Staff and my security advisers to give me a plan so that I could begin withdrawing our troops within 60 days.
And I would begin that with...
(APPLAUSE)
... with a very clear message to the Iraqis that they no longer had a blank check, as they had been given by President Bush, that as we withdraw our troops, probably one to two brigades a month, they would have to step up and make these decisions.
CLINTON: I believe that is in the best interest of our military, which has been stretched thin.
Last night in Brownsville, you know, a woman grabbed my hand and said, "Please, my husband's there for the third time. Bring him home."
And I told her privately what I have said publicly many times -- I will bring him home because I do not think it is in the interest of America or of the Iraqis that we continue to be there. It is up to the Iraqis to decide the kind of future they will have.
(APPLAUSE)
BROWN: Senator Obama, in the same vein, you were also opposed to the surge from the beginning. Were you wrong?
OBAMA: Well, I think it is indisputable that we've seen violence reduced in Iraq. And that's a credit to our brave men and women in uniform.
In fact, you know, the 1st Cavalry, out of Fort Hood, played an enormous role in pushing back al Qaeda out of Baghdad.
(APPLAUSE)
OBAMA: And, you know, we honor their service.
But this is a tactical victory imposed upon a huge strategic blunder.
(LAUGHTER)
And I think that, when we're having a debate with John McCain, it is going to be much easier for the candidate who was opposed to the concept of invading Iraq in the first place to have a debate about the wisdom of that decision...
(APPLAUSE)
... than having to argue about the tactics subsequent to the decision.
(LAUGHTER)
Because, ultimately, that's what's at stake. Understand, not only have we been diverted from Afghanistan. We've been diverted from focusing on Latin America.
We contribute -- our entire foreign aid to Latin America is $2.7 billion, approximately what we spend in Iraq in a week.
OBAMA: And it is any surprise, then, that you've seen people like Hugo Chavez and countries like China move into the void, because we've been neglectful of that.
Iran is the single biggest strategic beneficiary of us having invaded Iraq, and that is something that I think John McCain has to come to terms with.
So that is a debate that I'm happy to have.
One last point I want to make on this, and that is, the incredible burden that has been placed on the American people, starting with military families, and the fact that we still are not doing right by our veterans, that we still don't honor their service, that there are still homeless veterans, that we still don't screen properly for post-traumatic stress disorder and make sure that they're getting mental services that they need, that we are still...
(APPLAUSE)
... having veterans in south Texas have to drive 250 miles to access a veterans hospital.
OBAMA: That's unacceptable. But we talked about the economy earlier, the fact that we're spending $12 billion every month in Iraq means that we can't engage in the kind of infrastructure improvements that are going to make us more competitive. It means that we can't deliver on the kinds of health care reforms that both Senator Clinton and I are looking for.
And that is also an argument that we have to have with John McCain because he has said that he is willing to have these troops over there for 100 years. The notion that we would sustain that kind of effort and neglect not only making us more secure here at home, more competitive here at home, allow our economy to sink. As John McCain says, he doesn't really understand the economy that well. It is clear from his embrace of George Bush's policies that he doesn't, and that's what I intend to change when I am president of the United States of America.
(APPLAUSE)
BROWN: All right. We've got to take another quick break. We've got a lot more ahead. Stay with us. We'll be right back.
Jesus H. Christ, that's the sort of answer I woulda given ostie. Where were these types of strong, incredibly intelligent, thoughtful answers back in March 2003, or February 2006? When the United States and the world needed someone to speak truthfully and forcefully against this war and with the sort of knowledge and reason required on the matter, there was no one.
Lemme break the two candidates answers' down, and no, I'm not going to try and hide my leanings. Mrs. Clinton responded to the question and turned it around to say that yes, the surge may have worked, but the war must still end. Admirable, succinct, correct. I agree ma'am.
Mr. Obama on the other hand, waves the entire idea of the surge and the war away with a swipe of the hand, and the line "a tactical victory imposed upon a huge strategic blunder." Amen, brother. To translate, he's saying "Fuck the surge, even if Iraq was miraculously fixed right here and now, look at what we lost. He mentions, importantly, that he's against the very concept of invading Iraq. There's no way on Earth this could ever be seen as a victory.
That is especially crucial, because, lemme assure you, rolling back W's preemptive strike doctrine has got to be the first step towards both curbing the now half-trillion dollar Pentagon war machine as well as ensuring a safer, less war-infected planet.
Obama goes on to strike important notes with Latinos about the pitiful aid budget to Latin America, to the distraction from other, much more strategically important conflicts like Afghanistan and the rise of China and of course, multilateralism as a whole.
And finally, yes, the burden on America itself. When you have a guy talking about post-traumatic stress disorder for troops returning home, homeless vets and military hospitals, you have before you someone who understands that war is fundamentally a human action. He shows his empathy and his understanding of the sort of costs and toll that war has on human beings, and if someone has that, he will consider military options much more carefully. This sort of empathy is a rare damned thing I tell you. Watch this movie called Thirteen Days if you want to see what I mean.
I don't see that kind of empathy from Clinton, who seems to still be in campaign-mode trying to get everyone to like her.
