Politics

[tikiera]

Obama is looking better.

But I was listening to NPR  - and someone pointed out that Obama is carrying the primary votes in states that will not be giving their electoral votes to a democrat.

Now I need to track down a breakdown and see if that's right.  Gah. 

Comments

[mythicwarrior.livejournal.com]

I would love one logical reason to vote for the razzle-dazzle man. If the unwashed masses continue to push him as the democratic candidate, I'll vote Republican for the first time.

And yes, Obama is pulling the red states.

[diabhol.livejournal.com]

Well, while the conservatives don't love McCain, they hate Clinton. The Republicans will swarm the polls in a manner they won't necessarily do if Obama gets the nod.

Obama is also more likely to get the kids out to the polls than Clinton.

Personally, I've no interest in voting for Mrs. War Hawk, so Obama's where it's at for me.

[mythicwarrior.livejournal.com]

Ok first off, you haven't said why you support Obama, you've said why you don't support Hillary. I know people don't like her. But honestly, she'll get elected if she gets the nom. The Republicans saying they won't win against Obama sounds a lot like Briar Rabbit saying not to throw him in the briar patch to me.

What I dislike about Obama is that he is a man of intentions without plans. Hell I could be president based off of his campaign.

And lets cut right to the chase on his 'bringing people together' bs, he doesn't have the highest count of superdelegates. Those would be the people that he'll need to get legislation working. So if he can't bring the democrats together how do you think he'll do it for the Republicans too?

[diabhol.livejournal.com]

You didn't ask why I supported him, you just asked for a reason to vote for him. I think it's logical and you're welcome to disagree.

If you want his plans, search the web.

As far as the superdelegates go, whoever gets the prize is going to get cooperation from their party once the dust settles. I don't think there's any reason to be concerned about that.

[jamesofengland.livejournal.com]

Having made a little >10,000 calls to Republicans voting in this years primary, I can assure you that the vast bulk of Republicans who voted in the Democrat race for what they believed to be the weaker candidate voted for Hillary. Now, it's true that these were not all terribly educated people, and it's also true that we would try to nudge them to consider Obama (heck, Anya was handing out leaflets for Obama in New Hampshire), but it's worth noting that there are many, many Republicans who project their personal hostility onto others and sincerely believe that she isn't a powerful competitor.

In terms of bringing people together, I'd have thought that his bigger issues than the Delegates were in Florida, Michigan, and Nevada. He's not the man to bring the Hispanic vote into unity with the Democrats and he's kept his pledge to exclude the primary voters from two of the biggest battleground states.

[tikiera.livejournal.com]

I want a candidate the conservatives hate. I really do. Because I hate their politics, so if they hate my candidate, I know she is doing something right.

And if Obama gets the nomination, but doesn't have the popular support in the swing states - only has the popular support in states that don't matter because when the state is going to be for the Republican candidate when it gets to the actual election, I am worried.

Because Democrats will cut off their nose to spite their face, the last two elections have proven that for me. Third party candidates, not voting at all - these are the things that can lose elections.

And mythicwarrior is not the only person I hear saying what he says.

[diabhol.livejournal.com]

Sadly, I think a large part of the reason they hate her is simple sexism. After that, most Democrats can be tarred with the same "social liberal/tax & spend" brush (neverminding the fact that we all know Republicans spend just as much, if not more).

In any event, our part in the decision is over, so we'll see how it rolls out. California is not Florida and we're going blue no matter what, so I feel more than comfortable going with my feelings on this score.

[jamesofengland.livejournal.com]

The Clinton Presidency left a few serious legacies. Kosovo, AEDPA, the Iraq Regime Change Act & Desert Fox, Somalia, Welfare Reform, Don't Ask, Don't Tell, the NAFTA & WTO, the balanced budget, the DMCA, Tax Cuts... Republicans are somewhat divided on this stuff, but it's hard to really hate.

The Brady bill had the worst chunks either blasted away by the SCOTUS or by Congress in '98.

There's the minimum wage, sure, but that's kind of a symbolic issue to most.

Then there's Hillarycare. It's the one big liberal assault on America that got people's blood up. Well, until Lewinsky. It's the first thing that the vast bulk of Republicans talk about when I defend Clinton to them (which I do fairly regularly, as he is a hero of mine and I spend a fair amount of time talking to Republicans). Well, the first thing after the sham marriage.

There's good bits to Bill and bad bits, but the bad bits (the corruption, homicide slurs, sex harrasment, Hillarycare, blue dress stains) all involve Hillary, and none of the good bits do. There's no "but remember..." about hating Hillary, no defenses to be offered, except on a "the media were too hard on her/ Chelsea" type arguments.

Maine's a great example of a swing state which went for Obama with zero black population. Maine's two female Senators don't appear to be people who'd be voted in by misogynist throwbacks. Heck, in '06, both parties chose women in their primaries.

