Obama - What It Could Mean For The Country

[BT]

This is from my old buddy JayC28 from PIC days.



Obama - What It Could Mean For The Country

By Jay | @ 10:02 pm |

It?s too soon to tell in the wake of what happened in Iowa to say what it does mean. But we can speculate, should Obama get the Democratic nomination and ultimately win the Presidency. I?m going to forget all about the issues of race for a moment. What an Obama victory would mean, especially in the wake of more conventional candidates like John Edwards and Hillary Clinton being available, is the end of an era.

A generational era. A Presidental win by Barack Obama would spell the end of the road for the baby boomer generation, their power and their antiquated way of approaching the issues. Granted, there?s a bunch of things that Obama talks about that is right out of the Democratic playbook and the most sobering thought about him winning the Presidency is the fact that for at least two years, the old guard liberals in Congress would still be in charge. Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, Ted Kennedy, John Conyers, Patrick Leahy and a host of others who grew up in the ?make love, not war? era of American history whose policy proposals are anything but progressive.

Obama on the other hand, has been willing to at least listen to what others have to say. My brother pointed me to an article Obama had written about education for Mother Jones some time ago. I was very impressed with what he had to say because it was not the same thing we have been hearing for the last 20 years, which on the right has ?vouchers? and ?testing? and on the left has been ?more money.? What I gained from the article more than anything else is that he understands that a one size fits all approach will not work and that simply shouting ?No!? when somebody in an opposing party presents an idea is not the way to do things.

Sen. Obama has taken some heat from the ?netroots? as what they perceive to be capitulation to Republicans in an effort to make himself more electable. The problem with this line of attack is that Obama has been doing this ever since he delivered that stirring speech in 2004 at the Democratic National Convention. It should come as no surprise to anybody that he thinks outside the box and sometimes wears what he?s thinking on his sleeve. Like I said in an earlier entry, that?s what I find so appealing about the guy. Candor is a rare trait in politicians. However, some Democrats don?t like the fact that Obama has been candid about certain things. He said the following:

    Making an argument for his electability, Obama said, ?I don?t want to go into the next election starting off with half the country already not wanting to vote for Democrats ? we?ve done that in 2004, 2000,? according to a person at the event (rush transcript).

That made Markos upset:

    Funny, that. Last time I checked, Gore won his election. And really, is Obama going to argue now that the nation was divide because of the Democrats? fault? Is that the latest right-wing talking point he wants to peddle?

Chris Bowers went after Obama because he was critical of something Paul Krugman had written:

    It is certainly disturbing that Obama is attacking a leading progressive voice in a media system where progressive opinion journalists are few are far between.

So Paul Krugman is ?leading progressive voice? in the media and that suddenly is supposed to insulate him from criticism from another progressive?

Examples of such (and there are a lot more) are part of a problem I have started to have with the rigidity I see in both sides of the political spectrum. It?s an example of identity politics, which entails separatism to a degree. The netroots have been the biggest purveyors of identity politics for some time now. These example reinforce that. If you notice, they?re more upset that Obama made such statements. It didn?t matter if the statements were accurate or not. He said it and that?s bad enough. Granted, it doesn?t mean they?re going to stay home come election time, but how many of them will support other candidates in the primaries and Obama doesn?t get the nomination? They?ll get Edwards or Clinton and I don?t know if they could win.

The following is just an anecdotal example of the change that a candidate like Obama could bring, but I found the comment pretty remarkable. This is from an entry at Huffington Post by Marc Cooper:

    On the left side of the high school classroom, about 60 decidedly much younger, boisterous and ramped-up Obama supporters gathered in noisy clumps. ?I?ve never caucused before but I like everything Obama has to say,? said 30-year-old machinist Chris Augustine. Typical of exactly the kind of voter the Obama campaign had hoped to mobilize, he added: ?For me, Obama is the un-politician. If it comes down to Hillary Clinton versus a Republican in November, I would rather vote for the Republican. There?s nothing Clinton could do to prove she?s really different than the same old, same old of the past.?

The win is going to come from the independents, and simply because independents went more with Democrats during the mid-term elections, that doesn?t translate to them voting the same way this November. It?s a whole different ballgame.

I can?t say at this point whether I would vote for Barack Obama or not. But I will say this: Just like that man in Iowa, I will scramble to vote for whoever the GOP nominee is should Hillary Clinton or John Edwards get the Democratic nomination. Barack Obama represents a new type of candidate and despite my differences with him on a number of issues, I could see myself casting a vote for him this November.

http://www.popandsports.com/?p=1058

[Michael Tee]

<< . . . for at least two years, the old guard liberals in Congress would still be in charge. Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, Ted Kennedy, John Conyers, Patrick Leahy and a host of others who grew up in the ?make love, not war? era of American history whose policy proposals are anything but progressive.>>

Those "old guard liberals" so far have done a mighty good job of keeping the war going.  They talk the anti-war talk of the sixties but they sure as hell don't walk the walk.

