Runaway Horses's Blogtag:www.talkingpointsmemo.com,2008:/talk/blogs/rms//23812008-09-10T15:25:18ZMovable Type Pro 4.21-enAttention Demoracts: GOP Has Sterling Record on Fighting Sexismtag:tpmcafe.talkingpointsmemo.com,2008:/talk//17.2153692008-09-10T15:25:18Z2008-09-10T15:25:18ZRunaway Horses (1) John McCain called his wife a "cunt" in public.
To conclude, I think it's pretty clear that the GOP is expressing genuine horror at bona fide sexism here and not manufacturing outrage designed to score political points while undermining the legitimate battle against sexism that feminists have fought for centuries.
Feel free to add more items illustrating the GOP's and John McCain's principled and forceful defense of gender equality! ]]>
Palin as the "Republican Obama" — A Ludicrous Comparisontag:tpmcafe.talkingpointsmemo.com,2008:/talk//17.2144222008-09-07T17:56:17Z2008-09-07T17:56:17ZRunaway Horses For those of us who have been freaking out a bit over the generally positive reactions to Palin's sneering, self-aggrandizing speech at the Republican National Convention, this piece should help assuage some of our worries.
1) The Rise and Fall of Enthusiasm
Palin's enthusiastic base of support is comprised of largely of the religious right. There's little controversy on this point. Yet there is also fairly broad concensus that the religious right as we know it has already reached its apex of political influence and is now on the decline.
Interestingly, Palin doesn't seem to represent a fresh, reformed embodiment of core religious right principles; rather, she is just a younger advocate of precisely the same ideas that Bush used to motivate the evangelical base in 2000 and 2004: no abortion under any circumstances, global warming is not the result of human activity, creationism should be taught alongside evolution in public schools.
If anything, Palin is more of an extremist than Bush on these issues. In one way, that's good news for progressives because, for example, consistently over the past 12 years, less than 20% of the American public has supported making abortion illegal in all circumstances. From a common-sense standpoint, it's hard to believe that Bush has not fully mined the ranks of the religious right in the past two elections, especially given the host of anti-gay-marriage state constitutional amendments that brought out the base in 2004.
On the other hand, it's also well known that a very large part of Obama's enthusiastic support comes from young people. Today's young people will of course gain a growing share of the electorate as they age and older people pass away; Obama inarguably has demonstrated an enormous appeal to high schoolers who are not yet of voting age. Those young people who can already vote will continue to support the progressive policies Obama advocates as the youth vote swells with additional new voters coming of majority.
In short, unlike religious-issue voters, young voters are not already a tapped-out resource. I'm sure that, by virtue of her youth, Palin appeals to a larger number of young voters than McCain. But Obama has a full-blown youth movement supporting him in addition to his other bases of support. The dynamics of the campaign may change, but for now it's important to conflate Palin's personal youth with broad support from young people.
2) Record of Skill as a Campaigner
This is another salient difference between Obama and Palin. Obama's skill as a campaigner and politician has been tested with extreme thoroughness. I was quite upset with Hillary's campaign by the time we got through North Carolina, but I'm now grateful for the opportunity she gave us all to fathom the political abilities of Obama and his campaign. That Obama survived the Reverend Wright debacle is nothing short of a miracle, and it demonstrates that both he and his campaign advisors are at the very top of their game. (As a side note, I must admit that Hillary and her campaign were right in suggesting that airing all of Obama's scandals—both real and fabricated—before the general election campaign was to the Democrats' advantage. I was furious with Hillary and her supporters at the time, but you all were right on that point.)
We also know that Obama is a relatively poor performer in debates and a superb orator and speechwriter, and we have been able to weigh his strengths and shortcomings in deciding to put our support behind his candidacy. He has also shown us that he is able to endure the grueling pace of the Presidential campaign, which isn't something we can take for granted.
On the other hand, Palin's campaign skills on the national stage are still largely an unknown quantity. We now know that she can deliver a particular type of speech well, but we don't know about her speechwriting skills or her ability to defuse potentially explosive scandals by speaking to the nation and the press. The latter skill, especially, is likely to become important for her future career given the number of scandals and controversies threating to torpedo her ticket.
We also have not seen whether Palin is able to keep up with the pace of the Presidential campaign. Juggling a the care of a special-needs newborn with this campaign is going to be a Herculean feat. Palin also does not appear to be a particularly skilled debater in that she does not seem to have a very good handle on policy specifics. If the expectations for her performance are set low enough, her lack of skill may not matter, but Biden clearly realizes that.