It's not just the substance, and the horror over her marriage, though. Even her platitudes seem calculated to inspire rage. "As adults, we have to start thinking and believing that there isn't really any such thing as someone else's child"? I don't think there's another national politician who comes out with this stuff with the kind of regularity that Clinton does. There's also few people with the unambiguously negative record (she has had a few successes in the Senate that republicans can get behind, but those are somewhat lower profile than her time in the White House).

[jamesofengland.livejournal.com]

Clinton does have some swing states: MI & FL by default, NV & AR by talent. Obama has some, too, though. VA is pretty big, and CO gave him a clear lead. ME, WI, MN... there's a good number of electoral votes before you even start in on the Clinton '92/'96 Southern states won by Obama this time round (WV, KY, TN).

I think that the where-the-support-is factor does balance in favour of Clinton, but it's a far from open and shut case. VA, in particular, seems like a state that could swing the election.

[tikiera.livejournal.com]

I am for Clinton at this point. I like Obama, want to see him run when he has a bit more experience.

But I think Clinton has the political knowledge and will have the ability to actual cause the change Obama talks about.

And I am so very, very sick of the Clinton bashing.

[mythicwarrior.livejournal.com]

I am so with you on the Hillary bashing. Its funny that people's problem with Hillary when she was First Lady was that she was a strong woman and they rumored that she was running the white house. So then I scratch my head at them balking at her doing it now.

[jamesofengland.livejournal.com]

Obama is willing to break from the party line on several issues where the party is wrong. Charter schools, trade agreements, and whether there were awesome things about Reagan (as well as some bad) feature prominently in this line of argument.

I get that this is about the negative reasons, but this interaction was the worst I've seen on the Dem side this cycle:
BLITZER: All right. Senator Clinton, all of us remember the big NAFTA debate when your husband was president of the United States. A lot of us remember the debate between Al Gore, who was then vice president, and Ross Perot.

Ross Perot was fiercely against NAFTA.

Knowing what we know now, was Ross Perot right?

(LAUGHTER)

CLINTON: All I can remember from that is a bunch of charts.

(LAUGHTER)

That, sort of, is a vague memory.

The only possible defense is that she was lying and pandering, which I hope to be true. To her credit, her voting has been more positive than her rhetoric on the subject. Also, Bill's rhetoric is still great and it's possible that he'd have influence.

Anyway, back to the positive, electorally Obama puts himself forward as an optimist, a move forward to a new politics, and is exceptionally capable when it comes to making his attacks personal without seeming negative. His current stump speech about agreeing with the McCain who put was against tax cuts for the rich is a great example. By cultivating the razzle dazzle over the appearance of personal attacks, he guarantees a powerful contrast with his opponent that should have significant down ticket effect, getting more Democrats elected. Likewise with his honesty (lots of "you'll suffer under this policy, but it'll be worth it to protect the poor/ the planet/ etc.") and positive marital record. I'm not currently aware of any Obama silliness along the lines of the energy independence efforts being what is needed to get America out of a recession. Again, there's a lot of mileage to be made from the contrast between an environmental plan that's worth sacrificing for, and essentially the same plan that comes for free (McCain's claim). There's much less of a difference between one miracle plan and another.

His health care plan retains more of what makes American health care great. Canadians would still have somewhere to go.

The President isn't a legislator, and most of his administrative duties are cabinet secretarial work. There's a degree to which what we want in a POTUS is a diplomat, and Obama is pretty good at persuading the unwashed masses of various countries that he's a good guy. Admittedly, some of that may change since he's still wanting to be, you know, an American President, and with most of the world sucking on America's teat, it's pretty hard to avoid resentment.

I'm not convinced that Obama would be a better POTUS than Hillary. I'm not completely sold about which party would be better in November, either, but I thought I'd offer a few of the arguments that push me toward the man.

[jamesofengland.livejournal.com]

Different measure, same result, but I thought you'd be interested to see this.
http://www.electoral-vote.com/evp2008/Clinton/Maps/Apr04.html
http://www.electoral-vote.com/evp2008/Obama/Maps/Apr04.html

In other words, to get to 270 from where they are now, Obama needs to lose nothing and swing Colorado, Michigan, or Wisconsin, lose nothing and swing New Hampshire and South Carolina, or win Texas (if he wins TX, he can afford to lose some other stuff).

Clinton could do it by swinging any of those states (although New Hampshire wouldn't be enough, South Carolina, should it choose to go Democrat, wouldn't need New Hampshire to join it), she could also do it, by swinging Arkansas, Tennessee, and other states that she'd make competitive, or she could do it by swingingin Oregon or Washington, which doesn't seem like it'd be too hard. In other words, Florida really, truly, matters.