i think that obama certainly has a self-confident jocularity that i don’t personally find especially appealing (tho it doesn’t turn me off in his case either). but i believe that characteristic is demonstrably beneficial in a candidate. see, e.g., bush, george w.

someone who’s spent a lifetime in politics wondering why the field attracts egomaniacs is kinda perplexing. certainly its no surprise that the people that lust after power enough to sacrifice their entire lives getting it are, 9 times out of 10, egomaniacal jerks...?

i’ve decided, maybe, that the thing with edwards is that it’s really about his son—it’s about the issues and public service and doing right and all those other things of course, but an admitted underlying motivation is seeking the ultimately meaningful life after meaning has been snatched away. and while that is unlikely to become an issue, explicitly, I think it’s apparent to many people when they pay attention that he’s motivated by something of the sort. and i don’t think that perception will work in his favor. even if a personal motivation is rooted in something the public might have boundless sympathy for, they ultimately distrust and/or don’t identify with it.

you mean something like showing up daddy?

(granted Dubya was never sold that way and has been careful to deflect attention from his family life/role)

oh boy!. (but what will i do without my hotline tv crack? :((()

xpost: like you said

oh wait, he’ll stay with hotline! :)

maybe, but they should try and act a little more humble if they want to get very far.. i mean, what happens once it’s early fall and the iowa voters have seen all the candidates enough that none of them are going to be won over by the mere fact of obama gracing them with his presence? i don’t know, i guess i’m mostly waiting to hear what his campaign is about—he hasn’t even been in the senate very long—what is the compelling reason to run this time around?

re: edwards, he’s never brought his son into it. i don’t think that’s all the motivation. the whole ‘son of a mill worker’ thing got to be a shtick after a while but there’s something very relate-able about the story, that in this country anyone should be able to work hard, make a decent living, buy a house, send their kids to college, and even dream of them becoming president..

edwards, he’s never brought his son into it

not as a theme, no. but some people, myself included, have long identified some hard-to-pin-down inauthenticity about johnny sunshine (I believe it was one of those Political Insider dudes who was complaining recently about the perceived put-on of his squinty-eye shtick), and I think it may be rooted in a protective shell built over an underlying familial sadness—to the extent that he (understandably) doesn’t talk much about it, he’s also in some sense not being totally on the surface. people don’t want a guy wearing a mask.

is this a prelude to a Warner endorsement? co-ticket, *pant* *pant*?!

Franken introduces himself

what is the compelling reason to run this time around?

no one stays hot forever

Little Obama vs. Big Obama

obviously, Little Obama would be satisfactory to me. but Big Obama is why I lean his way.

even if I think that Hillary is the best policymaker of the bunch, it’s possible that rhetorical skill is the most important quality in a president-not-just-a-candidate at this particular point in time

i don’t know.. another thing about his rhetoric is, like dean, if you’re with him you’re with him, but the appeal is hard to fathom otherwise.. I have no doubt of HRC’s competence and if she can manage to be inspiring that’s icing on the cake.. but Obama, I don’t have that base line leve of confidence in his ability to govern b/c he has so little experience and it seems like he’s trying to sweep everyone along with this rhetoric, to be the movement candidate I guess.. and I don’t think it’s sustainable for a solid year. he should have waited longer to jump in the race, maybe?

i don’t think edwards is so much johnny sunshine any more and that’s a good thing, it did seem like a mask because it’s obvious, nobody gets elected to the Senate by really being mr nice guy.

If Kucinich is “the Far Left,” NO ONE is worried abt that constituency. See the new Ralph Nader documentary, the lesson of which is Fuck The Democrats.

One policy Hillary has ever “made,” pls? The healthcare triumph?

[Dean’s] support was limited to a sizable but insufficiently large minority without serious prospects of growing during the primary

Oh, bullshit. He was torpedoed by the DLC and MSM.

Worried about “authenticity” in prez candidate, yeah, LOL.

and at this date, fuck the White House horserace. Are the Dems gonna defund the war by Dec 31 or not?

