Teddy Kennedy, Caroline Kennedy, Toni Morrison -- and me!
The good news for Barack Obama just keeps on coming! After months of flirting with Chris Dodd and then hoping that John Edwards sticks around in the Democratic primaries, talkin’ health care and generally makin’ trouble, I have finally decided to endorse Obama for President.
And I have decided that while I deplore the media’s unhinged and openly sexist attacks on Hillary Clinton, and was personally astonished to find that her answer to the “likability” question was really quite charming, I just can’t take any more Clintonisms in American public life. Together with courtiers like Mark Penn and rafts of advisers from the DLC wing, they have come to constitute a malign force in the Democratic Party, and should put their considerable political and intellectual talents to better use, such as founding a Center for Advanced Triangulation in Bethesda or Fairfax somewhere. Barack Obama at the top of the ticket, I am now convinced, can mean a pickup of a few more seats in the Senate and a whole bunch of seats in the House, thanks to the heightened voter turnout he’ll bring with him– whereas Hillary Clinton, I am (truly!) sorry to say, will very possibly depress the Democratic turnout and dampen the close down-ticket races.
Together with recent endorsements from the Kennedys and from the Nobel Prize-winning Morrison, my endorsement is evidence that Obama has regained political momentum heading into Super Tuesday. “Michael’s endorsement is key,” said one member of the Bérubé household. “It not only unifies the critical Bérubé voting bloc, which many observers consider a key to the likely behavior of the Pennsylvania electorate, but it suggests that Obama will do even better than expected in the demographic of literature professors of French-Canadian/ Irish descent who are especially concerned about health care, education, civil liberties, and ending the war in Iraq.”
I agree with that impartial assessment completely.
OK, now that that little item is off my to-do list, here’s a look forward to what awaits us in 2009 from the guys on the other side of the campaign:
In a McCain Administration, your Secretary of State will be Joseph Lieberman.
In a Romney Administration, your Attorney General will be Rudy Giuliani.
And in a Huckabee Administration, your entire Cabinet and National Security Council will be Chuck Norris.
I therefore promise to support the Democratic nominee in November, however malign a force in the Democratic Party he (or she!) might be.
Comments (124)
Having objected to the other pro-candidate posts, I have to say you presented that pertinently and well.
John
http://www.haberarts.com/
January 28, 2008 1:51 PM | Reply | Permalink
Thanks! My household thinks so too.
January 28, 2008 2:57 PM | Reply | Permalink
This was a good endorsement. Thanks for reminding all of us, no matter who wins the primary, what the stakes are. There should be no jobs for Joe Lieberman, Rudy Giuliani or Chuck Norris.
In fact, can't we outsource them? I'm sure I can find somebody to act like Rudy Giuliani for cheaper in Bangalore.
thosethingswesay.blogspot.com
January 28, 2008 2:07 PM | Reply | Permalink
I'm sure I can find somebody to act like Rudy Giuliani for cheaper in Bangalore.
Indeed, I'm on the phone with that guy right now -- he's very upset about ferrets! I say we hire him.
The real trick is outsourcing Chuck Norris.
January 28, 2008 2:58 PM | Reply | Permalink
Norris? Come, now -- it's already been done. Hong Kong totally reinvented the action movie in the early 90s (if not before). Even the past-his-prime niche is filled by Jackie Chan in a way Chuck Norris can only dream of.
January 28, 2008 4:38 PM | Reply | Permalink
Well said, Michael. Now, can we meet at the Corner Room (or Websters) in the next few days so you can sign my petition to be an Obama delegate? :-)
January 28, 2008 2:28 PM | Reply | Permalink
Well? I've been standing here at the entrance to the Corner Room since 6 pm now, tap tap tap.
January 28, 2008 2:59 PM | Reply | Permalink
Noon Tuesday?
January 28, 2008 3:11 PM | Reply | Permalink
Why don't you two grow some class and head for the Nittany Lion Inn. Or at least go upstairs.
January 28, 2008 4:52 PM | Reply | Permalink
There is nothing the Clintons do that Obama does not, no matter how many sets of three monkeys you employ.
Those who don't believe in miracles aren't realists: Edwards it is and let the other two pretenders beat each others brains out.
January 28, 2008 3:52 PM | Reply | Permalink
Just forgot to mention that in Esperanto the word for triangulation is Obama.
