Tuesday, February 19, 2008

Obama as McGovern?

TalkLeft describes the danger of an "Obama Bubble" which when popped might culminate in a McGovern-like crash.

To be clear, the McGovern comparison has nothing to do with Obama's liberalness. I don't think he's a liberal. The comparison has to do with the result in November if the bubble bursts on his message of hope and change and if the right wing successfully smears him with it. In that event, I'm asking whether the results in November will resemble those of the McGovern race.

The Barack Obama phenomenon is probably a compound of three things. Mr. Obama's own considerable talents as a politician and speaker; the reaction against the Clinton Machine and the absolute dearth of new ideas in the Democratic Party. It has nothing to do with renewed excitement in the Democratic Party message; it is intensely personal. The enthusiasm is generated by Him; the hope is engendered by the Face.

And to Barack Obama's credit he has carried a near-empty hand to triumph. That alone is testament to his political skill. But he has done it at the cost of not talking about the platform of his own party, which truth to tell, consists of a collection of rotting planks left over from the 1960s and which no one is safe treading upon. Instead of embarssing himself by talking about higher taxes, more appeasement and more special interest politics, Barack Obama has done the smart thing. He's talked about himself; about "us"; about the future, about Hope and most of all, about Change. The subliminal message is that we want to Move On. And part of what the electorate wants to Move On from is all the fermenting baggage that Hillary Clinton keeps hauling along. It's as neat a piece of conjury as has been seen for the last fifty years.

Thus the Obama "bubble" isn't his personal problem, it's his party's problem. He's throwing a personal force shield around a decrepit core agenda and if it fails sometime in the next few months it will be no fault of his. He's already done the unbelievable. Any collapse will be foreordained by the Democratic Party's agenda.

Comparisons to McGovern and 1968 are all the more painful because they highlight how little has substantively changed from then. McGovern gone from politics, but the dead agenda lives. And poor Obama, having to carry the moldering corpse on his shoulders!

Watching Obama struggle forward, keeping up his momentum with the thin gruel of speeches, charisma and bravado is almost like watching a champion who you know is eventually going to be overhwhelmed by uneven odds continue a game fight. Whatever one thinks of Obama, he doesn't deserve so tragic a fate. Obama's worst enemy isn't the conservatives. It isn't even liberals. It's the dead hand of the past. The Spirit of '68, cackling and wheezing from the closed room which no one goes into. Except Hillary, who emerges each time to pronounce Mother alive and well.




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55 Comments:

Blogger Chas Cowins said...

Is McGovern actually dead?

2/19/2008 06:57:00 PM  
Blogger always right said...

Exactly. Similar to cover those rotten planks with a fresh coat of paint, and ask fellow Americans to blindly follow.

Obama would have been a good fit for some diplomat, but too green for POTUS ('too green' description also fit Michelle Obama).

Ever wonder why dems rejected Edwards early, but similar message is adapted now by (at least, Michelle) Obama?

2/19/2008 07:04:00 PM  
Blogger Unknown said...

We can only hope so.

The Obamas are rapidly achieving the almost impossible task of becoming less likable than the Clintons.

2/19/2008 07:41:00 PM  
Blogger Sparks fly said...

Wretchard!

"cackling and wheezing, the Spirit of '68...

That is pure poetry. You may have missed your calling. Perhaps a novel is fermenting between the synapses of your mind and the strings of your heart and the rock of your soul.

All McCain has to do is keep asking in a genlemanly way just exactly what are those changes you intend to, ahem..impose. And will current taxes be sufficient to cover the cost or do you see any need for new taxes?

I am somewhat concerned that not enough people will pause to hear the answer.

Is America's golden day over or will there be one more final blaze of glory. Have 45 million dead babies sealed America's fate in the halls of heaven? Is the verdict in?

Is the money going to go back to the Babylon of old on the banks of the Tigris-Euphrates river or slightly downstream in Dubai?

Forces alien to the U.S. are circling about and within. In some ways it's just the same old same old. But the people who knew better seemed more active then than today.

I'm a Thompson supporter.

2/19/2008 07:42:00 PM  
Blogger Pax Federatica said...

One rather ominous question remains unaddressed here: If/when the Obama bubble bursts, how will the remaining "true believers" respond after the GE voters have decided to pass on their "messiah"? My worry is that, as ugly as presidential politics has been in recent years, we ain't seen nothin' yet.

