If this is the way Clinton runs her campaign....

[Hometown]

Polls show the blue collar vote is going to Clinton.

Never heard of LBJ Democrats, but the Reagan Democrats are voting for Clinton.

[FOTD]

quote:Originally posted by Hometown

the Reagan Democrats are voting for Clinton.

Now that sez it all HT.

LBJ democrats have mostly all died and gone to that great society in the beyond.

Can you define blue collar as it relates to working class? Do you think the two have become seperable in light of the service economy? As a matter of fact, Obama has assembled voters that redefine red states from blue states and has managed to attract voters from all spheres. Seems to me he is putting a new stamp on the democratic party....

Obama resists and renonces pre-emptive attacks.
Not his opponents.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/04/09/mccain-wont-rule-out-pree_n_95963.html

[RecycleMichael]

quote:Originally posted by cannon_fodder


Also, at the risk of being extremely un-PC, every gay couple I know supports Clinton.    Did Bill have a strong gay rights agenda or does Hillary push one now or is this just a happenstance?  

Is this a reference to Elton John raising 2.5 million dollars last night at a concert for Hillary?

I serve on a national recycling board with a very high level Obama campaign official who is gay. I think that there are probably equal numbers of gay people working for Hillary and Obama nationally.

Gay republicans? Don't they know the republican agenda? That is like deer supporting a longer hunting season.

[cannon_fodder]

No RM, I was not referencing that at all.  Just seems every gay man I know (and the pair of Lesbians) are Clinton supporters and I wasn't sure if that was in my microcosm of the world or a trend.  If a trend, if it was for a reason I was unaware of.

I'd be just as curious if all Armenians that I know (or whomever) was siding with a candidate and I did not know why.

[USRufnex]

quote:Originally posted by Hometown

Pmcalk, to my recollection, the only positive statement you have ever made here about Obama was that you believe he can move us beyond partisanship.  I asked once and you didn't respond with your postive reasons for supporting Obama.  Now, this man has been in the public eye for all of four months so you probably aren't very familiar with his various positions and policies, but I sure would like to hear a definitive statement from you about what you like about Obama and what he is going to do for the United States.

FOTD made one positive statment about Obama, he'll get rid of lobbyists.

I honestly believe when you and FOTD and USRufnex repeatedly post negative statements about Clinton it is because you are worried that she might win.

No.  But I am worried that she will destroy Obama's chances in the general with her recent tactics and vows to stay in through the convention... she isn't gaining support, she's polarizing her supporters against Obama... I didn't need polarizing against HRC, I never liked her and thought on sheer policy questions, Bill Clinton was the best republican prez in my lifetime...

The only person connected with Hillary Clinton I have much respect for these days is Paul Begala, and he's not even formally in her compaign... so, there ya go...

--reposted from 3/28/08

quote:Originally posted by Hometown

Okay you Obama and McCain supporters, either it is taking you some time collect your thoughts or you are incapable of making a positive argument for your candidates.

Talk about a bunch of negative campaigners.

"Talk about a bunch of negative campaigners."

Ah, the irony, coming from a Hillary supporter... [B)]

My reasons for supporting Barack Obama...
http://www.biography.com/search/article.do?id=12782369&page=3

1.   In February 1990, he was elected the first African-American editor of the Harvard Law Review.  Obama graduated magna cum laude in 1991.

2.  His experience in community organizing... working with and representing low-income folks on the south side of Chicago ain't no picnic.  This kind of perspective recognizes that having a national minimum wage without a COLA not only affects the folks with jobs at or attached to minimum wage... it also recognizes that a minimum wage political tug of war hurts small, community-based businesses...

3.  His experience working in the Illinois senate... "Obama worked with both Democrats and Republicans in drafting legislation on ethics, expanded health care services and early childhood education programs for the poor.  He also created a state earned-income tax credit for the working poor.  And after a number of inmates on death row were found innocent, Obama worked with law enforcement officials to require the videotaping of interrogations and confessions in all capital cases.

4.  His principled opposition to the war in Iraq... in stark contrast to the go-along get-along views of most Dem politicians at the time...

"I am not opposed to all wars. I'm opposed to dumb wars," he said.  "What I am opposed to is the cynical attempt by Richard Perle and Paul Wolfowitz and other arm-chair, weekend warriors in this Administration to shove their own ideological agendas down our throats, irrespective of the costs in lives lost and in hardships borne.

"He's a bad guy," Obama said, referring to Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein.  "The world, and the Iraqi people, would be better off without him.  But I also know that Saddam poses no imminent and direct threat to the United States, or to his neighbors, that the Iraqi economy is in shambles, that the Iraqi military a fraction of its former strength, and that in concert with the international community he can be contained until, in the way of all petty dictators, he falls away into the dustbin of history."

