Third Party & Independents Archives

Unfortunately, there may well be a few other things to consider if Clinton decides she going to take the fight to the convention.

The whole tone of the Clinton’s primary campaign against Obama makes me suspect that they’d actually rather see McCain win. After all, why would Hillary have ever claimed that McCain had “crossed the presidential threshold” and Obama didn’t? If you ask me, she was the one crossing a certain “threshold” there — one of complete disrespect for her primary opponent, and one where she was defining who the DLC (which the Clinton’s control) consider the actual opposition to their political and policy goals in no uncertain terms.

To me it appears that all this desperation and goalpost moving we’ve seen by the Clinton camp despite what looks like a very clear loss is really all about the fact that the Clinton’s/DLC are willing to go any distance and do just about anything in order to remain the Boss of the Democratic Party. They really make no bones about how much they loathe the populist/activist base of our party, and that’s due to the fact that they’re part and parcel of the corporate/military industrial complex wing. Indeed that is the definition of what “New Democrat” has always meant.

Just my take on this.

Btw, a well written article.

Posted by: Veritas Vincit at June 1, 2008 03:27 AM

David,
Well stated. Having had to sleep through one of the finest moments in our political history I am glad to see that at least the Democrats understand that rules matter. However, it amazes me that the Republicans are so in lock-step with their leaders that not even one has spoke out about their vote not counting.

Nevertheless, to avoid this problem in the future and to be fair to all 50 States I do believe that All Political Parties should begin having the Presidential Primaries dates selected by an ever changing lottery the year before.

So, how does a citizen(s)get something like that put on the books?

Posted by: Henry Schlatman at June 1, 2008 05:16 AM

I still love to watch this Dem-on-Dem disenfranchisement.

I agree with the Dem leadership that you have to follow the rules – just as we did in Florida in 2000, with Gore playing the Hillary role and George Bush in the Obama position.

What I think is funny is how the party bosses can just divide people up like that, just enough so that it doesn’t really make a difference.

The historical precedent to this is the 3/5 compromise on counting slave votes. In fact, didn’t they give Hillary 3/5 of the undecided Michigan vote?

Dems have a wonderful sense of history.

Sometimes in the near future there will come a close election where Dems will pull the same crap they tried in Florida and Ohio. We can rest assured that they are just pretending to be outraged, since they obviously have no problem with all sorts of strange counting.

Posted by: Jack at June 1, 2008 10:06 AM

Veritas, thanks for the comments and input.

Henry, the way a citizen gets something like that into the Rules is to become a Democratic Party voter of record, then, submit a Rules change for consideration. If it hasnt’t changed over the years, Democrats can submit rules change proposals at the Precinct and County level. Whether they get passed up to the National Rules Committee for deliberation for consideration is a long shot, but, that is how a precinct level party member would proceed.

I don’t know if the GOP has a similar bottom up procedure.

Posted by: David R. Remer at June 1, 2008 10:42 AM

I cannot help but wonder why so many marvel at the Dem process handling essentially a split vote. If the Reps had left out two states (despite the rules) and the Reps had a race this close there would have be a substantial focus on how the Reps don’t know what they want and the Reps are truly divided … a sign of their weakness and disorganization.

Like Jack I have enjoyed this too.

I wonder when the Dems will hold themselves accountable to the standards they hold everyone else.

For that matter their media too.

Posted by: Edge at June 1, 2008 10:50 AM

Jack, the Rules Committee had no option available to them that would reconcile all differences and please all the people involved. They did strike a compromise solution that adhered to the thrust of each party with a vested interest at the Committee hearing.

What solution would you have derived that would have resolved most of the issues with the nearly all the rules intact, while insuring as best as possible the the unity of the Party, going forward?

Remember, their other options were to NOT seat either state’s delegation, seat one and not the other state, seat both states without punitive measure of anykind. And for apportionment their options were follow the vote which was flawed at the outset in proportions by virtue of so many voters not having turned out given that it would not count anyway, and by virtue of the candidates not having campaigned in those states. Then there was the fact of the strategic withdrawal of Obama’s name in lieu of the fact that Michigan’s vote would not count skewing the actual votes on primary day.

To have given Clinton all the pledged delegates and Obama none would not have been fair, obviously. To have given Obama all the Uncontested vote would have violated the definition of Uncontested votes. Instead, the Committee chose the solution proposed by the Democratic Party of Michigan. That option cost Clinton 4 delegates she would have had if her vote counted and Obama’s didn’t. On the other hand, the solution added significant delegate advantage to Clinton over Obama, 24 more delegates if I recall correctly.

So, what better solution would have offered? Rather odd question to be asking a McCain supporter, but, hey, give it a non-partisan shot, if you can.

Posted by: David R. Remer at June 1, 2008 10:55 AM

Edge, I ask you the same objective question I asked Jack. What procedure would you have recommended that would have BOTH united the Party through compromise and observed all the rules to the letter?

Fact is, such a solution did not exist. They chose amongst the options available to them. But, I am all ears if you have a better solution they didn’t see which would have accomplished both goals.

Posted by: David R. Remer at June 1, 2008 10:58 AM

David,
Thanks, but I guess that leaves me out of the argument. For as you know I am not given up on my personal point of view.

I just want to both sides to get back to debating how “We the People” are going to show the rest of the World how to build a Better World. However, I do believe that both the Democratic and Republican Parties would be better served by letting the Richest State and the Poorest State go first in the Primaries since that is the Debate of the Day.

Posted by: Henry Schlatman at June 1, 2008 11:54 AM

Good for you, Henry. I wouldn’t sacrifice my personal viewpoints for a Political Party either. Doesn’t mean I won’t align with various parties at various times to push my personal viewpoints forward. To think, analyze, and act independently according to one’s own good conscience is vastly superior to adopting mob or group think of a political Party for any length of time, by my way of reckoning.

Loyalty oaths for better or worse are best kept to marital partners and parental bonding to children and vice versa, not individuals and Political Parties.

Posted by: David R. Remer at June 1, 2008 12:08 PM

Henry, as for richest and poorest state, that too is discriminatory to other states. Carl Levin has in my opinion the most rational approach, a rotational system in which all states will eventually have the front loaded primary/caucus spot.

The trick is how to implement it without losing Iowa and New Hampshire in an election year? That’s a question that gives me a belly laugh. Folks ought to take greater care in establishing traditions that will come back to haunt them. :-)

Posted by: David R. Remer at June 1, 2008 12:12 PM

David

I have no trouble with what the Dems did. I am a believer in following the rules set up before the election and recognizing that an election is a practical and a statistical event, not some metaphysical phenomenon. But the Dems don’t believe as I do.

What I am calling attention to is the utter hypocrisy of the Dems. They literally made a Federal case about the votes in Florida in 2000 and still cry about the outcome. (It was decided by the rule of law, but in a more rational procedure, BTW) They also spread disinformation re the voting in Ohio in 2004. Now they are doing exactly the same sort of thing they unjustly accused Republican are doing and on a truly massive scale.

There is no “solution” to this problem. I hope that the Dems will learn from this and not be so childish next time it happens in a national election, but my experience tells me that they will soon forget and go back to blaming Karl Rove for everything.

Edge also makes a great point. Imagine the media outcry if Republicans just couldn’t decide how to resolve a rules issue and then decided to arbitrarily cut some voters in half and distribute the others in a capricious fashion.

Can Democrats spell disenfranchise?

The Democrats have since 2000 been running around with the rhetorical equivalent of a pointy stick and they have finally pocked themselves in the eye with it. There is no good solution. They really screwed it up and now they MUST disenfranchise some voters.

The Dems will have the best nominee elected by the 48 states.

Posted by: Jack at June 1, 2008 12:54 PM

The Democrats were the party of the working man. Now it appears to be the party of the blacks.

Posted by: slokipoki at June 1, 2008 03:49 PM

Jack-
There never was a real recount in Florida; many counties never even fed their ballots back through the machines. You would like to say you won on the votes, but what you really did was to get them to back the original count as certified.

Neither primary was a federal election; the party bosses could have picked the candidate out of a hat, and it would be legal. It was a private matter what contests would be valid, literally not a federal case at all.

The interest of our party was figuring out the intentions of the voters, a situation made difficult by the fact that both candidates and voters figured, at the time, that the contests were just a beauty contest, nonbinding on the rest of the campaign.

This was about seating Florida and Michigan delegates in a way that honored those who voiced their opinion despite being told it wouldn’t count, and those who took another rational course and didn’t vote in the democratic primary because they knew their vote wouldn’t count.

That’s the mess we untangled.

Your mess? Trying to convince people that a hand recount was unnecessary, that you didn’t need to make absolutely sure what voters real intentions were. I see our two parties going in opposite directions. Your position is closer to Clintons, trying to get a previous, flawed count certified to your advantage, instead of making damn sure that the results were right.

And in the end, all this interference meant what? For Bush, it meant coming into his first term under a cloud of illegitimacy that he never fully recovered from, one that undermined his image as a political reconciliator right from the start. He was a virtual lame duck right up until 9/11 gave him the chance to brand himself as a man of action. As a latent undertone in the Bush administration, it made it all the more critical that he prove his legitimacy by his policies and actions, and all the more problematic that his policies ended up so catastrophically wrong.

Meanwhile, for Hillary, it’s only served to put her further and further behind Obama, as Obama maintained a cool, calm, reasonable campaign, and Hillary became increasingly, actively disliked by people for her scorched-earth campaining.

Perhaps it wins sometimes. but on the balance, it only serves to alienate the people whose support you need later. During the last few contests of this time, the time frame of the election was generally shorter. Voter ennui is sort of like radiation: cumulative dose is what gets you. Hillary, by keeping the contest going so long, long after Obama’s obviously put himself in a permanent lead, has effectively nuked much of the support she had from her fellow Democrats. It’s not a good sign when your own supporters don’t like the tone of your campaign.