Scientists starting to plan for political responses

Obama made his announcement surrounded by hundreds of adoring Democratic voters. And those were just the reporters. There were about 400 more reporters at Obama’s announcement than Mitt Romney’s, who, by the way, is more likely to be sworn in as our next president than B. Hussein Obama.

Man, that Coulter piece could use a thesaurus! “platitudes”

anybody mention this yet?

Limbaugh: Obama Should ‘Renounce’ His Race And Just ‘Become White’

rushblue.jpg Yesterday on his radio show, right-wing host Rush Limbaugh derided Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL) — who is biracial — for saying, “If you look African-American in this society, you’re treated as an African-American.”

Limbaugh claimed that this statement meant Obama didn’t want to be black and should “renounce it”: “If it’s not something you want to be, if you didn’t decide it, renounce it, become white!” He added, “If you don’t like it, you can switch. Well, that’s the way I see it. He’s got 50–50 in there. Say, ‘No, I’m white.’”

Limbaugh totally unaware of racial history of the US shocker

Yup, it’s 2007 and she’s still out there

The sweetest Valentine Republicans in the U.S. Senate could give to American women would be to announce that they will filibuster until Christmas if Senate Democrats try to ratify the offensive United Nations Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women...

Guys, I think maybe we should forget the lessons of September the 11th. What do you think?

don’t forget to surrender our entire civilization to Islamic fundamentalists!

Here’s a new one: Obama is “obsessed” with race in his first book.

Then, you have this one by Russ Limbaugh’s brother, entitled “Barack Rodney King Obama”

Latest talking point about Obama is the word “platitudes.”

Nice little interview with Al Franken on his senate run

If they want to turn this race into a referendum on my career as a comedian, I guess that’s their prerogative. But I think Minnesotans are smart people with a very low tolerance for b.s., and I’m going to keep talking about how we can make things better for working families. The attacks didn’t work in 2006, and they’re not going to work in 2008. They may work in 2010; it’s too early to say.

working families

get me a gun

Oh don’t be grumpy, Grumpy

the kind of Senators Minnesota has given the country: leaders like Hubert Humphrey

Unionbusting mayor of Minneapolis, sold out the Mississippi Freedom Democrats at ’64 convention, no guts on Vietnam in ’68... What a leader.

http://techpresident.com/

these guys are tracking the web use of the candidates, incl. flickr feeds and # of myspace adds. Obama & Clinton currently lead at 44K and 23K.

Sam Brownback has 184.

nice site—another reason i like Edwards, his web team is way ahead of everyone else

Today’s Slate of Links Kingfish Found for You to Read:

-

For those of you who remember my thread on dealing with authoritarians, one of the keystones of that thing was John Dean’s great book _Conservatives without Conscience_. Dean based a lot of that book on the research of Bob Altemeyer, a professor in the Psych Dept at the University of Manitoba.

Altemeyer has now written an entire book about his work, called _The Authoritarians_, and is posting the entire thing, chapter by chapter, for free online. It’s written for a mass-audience, but he actually takes the effort to add enough footnotes containing all the techie bits for those who want that. I like what i’ve read of it so far.

—

On a related note, John Dean’s book was reviewed in an ish of the American Conservative last July, where Austim Bramwell spent the majority of the piece going after Altemeyer’s work w/o understanding or explaining much of what it entailed.

Interestingly, the AmCon editors gave Altemeyer a chance to respond in the very same issue, which is great mix of “WTF are you on about?” and “here’s what the stuff actually said had you read it.”

Is “working families” coding for yuppies?

Not in most instances I’ve seen. I’ve usually seen it used as not-really-coding as “people who actually have dayjobs instead of trust funds.”

right, but morbius and some other people hear this and other ways to talk about the folk—like “regular people”—and only hear a negative definition (i.e. “working people” is supposed to be an attack on all those people who don’t work and “regular people” is in distinction to weirdos)

regular people = BREEDERS

right, except breeders don’t hear it that way (the few who do vote gop already)

So what’s your point? that everybody who hears the term “working families” has a similar level of jaded cynicism and reacts Morbz-style?