2/19/2008 07:46:00 PM  
Blogger baldilocks said...

Hey there W!

McGovern's still living. And we thought McGovernism was dead but apparently, it's still living also.

2/19/2008 07:55:00 PM  
Blogger Unknown said...

how will the remaining "true believers" respond

Left wing blogs that support Hilary already get murderous hate mail. No hate as intense as what you get toward the disloyal family member.

The Obamas will turn his rejection into a huge racial issue as if there could be no other reason any sane person would refuse his saving grace.

Michelle Obama has already hinted as much. It's difficult to imagine a more contentious person than a black women with two Ivy League degrees and a million dollar income telling the rest of us that we are depressing and stupid for not worshiping her and her husband because they're black.

2/19/2008 08:02:00 PM  
Blogger wretchardthecat said...

Yes, McGovern's still alive and may he have many years yet to live. My mistake. Fixed.

2/19/2008 08:11:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

He's got it all:
---
Obama mentor identified as communist
Frank Marshall Davis 'discussed American imperialism, colonialism, exploitation'

Chelsea Clinton courts Maui votes

Andrew Cheng
Chicago, IL

#1 Yesterday
Having had Obama as senator for 3 years now, I can say unequivocally that we need a change.
Vote for Hillary and you would be voting for real change!!
From Hawaii
Irving, TX

Reply »

#2 Yesterday
Amen, Andrew!
Lots of skeletons in that Obama closet, no?
He's not really a Hawaiian "native son"... no real island roots.

And I'd still like to know how he was able to afford to attend Punahou at the same time his Mom was collecting welfare payments.

Just google his name and lots of interesting stuff comes up. Some of it he wouldn't be too proud of.
---

'I took drugs, had homo sex with Obama'
Minnesota man takes his case to court, YouTube, $100,000 polygraph challenge

2/19/2008 08:11:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

I've ignored this story for a month since someone first posted the Video at the EB,
but now the guy's got a lawsuit, and someone to pay him for the polygraph.
We'll see.

When his story was ignored by the news media, Larry Sinclair made his case last
month in a

YouTube video, which has now been viewed more than a quarter-million times.


And when it was still ignored by the media, Sinclair filed a suit in Minnesota

District Court
, alleging threats and intimidation by Obama's staff.

Sinclair, who says he is willing to submit to a polygraph test to validate his
claims, will now get his chance – thanks to
a website offering $10,000 for the right to record it and $100,000 to Sinclair
if he passes.
"My motivation for making this public is my desire for a
presidential candidate to be honest," Sinclair told WND by telephone. "I didn't want the sex thing to come out. But I think it is important for the candidate to be honest about his drug use as late as 1999."

2/19/2008 08:23:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

I kinda think a Republican would get noticed with a story that puts Larry Craig to shame, but that's the way it is, as Walter says.
---
Maybe you notice you sometimes do it yourself?
(apply a double standard)
I do.
The power of the propaganda machine.

2/19/2008 08:36:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

Muslims Against Sharia

2/19/2008 08:43:00 PM  
Blogger Nomenklatura said...

"The Spirit of '68, cackling and wheezing from the closed room which no one goes into."

The election of John McCain would take us back to 1968 for a do-over in another way. That was when the Left abandoned people fighting in Vietnam, including John McCain.

Wikipedia:

"In August of 1968, a program of vigorous torture methods began on McCain, using rope bindings into painful positions, and beatings every two hours, at the same time as he was suffering from dysentery. Teeth and bones were broken again, as was McCain's spirit; the beginning of a suicide attempt was stopped by guards..."

Yes, electing Obama would be an endorsement of 'the spirit of 1968', but equally electing John McCain, pro-US and pro-military then and now, would deliver a stinging and comprehensive repudiation of Left Democratic politics of the past 40 years. Given the age of the boomers, it may even prove to be a final repudiation.

In an attempt to prevent this, expect the media to pull out all the stops trying to destroy McCain before November.

2/19/2008 08:44:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

"The truth will set you free they say, but the truth plus $100,000 will set you even freer. That's the conclusion our good friend Larry Sinclair has come to after considering the offer we made him yesterday: $10,000 to take a polygraph test over his Barack Obama sex and drugs claims, and $100,000 if he passes it.