Posted by: Stephen Daugherty at June 1, 2008 03:53 PM

Florida should have been given full votes. The results would not have been any different if their primary had been on Super Tuesday. The uncommited Michigan votes should have gone to BHO, since he is now the only other candidate, and HRC should have gotten all of her delegates. Simple enough?

BHO is going to have more problems coming up on money, drugs, and sex, more significant than the a preacher and a visiting priest at the Trinity United Church of Comedy.

HRC knows this, and doesn’t want the nomination transferred to some third person when the BHO campaign implodes.

Posted by: ohrealy at June 1, 2008 03:59 PM

David,

Great summary. I was on-line this morning trying to figure out what happened with that decision which I missed yesterday, and found articles at CNN which didn’t answer my questions clearly. I should have just read yours instead.

Posted by: Walker Willingham at June 1, 2008 04:54 PM

I guess the good people of Michigan and Florida should be glad it wasnt’ up to me. I would not have given them any delegates at all, and no option for the state parties to participate until a second ballot. Sorry. The rules were clear. What will happen 2012? Some state parties will make the calculation and determine it is better to go first, with their delegates counting for half, rather than go later.

But one good thing about an extended primary- it gives Obama a change to get his message out, and define the agenda.

Ohrealy,
I doubt there are other revelations coming out, but I have no doubt the Republicans will do everything in their power to manufacture one- it will be something intangible, another example of character assassination. That is what the GOP does. They cannot run on the issues, so negative campaigning will be their only option.

Posted by: phx8 at June 1, 2008 05:01 PM

What needs to happen in 2012 was best stated by Carl Levin yesterday. I also think caucuses should be eliminated, and states that consistently vote Rpblcn should get less representation at the Democratic convention. The super delegates already do that to some extent, MI had more than FL for example, but I would rather have their influence ended, since their votes can actually be bought.

On BHO, nobody has looked closely into a real estate deal prior to the one that we all know about. In this case, BHO “bought” a condo, and somebody else actually made the down payment for him. There is also something missing on the records of his property tax payments, suggesting someone else may have paid those as well.

Posted by: ohrealy at June 1, 2008 05:30 PM

And, with much regret, it appears that I must put my support behind Ralph Nader! Not as a show of rebellion, but rather because he appears to be the only one left in the race that really has it right!

Nader ‘08!

And don’t tell me it can’t be done …………. it can be done!

Posted by: KansasDem at June 1, 2008 07:01 PM

Ohrealy,
After the elections, the Democratic Party will definitely need to revamp the primary system. For now, it is what it is, and it seems likely Hillary will concede within the week. I think she will be the VP.

I doubt Obama has anything substantial in the way of skeletons in his closet. The Clinton organization knows how to play hardball, and I’m sure they looked long and hard to see if there was anything to disqualify Obama.

The Republicans will almost certainly take the low road against Obama, and rely on character assassination, a 2008 version of swiftboating. They’ll attack intangibles. McCain’s campaign keeps talking about Iraq. I’m beginning to think McCain will be an extremely weak candidate.

Posted by: phx8 at June 1, 2008 07:41 PM

David,
Why I do not want to seem discriminatory I was unaware of Carl Levins’ position on the subject. However, I do believe that all primaries should be set up in a manner that allows the Issues facing the Children of America to establish the agenda and not the “Boys in the Back room.”

So, how does 2010 sound for the states to make their dates for the Election of 2012?

Posted by: Henry Schlatman at June 1, 2008 08:20 PM

David, you are right there are no options I could point out that I think would not have been beat to death by the DNC. My solutions are 20/20 hindsight, however, I think are more relavent when you compare a hypothetical Rep situation with the current Dem situation.

(1) Have your act together to begin with if you know you are going into the 08 elections with all the chips, why blow it by not controlling Michigan and Florida? (2) Get the canidates to agree publically and media wise that they support or don’t support MI and FL being out. (maybe they did this and I don’t recal) (3) Describe to America and party members how the Super Delegate system is of value if they always vote the same as popular vote

I’m 20/20 here and glad to see that they are involved. I think phx8 was how I felt months ago, but have come to believe they should have a voice in a national election. Even if muted.

Posted by: Edge at June 1, 2008 09:23 PM

Stephen, what a great attempt at rewriting history…

First, there was a recount done in the counties that Gore asked for recounts in. The vote changed but did not give Gore the win so they asked for a hand recount.

The republicans didn’t want a hand recount of course, the dems would feel the same way on the other side. But, once it was determined that there would be, the attempt to INTERPRET votes, not just recount them, was unconstitutional *AND* what the Democratic committee just admitted they should not be trying to do re: Michigan and Florida. Yet, that was what they wanted to do in Florida in 2000. And it is why they lost the ability to do the recount, because they knew that it didn’t matter if they couldn’t start re-interpreting votes.

And, the fact that we were told that the press and the Dems would not rest until those votes were recounted and proven that they were right, right up until the time it happened and they were proven to have lost in any interpretation that they asked for, and with that fact conveniently tucked away, it makes it interesting that partisan politics just keeps driving people to say that Gore won, by *ANY* measure, in 2000…

Posted by: Rhinehold at June 1, 2008 10:15 PM

Rhinehold-
There were elements to the way the machines work that would produce ambiguous results when they ran the ballots through the machine.

I will not argue that the interests of the Gore Campaign were detached from the results. However, given the incredibly small margin in Florida, no more than five hundred votes, it was reasonable to believe that an examination of the ballots by hand could yield a more definitive answer on that subject, especially considering the problem of hanging chad.

What was the voter’s intent? If somebody punched that thing, then hanging, pregnant or whatever, it should have been counted. It was important to interpret the votes correctly, regardless of whether it was correct the first time, or corrected later on. I believe the DNC had no problem doing this such that the result could be considered legitimate across the board.

The trouble with your connecting these events is that this is a private contest, and it wasn’t the National DNC, much less the RBC that came up with the compromises. The compromises were created by the State Democratic Party, the very people the original penalty was supposed to affect and punish. Nothing was being forced on the State Parties, or the voters in those primaries, except the penalty required by the rules.

The point here was to filter the funny business out. That’s what we did.

Posted by: Stephen Daugherty at June 2, 2008 12:21 AM

Kansas Dem is no longer a Democratic voter?

And, with much regret, it appears that I must put my support behind Ralph Nader! Not as a show of rebellion, but rather because he appears to be the only one left in the race that really has it right!

Nader ‘08!

And don’t tell me it can’t be done …………. it can be done!

No it can’t. You know it, I know it, and so does everyone else reading this blog.

People on the Left will not be willing to compromise their values in November by voting in any way that will give America the third Bush term that McCain is guaranteed to give. Instead, our values will bring us to pull the Democratic lever on behalf of saving the lives of our men and women in uniform, and making sure they’ll get the care they need when they finally, at long last, return home. Just as our values will not allow us to compromise when it comes to this country finally getting affordable healthcare, or protecting the environment, or investing in our infrastructure, or protecting women’s rights, or building diplomacy across the world again. Our values will not allow yet more far right Conservatives to sit on the Supreme Court for lifetime appointments when there are so many elderly judges sitting there now.
Liberals will not spite themselves and ruin their childrens futures simply because their favored Democratic candidate did not manage to win the nomination.

Indeed, Hillary herself has claimed to be in agreement with these sentiments, even as she lessens our chances by threatening to stage a nasty floor fight to try to steal the nomination out from under Obama, the clear winner of the primary.

But, if Hillary actually does steal the nomination at the convention with insider arm-twisting, bribes, blackmail, illogical mathematical formulas where caucuses somehow aren’t allowed to count, or cockamamie reasoning where the loser of the primary has to be more electable because their last name is Clinton, I will still vote Democrat.

That’s right, someone such as I, an “Obamabot” and “Cult Member” according to all the rabidly angry Hillary supporters, will still vote for Hillary, if I must. Despite the fact that I have given all the money I could afford to give, and volunteered a lot of my time in order to help Barack Obama win this primary because he’s the candidate that I honestly felt would make the best president, I will still vote Democrat.

No matter what.

Because I love my country and this planet very much, and I’ll be damned if I will allow my own personal anger and disappointment to relegate all of us to the trash heap with four more years of McBush.

Posted by: Veritas Vincit at June 2, 2008 12:49 AM

What was the voter’s intent? If somebody punched that thing, then hanging, pregnant or whatever, it should have been counted.

Wrong, and why the Dems can’t let go of 2000 or get it right. The law stated that a legal vote had to be completely punched through. To change the rules for those people in those three counties, just so one candidate can get an advantage (which may or may not have been the case) is, and was ruled, unconstitutional. Trying to determine INTENT is a noble motive, but that is why a legal, valid vote is clearly stated as being one thing, changing it, for whatever movtive, is wrong. Instead, change it for the next election, not to hopefully squeeze out vote for THAT election.

The point here was to filter the funny business out. That’s what we did.

No, I don’t think so. You may have come up with a compromise, but the fact that this situation even came up, as well as the nonsense that we are seeing in choosing your candidate, leads me to believe that this is PRECISELY the type of government most people want to avoid. As for it lacking funny business, that’s your opinion. To me, it seems that people are making wild assumptions and trying to codify them into acceptance.

The DMC should have gotten ahead of this long before now. That they waited this long, hoping it would sort itself out or not be consiquential is another example of the government of Democrats.

You can attempt to spin it any way you like, but trust me, it will be used against the Democrats come October, if not before, as a shining example of why people shouldn’t vote for them.

Posted by: Rhinehold at June 2, 2008 12:59 AM

Stephen

keep the Florida myth going if you want, but also recognize that Republicans may, maybe, coulda stopped the counting of some questionable votes votes that maybe coulda but probably not would have changed the outcome.