January 28, 2008 3:55 PM | Reply | Permalink
this one might be the tipping point for me. but if Hitchens goes for Obama
http://www.slate.com/id/2182938/
I will certainly re-evaluate.
January 28, 2008 4:06 PM | Reply | Permalink
Welcome to the club. You articulated the same reasons I gave for backing Obama.
January 28, 2008 4:06 PM | Reply | Permalink
Obamamania is starting to seem more and more like herd mentality.
I'm not there yet. I'm still not convinced a black man can get elected President. But who knows, my thoughts may change tomorrow.
What won't change is; if he's the candidate I'll happily vote for him.
January 28, 2008 4:20 PM | Reply | Permalink
It is really sad that, as you say, we can legitimately doubt that a black man can get elected President. Especially since a completely talentless idiot, who cannot even pronounce "nuclear" and who cannot give a speech without it sounding like he is v-e-r-y s-l-o-w-l-y reading off of first-grade flash cards, managed to take office [after smarter people than him managed to steal TWO FREAKING ELECTIONS].
The bar is so low for our president that Huckabee, a guy who otherwise would be laughed off the stage, is a serious contender because people who don't believe in science want someone like them in the White House.
The bar is so HIGH for impeachment [because of the fear of being labelled "payback"] that this regime, which has committed more high crimes and misdemeaners than we can shake a stick at...Why is all that true? Why is it "off the table?"
The republicans are responsible, but so are the Clintons. They need to go into retirement and let our country move on.
Jan
January 28, 2008 5:15 PM | Reply | Permalink
CVille,
I usually agree very much with your posts. But I whole heartedly disagree with somethign you've said.
I couldn't disagree more. We need Hillary, to use her great intellect as the esteemed senator from New York. Her talents and encyclopedic knowledge really are perfect for the senate. Not so much for president.
And Bill... Oh Bill... Who knew you still had fight in you? Seven years of silence. Well now that you remember how to fight, lets get off the Racist Dog Whistle stuff, and help our future president, Obama, to fight for democrats.
How about fighting against Iraq? Or against aids in Africa? Or help Obama get Israel Palestine negotiations back on track once he's in office.
I don't want them to retire. I just hope they can lose this primary with some dignity. Instead of in disgrace.
January 28, 2008 11:11 PM | Reply | Permalink
I don't care about his skin color, I'm concerned about fiscal and foreign policy, and so far, 'no sale'. He's also running under the democrat banner, and as far as I can tell, they're pretty heavy into some pandering these days. I don't want freebies, I want to know that the winner can 'do the math', and direct others likewise, and, AND, that they have no intention of turning the United States into a global homeless shelter.
January 28, 2008 6:54 PM | Reply | Permalink
Weird -- for a minute there I thought I was reading RedState. But yes, Obama is running for the nomination of the Democrat Party.
January 28, 2008 7:37 PM | Reply | Permalink
And the steam roller continues. Bradley Burston in Haaretz has just wrote a scathing assault on Hillary. I wonder how many Israelis vote in US elections?
January 28, 2008 4:21 PM | Reply | Permalink
That's a good discussion point, too, how many foreign parties have their proxies trying to tweak our country in favor of theirs, running around out there? I can think of two that have motive, make that three, counting Saudi Arabia,
everyone wants to lobby for this and that because now that they can have proxies, they bypassed the UN. I mean, why not go to the source where the Big Money is? IF all you have to do is chum up to some senator and tell a good sob story(we Murkinz are SUCKERS for a good sob story)...well, in short, it's no wonder the government can't balance its' budget anymore.
January 28, 2008 6:58 PM | Reply | Permalink
“Michael’s endorsement is key,” said one member of the Bérubé household. “It not only unifies the critical Bérubé voting bloc, which many observers consider a key to the likely behavior of the Pennsylvania electorate, but it suggests that Obama will do even better than expected in the demographic of literature professors of French-Canadian/ Irish descent who are especially concerned about health care, education, civil liberties, and ending the war in Iraq.”
Now Michael.... are you talking in the third person again?
January 28, 2008 4:39 PM | Reply | Permalink
Michael wouldn't do that.