3) A Dearth of Fresh Ideas
Even among Obama's detractors, those who are intellectually honest (and there are plenty of them) admit that he is a brainiac who has been thinking seriously about national policy issues for a long, long time. Furthermore, he contemplates complicated new approaches to problems that break with both Democratic and Republican orthodoxy. On a more concrete level, we have seen his campaign deftly take advantage of viral videos, social networking sites, and online fundraising—they have masterfully used fresh ideas to keep apace with the changing dynamics of what is possible in a presidential campaign.
Obama's resume underscores the depth of his intellectual resources. Not to put too fine a point on it, but consider this: according to recent statistics, the median Law School Admission Test score at Harvard Law School was at or above the top 1% of test takers. Obama graduated from law school magna cum laude, which is awarded to the top 10% of the law school class at Harvard. Many people seem to enjoy mentioning affirmative action upon hearing this, but consider that final exams at Harvard Law, which are usually wholly determinative of a student's grade for any given course, are blind-graded, meaning that the professors do not know, and are not allowed to know, whose exam they are grading at any given point. To summarize: Obama is very, very smart.
I'm not going to bother going into detail about Palin's educational history. Suffice it to say that, while Palin obviously is intellectual capable in some respects, people with Obama's level of intelligence are very, very rare to begin with. Palin is obviously not one of them. We know that Palin managed to leave Wasilla $22 million in debt at the end of her 6-year tenure. We know that her solution to our energy crisis is to drill, drill, drill for oil, that very recently she didn't know what the Vice President does, and that she heard about the surge in Iraq "on the news."
My point is not that she is dumb; her success in politics is enough to prove that she isn't. But it's impossible for anyone to argue with a straight face—unless we're talking about Karl Rove or some other willful liar—that she compares intellectually to Obama.
Obviously, this point does not necessarily speak to who is going to win this election. Indeed, the Republicans are clearly trying to make Obama's intellectual prowess into a liability. But this speaks to what I see as a potentially larger issue: Obama and Palin are both quite young relative to politicians of comparable prominence. Regardless of who wins the upcoming election, they each have the potential to spend decades as a national presence, advocate, and leader.
Win or lose, after this election, Obama will unquestionably remain a power player within the Democratic Party. He will continue to infuse the party—and, at times, the nation—with fresh, progressive ideas based on intense, reasoned analysis and a synethsis of various traditional approaches to the pressing problems facing the nation. It's hard to imagine Palin occupying a similar policymaking, visionary position in the Republican party of tomorrow.
In a way, it feels like by writing this I'm validating the preposterous idea that a comparison of Obama and Palin is justified. But it is worth noting that, upon a reasoned analysis, claims of Obama-Palin equivalency seem to be rooted in what Josh Marshall has adroitly termed "ascending heights of reactionary delerium." ]]>
Palin Is Not the "Republican Obama"tag:tpmcafe.talkingpointsmemo.com,2008:/talk//17.2144152008-09-07T17:38:44Z2008-09-07T17:38:44ZRunaway Horses For those of us who have been freaking out a bit over the generally positive reactions to Palin's sneering, self-aggrandizing speech at the Republican National Convention, this piece should help assuage some of our worries.
1) The Rise and Fall of Enthusiasm
Palin's enthusiastic base of support is comprised of largely of the religious right. There's little controversy on this point. Yet there is also fairly broad concensus that the religious right as we know it has already reached its apex of political influence and is now on the decline. Interestingly, Palin doesn't seem to represent a fresh, reformed embodiment of core religious right principles; rather, she is just a younger advocate of precisely the same ideas that Bush used to motivate the evangelical base in 2000 and 2004: no abortion under any circumstances, global warming is not the result of human activity, creationism should be taught alongside evolution in public schools. If anything, Palin is more of an extremist than Bush on these issues. In one way, that's good news for progressives because, for example, consistently over the past 12 years, less than 20% of the American public has supported making abortion illegal in all circumstances. From a common-sense standpoint, it's hard to believe that Bush has not fully mined the ranks of the religious right in the past two elections, especially given the host of anti-gay-marriage state constitutional amendments that brought out the base in 2004.
On the other hand, it's also well known that a very large part of Obama's enthusiastic support comes from young people. Today's young people will of course gain a growing share of the electorate as they age and older people pass away; Obama inarguably has demonstrated an enormous appeal to high schoolers who are not yet of voting age. Those young people who can already vote will continue to support the progressive policies Obama advocates as the youth vote swells with additional new voters coming of majority.
In short, unlike religious-issue voters, young voters are not already a tapped-out resource. I'm sure that, by virtue of her youth, Palin appeals to a larger number of young voters than McCain. But Obama has a full-blown youth movement supporting him in addition to his other bases of support. The dynamics of the campaign may change, but for now it's important to conflate Palin's personal youth with broad support from young people.