Democrats have a reasonably accurate count. They just choose to screw the voters of Florida and Michigan.

I understand the process, but please do not pretend that Dems are somehow more interested in counting votes. Dem leaders have clearly shown the opposite.

You know a hand count is no more reliable. We all saw the Dems looking crosseyed at those ballots. Even they couldnt tell.

You are should recall that the places with the biggest problems were CONTROLLED by Dems. Florida was a Democratic screw up in 2000 and it is again in 2008. Maybe Dems should wise up. The Dem bosses really are not the ones allowed to interpret the intent of “the people.”

Democrats for disenfrancisement. I think that should be the new slogan.

BTW - Dems were very enthusiastic about NOT counting military ballots in Florida in 2000. I did not know that much about this, but the military guys I talk to are still pissed at the Dems for this. What do you know about it?

Posted by: Jack at June 2, 2008 02:14 AM

ohrealy:

and states that consistently vote Rpblcn should get less representation at the Democratic convention.

I was sure that this was already true, but went to check it and cannot figure out what formula they are using. Clearly the states that vote more consistently Democratic are apportioned more pledged delegates than similarly sized states that are traditionally Republican, but it also seems that smaller states are apportioned more delegates per capita than larger states by a significant margin.

I calculated the pledged delegates per population and the pledged delegates per 2004 Kerry voters for six states - CA, TX, GA, MA, ID, & RI; and then did the same thing for total delegates.

Rhode Island does much better than Idaho based on population, but not quite as well based on Kerry voters. The same can be said of the Massachussetts - Georgia, and the California - Texas pairs.

It appears that some formula is being used that gives SOME weight to how Democratic a state is, but that’s not the only thing.

Posted by: Walker Willingham at June 2, 2008 02:18 AM

Rhinehold, can you quote the law you refer to? The exact wording of that law, please. Not your lay opinion as to what that law should have said.

Amici briefs submitted at the time indicate the State Law didn’t address hanging chads, and that counties were, and did for many years before the 2000 election, determine their own written procedures for how to count or not count punch card ballots. As long as they were consistent conforming to written procedures, Florida State and federal law had nothing to say specific to whether hanging chads should be counted or not counted.

Palm Beach County Canvassing Board had the written policy established long before the 2000 election and it read:

[A] chad that is partially hanging or partially punched may be counted as a vote, since it is possible to punch through the card and still not totally dislodge the chad. But a chad that is fully attached, bearing only an indentation, should not be counted as a vote. An indentation may result from a voter placing a stylus in the position, but not punching through. Thus, an indentation is not evidence of intent to cast a valid vote.

Whether hanging chads were legitimate for counting was never found to be inconsistent with Florida State law, not even by the Bush campaign before the courts.

So, Rhinehold, when you say the person you replied to was wrong for saying hanging chads should be counted, it is you who are wrong, not they. The hanging chad, in fact, resulted from completely punching the stylus through the paper stock with one or more sides or corners of the chad remaining attached nonetheless. Consistent with Florida law hanging chads SHOULD be counted as voter intent.

Read GW Bush’s argument in Rary v. Guess, in which Bush does “not contend that the Constitution or federal
law speak directly to the issue of dimpled chads. It is important for the Court to recognize, however, that this issue arose in Florida only because of the state supreme court’s decision to extend the deadline for manual recounts.”

It is DIMPLED chads, not hanging chads, that Bush et. al. had a problem with.

Florida’s law spoke to registering voter intent. Bush’s contest was over dimpled chads in the Brief as not representing voter intent, not hanging chads which DO register voter intent.

It’s important to research this stuff before putting your own unsubstantiated spin into pronouncements that others are wrong.

Posted by: David R. Remer at June 2, 2008 02:28 AM

What the Left and Right of Society is failing to see is that more and more citizens are becoming Independent because of actions taking by the Democratic and Republican Leadership.

For in 2000, it was not the Will of We the People or what is in the Inherent Best Interest of America, but which party could screw the other party using the Laws of the Land. So, please keep up the argument of the pot calling the kettle black for if history has shown us anything. It is the fact that All Political Parties lack the Leadership to maintain the Status Quo.

Posted by: Henry Schlatman at June 2, 2008 02:43 AM

Stephen Daugherty, a dented chad with all 4 corners and sides attached does not register voter intent. That was where the recount left the realm of defensible law and entered into voodooing intent.

Hanging Chads were never contested in the courts even by Bush et. al. as to registering voter intent, they do. The contest was over indented but intact chads. Many causes of dents in the punch card stock other than voter intention are possible, and thus, indented chads should never have been proposed as a means of determining intent, especially when Palm Beach County already had written rules prohibiting the counting of dented chads.

Posted by: David R. Remer at June 2, 2008 03:06 AM

David,

I’ll assent that I misspoke about the hanging chad issue, it has been a while, but my point was that once it is written into law what was to be counted as a legal vote and what couldn’t be had to be enforced properly throughout the recount process, not changed after the vote was taken, to attempt to guage intent of the voter beyond the regulations set before the vote was taken.

But I think we agree that even if they were to count hanging chads, they had to do it equally. one table couldn’t be counting 2 corners or less connected while another was counting 3 corners, etc. The same regulations had to be applied equally, not able to be changed during the recount process, as it was in 2000.

Posted by: Rhinehold at June 2, 2008 03:47 AM

David, Rhinehold,

Hence, the need for even the Hierarchy of Society and Your Parents to discover why when all is said and done the need to be Politically Unalienable Correct about building a Better World has to win out in order for the Spirit of the Law to work.

Personally, I think the 2000 Election declared Unconstitutional! So, as far as the Democratic Party finding a Viable Political Solution to a difficult Question of Enlightenment. I hope that the party members will grow up and realize that Certain Principles and Standards are Forever.

Posted by: Henry Schlatman at June 2, 2008 04:15 AM

David et all

If you shuffle them around enough by hand, especially by Dem hand, hangng chads fall off; dimpled chats become hanging chads and some whole new piles of ballot appear out of nowhere.

I had a real concern about cheating on the part of the counters. The more you handle the votes, the more it becomes dishonest.

Posted by: Jack at June 2, 2008 06:55 AM

Jack,
Do you think that is the reason why the Republican Leadership between 2001-2006 failed to develop a better way to vote considering every 10-year-old Child should know how to conduct an election using a simple piece of paper?

In fact, I wonder if this election will see the same problems like the one in 2000 and 2004. For I can see what would happen in November if both political parties screw up again.

No, the argument that every votes count is the reason why the Founding Fathers of America created the political system that they did. And why not perfect, I do believe that the 5th Graders of Society should be given the task of running the election in any state that cannot get the Democratic and Republican Leaders to agree to play by the rules of the game.

Posted by: Henry Schlatman at June 2, 2008 07:42 AM

Well, Jack, that certainly was the GOP claim, despite all televised evidence and overseers evidence to the contrary!!!

Posted by: David R. Remer at June 2, 2008 08:20 AM

Henry, with a national ID system and voting Kiosks at voting places combined with biometrics innovations, it would be possible to create a federal election system that is very straight forward, and which avoids all these problems.

That said, no system that relies on computers can be made tamper proof, but, oversight and validity measures can be implemented to insure that tampering sets off alarms or otherwise takes the appropriate review actions.

The fundamental philosophical and real world problem with voting results is trusting those empowered to oversee the results and relate those to the public. Who can we trust anymore with that awesome responsibility?

Posted by: David R. Remer at June 2, 2008 08:27 AM

David,
Who can we trust anymore with that awesome responsibility? Why I have to say in My Personal opinion that is why the Founding Fathers of America insisted that America stay Red, White, and Blue. I do believe that the Independents should request and volunteer for those positions.

Posted by: Henry Schlatman at June 2, 2008 09:04 AM

I’m certain Clinton is not going to get the VP slot. If you want to know when her camp asked for it and was declined, just look over the past few weeks and note when everyone (except the Clinton camp) was talking about how the tone of the campaign would calm down and become more conciliatory, there was a calm for a few days, then a threat in a speech from Clinton that she would take her case to Denver if Michigan and Florida weren’t seated in full. You can also tell from how desperate her camp is with forwarding the bogus popular vote claim. They are going to pretend they have leverage for as long as they can but in the end, the RBC showed they don’t have what they need to make anything happen. They aren’t going to win anything in the Credentials Committee because the RBC accepted Michigan’s delegate allocation proposal and Michigan is satisfied (for the most part).

Aside from all that, the main reason Clinton will not get the VP slot is because it is the worst tactical choice in the history of VP selection, and as we have seen, the Obama camp doesn’t make such gross tactical errors (like thinking the primary race would be over by Super Tuesday). The main problem with the Clinton VP choice is that it is an unspoken concession that Obama is a weak candidate and requires Clinton in order to lend legitimacy and win. This doesn’t help the ticket, it breaks its kneecaps. The second major problem with this scenario is that it would mean Hillary Clinton is on the ticket. The third major problem is that Hillary is married to Bill.

It doesn’t matter how much of a mess Clinton wants to make of the rest of the process leading to the end of the convention, she’s not going to get the VP slot. *crosses fingers*

Posted by: Joseph Briggs at June 2, 2008 10:49 AM

Also: There were no stolen delegates and the disenfranchised voters argument is special pleading. The 3/5 slave vote comparison is sleazy bullshit only meant as race baiting (“see, you white, hard working blue collar Americans, your votes are worth less than the slaves got”). The Florida 2000 comparison is also humbug for obvious reasons. It’s another baiting tactic by the right and the few remaining Clinton hardliners.

