Flip-floppin' HusseinFollow

I read that as Bull Mouse Party. Now I'm really disappointed.

Really? That's Obama's problem? McCain changes his stance with his underwear everyday, but you can't tell what Obama is actually going to do? Seriously?

"pretty much the rest of the world would just as soon see the ol US of A wiped off the map as not." --Elinda

I truly hope this is hyperbole, because the utter vacuousness of this statement s mind boggling. C'mon, E, please. Normally you're way better than this. Do at least attempt to resist the temptation to be a shill for the Left and demonstrate a propensity for independent thought.

Totem

When it comes to McCain he doesn't flip-flop, but "evolves" his position.


Being against off-shore drilling then overnight being all about off-shore drilling sounds like a solid flip-flop to me.


http://thinkprogress.org/2006/11/19/mccain-abortion/

http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/6731.html


Against Bush's tax cuts for the wealthy twice




This list goes on Gbaji, now I know this wouldn't register even if I hit you over the head with it because you are an insufferable moron.

Edited, Jul 9th 2008 5:43pm by NaughtyWord

This quote says for a fact that Obama claimed it.

Then you follow up with this drivel.


Well, I'd love to. The problem is that Obama tends to speak in vague terms and allow the audience he's speaking to just assume that he agrees with the signs and slogans that they're holding. Certainly, there were a whole lot of Dems who voted for Obama in the primary based on the assumption that he did want to "end NAFTA". Does that mean he literally said that? Dunno. It's not important though, since what matters is the perception of his position versus what he's saying today.

I can conclude from this that you are talking out of your *** again and are making sensational claims you cannot back up (not that you have ever met the status quo of finding sources though). Your behavior, responses, and claims on Obama hold about as much water as your ability to source. Thanks again for showing that you are a complete d*ckslap.


Maybe McCain now supports the Bush tax cuts because he sees that they've worked and to remove them now would hurt the economy more then it would help.


No, he's trying to win a few true conservative votes and sucking their collective ***** in hopes that they will put it in his puckering *** later. You seem to be completely oblivous to the fact that McCain isn't exactly popular amongst traditional conservatives and even less popular amongst Reagan Conservatives.

Obama already has Democratic support, he doesn't need to suck the d*cks of traditional liberals to wage a campaign.

Edited, Jul 9th 2008 8:54pm by NaughtyWord

On what? This OP started re: Iraq and, as the analysis Totem linked to points out, there was never really any flip. Rather people have taken Obama's statements and turned them into an absolute declaration that Obama himself never made.Serving in the Illinois State Senate and running for federal office with the United States Senate. Luckily, people continue to believe that the Obama is better suited to handle the issue. 50/30 by the last count.

Sigh. Didn't read what I wrote. The problem is that Obama plays on vague statements to allow whatever group he's in front of to believe that he supports "their position". This, btw, is exactly *why* he prefers and does better in a speech format then a debate format. In a speech you can carefully craft your words so that it sounds like you're supporting one thing, while not explicitly stating it and leaving enough extraneous bits and qualifications so that you can later deny you said what everyone thought you said at the time. In a debate, it's hard to think both of how to answer the question *and* how to say it in a way that doesn't stick you to a position that you'll later be held to.

If there's one constant about Obama, it's that he works really really hard to not say anything that'll definitively tie him down to a position. Which is what I've been talking about all along...


But, since you demanded it, here's the closest quote I could find on relatively short notice:

From some debate snippet



To be abundantly clear, this is what Clinton said that he was referring to:



Sounds awfully like he's saying it "needs to be completely re-written", right?


But then, in the next paragraph he leaves himself some wiggle room, in classic Obama style:




Notice what he does here. He manages to get in the same kind of "judge me by who is with/against me" logic by pointing out in a backhanded way that he has "strong opposition to NAFTA". You have to remember that they were both trying to win states where NAFTA wasn't liked much at the time, so this helps him. But again, note that he says it backhandedly. He doesn't say: "I strongly oppose NAFTA". He says that the Chicago Times said that he did.

Of course, the typical person listening is only going to hear that he strongly opposes NAFTA, which is exactly what he wants them to think.