"I know that even a successful war against Iraq will require a U.S. occupation of undetermined length, at undetermined cost, with undetermined consequences," Obama continued.  "I know that an invasion of Iraq without a clear rationale and without strong international support will only fan the flames of the Middle East, and encourage the worst, rather than best, impulses of the Arab world, and strengthen the recruitment arm of al-Qaeda."

5.  His experience losing a house race against Bobby Rush in which he was perceived as too intellectual and "not black enough"... his experience transcending race in winning the Illinois Dem primary for the senate against six other candidates; including a multimillionaire (Blair Hull), a white male political insider with widespread support from Chicago's black city aldermen (Dan Hynes), a white female with high name recognition (Maria Pappas), a black female who campaigned on "universal healthcare"... he won the primary...

U.S. Senate (Dem)  
 11504 of 11745 Precincts (98%)  
 Barack Obama    640,707  53%  
 Dan Hynes       288,176  24%  
 Blair Hull      130,944  11%  
 Maria Pappas     73,485  6%  
 Gery Chico       52,105  4%  
 Nancy Skinner    15,651  1%  
 Joyce Washington 12,973  1%  

... and then beat the crap out of Alan Keyes in the general, receiving 70% of the vote to Keyes's 27%, the largest electoral victory in Illinois history.

6.  His ability to "disagree without being disagreeable"... he was criticized by the Clintons before the Nevada primary for his positive statements about Ronald Reagan, yet this was not the only time Obama has praised Reagan...

6/7/2004 --  "Ronald Reagan left Illinois as a young man, but maintained his Midwestern sensibilities throughout his long and storied life.

While I disagreed with many of his policies, I, like most Americans, admired President Reagan's eloquence, optimism and unshakable faith in the ideal of America as a beacon of hope and freedom.

Tonight, our thoughts and prayers are with Nancy and his family.

All of America remembers the grace and courage with which President Reagan told the nation of his diagnosis of the dreaded affliction of Alzheimer's disease 10 years ago.

Let us hope one of the lasting parts of Ronald Reagan's legacy is a renewed commitment to finding a cure for this horrible disease so that no family must endure the pain the Reagan family has known."

7.  After entering the Senate, he could have used older Dem senators like Ted Kennedy as mentors, but instead, has taken lessons/wisdom from Republican senator Dick Lugar of Indiana...

http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalradar/2007/12/obama-says-hed.html

8.  His view of making healthcare affordable enough for the goal of "universal coverage" to be achieved, rather than mandating coverage.

http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2008/02/healthcare-mand.html

quote:...It's "Yes, We Can," vs "I'll Take Care Of You."

And that's why a simplistic Obama-is-a-leftist critique won't work as well as some seem to think. He's a liberal, but a reconstructed one. He's the kind of liberal who sees dependency as a problem not a solution. And he's not a statist in the way previous liberal generations have been. He actually listened to and absorbed some of the conservative critique of liberalism these past two decades. And he has changed not just to protect his right flank.

9.  Speeches matter.  And Barack Obama is the best speaker I've heard in a lifetime... So, when HRC consistently characterizes Obama's speeches as mere words without action, I get very angry... Abraham Lincoln, Teddy Roosevelt, FDR, Kennedy and yes, Ronald Reagan used great speeches which have stood the test of time, to shape policy and public opinion...

"We worship an awesome God in the blue states, and we don't like federal agents poking around our libraries in the red states," he said.  "We coach Little League in the blue states, and yes, we've got some gay friends in the red states. There are patriots who opposed the war in Iraq, and there are patriots who supported the war in Iraq. We are one people, all of us pledging allegiance to the Stars and Stripes, all of us defending the United States of America."

Yes, the speech from the 2004 Dem convention... and the race speech from a few days ago... there are many to choose from... one of my favorites is the speech he gives primarily to university students mentioning the "empathy deficit"...
 http://www.northwestern.edu/observer/issues/2006/06/22/obama.html

quote:...it called to mind a passage from scriptures that some of you may know: Corinthians 13:11: "When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I felt as a child, I thought as a child. Now that I have become a man, I have put away childish things."
------------------------------------------------
...There's a lot of talk in this country about the federal deficit. But I think we should talk more about our empathy deficit — the ability to put ourselves in someone else's shoes; to see the world through those who are different from us — the child who's hungry, the laid-off steelworker, the immigrant woman cleaning your dorm room.