Posted by: Joseph Briggs at June 2, 2008 11:02 AM

KansasDem, I’m starting to head in the same direction, and now am actually looking favorably on the draftnader movement, although there is so much resentment of him in the Green Party. I don’t think he can get far as an independent

Phx8, there is hardball and then there is HARDBALL. HRC couldn’t afford to go after BHO the way the Rpblcns will, and there are tangibles out here. Even WJC had to shut up after the BS that was pulled in SC and later in other places, to get the black vote for BHO. People are underestimating the cynicism of the virgin BHO’s handlers and supporters. It’s more instructive to look at who’s not talking, rather than who’s talking.

Walker, I agree that the system for awarding the delegates to the states seems as arcane as the caucuses. The state super delegate counts don’t make sense either. I gave up a while ago trying to analyze data by caucus, open primaries, semi-open primaries, and closed primaries. We have to get something simpler and more transparent than this system. It’s become something like the old rotten boroughs in England.

Are we still arguing about chads from FL in 2000? They were insignificant. The election was stolen by eliminating thousands of voters in Duval county, and huge abstentee ballot fraud in Seminole and Martin counties, and I still blame Bill McCullom, who was running for the Senate, for that.

Posted by: ohrealy at June 2, 2008 11:58 AM

Joseph,
Obama was not my first choice, and Hillary was not either. But I think the best candidate has won. Obama rose to the top in spite of a primary system skewed towards the a candidate with institutional backing. It’s really pretty amazing that he pulled it off. Anyway, despite what some Democratic partisans might say today in the heat of competition, virtually all of Hillary’s supporters will vote for Obama, and the situation would have been the same had the positions been reversed. In general, the policy positions of Clinton & Obama are similar.

No question, Hillary as VP is a choice fraught with political danger. But there’s no denying a lot of Democrats voted for her. It was a tough competition between her & Obama, but if you think about it, the contest never degenerated into a truly ugly negative campaign. Yes, they fought hard, but when the dust settles, I think most people would agree it was a relatively civil contest.

To put it into perspective, compare the race between Hillary & Obama to the 2000 South Carolina primary between Bush and McCain. Bush stood on the platform next to a speaker at Oral Roberts University who accused McCain of being a Manchurian Candidate, which is an incredibly ugly accusation, one most of us would never let slide, and Bush never said a word. The Bush campaign rather famously spread rumors about a McCain illegitimate child, and so on. That’s what burning bridges looks like.

I think Obama could win the presidency without Hillary. But I think she brings too much to the table to be turned away, even if she also brings some unwelcome baggage…

Posted by: phx8 at June 2, 2008 12:05 PM

Ohrealy,
True enough, the GOP will come down on Obama like a ton of bricks. I just don’t think there will be anything tangible to attack. The GOP will stay true to pattern, and concentrate on attacking intangibles- Obama is a terrorist, Obama hates America, Obama is a Muslim, Obama is unpatriotic, Obama is an Unruly Negro, Obama is an elitist, i.e., uppity ******, and so on. Somewhere between 5 - 10% of Americans will not vote for Obama under any circumstances, simply because he is black. Obama will probably encounter more irrational, frenzied hatred than any candidate in modern history.

But I think Obama is a powerful enough candidate that he can win in a landslide. He will concentrate on issues as well as a message of unity. The GOP will concentrate of character assassination and divisiveness. I’m confident Americans will rise to the occasion, and shun the GOP.

Posted by: phx8 at June 2, 2008 12:20 PM

I don’t know, phx8, I think calling Bill (and Hillary) racists was a pretty big bridge burner… I don’t remember seeing Obama distance himself from that one at all.

Posted by: Rhinehold at June 2, 2008 12:29 PM

phx8, I definitely wasn’t saying this Democratic primary season has been anywhere near as dirty as primary seasons of the past, I just don’t think she brings anything positive to the VP slot. Again, saying a lot of people voted for her is not relevant unless the premise of bringing them up is to say they won’t vote for Obama in the fall, which I believe is false. I subscribe to the “do no harm” approach to VP selection, but most of all, it needs to be Obama’s ticket. The focus of the campaign needs to be Obama and his platform and its contrast with McCain and his. And I just can’t see Clinton on the ticket as anything but a distraction.

And to be clear, I don’t hate Clinton. I’m looking at this from a very pragmatic perspective. I have also argued (on other sites) against Webb/Biden/Hagel as VP for similar reasons (as they apply to a perceived foreign policy weakness).

Posted by: Joseph Briggs at June 2, 2008 12:36 PM

When did Obama call Bill and Hillary racists? You do realize that accusing someone of “playing the race card” is not an accusation of being a racist, right?

Posted by: Joseph Briggs at June 2, 2008 12:38 PM

It wasn’t the Clinton that wounded the beast, it was the caucaus.

The idea was not to punish the Demcrats in Michigan but, to punish the party leaders. Instead, the rules committee and the Obama camp accepted the Michigan party leaders solution and ignored the people.

The money was made available to do both primaries over. Obama refused to participate.

If this does go to the Convention and Obama doesn’t win on the first ballot, he could be in serious trouble.

I believe that a brokered convention is a good thing for the party. I am tired of hearing that the nominee has been chosen in March before the people of many states have an opportunity to be heard.

IMO, the difference between Democrats and Republicans today is that with the Repugs in charge, the corporations will get everything they want and with the Demwwits in charge, the corps will only get 90 percent of what the want. The workers can’t expect different results from portfolioed politicians.

The workers should give the Democratic party to the elitists, Tell them what they can do with their destructive welfare systen, their minimum wage joke and their illegal immigrants, and join the Workers Party.

Posted by: jlw at June 2, 2008 12:46 PM

Rhinehold,
Obama called Bill Clinton a racist? That’s pretty inflammatory. Please cite the quote.

Both campaigns have danced around issues of racism and sexism, but neither candidate has taken a roundhouse swing using those terms.

Joseph,
Well, that’s a well-reasoned take on the VP situation. I agree, the focus needs to be on Obama and the issues and the glaring contrast with McCain, rather than Hillary. I also agree it’s not necessary to go with a Biden type VP candidate. That would be very disappointing.

I don’t hate Hillary either. Like I said, she’s definitely not my first choice, but I would vote for her in a heartbeat over a third term of the Bush presidency with caretaker McCain. But I do think the enormous turnouts she generated in the primaries deserves some careful consideration.

Posted by: phx8 at June 2, 2008 12:53 PM

The idea was not to punish the Demcrats in Michigan but, to punish the party leaders. Instead, the rules committee and the Obama camp accepted the Michigan party leaders solution and ignored the people.

This is just a misunderstanding of the facts and the process. The unrecognized Michigan primary could not provide a fair reflection of voter preference because the people of Michigan were told the election wouldn’t count and only one of the two candidates involved with the RBC challenge was on the ballot. The compromised delegate selection proposal crafted by Michigan tried to find a middle ground between the Clinton proposal and the Obama proposal. The RBC accepted the Michigan proposal. So the people of Michigan, through their elected representatives, were served.

Very simply: in an unsanctioned and unfair election where no campaigning took place, votes cannot be representative of voter preference.

The money was made available to do both primaries over. Obama refused to participate.

This is just a lie.

Posted by: Joseph Briggs at June 2, 2008 01:01 PM

Hillary had more of the popular vote, but only if you believe no one voted for her in Michigan. Obama won fair and sqaure. I would not say the same thing of Bush versus Gore. The outcome there was effected by all of the shenanigans that went on.

I have grown more and more impressed with both our democratic candidates. Obama has shown that he not an empty suit; he’s an inpsiring leader capable of uniting us and bringing real change. Hillary showed more fight and preserverence than I would have thought possible in anyone. She would have made a fantastic president as well.

Posted by: Max at June 2, 2008 01:33 PM

That should be “Hillary had more of the popular vote only if you believe no one voted for Obama in Michigan, which is unrealistic.”

Posted by: Max at June 2, 2008 01:35 PM

Obama called Bill Clinton a racist? That’s pretty inflammatory. Please cite the quote.

Bush called McCain a ‘Manchurian Candidate’? Please cite the quote.

Both campaigns have danced around issues of racism and sexism, but neither candidate has taken a roundhouse swing using those terms.

Yeah, who’s Donna Brazile anyways, right?

I can tell you that Bill was not very happy after being asked on the street by a reporter about his racism, he sure went after Obama on WHYY.

Then, of course, the Obama campaign detailed all of the times that Hillary used ‘the race card’. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/01/12/obama-camps-memo-on-clin_n_81205.html

I suppose if we ignore all of that, then you are correct, there have been no mention of racism at all!

Posted by: Rhinehold at June 2, 2008 01:57 PM

The outcome there was effected by all of the shenanigans that went on.

Except they weren’t. The votes were counted afterwards (they didn’t throw the ballots away) and it was determined that Bush won with every possible scenario except one, that was a full state hand recount that Gore never asked for.

Nevermind all of the military votes that they asked be invalidated because there was no postmark (from overseas), even though there were in the office before the cutoff date. Or that the state was called before the panhandle was done voting, made up mostly of republicans…

No, you are hanging onto a fairy tale (Yes! I said it!) that you keep next to you like a warm blanked when in fact it is made of asbestos… I

Posted by: Rhinehold at June 2, 2008 02:02 PM

You do realize that accusing someone of “playing the race card” is not an accusation of being a racist, right?

It’s not? What is your definition of racism, I wonder?

Posted by: Rhinehold at June 2, 2008 02:07 PM

jlw said: “The idea was not to punish the Demcrats in Michigan but, to punish the party leaders. Instead, the rules committee and the Obama camp accepted the Michigan party leaders solution and ignored the people.”

jlw, in a democracy, that’s precisely how it works, unless you think the Rules Committee could have seated and heard all of the voters of Michigan who wished to attend. Our entire political system is based on elected leaders to speak on our behalf.