?

hot warner on obama action

Next bullshit talking point: the Slow Bleed

apparently a friend of mine just passed Obama at the Ferry Bldg in SF, I guess he’s here for some fundraiser with Boxer.

“working people” vs “working FAMILIES” is a gulf of a difference.

ppl who use this kinda test-marketed jargon are the cynics, my dear.

Obama is having a big rally here on friday. Originally it was at a gym on campus, just down the street from my building. I was looking forward to skipping down there and basking in the spirit. (I attended a Clinton/Gore rally here on campus in 92 so also felt it would be good luck.)

But the demand for tickets was so high they’ve moved it a much, much larger venue on the banks of Town Lake. It would involve missing a half day of work to go down there and back so I don’t think I can go. yay for him, boo for me.

“working people” vs “working FAMILIES” is a gulf of a difference

otm, we’ve already got most of the single people

most of the single people ain’t voting

that can’t possibly be true

Single young people, particularly women, are more likely to vote than married young people. The turnout among single women age 18–24 led the way and increased by 12 percentage points, or about one third, since 2000.

http://www.civicyouth.org/quick/youth_voting.htm

now strike “young”

Ah. that’s crazy. it was 67% to 44% (married/non married) in the 2000 election.

From reading his work, one gets the idea that Bob Somerby is getting closer and closer to losing it completely from sheer exasperation.

Unionbusting mayor of Minneapolis, sold out the Mississippi Freedom Democrats at ’64 convention, no guts on Vietnam in ’68... What a leader.

and what evidence do you have that humphrey was a “union-buster”? this is the 1st time that i’ve heard this accusation about him.

There’s a HASTINGS shout-out in that Franken video.

down in Arizona, there’s a state bill that will fine up to $500 for a myriad of in-class activities, including:

Advocating “one side of a social, political, or cultural issue that is a matter of partisan controversy.”

even professional douchebag David Horowitz released a statement that thi s was going a bit far

this David Geffen-Obama-Hillary spat is hilarious but uh, bodes ill for the campaign. things are gonna get nasty for sure if this is any indication. although honestly I can’t see Hillary running anything besides a very aggro campaign...

There’s a HASTINGS shout-out in that Franken video.

That’s Dan Perry one step closer to the White House, then.

so wait did no one else see/hear/read David Geffen calling Clinton “kind of a reckless guy” etc.?

that’s right, no one else heard/saw/read that

I can’t tell if yr being sarcastic so um here:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070221/ap_on_el_pr/clinton_obama

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2007/02/20/dreamworks-geffen-slams-_n_41732.html

enh, whatever. 21 months of this shit left.

yeah can’t say I’m lookin forward to it

http://gizmodo.com/gadgets/cellphones/switch-to-sprint-support-planned-parenthood-and-skip-on-the-fee-239003.php

Cheney douchebaggery continues unabated:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070223/ap_on_go_pr_wh/cheney_iraq

i’m still waiting for the call of damnation down on Sprint, and their castigation on the rightwing shows 24/7. Maybe it just takes the news a bit to get out.

(Gameboy?)

maybe he meant Gameboy Advance, which just had Final Fantasy VI reissued to it this month

on the other hand, i probably wouldn’t mind this upcoming 1.5 years of campaign season if it’s nothing but zings and constant busting on the vice president

Obama brings the ROFLZ!

Barney Frank will not seek reelection

http://joemygod.blogspot.com/2011/11/breaking-barney-frank-to-retire.html

I think some other parts of the world might think differently about us if we elect a guy with Hussein in his name.

not so much as long as he keeps drone-bombing ’em, eh?

That Nobel Peace Prize may have been a mistake. Now that he has one, he obv isn’t aiming for two.

Seeing Bill Frist and Sam Brownback’s names on this thread remind me of how far we’ve sunk.

speaking of brownback

#heblowsalot

She tweets that a politician “sucks” and someone on his staff contacts her school principal about it?! I am speechless at this assininity.

yeh fuck him

wow!!!