As you go on in life, cultivating this quality of empathy will become harder, not easier. There's no community service requirement in the real world; no one forcing you to care. You'll be free to live in neighborhoods with people who are exactly like yourself, and send your kids to the same schools, and narrow your concerns to what's going on in your own little circle.

Not only that — we live in a culture that discourages empathy. A culture that too often tells us our principal goal in life is to be rich, thin, young, famous, safe, and entertained. A culture where those in power too often encourage these selfish impulses.

10.  Words matter.  I tire of political consultants who have much more power than they have any right to exercise... Peggy Noonan wrote eloquent speeches for Ronald Reagan but those words became his own.  Contrast that to the cynical strategies of Lee Atwater, James Carville, Dick Morris, and "Bush's brain," Karl Rove...... I'm happy to hear the words of Barack Obama in his quotes and speeches, with a minimal amount of political meddling from David Axelrod...

Quotes from Obama:
http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/b/barack_obama.html

"A good compromise, a good piece of legislation, is like a good sentence; or a good piece of music. Everybody can recognize it. They say, 'Huh. It works. It makes sense.'"

"If you're walking down the right path and you're willing to keep walking, eventually you'll make progress."

"My first job is to say thank you to those who voted me. Those who didn't, I'm going to get your vote next time."

"No one is pro-abortion."

"Today we are engaged in a deadly global struggle for those who would intimidate, torture, and murder people for exercising the most basic freedoms. If we are to win this struggle and spread those freedoms, we must keep our own moral compass pointed in a true direction."

"We're not going to baby sit a civil war."

"You know, my faith is one that admits some doubt."

"We need to steer clear of this poverty of ambition, where people want to drive fancy cars and wear nice clothes and live in nice apartments but don't want to work hard to accomplish these things. Everyone should try to realize their full potential."

"I opposed the Defense of Marriage Act in 1996. It should be repealed and I will vote for its repeal on the Senate floor. I will also oppose any proposal to amend the U.S. Constitution to ban gays and lesbians from marrying."

"It took a lot of blood, sweat and tears to get to where we are today, but we have just begun. Today we begin in earnest the work of making sure that the world we leave our children is just a little bit better than the one we inhabit today."

"In the end, that's what this election is about. Do we participate in a politics of cynicism or a politics of hope?"

[Conan71]

quote:Originally posted by Hometown

FOTD, the only homerun hitter our party has seen since LBJ was Clinton.  Our party is peopled by losers who have crashed and burned -- except for the Clintons.  If you want a homerun, I suggest you look to someone who has hit a few instead of someone who has no record.

Cannon, I haven't seen any endorsements from gay groups.  I haven't really been involved in gay politics for many, many years.  I'll have to tell you about Tulsa Gay Alliance 1973 one of these days.

Gays constitute about 10% of the population in the United States.  About the same percentage as Blacks.  Given our disposible income, I would guess we have been important to the party.  

I have been dismayed by some local gays who admit to voting Republican and I look at them like, don't you have any memory of what the Republican party has done to gay people.

HT- there could be worse things than gay friends voting Republican.

Seriously, a friend of mine when we were in college had been dreading telling his father he was gay for some time.  They were a western Ok farming family, so "gay" was pretty foreign to them.  He finally decided his freshman year of college was the time.  He kept trying to tell him for a month and would get cold feet or stammer and not be able to do it.  Finally when he managed to get the truth out to his dad, in it's entirety, his dad replied (big strapping farmer type):  Son, is that all??? Hell, I thought you were going to tell me you'd joined the Baptist Student Union or Democratic party of something along those lines".

The Republican party is a welcome home for thinking homosexuals who can see when they are pandered and lied to, I guess.  Let's face it, the Democrat party has really not accomplished much in regards to gay rights.  Gay marriage as a national issue is a stupid wedge as it's usually deferred to states rights.  The only thing of note which came from Bill Clinton was "Don't ask, don't tell."  Now how was that new ground for the military?  That's the way it had always been.  It got media attention and not much else.

Honestly look at the way Mark Foley and other Republican gays are treated by the Democrats, and that should tell you plenty about how the gay community is pandered to by the DNC.  If you'll carry the DNC's water, they want you.  If you vote against Democrat initiatives, you will pay a hefty price for being a gay person.  In fact, instead of allowing you to live your live privately, they will make sure you get a very public outing.

Most of the gay people I know aren't singe-issue voters.  They are interested in taxes, SSI, overall leadership, growth, national security, etc.  

[FOTD]

Such nonsense.... Hillary concedes after Penn.....somewhere around May 2nd. Get wired in. Her negatives will drop and everyone will think she's a hero. Watch.