2) Record of Skill as a Campaigner
This is another salient difference between Obama and Palin. Obama's skill as a campaigner and politician has been tested with <I>extreme</I> thoroughness. I was quite upset with Hillary's campaign by the time we got to North Carolina, but I'm now grateful for the opportunity she gave us all to fathom the political abilities of Obama and his campaign. That Obama survived the Reverend Wright debacle is nothing short of a miracle, and it demonstrates that both he and his campaign advisors are at the very top of their game. (As a side note, I must admit that Hillary and her campaign were right in suggesting that airing all of Obama's scandals—both real and fabricated—before the general election campaign was to the Democrats' advantage. I was furious with Hillary and her supporters at the time, but you all were right on that point.)
We also know that Obama is a relatively poor performer in debates and a superb orator and speechwriter, and we have been able to weigh his strengths and shortcomings in deciding to put our support behind his candidacy. He has also shown us that he is able to endure the grueling pace of the Presidential campaign, which isn't something we can take for granted.
On the other hand, Palin's campaign skills on the national stage are still largely an unknown quantity. We now know that she can deliver a particular type of speech well, but we don't know about her speechwriting skills or her ability to defuse potentially explosive scandals by speaking to the nation and the press. The latter skill, especially, is likely to become important for her future career given the number of scandals and controversies threating to torpedo her ticket. We also have not seen whether Palin is able to keep up with the pace of the Presidential campaign. Juggling a the care of a special-needs newborn with this campaign is going to be a Herculean feat. Palin also does not appear to be a particularly skilled debater in that she does not seem to have a very good handle on policy specifics. If the expectations for her performance are set low enough, her lack of skill may not matter, but Biden clearly realizes that.
3) A Dearth of Fresh Ideas
Even among Obama's detractors, those who are intellectually honest (and there are plenty of them) admit that he is a brainiac who has been thinking seriously about national policy issues for a long, long time. Furthermore, he contemplates complicated new approaches to problems that break with both Democratic and Republican orthodoxy. On a more concrete level, we have seen his campaign deftly take advantage of viral videos, social networking sites, and online fundraising—they have masterfully used fresh ideas to keep apace with the changing dynamics of what is possible in a presidential campaign. And of course, Obama's resume underscores the depth of his intellectual resources. Not to put too fine a point on it, but consider this: according to recent statistics, the median Law School Admission Test score at Harvard Law School was at or above the top 1% of test takers. Obama graduated from law school magna cum laude, which is awarded to the top 10% of the law school class at Harvard. Many people seem to enjoy mentioning affirmative action upon hearing this, but consider that final exams at Harvard Law, which are usually wholly determinative of a student's grade for any given course, are blind-graded, meaning that the professors do not know, and are not allowed to know, whose exam they are grading at any given point. To summarize: Obama is very, very smart.
I'm not going to bother going into detail about Palin's educational history. Suffice it to say that, while Palin obviously is intellectual capable in some respects, people with Obama's level of intelligence are very, very rare to begin with. Palin is obviously not one of them. We know that Palin managed to leave Wasilla $22 million in debt at the end of her 6-year tenure. We know that her solution to our energy crisis is apparently to drill, drill, drill for oil, that very recently she didn't know what the Vice President does, and that she heard about the surge in Iraq "on the news." My point is not that she is dumb; her success in politics is enough to prove that she isn't. But it's impossible for anyone to argue with a straight face—unless we're talking about Karl Rove or some other willful liar—that she compares intellectually to Obama.
Obviously, this point does not necessarily speak to who is going to win this election. Indeed, the Republicans are clearly trying to make Obama's intellectual prowess into a liability. But this speaks to a bigger point: Obama and Palin are both quite young relative to politicians of comparable prominence. Regardless of who wins the upcoming election, they each have the potential to spend decades as a national presence, advocate, and leader. Win or lose, after this election, Obama will unquestionably remain a power player within the Democratic Party. He will continue to infuse the party—and, at times, the nation—with fresh, progressive ideas based on intense, reasoned analysis and a synethsis of various traditional approaches to the pressing problems facing the nation. It's hard to imagine Palin occupying a similar visionary, policymaking position in the Republican party of tomorrow.
In a way, it feels like by writing this I'm validating the preposterous idea that a comparison of Obama and Palin is justified. But it is worth noting that, upon a reasoned analysis, claims of Obama-Palin equivalency seem to be rooted in what Josh Marshall has adroitly termed "ascending heights of reactionary delerium." ]]>
Palin's Speech Was Heavy on the Rhetorical Filigree, Don't You Think?tag:tpmcafe.talkingpointsmemo.com,2008:/talk//17.2133122008-09-04T14:30:20Z2008-09-04T14:30:20ZRunaway Horses
And now, comrades, as we stand besieged by fusillades of partisan catechisms, we cannot afford to forget a fundamental verity: our opponent is a rhetorical vessel and nothing more. He is but a hubristic neophyte, a man clinging with fervor to long-discredited melioristic chimera and a man who is followed by throngs of frothy-mouthed, purblind acolytes, wishing to foment change yet knowing not even for what they cheer; to brand them Pollyannas is to demean and debase a harmless member of our lexicon. Countrymen and countrywomen, I shed tears for this great nation that a contest can be borne from such poverty of substance.