January 28, 2008 5:33 PM | Reply | Permalink
I long ago resigned myself to being stuck with whoever the Democrats pick. Not that I won't vote for whichever it is, but faced with Obama's calculating, cloying centrism or Clinton's calculating, cynical centrism, it'll ultimately be the horror of another Republican administration that ensures I punch the donkey chad. The only real difference between Obama and Clinton is that he's somehow managed to dupe millions of people that he's somehow new and different.
January 28, 2008 5:03 PM | Reply | Permalink
You know, I'm sometimes tempted to say there isn't a dime's worth of difference between Clinton and Obama. Certainly they're working much of the same turf in roughly the same way. But, again, it's not just the candidates -- it's their whole retinue and their larger relation to the rest of the Democratic ticket. That's what decided it for me.
January 28, 2008 5:19 PM | Reply | Permalink
Well, that's certainly a good point. Of the two, Obama's crowd (aside, I suppose, from McClurkin and similar ilk) is better. But to me, that just means of the two leading candidates, one is a tad better than the other, but both are still a big blech. I'm all kinds of done with the Clintons and their crowd, but Obama hasn't impressed me as being anything other than a sweet-talking snake oil salesman with lots of starry-eyed friends. Neither is anywhere near as good as almost all the other candidates who've now been left behind. Even Biden.
January 28, 2008 6:25 PM | Reply | Permalink
"a sweet-talking snake oil salesman"
I think you have him confused with Romney.
January 28, 2008 6:50 PM | Reply | Permalink
Mitt "Who Let The Dogs Out" Romney is MERELY a snake oil salesman. Even I give Obama credit for finesse.
January 29, 2008 5:44 AM | Reply | Permalink
I feel the same way. The conversation has turned from Obama all of a sudden to Obamamania. The idea now is that the movement transcends politics and whatever Obama is as a politician. Now you can’t really argue with that. Who can challenge a new national multi-cultural, multi-generational grassroots movement for change? But I wonder how a movement for a presidential candidate can transcend the candidate, his positions and history. (But even though I agree with you, I don’t think you should be punching donkeys named Chad).
January 28, 2008 8:26 PM | Reply | Permalink
Ever hear tell of Jesus?
Agreed.
Best, Terry
January 28, 2008 11:06 PM | Reply | Permalink
Jesus is running for president?
(Sorry, couldn't resist.)
January 29, 2008 11:14 AM | Reply | Permalink
Ever hear of Jesus?
You know Jesus Garza? It is a small world. Oh, you meant that other Jesus. So that’s why everyone keeps saying “he’s the one” about Obama. I guess he transcends everything in that case. I think you're making my point here, Terry.
He's the One. I had to add this announcement on Democratic Underground (H/T artappraiser). I see why everyone gets excited over endorsements.
January 29, 2008 4:42 PM | Reply | Permalink
Of course. I shall deal most gently with Chad.
January 29, 2008 11:13 AM | Reply | Permalink
The hatred for the Clintons is backed by intelligent argument by people who using the same arguments in the 50s hated Blacks and in the 30s hated the Jews.
These people were not less prominent or less respect, except the hatred of Blacks and Jews was then the coin of the realm. Now the coins are the Clintons!
Don't vote for them, but please stop the hatred it's disgusting.
January 28, 2008 5:39 PM | Reply | Permalink
~
How sad your views of others seem to be through your own prism.
~OGD~
January 28, 2008 7:43 PM | Reply | Permalink
Three people gave this comment a 5? But it doesn't make any damn sense! The analogy to hating Blacks in the 50s and Jews in the 30s is completely wrong -- everyone knows that criticizing the Clintons is like participating in the Armenian genocide of the teens.
January 29, 2008 5:44 AM | Reply | Permalink
Excellent point.
Everybody knows that hating elderly women running as stand-ins for their husbands is akin to hating Gary Kasparov, former World Chess Champion, who is probably trying to sell rugs to his Russian prison guards.
Best, Terry
January 29, 2008 5:51 AM | Reply | Permalink
I must say, it does make me very sad to see you and MJ become the tools of the very same forces you started out trying to counter.
You had an opportunity to be more.
The more you ridicule the same people that have always supported you--maybe not always agreed with you--but supported your different voices, the more you alienate us.
Any minute now you'll be using "Breck girl" and "Billary." You've become the establishment. Congratulations.
I'm sorry. Your influence is your own to squander.
CSPAN junkies visit http://spannerbackup.ipbhost.com
January 29, 2008 5:59 AM | Reply | Permalink
And here I thought that the name of the establishment was Clinton...