And finally, he brings it back home in a way that all Americans can understand. The war is another reason for this shitty economy. The more you spend on the war, the less on roads, hospitals, social programs, bread and butter. He understands the big picture of how a country is supposed to work, and how a massive blunder, to use his words, like Iraq can bring the United States consequences it never even imagined.
He's got my endorsement.
Let's see what the voters will say, come November 4th.
=//Turnquest
2008/01/05
Post Iowa, Pre New Hampshire (pt. 1)
Having predicted Iowa pretty much accurately, I finally feel compelled to let loose about this U.S. Presidential campaign, now that's it's somewhat sane to actually talk about it.
First of all, the amount of coverage and focus over the last 6-12 months has been totally overblown and sort of disconcerting. The fact that there were grown women and men arguing passionately on live TV over an election that was two years away is a testament to the broken media in the States.
In any case, I'll start with the results and follow with brief comments about both the winners.
Look, I like Barack Obama. If I were to vote on November 4 for one person, it would be him. His policies are not 100% great (whose are?). His experience is scant. Heck, I'm one of the people who agree that he should have waited another four to eight years. His wife is a big target for GOP hit squads wanting to stir up sideshow controversies and distract from the issues. And he has other little vulnerabilities to media attacks. So why the support?
Because he's a good man.
Not that he looks like one, not that he seems nice. He is good. Mr. Obama doesn't have an ounce of wicked manipulative politician in him and that contrast becomes especially obvious when compared to Ms. Clinton.
If Mr. Obama ever did win the whole thing one day, he would make a fine President for the United States and indeed be able to follow up on his promise to offer real change for not only the Executive Office, but for the overall direction and character of the country.
Now having said that, I have very real doubts about his chances in this primary season, let alone in the general. The United States has, as everyone knows, a long, sordid history with the subject of race and with the majority's treatment of persons of African descent. Blacks in the States, though legally "freed" in 1865 by President Lincoln, have continued to suffer incredible discrimination, persecution and downright contempt for decades.
Travel to any major American city and you too will see the absolute reality of what I call
"covert discrimination." Inexorably, the white population will dominate the suburbs, commuter towns and upper-class neighborhoods with their 5-bedroom and two-car garages. Take a stroll in the inner city and downtown areas and suddenly colour reenters the equation. A subway ride on the 2 Line in New York from the Bronx to Lower Manhattan reveals this phenomenon most glaringly. One could describe it as if traveling to a whole new country.
The point is, racism exists in America, and elsewhere, even if no-one wants to admit to it. There are larger forces at work that seek to shape the election. And that simple, bigoted line; "a black man can never become President," tragically, may be the one thing that stops the DNC and the United States at large from electing Barack Obama.
To put it to a sharper point, consider that the last time someone with that sort of genuine human quality became President was 1960, and J.F.K. And he was a white man.
The Evangelical President
On the flip-side of the democratic divide, we have Governor Mike Huckabee. Though I know too little about him as of yet, a feeling I imagine I share with many Americans, watching some of his interviews, this man shares that same key quality of decency and genuine humanity that Obama has.
Mr. Huckabee brings with him some interesting commonalities with, of all people, Bill Clinton. He's from Hope, Arkansas, Mr. Clinton's hometown, first of all. Secondly, they were both two-term governors of the great state of Arkansas. Thirdly, they both play musical instruments (Clinton with his famous sax, Huckabee a bassist). And finally, the two have also shared friendly relations with political strategist Dick Morris, with whom though Mr. Clinton has since severed ties.
His ace in the hole against his opponents though, aside from his astute, "aw-shucks" public persona, is his career as a Southern Baptist pastor. These irrefutable religious credentials are in marked contrast to the pseudo-evangelism of President Bush, as well as the still thorny issue of Mr. Romney's Mormonism. His years as a pastor also hold much water for grassroots Republican voters, as well as the enormous amount of Evangelical Christians who swept Mr. Bush into power in 2004. Their potential power was displayed back then, and now again in Iowa.
The significance of this common denominator is best understood when juxtaposed with the sort of ruthless, win-at-any-cost establishment campaigns run by Mr. Romney and Ms. Clinton. As I see it, Americans are finished with the Rove/Carville politics of the 90s where elections became battles, personal attacks commonly accepted, and any tactic that produced a surge in the polls celebrated. Furthermore, average American voters, especially in the middle-class, feel more disconnected with their government than at any time since the Nixon era thirty-five years ago. They yearn for a leader in whom they can trust. They demand competence, wisdom and righteousness after eight years of their absence.
Ms. Clinton and Mr. Romney can certainly provide the competence and the leadership, no doubt about it. But can they provide the vessel in to which American voters can pour their hopes, dreams and faith? That is their biggest weakness, and both Obama and Huckabee are smart enough to exploit that. This answer to this question is sure to be illuminated a little more in a few days time with the New Hampshire primary. Until then, I will try to follow up with some more analysis and speculation in a second part.