Therefore, your statement makes no sense. Either the Mich. State Party leadership DID speak for Michigan voters, or, Michigan voters were damned fools for electing their Party Leaders in the first place who would not represent them. Which is it, jlw? You can’t have it both ways.

Posted by: David R. Remer at June 2, 2008 02:47 PM

phx8 said: “True enough, the GOP will come down on Obama like a ton of bricks.”

Quite right, and expose their lying and deceptions and mean and ugly souls which the majority of Americans have already rejected in the first place. Obama came from nowhere to the nominee by elevating his politics above that of former Dem and Rep dirty tricks. Leave it to loser Republican leadership and supporters to think more of the same will produce a different result than what occurred in 2006.

Einstein called it insanity. I would simply call it lacking anykind of integrity at all. When the GOP on the one hand says they will improve the country and on the other debase the political process in these ways, it becomes pretty obvious to folks they aren’t the folks to be trusted.

Posted by: David R. Remer at June 2, 2008 02:53 PM

Rhinehold,
Rhinehold,
Bush did not use the words “Manchurian Candidate.” This was an accusation thrown at McCain by a nutcase named Ted Sampley, along with a lot of other awful things. But I was wrong, it wasn’t Sampley who stood next to Bush on dais at Bob Jones University during the 2000 primary, it was another Vietnam Veteran; as far as I know, that vet didn’t call McCain a “Manchurian Candidate.”

“There’s no doubt that McCain’s 19 percent victory over Bush in New Hampshire caused a panic rethink strategy in the Bush team. Their response was to drop the “compassionate conservative” that had failed Bush in New Hampshire and wage a nonstop barrage of negative attacks to kill the messenger McCain. Nothing was too low to rule out. The nadir moment occurred February 3rd when a smiling Bush stood in front of television cameras as a fringe Vietnam veteran, Thomas Burch, denounced McCain as a POW who “came home and forgot us.” Governor Bush knows Burch well. The same Thomas Burch had accused President Bush of abandoning veterans during his administration, but alas, all old wounds must have been healed in time to neutralize McCain’s war hero factor. Push polling by Bush activists was standard fare and leaflets distributed by Bush allies described McCain as “pro-abortion” and “the fag candidate” (because McCain was the only Republican presidential candidate to meet with the gay Republican men’s group, Log Cabin Republicans). One particularly offensive missive distributed via the Internet and to the press was from the Christian Fundamentalist Bob Jones University, where Bush had staked his Christian conservative claim one day after the NH Primary. A professor named Richard Hand wrote that McCain “chose to sire children without marriage,” among other hallucinations.”

http://www.commondreams.org/views/022100-106.htm

Despite letters from Senators, Bush refused to apologize:

“Then the five Vietnam veterans in the Senate — Max Cleland, D-Ga., Bob Kerrey, D-Neb., John Kerry, D-Mass., Chuck Robb, D-Va. and Chuck Hagel, R-Neb., four Democrats and a McCain supporter — fired off a letter to Bush calling on him to “publicly disassociate” himself from the “false” allegations.

“We believe it is inappropriate to associate yourself with those who would impugn John McCain’s character and so maliciously distort his record on these critical issues,” the letter said.

Other letters followed, from seven other former POWs who served with McCain, from South Carolina legislators and so on.

Bush refused to do so, however, responding that Burch was “entitled to his opinion.”

http://archive.salon.com/politics2000/feature/2000/02/11/veterans/index.html

THAT is political hardball. Nothing in the Democratic campaign comes anywhere near it.

Posted by: phx8 at June 2, 2008 02:57 PM

The hysterics demonstrated by supporters of all three campaigns speaks volumes about American voters and society and almost nothing about the candidates themselves.

The founding fathers were acutely aware of the mob hysterics phenomena which is why they designed a democratic REPUBLIC instead of a direct democracy. The Party Leadership is supposed to be able to rise above the hysterics and lead by rational and cool headed reason on a path to meet expected ends. I think the Rules Committed and Democratic Party leadership have acted in just that manner.

The majority of Democrats will back a Democratic candidate. The majority of Independent voters will too. The only alternative is another 4 years of being McBushed, and that just isn’t a viable option for the majority of Americans.

So 5% or so of Clinton hysterical supporters will vote for McCain or stay home. In this election year, it will only mean that Obama beats McCain in the popular vote by 5 or 10% instead of 10 or 15%. Same outcome.

And in 4 years, even if Obama proves to be another Abraham Lincoln, the Clinton hysterics will trounce his presidency and promote Hillary again in 2012. There is always going to be subset of the population that is moved by variables unrepresentative of the majority. That is true for conservatives (Constitution Party) and Liberals (The Socialist Party). They won’t go away because this is a politically free country where people can choose what moves them and act accordingly.

That is a net positive no matter how you slice it. The more active and motivated American voters are, the messier and more rough and tumble its politics becomes. That too is a net positive. The alternative is authoritarian order required by punishment. That is no alternative at all for America.

With the problems America now faces, the Congress is the greater concern and impediment to a better future, regardless of who is elected president. Folks ought to be investing in a new Congress at least as much as they are invested in a new President.

But, American politics is, for about half of Americans voting, a popularity contest based on instinct, appearance, gender, race, religion, and style. Not a deliberative and rational process at all. Still amazes me that our government functions as well as it does, and it isn’t functioning well at all, considering the voters.

Posted by: David R. Remer at June 2, 2008 03:11 PM

phx8,

I didn’t deny that Bush did that, my point was it is no different than what Obama’s campaign has done to Hillary. When did Obama say anything about the memo put out by his own campaign? Or the words of Donna Brazile?

Same game, different name.

Posted by: Rhinehold at June 2, 2008 03:15 PM

The race card was played discreetly but directly by BHO, using buzzwords from Malcolm X, “Don’t be hoodwinked! Don’t be bamboozled!”, that would not be recognized as such by most people, basically a pretty cynical move. James Clyburn, Jesse Jackson Jr, Daily Kos, and Keith Olberman also helped spread lies with completely fabricated attacks on both Clintons, as seen so often here by those who apparently are schareholders in the BHO campaign. They should have used the money to buy Altria stock instead.

Posted by: ohrealy at June 2, 2008 05:23 PM

You do realize that accusing someone of “playing the race card” is not an accusation of being a racist, right?

It’s not? What is your definition of racism, I wonder?

“Playing the race card” is used to describe an act or statement, usually to call it out as specious, disingenuous, divisive and distracting from a more pressing issue. It speaks to a specific event.

Calling someone a racist is speaking to something essential about that someone. It doesn’t regard any specific event but is instead an indictment of character.

Posted by: Joseph Briggs at June 2, 2008 05:41 PM

Anytime, any politician speaks of race, someone is going to charge it is playing the race card. Sorry, folks, but, race and gender ARE large factors in this election year because a Black Man and Woman and White Guy are running for President.

GOPUSA has an email out full of Black faces associated with Barack Obama like Louis Farakhan whom Obama has denounced, like Pastor Wright whom Obama has separated from in the clearest of ways, and Rev. Al Sharpton who is one of Americas more shrewd and well known civil rights activists.

Seems GOPUSA believes the way to beat Obama is to simply put his Black face up with a host of other Black faces. Hillary nor Obama are responsible for the actions of their supporters. That logic leads to condemning our soldiers for carrying out the wishes of Bush in Iraq by direct association and implementation.

Give it a break folks. Race and gender are huge factors. Millions of women are supporting Hillary BECAUSE she is a woman. Millions of Black Americans are supporting Obama because he is a Black person. And millions of Republicans are supporting John McCain because he is the ONLY white man in the race, no matter how much like Bush he is in carrying out Bush policies which they now reject in the millions.

Look at your own comments here, and ask, aren’t my comments proof that race and gender matter? If so, then perhaps YOU are part of the problem instead of the solution toward electing individuals based on their vision, policy proposals, and the content of their characters.

White folks supporting Obama prove that race doesn’t have to matter. Men of any color supporting Hillary prove that gender doesn’t have to matter. And those supporting McCain prove that common sense doesn’t matter at all :-)

Posted by: David R. Remer at June 2, 2008 06:11 PM

On Michigan, didn’t 3 or 4 times as many people vote in the primary that wasn’t going to count, as voted in their primary in 2004?

On the VP spot, they should pick someone who capitalizes on McCain’s weak spots. HRC should go back to the Senate and forget about campaigning for BHO. So far, I can see BHO winning the electoral votes of DC, HI, CT, and IL.

On 2000, when it became clear that the vote in FL was close, more military absentee ballots came in after election day than before it.

Posted by: ohrealy at June 2, 2008 06:46 PM

like Louis Farakhan whom Obama has denounced

As he should

like Pastor Wright whom Obama has separated from in the clearest of ways

Finally, once it was politically expedient

and Rev. Al Sharpton who is one of Americas more shrewd and well known civil rights activists.

Who also has a habit of blaming white people first and asking questions later, ie Tawana Brawley

The ad focuses on race, and it shouldn’t. But there are questions that should be raised and no raising them for fear of being labelled racist is not appropriate.

Hillary nor Obama are responsible for the actions of their supporters

Wasn’t Bush responsible, according to everyone on the left, for the Swift Boat guys even though he had nothing to do with it and denounced it (along with all 527 ads) early on?

Wasn’t it Obama’s campaign who put out the memo? Isn’t he responsible for those people working under him? Why does he get a free pass when no one else would?

Oh yeah, I’d almost forgot, you’re an Obama supporter…

Posted by: Rhinehold at June 2, 2008 06:48 PM

David R.: What you say is true. The majority of Democrats are registered Democrats. They are not PARTY members. They don’t participate in the PARTY’S activites. They don’t choose the PARTY leaders. Therefor, they are taken for granted by the PARTY and doused with political propaganda and promises when the PARTY wants their vote. As a result, the PARTY does what is best for the PARTY’S members and claims that is what is best for the voters. Unfortunately the Democratic voters have a way of often disappointing the PARTY members in the voting booth.