Seriously, can we put this "plainspoken" thing to rest. I don't want somebody who talks like Finnegan's Wake, but Palin sounds like she's still speaking in front of the PTA when compared to, oh, I don't know, Hillary Clinton. ]]>
I Guess McCain Didn't Have a Chance to Overhear the "How Many Houses" Question in Pastor Warren's Cone of Silence Before His Press Conferencetag:tpmcafe.talkingpointsmemo.com,2008:/talk//17.2096582008-08-22T06:24:26Z2008-08-22T06:24:26ZRunaway Horses That is all.]]>
Infuriated by Hillary? This will help!tag:tpmcafe.talkingpointsmemo.com,2008:/talk//17.1823302008-03-08T05:45:11Z2008-03-08T05:45:11ZI've been a lot angrier than I like to be over the past few days. More than anything, Hillary's effusive praise of McCain, one of the most myopic and bizarre strategies of her campaign, pushed me over the edge. I...Runaway Horses Part of what makes this most frustrating is the impotence that accompanies my anger. No doubt that's true for all of us. I want to ask Hillary how she can possibly say things like this, over and over again, in good conscience. But of course I'll never get that opportunity. There is one thing we can do, however. Give money to Obama. I despise what Hillary has done in the past few days, and my displeasure will be evidenced by my donations to Obama this month. So go to barackobama.com, open your wallet, and feel a little less impotent. It helps. Trust me.
Obama is offering us something extraordinary this election cycle. From this—exactly what Hillary is doing right now—Obama offers a reprieve. From falsified charges about "NAFTA-gate" and mischaracterized quotes about withdrawal from Iraq. From those who didn't take a stand on our horrifying adventure into Iraq. From Democrats as nothing more than Democrats and Republicans as nothing more than Republicans. From those politicians who believe they—only they and not the people—are the ones for whom the messy machinery of democracy operates. Obama, Kansan and Kenyan, American and international, community organizer and trailblazer and a man whose campaign demonstrates every day the incredible potential of a people-powered movement for hope and change and unity in 21st century America.
Take a deep breath, think about what this campaign means, and give.]]>
What Do Hillary's Victories Mean?tag:tpmcafe.talkingpointsmemo.com,2008:/talk//17.1815992008-03-05T16:03:22Z2008-03-05T16:03:22ZRunaway Horses The results from last night can't be meaningfully analyzed until we get
some more polling from the rest of this week. The fact of the matter
is that, at some point last week, Obama came dangerously close to snapping
up a victory in Texas, perhaps even in Ohio, and knocking Hillary out
of the race. At the same time, it's clear that Hillary was able to
reverse the trend. But in looking at the big picture, we need to
remember that the Clinton campaign categorized Ohio and Texas as firewalls. After Wisconsin, Obama dug deep into Hillary's Ohio lead,
and brought Texas within a mere three points. We know that the
delegates from this are more or less going to wash out, and that
doesn't simply cut it for Hillary. This unquestionably
leaves Obama as the frontrunner (and still with a distinct advantage),
but the real question now is if the reversal of Obama momentum
continues. This reminds me a lot of Super Tuesday, when we saw a
putative victory for Hillary that actually left Obama quite nicely
positioned for the coming campaign. The fact Hillary nearly lost of one of her "firewall" states is clearly getting overshadowed by the turnaround in Obama momentum, just as on Super Tuesday Obama's string of high-profile endorsements overshadowed the fact that a couple weeks prior he had been down by huge margins in many of the states Hillary carried and was in fact grabbing huge chunks of her support. What was then characterized as a Hillary victory in fact masked a bigger picture of growing Obama momentum.
It is abundantly clear from the numbers that Hillary won't come close
to taking a pledged delegate lead without some kind of an Obama
implosion. Her only hope now is to either (a) wait it out for such an
implosion, or (b) try to gain enough momentum to gain a nationwide
Democratic polling advantage in hopes it will outweigh her pledged
delegate deficit at the convention. I don't think a series of 3%
margin victories, like Texas, are going to do it for Hillary. One also
has to wonder if the demotion of Patti Solis Doyle and her replacement
by Maggie Williams is bearing fruit. It seems that by all accounts
Maggie Williams is far more capable.
In short, the real question is whether we should look at this from a
four-week perspective (with Obama making huge inroads to Hillary's
support in Texas or Ohio) or a week-and-a-half perspective (with
Hillary fighting back an Obama upset). And I think we need another
week or so of polling before we can decide which view is more accurate.]]>