After communicating via email to work out the logistics of the challenge, we were able to reach an agreement. Now, the plan is to get together with Sinclair and one of the best polygraph experts in the country, and ask him some questions – with the camera rolling, of course. As more details are made available we will post it here."

2/19/2008 08:45:00 PM  
Blogger eggplant said...

"Obama as McGovern?" How about: Obama as Alcibiades?

I am terrified of Obama.

The standard failure mode for a democracy is to be driven into the ground by a demagogue like Obama.

Obama runs such a loose ship that one of his campaign worker moonbats actually displayed a Che Guevarra flag ***and*** allowed a journalist to photograph him.

We knew the Democrat party was malfunctioning when John Kerry got the previous nomination. However this is worse. The Democrat Party's dysfunctional state has become a threat to the nation.

2/19/2008 08:53:00 PM  
Blogger Charles Gitout said...

His chin proudly skyward, with a mere flick of his svelte aristocratic wrists, Obama will part this surly gauntlet of moralists, extortionists, homosexual traitors, anti-sharia muslims, the self-serving employed and the tyranny of the centrist extremists who'd sooner let historians judge us as coarse and crude than take the higher moral road. Michelle Obama was proud to see us look to that road and we should be proud of who showed us the way. And behind Michelle and Barack we shall walk to untold progress in the 21st century.

Gone are the days when Negroponte and Hadley and Poindexter would haunt our dreams, gnashing their teeth as they slinked about, more creatures than men, swiping and clawing at the innocent vanguard, who've only the constitution, bill of rights and the UN charter to defend themselves. But still they kept charging, hurling explosive pyramids of TIA like impossible 8 bit monsters...

When Obama road into town, its doubtful Americans care whether he strode atop a limousine blaring triumphal house music. They were happy to be rescued.

2/19/2008 08:56:00 PM  
Blogger Fat Man said...

"I don't think he's a liberal."

How thin is the air where that dude lives. Hussein is doing a very convincing imitation of a liberal as far as I can see. I guess his definition of a liberal must be someone who makes Kusinich look like a pragmatist.

2/19/2008 09:10:00 PM  
Blogger raymondshaw said...

I would be very leery of giving credence to this Larry Sinclair person. His story doesn't flow very well. Let him prove something, then let the press ask their questions. If he can't prove his allegations, then that is all that he has.

2/19/2008 09:12:00 PM  
Blogger geoffb said...

I thought the "super-delegates" were created to avoid a repetition of the 1972 McGovern nomination.

As for Obama not being liberal, well yeah he's far to the left of that.

2/19/2008 09:27:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

That's how I looked at it too Raymond.
Now it will be much to do about nothing, if so.
Maybe he's not quite right upstairs?
Either that or he's got a brass pair, gay, or not.

2/19/2008 09:27:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

Charles,
The multitudes are overjoyed that the promised arrival of the Anti-Whitaker Chambers has finally come to pass!

2/19/2008 09:31:00 PM  
Blogger Elroy Jetson said...

My first comment on this blog goes first to Mr. Gitout: you should try writing a novel. You do have a talent in painting a picture with words. It's too bad that picture is a nightmare.
The truth is Charles that by the end of a first Obama term, we will be pining for the likes of Negroponte and company. Our enemies will sense that we have elected someone with no spine and they will show no mercy. Taiwan, Kosovo, Lebanon and the Iran-Iraq border will fire up almost simultaneously. Obama will get laughed out of the UN when he goes for the ultimate talk-a-thon in response. The first lady will say it is all because we have lost our souls.

2/19/2008 09:54:00 PM  
Blogger Whiskey said...

Global tax, gun confiscation and ban, racial anti-white politics. Equals blowout loss. BTW, McGovern was 1972, not 68. Hillary = Humphrey, the 68 nominee.

Obama offers angry black nationalism and anti americanism. With I hate America driven appeasement.

2/19/2008 10:11:00 PM  
Blogger Bob said...

Our enemies will know we've elected them a friend.

2/19/2008 10:30:00 PM  
Blogger Unknown said...

"Not a liberal"?? How can Hussein Obama not be a liberal? when he's been rated the numero uno leftmost liberal in the entire Senate? to the left of Barbara Boxer, Carl Levin, Dennis Kucinich, and Ted Kennedy?

The guy who said that must be a fargin' Stalinist.

2/19/2008 11:03:00 PM  
Blogger Bob said...