Then you get to the second half of that paragraph and he's basically tossing out wonderful words about the American worker. Plays well in a blue collar state, right? But these words can also (and are now) being pointed to later to support an argument that he's "for trade agreements". Which is exactly the type of vague wiggle that he's using to appear to do both at the same time.


Look. I get that there are elements of NAFTA that are good, and elements that are bad. This isn't a black or white issue. But the point is that he presented himself as someone who "strongly opposes NAFTA" when it was convenient, and is now playing on the other parts of his statements to claim that he "supports free trade".


If his consistent message was one of some good and some bad about NAFTA, I wouldn't have a problem with it. But that's not what he's doing. He's crafting his message so that he appears to be one thing one day, and the exact opposite the next. Playing parsing games with his statements to find sections that justify both positions only shows the degree of his dishonesty with the issue as a whole. At the end of the day, he gained by allowing himself to appear to be staunchly opposed to NAFTA. His entire attack on Clinton during that couple weeks of primaries was about this very issue and how she supported NAFTA and her husband helped create it. You can't possibly look at the number and types of attacks his camp made against Clinton on this very issue back then and now claim that he didn't intend to make voters choose him on the basis of a perception that he was more opposed to NAFTA then Clinton.


Ok. I suppose you can, but you kinda have to ignore everything that was going on at the time. Context matters here...




Lol! Reagan wasn't popular among "Reagan Conservatives" during the lead up to the 1980 election. He was viewed as a moderate maverick as well. McCain is arguably far more like Reagan in this way than any Republican candidate we've had since...



Wrong. He's got the far left support. And is now pissing them off trying to angle sharply to the middle.


Let me explain a really simple fact about US politics. When plotted by population across a "left-right" political scale, the population makes a Bell Curve, with the most people in the middle, and the least on the far right and far left. This is why pretty much every successful presidential candidate for at least the last 60 years has started somewhere near the middle of their party, leans a bit outside during the primary, and then re-establishes themselves in the middle during the general. The objective is to field a candidate that will win votes in the middle without losing too much on the edges. And really, if you have to choose between them, lose on the edges instead of the middle. No one on the far right or far left will switch over and vote for the other side, so at worse you lose a vote. Every vote lost in the middle counts for double since that vote will go to the other guy, *and* there's a lot more people there.

McCain has the middle. He managed to win the Republican nomination without even having to lean to the right. Yes. He's playing some lip service that direction in order to calm fears and get some of the campaign assistance he'll need, but the reality is that he's firmly in the middle politically and everyone knows it.


Obama is far to the left. That's his natural position. And most people know it, or are figuring that out. He's having to veer far far to the middle to try to hide this fact. Whether he'll be successful at convincing those folks that he's not really the far left liberal candidate that he was during the primary will determine his success in the election.

And frankly, I don't think even the US voters are quite that dumb. We'll find out though...

Edited, Jul 9th 2008 8:54pm by NaughtyWord[/quote]

I see. So there's no re-writing involved when one re-negotiates a trade agreement. Go it!

Obama has not changed his position on Iraq. He is committed to withdrawing troops as carefully as we were careless getting in, and as quickly as possible.

Some military commanders think this could be accomplished at a rate of 1-2 brigades a month, which would take 16-24 months to complete a full withdraw. Some military commanders think that this could not be accomplished so quickly.

Obama has always maintained that we would keep a small force in Iraq permanently, mostly for training purposes but also to assist with any outbreak of violence (something I disagree with but I can see the logic behind it.)

Full 2007-2008 debate videos and transcripts:
http://www.youdecide2008.com/2007/06/13/full-2008-debate-schedule-from-dnc-and-gop/

The article you cited as evidence Totem has a clear slant against Obama (it mentions the possibility of going back to Clinton about one paragraph in), but it still validates Obama's unchanging position and rejects your assertion that he has waffled, but I guess you wouldn't realize that if you just read the headline or didn't go on to the second page.

For full disclosure, I voted for Obama in the primary but I will vote for a third party candidate in the general. I just don't like to see misinformation and misunderstanding spread around.