I don’t want anyone to get the impression that I am against Obama because I am for Clinton. If she were somehow able to get the nomination I would not vote for her. I will say a few words in her defence though. The obamaites want to blame her for Iraq because she voted for the war resolution. If I were to guess how Obama would have voted, my guess would be that he would have voted present. Obama had the luxury of being elected after the majority was turning against the war and starting to realize that they had been suckered by Bush and Cheney. They are also trying to convince the voters that NAFTA was Bill Clintons fault and Hillary’s by association. It was a Democratic Congress, composed primarily of liberals that passed NAFTA and sent it to Clinton. It was the Democrats that got the ball rolling on the exportation of blue collar middle class jobs. It was the Democrats especially the liberals that have encouraged the mass immigration of illegal workers and the liberals that are still championing them while they turn a blind eye to the damage the it is causing.

I consider George Bush, Dick Cheney, and their corporate allies trators against our people and our country.

I consider the Democratic PARTY traitors to the bluecollar middle class. It is as if the liberal college educated have bought into the idea that the aristocracy should be the upper class, the profesionals should be the middle class and the workers should be relegated to the lower class.

My advise to the workers is to either unite and form your own party (something that is hard to do in capitalist propaganda land where divide and conquer is the name of the game played by the liberals and conservatives) Or put your work boots on, grab a beer and go crash the PARTY. Quite waiting for the professional class to start handing out copy’s of Common Sense. They are not going to do it this time, they are invested.

Posted by: jlw at June 2, 2008 08:28 PM

David,
Why the Democratic and Republican Leadership insist on protecting a Humans’ Unalienable Right to be Ignorant of the Law and act a Fool is a question that I cannot answer. However, why the Left and Right of Society have those citizens who believe that hate and racism is the way to power. I do believe that many will be shocked to find the generational challenge facing the Democratic and Republican Civil, Political, and Religious Leaders of the 21st Century.

Posted by: Henry Schlatman at June 2, 2008 09:21 PM

Rhinehold-
I will concede what the law says, but I will maintain the point that the hanging chads were an important reason why a hand recount was necessary.

By any chance, do you know how many complete hand recounts there were? None. The Supreme Court decisions cut it short. The Bush campaign sought that cut off, made the machine revote the standard. Because of this, a deep ambiguity was introduced into the vote.

We came up with a compromise that did as much justice to the voters as it could. We recognized that a significant percentage, five percent, tried to write Obama in, and that most of those voting uncommitted were voting either for Obama or Edwards. Without a new election,the balance had to be struck according to the best guess of what Michigan voters would have done had Edwards or Obama been a viable option on the ballot.

The primary was a farce. A compromise was needed because many people would be up in arms if an election with only one major candidate on the ballot, one that wasn’t supposed to count, was suddenly made the sole standard by which delegates were apportioned. Is it perfect? No. But we needed good and doable rather than perfect and not going to happen.

Moving on to your Huffington Post argument, you’re not telling the rest of us this very important fact: Obama didn’t release that memo. The card was not played, it was kept in the deck.

Meanwhile, others played the scary black preacher videos and distributed e-mails claiming Obama is a secret Muslim. I think it matters whether you use such tactics, more than whether you come up with.

Jack-
Florida 2000: Republican governor (Jeb Bush, as a matter of fact) Republican Secretary of State (Katherine Harris) Majority Conservative Supreme Court.

Florida 2007-2008: Republican Governor (Charlie Crist, potential running mate of McCain), Republican majority in the Florida Legislature.

I think that makes it YOUR responsibility.

The imposition of the penalty was reasonable, and no mistake. The totality of the penalty, I think, was the problem. I would hope we’re a bit more restrained next time, as our rules permit for us. I won’t insult your intelligence by saying we don’t make mistakes, but I think your conception of what happened was a combination of wishful thinking and the wish to justify your tactics in that election.

Let me tell you why you are wrong to do so. First, on a purely rhetorical level, you cannot have it both ways. Either you believe you purposefully disenfranchised Floridians to win the election, and have no problem with Democrats doing the same (as you erroneously assume), or you don’t buy that, and you’re just pitching the cow chips our way to make us flinch and duck.

Let me start pitching a few back. First and foremost, nobody was disenfranchised. Nobody was prevented from voting, nobody had their ballots left uncounted, or un-recounted. The election just didn’t meaning anything, and people were told that ahead of time. You didn’t have Democratic activists trying to intimidate the vote counters by staging a window rattling pseudo-riot. You didn’t have someone like John Bolton walking into the middle of a recount station and declaring it over. Why were the Republicans engaged in this behavior, if they had no fear that the vote might not come out in their favor?

Now, there might have been some dispute about the legitimacy of certain military votes by Democrats, but the Republicans were challenging and frustrating the counting of just about everybody’s votes in Florida. We may have inadvertantly offended some in the military (I think they’re more angry at you, nowadays) But you offended half the people in Florida and the rest of the country by demonstrating your sheer contempt for the Democratic process. That’s why your candidate has never really had much of a benefit of doubt to be given: his legitimacy was always in question, his leadership probationally tolerated at best.

Michigan and Florida will now be counted, Michigan delegates apportioned in a compromise that accounts for the evidence that most uncommitted and write-ins were votes for Obama, or those who endorsed him later. They will both be halved, but since your people did the same, it’s a poor talking point for your side.

ohrealy-
Biased media, is it? The truth is, a lot of mistakes were made, not the least of which was going profoundly negative and divisive in a year where people were looking for a remedy to Bush politics, and a united party to take advantage of the Republican’s political problems.

Another big mistake was not being up to speed on the varied primary system. They were too concentrated on winning by just triumphing the traditional way, by using Super Tuesday and the big mainline Democratic states as a means to secure the nomination early. Obama’s campaign was more long term, better planned at the local level.

As for Electoral votes? Reports I’ve seen have Obama winning. You assume wrongly: Polling in states he lost indicate that he can win them against McCain. That’s what matters. People will accept him as the Democratic Candidate. He’s a lot stronger, a lot more assertive, and talking a lot more common sense than McCain is. He’s not the charisma challenged establishment candidate we’ve seen fielded the last two elections.

jlw-
Ignored the people? One part of the compromise was based on what people told exit pollers their preferred choice was. The people were part of the calculation. Obama is in a statistical dead heat now with McCain in Michigan, and this with the campaign’s bruising competition not yet finish. As a confirmed nominee, he’ll gain an immediate bump in his polling, which should get his numbers much higher across the board.

In terms of the abortive attempt at a primary, that was the responsibility of the legislature. They couldn’t agree on a plan, and it was not within Obama’s power to force that agreement on them.

The likelihood is that this will not go to the convention. Folks won’t allow it to. A brokered convention should only be necessary if nobody reaches the required votes. Obama looks likely to hit the mark, without a bargain necessary, by tomorrow’s election and reported flood of delegates alone. He will get the necessary number, and if you guys keep pushing the maximum delegate number as the standard, folks will probably build that up just to shut things down.

As for what people expect? Good God, man, that’s the rhetoric that got us in trouble in the first place. There is a difference, if not in actual behavior, then in potential, potential that 9/11 gave this president the clout to fulfill. Obama will come into this with more raw strength than any other Democratic candidate in a long time, even Clinton.

Third parties long aped that propaganda about how one party was no better than the other. That proved false. Even if it is only marginally better, the Democrats have been better. What you saw in those meetings on Saturday was the final obsolescence of the DLC, because both compromises were brokered by Obama. He’s essentially the party leader now, rather than the Clintons.

Posted by: Stephen Daugherty at June 2, 2008 11:39 PM

Stephen,

First, the votes WERE counted, after the election, and it was discovered that had the recount gone ahead the outcome would have been what it is today. Nothing was stolen, Gore was never the winner of the election. Please move beyond this simple fact…

Second, you should take a look at http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/issues2/articles/mccain_trusted_more_than_obama_on_economy_iraq_national_security.

It is a very good detailed examination of the race as it stands now and I have to tell you that it is not going to be a landslide for either candidate. In fact, it will most likely be the most divisive in recent memory. And with us being told every year that ‘this is the most important election in history’ the emotions will be ramped up even more by both sides in order to persuade those undecided voters by pitting fear and emotion into the mix at such a frenzy it would rival a pirahna attack…

Have pleasant dreams, but don’t count your chickens before they come home to roost, ok?

Posted by: Rhinehold at June 3, 2008 12:37 AM

Rhinehold,
McCain has enjoyed a free pass for the past weeks as Hillary and Obama go at it. I think he’s shaping up to be a very weak candidate. He wants to keep talking about Iraq and Iran and his national security credentials, but he keeps committing gaffe after gaffe. It’s ok for now, because no one is paying attention to him, but that kind of sloppy performance won’t fly in the coming months. McCain needs to get his act together if he wants to be competitive, and so far, he’s doing poorly.

I predict Hillary will concede tomorrow night, and she will be Obama’s nominee.

I also think the Democrats are running a superb campaign. Reid and Pelosi will use Congress to push legislation which promotes Obama and embarrasses McCain. Corruption probes will mysteriously find new life as Waxman and Conyers start hammering away. Congressional contempt citations will be enforced.

There are some extremely sharp people putting this thing together. Rhinehold, you know my predicitons are usually pretty good.

Landslide.

Posted by: phx8 at June 3, 2008 12:54 AM

phx8,

If they do what you suggest, Obama will lose. How can a candidate call for Change when the party he represents are doing the very things that people want changed? Why can’t they do the business of representing us instead of using their position to further their own political power? People are tired of it, something I thought you would have noticed when the trial balloon attack on McCain backfired earlier this year…

Take it for what it is worth, its obvious you are basking in your perceived landside victory already.