That's quite the getup you got on there Gitout. You look to be from some other century. Nay, some other age altogether.

2/19/2008 11:03:00 PM  
Blogger Bob said...

We'd better drain and change John's embalming fluid before the debates is all I have to say. Cause this election isn't about rationality.

2/19/2008 11:12:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

Fiesta or Siesta: Does Obama Know the Difference?

ABC News' Sunlen Miller Reports: Barack Obama is not a Spanish speaker, but regularly throws out Spanish phrases out of the campaign trail.

"Si Se Puede" and "Mucho Gusto" are common phrases he feels comfortable saying.

But today in San Antonio, Texas, his limited Spanish might have gotten the best of him as a small difference in words had a huge difference in meaning.

A few people were leaving at the end of his town hall event while Obama was still speaking. Obama chalked that up, unknowingly, to them just wanting to beat traffic so he said goodbye in front of the 3,000 person crowd.

But then said, "We're having a little siesta out here - a little party," as a way to coax them to come back.
---
While Obama gave the 2005 State of the Union Spanish Democratic response in Spanish, the campaign admits it was with much coaching.

Obama also has spoken in Spanish in a few of his campaign TV ads, intended to appeal to Hispanic voters in Nevada and California.
---
Guy can give State of the Union Address in a Language he doesn't know, give voice to other politicians words as though they were his own!
Whatta Guy!

2/19/2008 11:12:00 PM  
Blogger Bob said...

Hasta lumbego.

2/19/2008 11:18:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

Viva la Plaza!

2/19/2008 11:25:00 PM  
Blogger probus said...

charles is such a 'card'-- he thinks he's charles guiteau, the assasin of President James Garfield-- his nickname was charles 'gitout' for reasons u can research on ur own-- charles is wacky as a bedbug for picking this guy for his 'handle'-- guiteau was a failure in every single thing he ever did, except for shooting Garfield (in the back)-- last words by guiteau from the gallows before they hung him: Charles Guiteau
The Prisoner's Last Words
(June 30, 1882)
I am now going to read some verses which are intended to
indicate my feelings at the moment of leaving this world. If set to music they may be rendered very effective. The idea is that of a child babbling to his mamma and his papa. I wrote it this morning about ten o'clock:


I am going to the Lordy, I am so glad,
I am going to the Lordy, I am so glad,
I am going to the Lordy,
Glory hallelujah! Glory hallelujah!
I am going to the Lordy.
I love the Lordy with all my soul,
Glory hallelujah!
And that is the reason I am going to the Lord,
Glory hallelujah! Glory hallelujah!
I am going to the Lord.
I saved my party and my land,
Glory hallelujah!
But they have murdered me for it,
And that is the reason I am going to the Lordy,
Glory hallelujah! Glory hallelujah!
I am going to the Lordy!
I wonder what I will do when I get to the Lordy,
I guess that I will weep no more
When I get to the Lordy!
Glory hallelujah!
I wonder what I will see when I get to the Lordy,
I expect to see most glorious things,
Beyond all earthly conception
When I am with the Lordy!
Glory hallelujah! Glory hallelujah!
I am with the Lord.

"I am Going to the Lordy".

2/20/2008 02:20:00 AM  
Blogger Doug said...

Barack on Drugs

2/20/2008 05:08:00 AM  
Blogger Florentius said...

Once the novelty wears off (and it's wearing off already) I think Obama will crash in a big way.

He's just too phony, too inexperienced, too empty. I'm not a big fan of John McCain, but the differences between he and Barry O are stark.

That said, I thought there was no way Bill Clinton could beat George H. W. Bush in 1992 either...

2/20/2008 08:03:00 AM  
Blogger peterike said...

I fear -- and I do mean fear -- that Obama is going to win this thing. Sure, McCain will attempt to "expose" Obama's extreme Left wing agenda. But that doesn't matter. It's what people want.

Yes. You can't go by what the folks on this blog, who actually understand the true upshot of Leftism, think about things. Eight years of relentless anti-Bush propaganda have worked their magic, and I believe the American electorate have moved sharply if ignorantly Leftward. (Of course, the irony is that Bush governed like a liberal quasi-socialist himself, yet he is now the definition of what "conservative" means to most people.)

Without another major terrorist attack before the election, the defense issue is a non-starter, and mostly a negative for McCain. The ignorant Jon Stewart and Oprah watchers out there really can't think beyond a level of "war bad, no war good."