BTW have your sense of humor checked. It seems to be off.
January 29, 2008 6:25 AM | Reply | Permalink
Well, of course I'm sorry to hear I've alienated someone who's always supported me -- especially when I've never said a bad word about Edwards, not even one. But I suppose it's true that in deciding not to support Clinton, I've become the establishment. What a long strange trip it's been from the days when I argued that we should smash the state!
January 29, 2008 8:34 AM | Reply | Permalink
Found at an archeaological dig in Happy Valley -- a Deadhead Sticker on a Cadillac.
January 29, 2008 9:31 AM | Reply | Permalink
"....except the hatred of Blacks and Jews was then the coin of the realm. Now the coins are the Clintons!"
Is this for real? Two white, bourgeois career politicians (Bill didn't start out bourgeois, to be fair) are now the equivalent of blacks in the Jim Crow South and Jews in the 1930s? Seriously?
Next thing you know we'll be hearing about how the Clintons are the Jews of liberal fascism....
Ben Cronin
January 28, 2008 6:03 PM | Reply | Permalink
Was Bill Clinton our first Jewish President? Or is that to be Ms. Clinton's legacy?
You know the excitement of this brief little campaign is getting to me. Tonight I managed to stay awake for all of 5 minutes of the SOTU farce. In another couple of weeks I can possibly even sit through a Hillary speech.
I am one of the fortunate: I already voted a couple of weeks ago.
Hoppy in Sacramento
January 28, 2008 6:42 PM | Reply | Permalink
Enjoy the multi culti hates government Chicago mob Bush.
January 28, 2008 9:20 PM | Reply | Permalink
Stellaa,
is it me or is your post incoherent?
January 29, 2008 8:20 AM | Reply | Permalink
Free versifying or free basing?
January 29, 2008 9:35 AM | Reply | Permalink
She was absent the day they taught punctuation?
January 29, 2008 10:17 AM | Reply | Permalink
She??? Wasn't Stanley Kowalski the one who shouted out that name?
January 29, 2008 3:40 PM | Reply | Permalink
AH COULDA BINA CONTENDAHHHHH!
January 30, 2008 5:30 AM | Reply | Permalink
Quoting the wrong Brando movie. The horror...the horror. It'll buy you a one-way ticket to Palookaville. Accept this as gift on my daughter's wedding day.
January 30, 2008 4:23 PM | Reply | Permalink
You earn the Darwin Achievement Badge---I'm still waiting for my daughter to take that step.
January 30, 2008 5:01 PM | Reply | Permalink
Okay, either I'm stupid (probability: 85%) or culturally illiterate (92%), or you're almost as obscure as Stellaa. Whiskey Tango Fox?
January 30, 2008 6:36 PM | Reply | Permalink
I guess you're making obscure (to me) reference?
Took it literally.
January 30, 2008 6:39 PM | Reply | Permalink
I hate to be a party pooper, but it seems that everybody has forgotten that if Obama finally wins the nomination he will be facing the Karl Rove filth machine and Swiftboaterdom.
Now since most Americans don't follow events beyond their shores closely, disaster from afar usually tends to catch them with their trousers at half mast. It seems left to me to bring up an awkward bit of business.
One of the most charming parts of what Bill Clinton calls Obama's "fairy tale" takes place in Kenya, which for most readers probably summons up visions of Meryl Streep out hunting with Robert Redford, however recently Kenya has exploded in Rwanda-like ethnic violence, with people being locked in churches and burned alive and folks being hacked to bits with machetes. Here is a Google News search link to bring you up to speed.
I read "Dreams From My Father" a couple of years ago and don't have it at hand at the moment, but I seem to recall that the Senator from Illinois has quite a few aunts and uncles and cousins by the dozens in that country and that his father was some sort of a civil servant. I can't remember what tribe they belong to and I have no idea what, if any, might be their participation in today's situation, but you can be sure that Karl and the Boaters are already on the case.
This is a potential can of worms unlike anything heretofore imagined in American political mudslinging and the faster this gets talked about and cleared up the better.
http://seaton-newslinks.blogspot.com/
January 29, 2008 2:20 AM | Reply | Permalink
I doubt the Republican slime machine will spend too much time on Kenya. Most Americans would recognize that for what it is - a pretty desperate move. Has Obama even been to Kenya? If he has, he probably hasn't spent much time there.