Posted by: Rhinehold at June 3, 2008 01:03 AM

Rhinehold,
My representative and one of my senators, Wyden, do a very fine job of representing me. The Portland metro area has done a wonderful job of investing in infrastructure for public transportation, rather than freeways and other policies which encourage urban sprawl. We’re seeing far fewer foreclosure in real estate. Oregon is blue and getting bluer. That is what change is all about: thinking ahead, working together, and creating a wonderful place to live and raise a family.

And yeah, I’m pretty confident about the landslide, Rhinehold. I’m pretty sure you underestimate Obama. Meanwhile, McCain keeps messing up, and it’s going to become harder and harder to ignore. I really think he should stop campaigning, and just hold BBQ’s at one of his houses, maybe the one in Sedonia. He’d do much better if he kept his campaign more informal and non-traditional. Let the world come to him, and avoid on-the-record gaffes. But no. McCain is letting himself be the caboose on the train of the conservative Republican train wreck.

Posted by: phx8 at June 3, 2008 01:22 AM

phx8, the story is breaking that Phil Gramm, his advisor, is now tied to lobbying for banks doing business with terrorists. Not dissimilar from Bush’s strong ties to the House of Saud responsible in part for the fleecing of American oil and gas consumers today.

If McCain wants to hold Obama accountable for his pastor’s actions, then McCain is going to have to be held to account for his advisor’s actions and relations with our foreign and consumer adversaries for profit.

Posted by: David R. Remer at June 3, 2008 06:10 AM

Henry, I agree, there is a generational backlash coming in the political life of America, similar in some respects to what we witnessed in the 1960’s. But, only in some respects. Very different in many others. Obama’s meteoric rise in politics is a product of that backlash, and a welcome one, I might add.

Posted by: David R. Remer at June 3, 2008 06:13 AM

David,
As a Child of the 70’s who has been able to stand up to the Elders and Powers-that-Be of the 70’s I wish that I could be blunt. However,seeing that My Peers and the Children of the 21st Century have asked their Presidential Candidates for Political and Societal Change. Tomorrow I will do my part as an American Layman Citizen to help the Democratic and republican Civil, Political, and Religious Leaders discover the political tools needed to bring the Powers-that-Be into the 21st Century Mindset.

Posted by: Henry Schlatman at June 3, 2008 06:58 AM

Landslide.

I tend to agree. I was looking at the Rasmussen state by state polling a week or so ago and it had McCain winning the electoral college by a fair margin over Obama. But here’s the thing: 21 states were competitive, of them, 15 were Republican. Of the 15 soft R states, 13 of them were within 6% over Obama. They included New Jersey, Michigan, Ohio, Indiana, and Florida (Obama has since overtaken McCain in a couple of these already). Even Texas (worth 34 electoral votes) was within 5%.

When you consider that and the organizational advantage that Obama has over McCain, I can’t help but think this is going to go very well for the Democrats come November.

Posted by: Joseph Briggs at June 3, 2008 07:56 AM

Joseph,

Interesting, because the latest news on Rasmussen were the states no longer in the Democratic safe column, and I don’t recall seeing any polling data that had either candidate winning 270 electoral votes and the Dems have always had the electoral college lead on Rasmussen… Not sure what I was missing.

As for Indiana, that would be a feat…

Posted by: Rhinehold at June 3, 2008 09:00 AM

BTW, Joseph, McCain is still more trusted on the Economy, Iraq, Foreign Policy, National Security and Taxes. This when the Republicans are viewed very negatively. The *ONLY* option, which is already being tried, is to tie McCain to Bush, which isn’t going to work knowing the number of democrats in the past who have lamented having to suffer Bush when they would rather have McCain in office. People know bull when they see it and the Dems are hurling a lot of it around right now.

Then, they just have to view what was done to the Democrat’s hero of the 90s, Bill Clinton, in recent months to see what kind of ‘nice clean above board’ campaign that Obama runs. Bill said just yesterday what the Republicans have been saying for months, that the media is handing Obama the race, are attacking anyone who gets in his way with lies and allowing Obama to get away with having ‘other people’ do his dirty work for him.

Perhaps Hillary and Bill will become Republicans when this is all over? Anyone thinking that Hillary is going to be the VP is delusional…

Posted by: Rhinehold at June 3, 2008 11:20 AM

Rhinehold, what’s bull is your quoting Bill Clinton as if you ever trusted his word before. Expedience holds no boundaries for your comments does it?

Tying McCain to Bush is about as difficult as zipping as zipper. His tax policy, Iraq policy, ignorance of economics, and I do mean ignoring an education in it, his duplicitous nature of condemning lobbyists and special interests while retaining these very same as his campaign staff and advisors, make tying him to Bush a zipped up deal.

The reason Republicans did not want to face Obama is because Obama’s political record leaves little meat to hook into. McCain’s political record presents a target as nearly as wide as this nation with associations and ties to a number of people rejected by the American people, the legal system, and ethicists.

Phil Gramm represented banks who dealt with terrorist organizations? Oh, My. Same Phil Gramm who has been advising McCain on economics. That’s a story that will play well in October and November. And is reminiscent of the close ties between Bush and the Saudis, also a sponsor state for terrorism.

Sorry, but these McBush siamese twins are inseparable at so, so many levels. A fresh graduate from PR school would be able to take McBush down in November. And no doubt will.

I see MoveOn.org has countered the GOPUSA race ad with one of their own full of photos of the siamese twins and their shared policies. Someone recently said a Democratic refrigerator could beat John McCain in 2008. I suspect that was about as accurate a statement as has been made in political circles this year.

Posted by: David R. Remer at June 3, 2008 12:20 PM

Rhinehold,
A neighbor of mine saw Bill Clinton speak recently. She said he was awesome. Candidates don’t get vetted much more than the Clintons, and although some people still have the knives out for Bill and Hillary, both still bring a lot to the table. They are competent, politically savvy, and very good at organizing.

I’m not too concerned about polls, since the Democratic race is only now being resolved. It wasn’t that long ago conservatives were swearing they would never support their nominee, McCain.
The Democrats will have to go through a healing period too. And suggest I’m “delusional” if you’d like, but I’m expecting a choreographed announcement and emotion-evoking reconciliation between Obama and his VP select, Hillary.

Here’s a pretty good site for tracking electoral votes going into November:

http://www.electoral-vote.com/

Joseph,
McCain is scrambling to put space between himself and all those lobbyists before the public’s attention focuses upon him. He’s also making some feeble efforts to differentiate himself from Bush. It’s kind of pointless, and it’s easy to see no one believes it. No one is willing to invest much energy in promoting the differences. There are so few points of disagreement: health care, tax cuts, dismantling social security, Iraq, Iran, and so on; Bush and McCain share nearly identical agendas.

McCain claims to differ from Bush on the environment and Global Warming, but McCain has not voted on one piece of environmental legislation during the past year. Nice.

Posted by: phx8 at June 3, 2008 12:48 PM

Rhinehold, what’s bull is your quoting Bill Clinton as if you ever trusted his word before. Expedience holds no boundaries for your comments does it?

Wow, talk about rational. I will repeat what I’ve always said about Bill Clinton. I think he was an effective president when the congress was Republican because he couldn’t drive through the worst of his policies, he did some good things, and some bad. I backed him on doing something about Iraq in the last 90s, though I don’t think he went far enough to resovle the issue and left it up to his successor. He failed in Somolia and succeeded in Kosovo and Bosnia.

He wasn’t the best president, he wasn’t the worst. He failed when he committed perjury and was properly impeached for it. He oversaw the HORRIBLE Digital Millinium Copyright Act but for the most part took a hands off strategy during the .com boom that allowed him to decrease the deficit, though by the time he was leaving office we were in a recession and his deficit reduction was never fully realized, mainly because the .com bubble burst on him.

Having said all of that, what does it have to do with anything? My point, which you obviously missed, was that the Democratic Party is now eating its own in order to advance the cult of Obama, something that will most likely come back to bite them. They do this every primary cycle, as I’ve noted before, go after the more liberal candidate and the end up advancing them during the general to a displeased citizenry. Kerry had a lot more unity and wrapped up the nomination much easier and cleaner than Obama and was beaten in the general election because he was probably the worst candidate that the Democrats could come up with at the time. I don’t see Obama being any different in that respect. Does that make me happy? Well, considering that I do not support either Obama or McCain, it doesn’t really make me anything. I am only observing and pointing out the folly of those, like yourself, that have already coronated someone who most likely will be in a very tough fight over the next few months, the outcome is far from clear and the call of a LANDSLIDE is ridiculous on its face.

His tax policy, Iraq policy, ignorance of economics, and I do mean ignoring an education in it, his duplicitous nature of condemning lobbyists and special interests while retaining these very same as his campaign staff and advisors, make tying him to Bush a zipped up deal.

First, he is seen more positively on taxes, Iraq and the Economy than Obama, as I have pointed out. If he is that bad on those areas, what does that say about the citizen’s view of Obama in these areas?

Second, he is following the Obama paradigm, isn’t he? Say one thing to get elected but violate that when expediency comes to bear? Isn’t what Obama has done repeatedly in his struggle with Hillary? How can he claim to be the candidate of principle when he is willing to violate it when necessary and then condemn his opponent for the same thing? Or, more to the point, get his attack dogs to do it for him? Perhaps Donna Brazile will be called out to call McCain a racist as she did against the first black president?

McCain is not seen by the public as Bush. The Democrats can continue to run against Bush all they want, but according to the polling data, that will be a mistake. “It is interesting to note that while McCain has the edge over Obama on these issues, Democrats are trusted more than Republicans on a generic basis. This ability of McCain to outperform the party label helps explain why he is competitive with the Democrats.”