The economy isn't even close to the picture Obama paints, but his picture is the one in people's heads, again due to the barrage of disinformation they receive.

And as for all that "unity" business, the greatest irony of all perhaps is that the spite, bile and viciousness of the past eight years stems 90% from the Left -- the children of Al Gore, sprung from his head during the 2000 election. Yet they clamour for the hate to end, when all it really takes is for them to shutup for a few minutes and act in a civil manner.

But they want blood, and they want Republican blood, and that's what they'll get. More Democrats in Congress and Obama as president and a crash course in hard-core Leftism for all. The only upside is that a dessicated and rotten Republican party may take those four years in the wilderness to return to their roots. But I doubt even that will happen. They are too far gone.

The Conservative movement always was, as Buckley had it, a bunch of people standing in front of the train of history yelling "stop". But that train has finally run them over and all we can do is watch as it disappears into the distance.

2/20/2008 10:37:00 AM  
Blogger eggplant said...

Peterike said:

"Eight years of relentless anti-Bush propaganda have worked their magic, and I believe the American electorate have moved sharply if ignorantly Leftward."

I agree with Peterike. The damned MSM are playing us like marionettes. They have been almost completely uncritical of Obama and acting as his cheer leaders.

Do these idiots have an agenda other than to bring the United States to ruin? Wouldn't it be "hillarious" that the world's greatest nation was wrecked because its news agencies wanted better ratings?

2/20/2008 10:52:00 AM  
Blogger JimMtnViewCa said...

Obama has some roots of his own in the 60s. I know Billy Ayers when he was a leader in the Weatherman/SDS before they went underground, for example.
Sen Obama, not a liberal. Much more dangerous than that.
http://themoderatevoice.com/media/internet/17879/has-obama-been-sufficiently-vetted-to-survive-the-gop-machine/

2/20/2008 11:18:00 AM  
Blogger Whiskey said...

If all it took was the MSM, Britney and Lindsay and Paris would be starring in huge big-budget movies. The MSM can do the tabloid thing, but has far limited pull. Viewership is down, way down, and those who do watch news/media are older, whiter, and far less liberal.

Obama is a black man who will need at least 25% of the electorate, which is blue collar white males, to win. He's not going to get much of them. Affirmative Action means they're out and someone else of color is in. People won't risk their jobs (in a recession) for status.

Obama draws crowds of young people who DON'T VOTE. Like Obama Girl who couldn't be bothered to vote for him.

Obama is on record for confiscating all handguns and semi-autos rifles, forbidding sale, manufacture, or possession. THAT will have the mother of all NRA get out the vote efforts. He'll lose the South and West decisively. People are not going to hand over their guns, purchased dearly (many handguns can run to $900 or more) to feel good about electing the black guy.

Obama is pushing one legislative effort -- a "global Tax on America" that takes US tax dollars and gives it to foreign countries, aka dictators. This is going to be hugely unpopular because it penalizes Americans during a recession for "ungrateful foreigners."

Obama has said Detroit jobs must go away, and plans to sign Kyoto, sending Manufacturing jobs to China. That's guaranteed to get blue collar union workers AND white collar engineers to vote against him. Regardless of what Union bosses or peers say.

Obama is the candidate of status-seeking, wealthy white yuppies, and minority groups. That's it. It's not a winning coalition. Forget foreign affairs he presents a direct economic threat to people -- by taking away objects purchased dearly or their very jobs to pander to upper class whites and minorities.

Do you honestly think an Ivy League, "elegant" and condescending man who's main message to average white working men is that they are so flawed and evil that they need to vote for him to be "redeemed" is going to win their votes?

No of course not. Winning messages with those guys is that THEY are the bedrock of America, good and noble and hardworking and the candidate embodies THEIR values. Windsurfing in polka-dot wetsuits don't cut it. Neither do other culturally condescending things. Ask Presidents Dukakis and Kerry.

The fact that women "swoon" over Obama is guaranteed to get most blue-white collar men to vote against him. Ask how many are fans of Leo Dicaprio.

McCain's artlessness, lack of sophistication, blue collar "dumbness" to the extent he can cultivate it will win. As long as hits those messages above. And offers that Obama will surrender to AQ and they'll follow us home as in 9/11.