No, I think the most likely targets of the slime machine will be (a) his Muslim heritage, which we're already seeing, (b) his church, which, if not quite the haven for radicalism it's sometimes portrayed as, is still pretty outlandish by the standards of white America; and (c) his days as a community organizer, where he was a follower of the ideas of Saul Alinsky. Alinsky is pretty easily characterized as a leftist radical. Someone somewhere will dig up a video of Obama giving a speech to a neighborhood group in Chicago in like, 1986 saying radical things.
I would not put it past the GOP to try to associate Obama with machete-wielding Kenyans. But I expect these other issues to be more prominent.
January 29, 2008 5:11 AM | Reply | Permalink
Oh, I fully expect the GOP to accuse Obama of having founded the Pan-African Federation with Kwame Nkrumah in 1946 and of having blown up the American embassy in Nairobi in 1998.
Also, they'll use his middle name a lot, and they'll get Jonah Goldberg to write about his connection to Mussolini.
But let's be serious, now -- it's not as if they're going to abide by Marquis of Queensbury rules with Clinton or Edwards. The thugs and reprobates of the GOP will behave like . . . thugs and reprobates.
January 29, 2008 5:19 AM | Reply | Permalink
It doesn't matter what they say, because Lynn Cheney gave us what we need most:
Barack Obama is a distant relative of our esteemed VP, Darth Cheney! So now we know he has the right stuff, huh?
Jan
January 29, 2008 6:16 AM | Reply | Permalink
Jan,
heh heh heh :-)
January 29, 2008 6:47 AM | Reply | Permalink
I agree. But here are two interesting questions:
There are those who say that an Obama/McCain contest would be inspiring and uplifting. I'm not sure I buy it.
January 29, 2008 7:23 AM | Reply | Permalink
The GOP nominee doesn't sling the slime - the 527s do - like the Swiftboaters, etc.
And you only have to look to the 2006 Senate campaign in Tennessee to see that they will have no problem sliming a Black man - remember the "Harold, call me" ads?
January 29, 2008 7:50 AM | Reply | Permalink
Or the Jesse Helms ad showing just hands crumpling a letter telling how a black man just took your job.
January 29, 2008 8:18 AM | Reply | Permalink
Slime ads tend to be effective when there is at least a small kernel of truth to them, even if they are totally outlandish. Harold Ford was known as a womanizer, so slime associated with that was likely to find more of an audience that something totally off the wall, like accusing Bill Clinton of murdering Vince Foster. The best example of this is the Swiftboat ads themselves. John Kerry may have legitimately won three Purple Hearts and a Silver Star, but he also testified to the Senate in 1971 and basically accused his fellow soldiers of war crimes. The most effective Swiftboat attacks were not about Kerry's war record and whether he deserved his medals. It was the ones that talked about the effect of Kerry's Senate testimony on other soldiers. Now leaving aside the issue of whether Kerry's 1971 testimony was a good thing or not, the fact is that it happened and no doubt some veterans actually did feel betrayed by him.
January 29, 2008 8:31 AM | Reply | Permalink
The Republican slime machine is already dusting off the Willy Horton picture.
January 29, 2008 8:15 AM | Reply | Permalink
Are you trying to tell me something?... Is that code?
January 29, 2008 2:10 PM | Reply | Permalink
Yep, its code, it means
the Republican slime machine is already dusting off the picture of Willy Horton.
Repug slimies believe as the Boy Scouts do, "Be Prepared."
January 29, 2008 2:39 PM | Reply | Permalink
I know your game. You want a President who will deliver a SOTU address in French. In the style of James Joyce.
Ps. I think the idea is awesome.
January 29, 2008 3:15 AM | Reply | Permalink
This is definitely THE celebrity endorsement needed to put Obama over the top. Move over Oprah!
Might you be fishing for a plum admin appointment here Michael Berube? I hear ambassador to France or Canada might be open to someone literate in the lingua franca.
January 29, 2008 4:36 AM | Reply | Permalink
Canada. And I pledge to make the Obama Administration the most hockey-friendly US administration since Woodrow Wilson sent that famous congratulatory telegram to Newsy Lalonde.