You can say all you want about how easy it will be to beat McCain in November, but there were people saying nearly the exact same thing in June 2004…

Posted by: Rhinehold at June 3, 2008 01:01 PM

S.D., “Polling in states he lost indicate that he can win them against McCain.”

Because people being polled are telling the truth? Like in 2004 when the exit polls contradicted the results in so many states? Do you have a list of the exact questions they were asked? Do you have a calendar?

The unfortunate truth is that JMcC is a good candidate, likely to win votes from people that won’t vote for BHO. An upturn in the economy before November could kill BHO’s candidacy.

phx8, why not be pdx8? I keep thinking you’re from AZ, where Sedonia is spelled Sedona.

Posted by: ohrealy at June 3, 2008 04:15 PM

Rhinehold,
Landslide. Why would you say that’s “ridiculous”? This election was the Democrat’s to lose right from the start. Landslide is conventional wisdom, if anything, and looking stronger as the 2008 campaign progresses. You’re welcome to go out on a limb and predict a close contest, of course…

Why would McCain be “seen more positively on taxes, Iraq and the Economy than Obama”? McCain’s economic platform has no original ideas. It is quite literally more of the same as we’ve seen under Bush. That’s not just partisan rhetoric. That’s the plan. That’s the Republican platform. It’s no secret. Almost 70% of Americans hold opinions directly contrary to McCain on Iraq, and consistent with the position of Obama on Iraq. Almost 80% of Americans feel the country is going in the wrong direction. And every sign is that we’re going to keep going in the same direction right up to November, and it will probably get worse, not better.

Posted by: phx8 at June 3, 2008 04:24 PM

Ohrealy,
I started using ‘phx8’ when I lived in Phoenix, but it’s been 11 years since I left. Guess my mispelling of Sedona is a giveaway! And ‘pdx8’ makes more sense, I guess, but… I dunno. By fall I will be trying to publish the science fiction book I’ve been working on for a long time, starting with a submission to Asimov’s, so the ‘phx8’ moniker might go into retirement as I try to market the book…

Posted by: phx8 at June 3, 2008 04:40 PM

Rhinehold, I used their state by state chart and added up the poll wins myself. It was almost two weeks ago now and I haven’t really tracked how it has changed. I mostly wanted to know what the landscape looks like.

And yeah, Indiana may not happen, same with Texas, but the point is to make McCain spend money and time there.

I did see that “more trusted” poll on Rasmussen recently, too, but it’s still June. Just before I saw the “more trusted” poll, I was, in fact, griping to myself that Obama needed to start hammering McCain on the economy like he has been on foreign policy.

Posted by: Joseph Briggs at June 3, 2008 05:53 PM

Anyone thinking that Hillary is going to be the VP is delusional…

She just said she is open to it, but I’m on your side in this one (though I wouldn’t call anyone delusional for thinking it, I agree with phx8 that there’s definitely reason to think it worthwhile, I just think it would ruin the ticket).

Posted by: Joseph Briggs at June 3, 2008 06:02 PM

Rhinehold said: “was that the Democratic Party is now eating its own in order to advance the cult of Obama, “

that’s how you see competition in the political realm within the same Party? WoW! And I thought competition was an admired thing by Libertarians. There is absolutely no question that the Democratic Party will mend its rifts, nearly entirely before election day in Nov. Hillary’s reputation can’t afford for that not to happen, if she did harbor fantasies of scorching the Party to lay the ground for a 2012 run. That said, if I were Obama, I couldn’t trust her as VP. But, that I think Hillary already knows.

One cannot ignore the wilderness Democrat supporters have been in since 1994, and that will trump any bitterness and disappointments created by the competition between Obama and Clinton. The disappointments and bitterness toward Republicans is far greater.

You said: “First, he is seen more positively on taxes,”

Not by the working Middle Class he isn’t, especially the Democratic Middle Class and a large number of the Independents who have seen inflation eat whatever tax breaks they got under Bush. Hate to tell you but, the majority of the electorate is definitely going to shy away from McCain on taxes given his propensity to favor the wealthy and corporate. McCain favors the national sales tax which of course relieves the corporations of taxation entirely and places the greatest burden for total tax revenues on the working classes.

Just ain’t going to wash, Rhinehold with the Middle Class, Democratic (who outnumber Republicans now in registered voters by a substantial margin) and Independents.

You said: “McCain is not seen by the public as Bush.”

Technically correct, the whole of the public doesn’t. But a very large minority do, and a majority will, by the time November roles around. Unless of course, McCain out flip-flops Kerry, which he has already begun to work on.

A large portion of the public hasn’t yet gotten to know Obama’s positions on the Economy and taxes, especially Clinton supporters. But they will, and compared to McCain’s, there will be no contest.

On Iraq, there already is no contest. Phx8 has that one dead on. Perpetual military occupation of Iraq for any reason will strengthen the enemies of the U.S. and their recruitments. America voters have finally awakened to this simple fact of life about Iraq based on the history of our occupation to date. CIA agrees. NIE agrees. McCain is simply on the wrong side of Iraq, and that will become ever more abundantly clear as the face off begins.

You said: “Second, he is following the Obama paradigm, isn’t he? Say one thing to get elected but violate that when expediency comes to bear?”

I haven’t a clue to what you are referring. Unless you are superimposing what Obama supporters have said and done, for what Obama has said and done. Obama lived up to his pledge for an above board clean campaign for his part. Critiquing one’s opponent on issues or responding to the opponent’s dirty politics in a campaign is anything but dirty politics. That is fair game for all but the supporters of the opponent of course.

You said: “Or, more to the point, get his attack dogs to do it for him?”

There you go, acting like a Republican promoting guilt by association. These Pastor Wright tactics are being adopted by Libertarians such as yourself now are they? The 527’s will do what they do best with, or without, a candidate’s bidding. Obama has absolutely no control over them anymore than McCain has over the GOPUSA.

Relying on current primary period polling are you? Even though history teaches it is relatively meaningless in foretelling the actual presidential campaign outcome after the primary season ends? Mistake, big mistake. The poll that matters and hasn’t changed except to get worse for Republicans, is the one indicating the majority of Americans no longer trust Republicans with governance, and the majority now does believe Democrats will do a better job. Since 2006 that divide has just grown wider.

And there won’t be any economic reversal between now and November. The stock markets are likely to improve somewhat, but the economic situation won’t be improving in employment, inflation, wages, and personal debt anytime this year. Bernanke was dead on right about that this morning. And consumers can now add increasing interest rates as Bernanke indicated the cuts are over, inflation and stagflation are the targets now.

Posted by: David R. Remer at June 3, 2008 06:09 PM

phx8, good luck on the book, but you’re really tempting fate with the “landslide” prediction. BHO is lucky, and the handicapper’s choice, but the outcome depends on the economy, which is not that predictable.

On HRC for the VP spot, I wouldn’t want her to take it, or BHO to offer it. His supporters are already blaming her for losing the November election, 5 months from now.

Posted by: ohrealy at June 3, 2008 08:50 PM

Holy cow, Obama gave an AMAZING speech tonight. Hillary refused to suspend her campaign, which is understandable, since it gives her unspoken leverage over the VP selection.

Meanwhile, McCain made the enormous blunder of giving a speech tonight too, on the same night as Obama. That is NOT a comparison any Republican would want to see: McCain in front of a small crowd talking and looking old, versus Obama in front of 20,000 excited supporters, giving the kind of inspirational speech most of us have not seen in decades.

Posted by: phx8 at June 3, 2008 11:15 PM

phx8, it was rather amazing, wasn’t it? Old ways versus new ways, failed ways versus hopeful ways. Tradition vs adaptability. Trickle down survival for the majority versus shared responsibility and rewards for all.

Doesn’t look like much of a contest does it, when viewed in this way? And this is precisely how Obama’s campaign must frame the contest with every commitment and intention of living up to these comparisons with its efforts and policies.

Posted by: David R. Remer at June 4, 2008 08:45 AM

David,
The public image presented by Obama makes an incredible contrast with the image presented by McCain. It reminds me of the contest between Reagan and Mondale in 1984. I detested Reagan and had been a huge fan of Mondale’s since high school, when his response to a research project was incredibly helpful, and it was obvious from hearing transcripts that Mondale was a sharp guy and a great public servant. Yet the image during the presidential debates was damning. Reagan recited lines like a B-list movie star. His replies were vacuous, but looked good on tv. Mondale provided smart answers, but looked just awful.

In the speeches yesterday, Obama looked great, while McCain looked ghastly. It is too bad image plays such a big role, but this go around it’s unquestionably in Obama’s favor.

Posted by: phx8 at June 4, 2008 01:17 PM

His message content is overpowering as well, phx8.

Simply put: ‘Difficult challenges lie ahead requiring that Americans step up to the plate to shoulder the burden along side their representatives. If the voters are willing to take new innovative approaches over the old failed ones, and demand the same from their representatives, America can meet and exceed those challenges.’

It is as compelling a message as any candidate has put forth since Reagan, RFK, JFK, and MLK. Its rallying power dwarfs McCain’s content which is the same old “Listen to me and what I will do for you”. That was Clinton’s message as well. If didn’t carry the day. Nuff said!

Posted by: David R. Remer at June 4, 2008 01:43 PM

Joseph Briggs, another violation of our rules like that, and your comments will no longer be welcome here.

Maybe you should keep your baseless accusations, schizophrenic delusions of conspiracy, and sarcastic advice to yourself because it certainly doesn’t lend any credibility to your argument. Posted by: Joseph Briggs at June 2, 2008 05:51 PM

Posted by: Managing Editor at June 4, 2008 06:18 PM

ohrealy, please don’t reply to offenders of our Rules, just email me and I will take care of it.

Thanks

Posted by: Managing Editor at June 4, 2008 06:34 PM