<<What I gained from the article more than anything else is that he understands that a one size fits all approach will not work and that simply shouting ?No!? when somebody in an opposing party presents an idea is not the way to do things.>>

I doubt if there's any politician on either side of the aisle who "simply shouts no" when presented with an opposition idea.  There are always reasons given.  As far as the "one size fits all" allegation, without any specifics being given, I can only say that it's a common criticism of any universal, government-funded initiative in education or health-care where private initiatives are allowed to compete with government, basically siphoning private and public funding to the detriment of the public system.  Those who favour government monopolies on the provision of services usually do so, NOT on the argument that "one size fits all," but on the basis of egalitarianism - - that any privately-run, for-profit system operating in parallel with the state system will inevitably lead to a two-tiered delivery system, leaching the public system for the benefit of the monied elite.  This is particularly true in health-care and education.   When the article lauds Obama for rejecting a "one-size-fits-all" philosophy, the correct English translation is that this guy is a sell-out to conservative ideology and has already built the design for failure into grand projects designed to benefit millions of poor and middle-class kids so that private interests can continue to rack up profits at their expense.  Had JayC been more specific, I could have been more specific, but specificity probably would have killed his argument by pin-pointing exactly what vital progressive principles Obama had had to sell out in order to win the right-wing's grudging approval.

<<Obama has taken some heat from the ?netroots? as what they perceive to be capitulation to Republicans in an effort to make himself more electable. The problem with this line of attack is that Obama has been doing this ever since he delivered that stirring speech in 2004 at the Democratic National Convention. It should come as no surprise to anybody that he thinks outside the box and sometimes wears what he?s thinking on his sleeve.>>

So it's a problem criticizing a sell-out when he started selling out early on?  He should have been roundly criticized at the time, but unfortunately most of the rest of the Democrats had already sold out, and the REAL Democrats - - the "Democratic wing of the Democratic Party - - had bigger fish to fry; or were asleep at the switch, take your pick.  As for "thinking outside the box" in this circumstance, it's hilarious.  The spin doctors have developed a new way of saying "sell-out."  I guess it IS "thinking outside the box" when a Democratic politician openly adopts Republican positions, or opens the way for them to sabotage publicly-funded Democratic initiatives.

  <<Making an argument for his electability, Obama said, ?I don?t want to go into the next election starting off with half the country already not wanting to vote for Democrats ? we?ve done that in 2004, 2000,? according to a person at the event (rush transcript).

<<That made Markos upset:

 <<   Funny, that. [This is presumably Markos speaking.] Last time I checked, Gore won his election. And really, is Obama going to argue now that the nation was divide because of the Democrats? fault? Is that the latest right-wing talking point he wants to peddle?>>

Bravo, Markos!!  Couldn't have said it better myself.  Four years ago, the morons were still fooled by Bush's bullshit.  Now, four years down the road, with all the lies and failures staring every voter right in the face, NOW is the time to abandon the arguments that had even then won Gore a bigger share of the popular vote than the lying bastard Bush?  NOW is when you hit them with all the old arguments plus one new argument:  "WE TOLD YA SO!!!"

<<Chris Bowers went after Obama because he was critical of something Paul Krugman had written:

<<    It is certainly disturbing [presumably this is Chris Bowers speaking] that Obama is attacking a leading progressive voice in a media system where progressive opinion journalists are few are far between.

<<So Paul Krugman is ?leading progressive voice? in the media and that suddenly is supposed to insulate him from criticism from another progressive?>>

More spin. Without the context of the actual Krugman article being criticized by Obama, it is impossible to judge whether Bowers was justified or not.  Certainly, in general, if one stands for progressive ideas, it would be strange to attack a fellow progressive.  The odds are that both will see eye-to-eye.  This is the second time in his article that JayC has failed to provide key details of the circumstances, probably not by accident.

<<[Quoting Marc Cooper]  Just like that man in Iowa, I will scramble to vote for whoever the GOP nominee is should Hillary Clinton or John Edwards get the Democratic nomination. Barack Obama represents a new type of candidate and despite my differences with him on a number of issues, I could see myself casting a vote for him this November.>>

That's very true, but it's obviously a criticism of Hillary, well-deserved for sure, but I don't view that as in any way favourable to Obama, apart from the fact that it says he's a little slicker than Hillary and as I said at the outset, no one will deny that Obama generally knows how to talk the talk of "change," at this point much more convincingly than his rivals.