Hillary wins OH, TX, RIFollow

Well, I'm just the type of person that likes to state the obvious sometimes, you know, just to throw it out there for anyone not seeing it. >.> Unfortunately, I lack children to mold into my personal forum trolls. I need to get going on that baby making stuff.

Edited, Mar 5th 2008 11:04pm by Alixana

"Wait, conservatives feel that Obama is less liberal than Hillary? Where has this been stated?" --Alix

It is the commonplace conservative thought that Hillary has the mortal lock on traditional Lefty liberalism. Obama represents all things to all people, so he is perceived as being more moderate, thus appealing to the middle, independents, and the traditional Left who are willing to vote in a carbon rod just so that the Republicans lose the Oval Office. Whether this is accurate or not depends on your political viewpoint, but to this date I suspect it is true that by being as vague as possible Obama allows himself the latitude to be what people wish him to be.

This is precisely why I desire a protracted and bloody fight between Clinton and Obama. It forces them to set their political views in concrete to differenciate themselves from the other candidate for the sake of garnering Democratic party votes. By allowing Obama to win early (read: now) he can continue to skate by promising hope, pots of gold at the end of rainbows, and teaching tone deaf Coke drinking Lefties how to sing in perfect harmony. As it is, the media is finally busting his chops a bit more after treating him with kid gloves (ie. Staurday Night Live skits about the Dem debates). By showing that he does not walk on water, and can indeed be beaten in the face of the Obama campaigning juggernaught, it demonstrates he has chinks in his armor.

That being said, should he win the presidency, it'll just be a matter of months before the press turns on him like they do with every president and his luster is tarnished. An antagonistic relationship with the press is an inevitability in modern day politics.

Totem

"Look. My statement wasn't that confusing, nor that controversial. Obama is very liberal. More liberal then Clinton. You know this. I know this. Anyone who's read his website, or listened carefully to his speeches knows this. However, exit polls show that Moderates and Republicans *think* that Obama is less Liberal then Clinton." --gbaji

I have to disagree with you here, G. His speeches are so vanilla that he literally becomes a Rorshach dot test for the wishful thinking, uncritically examining voter that pines for the mythical happier government of yore where both parties held hands and worked together for the commmon good of John Q. Public. He is all things to all people-- at least to those who don't go beyond the politically superficial.

Actually, I found out what Obama did before he went into government. He was an actor. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Ubg2lNWhH8

Totem

How about you guys decide whether Obama is more Liberal then Clinton and then get back to me, cause so far, it looks like Smash keeps changing his position on this every other post.

No, it was obvious no one was arguing that she was more liberal.

I should have qualified it "obvious to all but the most ignorant oblivious fool" to allow for you, I suppose.

While I do not necessarily agree with everything that you said Totem, your argument does seem to hold weight, when viewing it from a conservative standpoint. I'll agree that many seem to feel that "Hillary has the mortal lock on traditional Lefty liberalism"...and unfortunately, I think the crux of the matter is that it's clouding far too many people's views on the actual stances of the candidates.

GOP fund raisers have spent decades characterizing her as ultra liberal, when really she and the whole DLC crowd are much more centrist. You reap what you sow, I guess.

You'd be hard pressed to place the Hellbeast as a centrist-- at least when compared to a real live, honest-to-goodness centrist. Moreover, from various reports, she is an uncompromising idealogue, not a pragmatist. If true, this is not what makes for bipartisan politics.

Totem

To a more independant voter, such as myself, Obama is a different way to go that might actually win.

The majority of poloticians are corrupt. It's the way of the profession. If you know your history you know this. I'm sure the majority of Americans are tired of the corruption and blatent disreguard for our input.

Obama is a (relatively)clean and new canvas. We've already seen the paintings that are Clinton and McCain. We know where those go. We don't know where Obama goes quite yet. It can go just about anywhere. All the "old blood" is what got us into this mess that we're in today, it's time to change the guard and the best shot at that is new blood.

That's why I'm hoping for Obama. Yes, he could easily be taken in the wrong direction when in office but it'll be the same direction as the others would take us anyway. At least we have a chance of getting something fresh into office now.

If things keep going the way they're going that might not work out. As it stands both Clinton and Obama would need to win a large majority. If that doesn't happen it will be up to the Super Delegates. The Clintons have more money. They'll get more Super Delegates.

Super delegates??

American politics is teh funny.

It's not just elected office that helps paint a picture of someone's roles. McCain has run for president before, and lost that time to Bush. (That's really sad.) He's been in the media, he's been "vetted" to use the Clinton term, and eight years and four years ago, people liked the beer guzzling good ol' boy better. You don't have to know the training of the artist, the medium, the setting, or the subject to determine whether or not you like the portrait before you. You either like it or you don't.

Personally, I see McCain as the best of a bad lot by a far sight but, at the end of the day, he's still a pro-life conservative hawk. So I can't vote for him in good conscience. If he wins, at least I can tell myself that we got the best possible Republican compared to Romney/Huckabee/etc.

On that Rezko Thing: On NPR's All Things Considered on the way home from work today, they had someone who was familiar with Rezko giving an analysis of what fallout we can expect from the trial. He said that Obama is at most a periphery; he was an acquaintance of Rezko, they moved in the same social circles, and Rezko did him a favor that Obama now calls "boneheaded" for accepting.

It turns out that it's not Obama that has the most to worry about from this trial. It's the governor of Illinois, Rod Blagojevich. Rezko's mad money raising skillz for new politicians mostly came from buying access to the governor, with whom he was close. Rezko also raised money for over seventy other politicians, so there's a lot of people that got some 'splainin to do during the course of this trial.

Rezko was infamous for glomming onto up and coming politicians, and after the DNC in 2004 where Obama was first hailed as the Dem's new rock star, Rezko saw the opportunity to latch on early. He did Obama a favor by buying the lot adjacent to the Obama household, so they could buy the house under the conditions of the seller. He then sold Obama a 10-foot strip of land from the adjacent parcel, which is now a small private garden for Obama. The rest of the land is still undeveloped, and has since been sold by Rezko's wife at a profit. The current owners are asking 1.5 million dollars for the properly, more than twice what they bought it for.

This sounds like a really shady thing, except Rezko's business is real estate development and property management. This was a business transaction that made money for all parties involved and just happened to help out Obama as well.

So, there's nothing shady about the deal, really. Just the person, and why he was doing Obama, someone he wasn't exactly bosom buddies with, such a favor. After Rezko was indicted, Obama severed their friendship, and donated $84,000 in funds raised by or linked to Rezko, to charity.



Edited, Mar 6th 2008 6:39pm by catwho

More on NAFTAate: Apparently the Prime Minister of Canada is pushing for Hillary as candidate so McCain will win the presidency -- isn't that what Rush Limbaugh is doing too?

So yeah, the leaked memo actually implicated Clinton in political doublespeak, not Obama, which makes sense given her support over the decade. But an overzealous reporter latched onto Obama's name instead.

Once again . . . nobody died when Clinton lied, but if you're not outraged, you're not paying attention.