January 29, 2008 5:01 AM | Reply | Permalink
Canada? Oh yeah, they have hockey and you love hockey. (hate frogs?) Got it. I'll be happy to give you a letter of recommendation.
Just remember, the name on FAUX News is Barack Hussein Obama, the evil, dark skinned, scary Muslim, who, unlike Rudy, will be the ruination of Amerika!
January 29, 2008 11:43 AM | Reply | Permalink
I'm sure the MSM is quite happy you've been led by the nose as they planned.
Where's his actual policy, why so excited over a media darling?
It hasn't escaped my attention that the RW, while trashing McCain and Hillary, says plenty of nice things about Obama.
I'm not giving up on Edwards just yet. I'm sorry you have.
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January 29, 2008 4:45 AM | Reply | Permalink
The MSM are leading me by the nose? Golly, I must be stupider than I thought!
January 29, 2008 4:58 AM | Reply | Permalink
Yep.
Tell me, what kind of "change" does a Ted Kennedy endorsement signify?
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January 29, 2008 5:23 AM | Reply | Permalink
Yep.
Ah, so you are as smug as your first comment suggested.
Would you like to say more about your deep concern about Ted Kennedy, while you're here?
January 29, 2008 5:41 AM | Reply | Permalink
I'm sorry, was the question too difficult? Or make you feel a teensy bit uncomfortable? Apparently it does.
Well, it should. The smugness seems to be among the Obama cultists, not with those of us that look at this MSM driven hysteria and say: "WTF? This guy is the most conservative of those Dems running. Even Rush Limbaugh likes him."
My only concern about Ted is that he IS the same ol same ol.
Enjoy your Kool-aid. I'm going to keep my wits about me for a few more months at least.
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January 29, 2008 5:30 AM | Reply | Permalink
And you are even smarter than I thought! The rest of us are, like, drinking Kool-Aid or being led by the nose, because only Your Candidate is the Total Truth.
Your Kennedy question, by the way, made no sense. I don't place any hope whatsoever in listening to Clinton, Obama, and -- yes -- Edwards prattle on about "change". So no, I'm not terribly upset that one of the senior senators from the left wing of the Democratic Party endorsed Obama. By your logic, however, Ted Kennedy taints whomever he endorses -- and that's a weird kinda logic.
I still want Edwards to stay in for the long haul, talkin' about health care and makin' trouble. But when you start counting delegates, you realize that it really is a two-person race, and I prefer one of those persons to the other.
Now, that wasn't too difficult to understand, was it?
January 29, 2008 5:38 AM | Reply | Permalink
Really.
So that's why the title of this post is:"Teddy Kennedy, Caroline Kennedy, Toni Morrison -- and me!"
Yes, that's "sensical."
My candidate is the one the MSM ignores, the one that keeps "prattling on" about policy. That actually counts for something in the reality based world. I don't disagree that reality doesn't count for much, but I suppose it's too much to hope that popularity isn't about as corrupting an influence as power is.
I'm sorry to see you bow to it, but I can't say I'd do any different.
I simply will never know. I'm nobody.
I didn't mean to make you so upset. Have a good day. I'll just stay out of your threads from here on out.
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January 29, 2008 5:50 AM | Reply | Permalink
Really.
So that's why the title of this post is:"Teddy Kennedy, Caroline Kennedy, Toni Morrison -- and me!"
Yes, that's "sensical."
No, actually, it was tongue in cheek. You see, in the world of endorsements, I'm nobody too! That's the joke, because I only decided to go with Obama this weekend, and it just so happens that . . . ahhh, forget it.
But sure, when people start off an exchange with "so you're being led by the nose by the MSM, as they planned," I do get a bit techy. I don't assume stupidity or ill will on the part of people who disagree with me at the very outset (until they turn out to be David Horowitz! then all bets are off), and I prefer interlocutors who work more or less the same way.
Best wishes to you and your daughter, for whom I, too, desire a better world than this one.
January 29, 2008 8:12 AM | Reply | Permalink
'Goofy Grape' Kool-Aid is my favorite.
January 29, 2008 6:03 AM | Reply | Permalink
Endorsements have as much influence on me as
"a bucket of warm spit."
January 29, 2008 5:46 AM | Reply | Permalink
That bucket is on its way!
January 29, 2008 8:13 AM | Reply | Permalink
My hopes for an Edwards-Obama ticket finally faded on Saturday night. But maybe Edwards for VP instead of AG?