=//Turnquest
First of all, the amount of coverage and focus over the last 6-12 months has been totally overblown and sort of disconcerting. The fact that there were grown women and men arguing passionately on live TV over an election that was two years away is a testament to the broken media in the States.
In any case, I'll start with the results and follow with brief comments about both the winners.
Iowa Caucus 2008 Results
Democrats:
1,781 of 1,781 districts reporting
Obama 37.58
Edwards 29.75
Clinton 29.47
Richardson 2.11
Biden 0.93
Uncommitted 0.14
Dodd 0.02
Republicans:
1,546 of 1,781 districts reporting
Huckabee 34
Romney 25
Thomspon 13
McCain 13
Paul 10
Giuliani 3
Look, I like Barack Obama. If I were to vote on November 4 for one person, it would be him. His policies are not 100% great (whose are?). His experience is scant. Heck, I'm one of the people who agree that he should have waited another four to eight years. His wife is a big target for GOP hit squads wanting to stir up sideshow controversies and distract from the issues. And he has other little vulnerabilities to media attacks. So why the support?
Because he's a good man.
Not that he looks like one, not that he seems nice. He is good. Mr. Obama doesn't have an ounce of wicked manipulative politician in him and that contrast becomes especially obvious when compared to Ms. Clinton.
If Mr. Obama ever did win the whole thing one day, he would make a fine President for the United States and indeed be able to follow up on his promise to offer real change for not only the Executive Office, but for the overall direction and character of the country.
Now having said that, I have very real doubts about his chances in this primary season, let alone in the general. The United States has, as everyone knows, a long, sordid history with the subject of race and with the majority's treatment of persons of African descent. Blacks in the States, though legally "freed" in 1865 by President Lincoln, have continued to suffer incredible discrimination, persecution and downright contempt for decades.
Travel to any major American city and you too will see the absolute reality of what I call
"covert discrimination." Inexorably, the white population will dominate the suburbs, commuter towns and upper-class neighborhoods with their 5-bedroom and two-car garages. Take a stroll in the inner city and downtown areas and suddenly colour reenters the equation. A subway ride on the 2 Line in New York from the Bronx to Lower Manhattan reveals this phenomenon most glaringly. One could describe it as if traveling to a whole new country.
The point is, racism exists in America, and elsewhere, even if no-one wants to admit to it. There are larger forces at work that seek to shape the election. And that simple, bigoted line; "a black man can never become President," tragically, may be the one thing that stops the DNC and the United States at large from electing Barack Obama.
To put it to a sharper point, consider that the last time someone with that sort of genuine human quality became President was 1960, and J.F.K. And he was a white man.
The Evangelical President
On the flip-side of the democratic divide, we have Governor Mike Huckabee. Though I know too little about him as of yet, a feeling I imagine I share with many Americans, watching some of his interviews, this man shares that same key quality of decency and genuine humanity that Obama has.
Mr. Huckabee brings with him some interesting commonalities with, of all people, Bill Clinton. He's from Hope, Arkansas, Mr. Clinton's hometown, first of all. Secondly, they were both two-term governors of the great state of Arkansas. Thirdly, they both play musical instruments (Clinton with his famous sax, Huckabee a bassist). And finally, the two have also shared friendly relations with political strategist Dick Morris, with whom though Mr. Clinton has since severed ties.
His ace in the hole against his opponents though, aside from his astute, "aw-shucks" public persona, is his career as a Southern Baptist pastor. These irrefutable religious credentials are in marked contrast to the pseudo-evangelism of President Bush, as well as the still thorny issue of Mr. Romney's Mormonism. His years as a pastor also hold much water for grassroots Republican voters, as well as the enormous amount of Evangelical Christians who swept Mr. Bush into power in 2004. Their potential power was displayed back then, and now again in Iowa.
The significance of this common denominator is best understood when juxtaposed with the sort of ruthless, win-at-any-cost establishment campaigns run by Mr. Romney and Ms. Clinton. As I see it, Americans are finished with the Rove/Carville politics of the 90s where elections became battles, personal attacks commonly accepted, and any tactic that produced a surge in the polls celebrated. Furthermore, average American voters, especially in the middle-class, feel more disconnected with their government than at any time since the Nixon era thirty-five years ago. They yearn for a leader in whom they can trust. They demand competence, wisdom and righteousness after eight years of their absence.
Ms. Clinton and Mr. Romney can certainly provide the competence and the leadership, no doubt about it. But can they provide the vessel in to which American voters can pour their hopes, dreams and faith? That is their biggest weakness, and both Obama and Huckabee are smart enough to exploit that. This answer to this question is sure to be illuminated a little more in a few days time with the New Hampshire primary. Until then, I will try to follow up with some more analysis and speculation in a second part.
=//Turnquest
2007/10/10
GOP Debate Pics
Following up on the last column, I ask the question:
Do you want any of these men as your President?
Jeez. Okay, Mitt's not so hideous, but like, he really is just a handsome face. No darling readers, this is what a real President ought to look like:
=//Turnquest
Do you want any of these men as your President?
Jeez. Okay, Mitt's not so hideous, but like, he really is just a handsome face. No darling readers, this is what a real President ought to look like:
=//Turnquest
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