I love the SRS BIZNIZ happening in the comments on that article

WDinDallas

Typical youth of today. No respect, no discipline, all about me attitude. She will not make it in the real world. Suicide waiting to happen.

very disappointed that there’s no followup “oops that was supposed to only go to my friends” comment on that one

Loved this line from NRO yesterday: “This is the moment where it’s going to be hardest for Gingrich to restrain his Newtness.”

http://campaignstops.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/11/27/the-future-of-the-obama-coalition/?hp

Giving up on trying to appeal to white folks who do not have college degrees-

For decades, Democrats have suffered continuous and increasingly severe losses among white voters. But preparations by Democratic operatives for the 2012 election make it clear for the first time that the party will explicitly abandon the white working class.

All pretence of trying to win a majority of the white working class has been effectively jettisoned in favor of cementing a center-left coalition made up, on the one hand, of voters who have gotten ahead on the basis of educational attainment — professors, artists, designers, editors, human resources managers, lawyers, librarians, social workers, teachers and therapists — and a second, substantial constituency of lower-income voters who are disproportionately African-American and Hispanic.

It is instructive to trace the evolution of a political strategy based on securing this coalition in the writings and comments, over time, of such Democratic analysts as Stanley Greenberg and Ruy Teixeira. Both men were initially determined to win back the white working-class majority, but both currently advocate a revised Democratic alliance in which whites without college degrees are effectively replaced by well-educated socially liberal whites in alliance with the growing ranks of less affluent minority voters, especially Hispanics.

yeah that’s based on very little evidence

“A top priority of the less affluent wing of today’s left alliance is the strengthening of the safety net, including health care, food stamps, infant nutrition and unemployment compensation. These voters generally take the brunt of recessions and are most in need of government assistance to survive. According to recent data from the Department of Agriculture, 45.8 million people, nearly 15 percent of the population, depend on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program to meet their needs for food.”

uh right clearly not things that would appeal to poor non-whites

basically there’s a difference between ‘the numbers look better for us in colorado than ohio’ and ‘obama gives up on poor whites’. if anything the story is ‘poor whites gave up on obama’.

http://takingnote.tcf.org/2008/11/digging-into-th.html

(also mostly didn’t vote for him in 2008)

That NYT article just accepts the reality that Reagan Democrats are now Rush Republicans.

The New Deal Coalition — which included unions, city machines, blue-collar workers, farmers, blacks, people on relief, and generally non-affluent progressive intellectuals — had the advantage of economic coherence. It received support across the board from voters of all races and religions in the bottom half of the income distribution, the very coherence the current Democratic coalition lacks.

Yes, although FDR flip-flopped a bit too. If Obama and the Democratic Party had offered a strong and consistent and coherent economic message (lets pretend the blue dogs and the Goldman Sachs crowd didn’t exist) would that have won back Rush Republicans, or just aggravated them more?

we haven’t had rush republicans for a long time and there’s good reason to believe that the reason goes beyond economics.

we = San Francisco?

oh I’m sorry were you not aware I am a registered democrat

lets call the next politics thread #heblowsalot

sounds good to me

Iatee, I know there are/were cultural and race issues as well and that one can trace things back to attacks on Dem candidate Adlai Stevenson in the 1950s for being an egghead, and later the Republican southern strategy, and hippie bashing...As the article noted:

In an interview, Greenberg, speaking of white working class voters, said that in the period from the mid-1960s to the early 1990s, “we battled to get them back. They were sizable in number and central to the base of the Democratic Party.” At the time, he added, “we didn’t know that we would never get them back, that they were alienated and dislodged.”

Also, “we” still have blue dog Dems

Not that they help

2010 wiped out a lot of them actually

I naively dream that someday liberal/lefty ideas will win over the non-college degree demographic (and even win over the Democratic party too). It’s all a dream...

http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/judge-rejects-sec-citigroup-settlement/2011/11/28/gIQA8KsH5N_story.html?hpid=z1

But this is real, and is good news (though slighly depressing but expected that Obama’s SEC would push a weak settlement that only benefited Citigroup)

shd we start a separate Republican primary thread, because lol:

http://www.cnn.com/2011/11/28/politics/cain-accusation-affair/index.html