Any Dem will face the right-wing slime machine. And the MSM may not like Obama if he goes up against Saint John. So I have my doubts about Obama, but they're not nearly as great as my doubts about the Clintons.
What I don't doubt is that Obama is a natural in a way that Hillary never was. His speeches may be vague on specifics about policy, but that tends to be true of inspirational speeches, and the guy does know how to give an inspirational speech. As for his centrism. . . I think he sounds centrist because he decided that it probably wouldn't be a good idea for a black candidate to run a traditionally liberal campaign, so he's running a general-election-style campaign in the primary. But the Clintons are centrist because they’re DLCers, and I don't want to see the DLC back in the White House.
January 29, 2008 6:01 AM | Reply | Permalink
Corvid
.
Wouldn't it be a good idea for some of these Obama adorers to just once check out his background BEFORE endorsing him?
.
I say that as the Chicago Tribune reports this morning the jailing of Tony Rezko, the crooked, Syrian-born Chicago "property developer" with whom Obama has a deep and long-lasting relationship. And now it appears that Rezko is linked up somehow with a shadowy Iraqi-born billionaire, Nadhmi Auchi. Here's the link:
.
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/chi-tony-rezko-arrestedjan29,0,7987753.story
.
The Obamas have a mansion on the South Side. Rezko helped them get it. He also has been a key backer of Obama at crucial points in his political career. It doesn't matter how much Rezko money Obama returns now; the damage is done. (And Obama no longer needs the dough. For instance, I see he's taken something like $870,000 from credit card companies in the current cycle, which may explain why he refused to vote for any cap on credit card interest rates when he had the chance. But I digress.)
.
Just in general, Obama is a real sweetheart (as are Clinton and most of the others, quite true) for anyone with deep pockets. The point is that Obama is nothing special, nothing different and least of all is he any kind of agent for "change." Quite the opposite, in fact, if you look at his background--which hardly anyone seems willing to do.
.
Again, I'll refer you all to beachwoodreporter.com, which is a terrific little blog that has been quite diligent about aggregating responsible, mainstream journalism OF SUBSTANCE on Obama. So it's not just the Chicago Tribune (which decidedly is NOT a Republican newspaper in its news columns). The New York Times and even The Guardian, among others, have from time to time reported these disturbing details. They just tend to get shunted to the side by these great gushes of misty-eyed (and blind) enthusiasm for Obama.
January 29, 2008 8:20 AM | Reply | Permalink
Corvid, are you trying to show us how sleazy the Republican Slime-Machine will be?
I say that as the Chicago Tribune reports this morning the jailing of Tony Rezko, the crooked, Syrian-born Chicago "property developer" with whom Obama has a deep and long-lasting relationship. And now it appears that Rezko is linked up somehow with a shadowy Iraqi-born billionaire, Nadhmi Auchi.
So REZKO is linked to a shadowy person -- Iraqi, no less! I guess that cinches it that Obama is a bum -- also probably an islamic extremist too. Did Did you forget to mention that Obama's middle name is Hussein -- I guess you didn't need to.
Jan
January 29, 2008 9:32 AM | Reply | Permalink
There sure is some grade-A concern trolling goin' on in this here thread.
January 29, 2008 9:52 AM | Reply | Permalink
Corvid
.
Well, maybe you ought to actually read the story and, better yet, do a little research into the entire Rezko-Obama backstory. It's out there in a number of mainstream, responsible publications.
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And here's a little on Auchi, from the Observer of London (a decent paper). He's a bit more than just "Iraqi-born":
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"An Anglo-Iraqi billionaire who has close links to the Blair government, built his financial empire on peddling his influence with Saddam Hussein's Baathist regime - the Observer can reveal.
Nadhmi Auchi, who is one of Britain's richest men, will appear in court Tuesday [this was last fall] after his arrest in London. He faces extradition to France on fraud charges connected with a multi-million pound corruption scandal involving the French oil giant Elf-Aquitaine.
In a series of astonishing new developments in a story first broken by this newspaper two years ago, a fresh Observer investigation has discovered that Auchi:
· Was tried alongside Saddam Hussein for his involvement in a conspiracy to assassinate an Iraqi prime minister in Baghdad in the 1950s;
· Used money from military contracts in Iraq to establish a business and banking empire in Britain and Luxembourg; and
· Was employed to pay alleged bribes from Italian companies to win oil contracts in Iraq because of his close links to the regime.
The disclosures have already prompted opposition MPs to demand full details of Auchi's relationship with the Blair government."
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Look, if this character was trying top keep Rezko out of jail, and Rezko and Obama are old buddies going way back, it probably ought to raise some red flags, don't you think? And, yep, the Republican slime machine an be expected to pick up on this.
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When Democrats have two better choices--Clinton and Edwards, mainly Edwards--to choose from (they each have their baggage but each is more of a change candidate and substantively better than Obama on a range of issues), why insist on Obama?
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January 29, 2008 11:02 AM | Reply | Permalink
But, the fact that Obama knows Rezko and Rezko has dealings with Auchi does NOT mean that Obama is in bed with Auchi. Do you think we're all fools?
The only red-flag you are conjuring up is the one that says,
I AM A TROLL!
Jan
January 29, 2008 1:38 PM | Reply | Permalink
Mr. Berube --
Let's put all the cards on the table and stop talking in class code.
At its heart the message coming from the Obama campaign and his elite supporters in the media and the blogosphere is this; the Clintons' are using "divisive" racist tactics to appeal to their "racist" downscale white supporters, most especially working class women -- whose votes throughout this campaign have been routinely dismissed as being based in nothing more important than stupidity, sympathy, and now race.
And whose voices, of course, are nowhere represented in either the media or the blogosphere.
The arguments made by the Obama camp do not hang together, logically, unless that is the basic assumption -- that there is a lot of racial animosity and distrust out there, among the Democratic base and potential Clinton supporters, for the Clintons' to exploit.
Can you turn this around in your head and understand what this looks like to people who do not share your class prejudices and assumptions? Can any of Obama's supporters do so?
Now, I happen to not only think that assumption of racism on the part of the Democratic base, most especially working class voters, is not true. I think the Obama camp knows its not true. But, they are cynically using these accusations of racism against the Clintons to exploit larger, more acceptable class and gender prejudices that exist among middle class and elite Democrats.
This is a repeat of the clueless generational and class-based politics that divided the party during McGovern's bid for the nomination, and weakened the party well into the future.
Working class men are accused of leaving the Democratic party "against their best interests" in the 1970s and beyond. But the rising meritocratic elites of the Democratic party, who did not share the economic interests of, and were convinced by their own class prejudices of the stupidity and racism of, the working class, even more so walked away from the best interests of working class men and their families. And the proof of that is in the policies they supported, and the "compromises" against working class economic interests they happily made throughout the late 70s and 80s, when they still enjoyed substantial legislative strength.
To me, it looks like those same elites (and their children) are now prepared to do the same thing to working class women. By, for example, patronizingly insisting that those women need to "turn the page" and shut up about the gender issues that have immense negative economic impact on their lives and the welfare of their families -- an impact that is no longer experience in any substantial economic degree by elite women. And, of course, by refusing to examine and respect the real, vital interests and concerns that are informing these women's votes -- instead dismissing their motivation, as I said earlier, as nothing more than stupidity, sympathy and, now, racism.
Obama may have policies that are meant to appeal to these women -- but its hard to convince anyone that you have their economic interests at heart when your class prejudices are so strongly on display.
January 29, 2008 8:38 AM | Reply | Permalink
At its heart the message coming from the Obama campaign and his elite supporters in the media and the blogosphere is this; the Clintons' are using "divisive" racist tactics to appeal to their "racist" downscale white supporters, most especially working class women -- whose votes throughout this campaign have been routinely dismissed as being based in nothing more important than stupidity, sympathy, and now race.
Actually, that's not the argument at all.
The argument I've seen quite clearly different from the one you describe. For one, the tactics are clearly meant to be "divisive", but not racist, as has been clear, but racial or, the term most commonly-used, meant to be "race-baiting". There are distinctions. Clinton isn't calling Obama "lazy" or anything like that.
Rather, it seems pretty obvious that her campaign was trying to provoke a response from the Obama campaign where Obama cried "racism", which would damage his 'transcendental' brand and turn-off white voters who, while not racist, are not interested in voting for someone they view as running solely on his ethnicity or to be President of only his ethnicity.
This seems clearly not only to be the dominant "narrative" but also obviously true. See, fo