Dems lose because they are culturally from the elite, pander to elite policies which cause non-elites to lose economically and culturally. And disdain any coalition that sacrifices elite positions.

2/20/2008 12:02:00 PM  
Blogger Fred said...

I completely agree with "peterike" in his analysis. The only thing I differ with him about is the death of conservatism that he laments. I don't think it's dead. Definitely in the wilderness, no doubt about that. Newt Gingrich of Georgia for a couple of years now has been expounding his view that the grassroots of the movement has been neglected and not expanded. The Bush clan has something to do with it, but also we are now seeing the fruits of "the long Gramscian march through the institutions." By that I mean that the under-40 crowd has been heavily inundated with indoctrination and with not enough education - all mostly on the taxpayer dime.

It is my belief that both the grassroots of the conservative movement will rebuild, in concert with a calamitous four year term beset with crises, foreign and domestic. This guy Obama is considerably farther to the Left than Jimmy Carter was, and he will be a worse president as well. The country survived it, and people learned a valuable lesson from that experience. But, most of those who learned the lesson are dying off in droves (I am talking about the Reagan Democrats, from the WWII generation), and the Baby Boomers (yours truly being one of the younger cohort of that group)are largely split down the middle as far as the Left is concerned. The decisive factor, I believe, are the GenXers and younger. The generation behind them were not even born yet, or were mere toddlers when Carter was in office. Since history is not a strong suit in their educations, they didn't get that lesson yet.

They are about to get that lesson in a big way. It will fall hard. I think most will draw the proper lesson from it. This IS an important, defining moment in the nation's history. I believe the Left is reaching its high water mark, and hopefully will be discredited. What's frustrating for me, given my own evolution away from the Left many years ago, is that the kids aspire to a kind of Euro-socialism, when across the pond it is failing badly.

Why do we want to imitate failure?

2/20/2008 12:13:00 PM  
Blogger lugh lampfhota said...

I have observed that a lot of working people believe that Republicans are responsible for jobs moving overseas and wages stagnating. They hear Republican and think greedy, overpaid CEO sending their work overseas. Many tell me that I don't make enough money to be a Republican.
That is the perception of young and old, male and female here in the industrial heartland.

These same folks don't neccesarily embrace socialism, but they believe that Republicans just don't care about their fears. They voted overwhelmingly Democrat in 2006-07, unseating Republicans across the board.

Prepare to inaugurate President Obama in 2009.

2/20/2008 12:51:00 PM  
Blogger PeterBoston said...

Small government conservatism is dead and buried if it ever lived beyond the 1800s at all. The opportunity to use the treasury to buy demographic votes is permanently implanted in the system. It is the raison d'etre of the Democrats and the center wing of the Republicans. Corporations, labor unions, foundations, and others use the right to petition the government for legislation they can use to line their own pockets or to bash the competition.

It would take a revolution to change the current state of affairs and there are already too many pigs at the trough to find enough with any interest in that kind of thing. Maybe the most remarkable aspect of the American experiment is that even a little bit of liberty is enough for most men to take and fashion into a decent life.

2/20/2008 12:53:00 PM  
Blogger Whiskey said...

lugh -- will working class people vote for sending more jobs to China for Kyoto and "green jobs" as Obama says he'll do?

Will they give up their guns?

Will they embrace Hollyweird-style elitism?

Will they give up their jobs for Affirmative Action so a Black guy can take their job?

2/20/2008 01:28:00 PM  
Blogger Fred said...

peterboston,

Like a lot of people here in Southern New Hampshire, I had been an Independent at one time, and a Democrat before that, and a socialist before that. Now, I am a Republican and perhaps not quite a conservative one, but closer to that end of the spectrum than the middle. I am not a Republican because I'm into corporate welfare, and all that other miasma. But, I am definitely more realistic about what the world is really like, and I have seen absolutely nothing in the Party of Jackasses that convinces me that they take the new muscularity of the world's oldest surviving totalitarianism seriously. And many never took Communism seriously.

I, too, am one of those people who many would consider "not wealthy enough" to be a Republican.

I believe a period of serious crises is ahead and will disabuse people of their reductionisms.

2/20/2008 01:42:00 PM  
Blogger lugh lampfhota said...

Whiskey...rationality has nothing to do with it. Workers "feel" that Republicans are screwing them. So they "feel" that they need change. Along comes Obama with all his feelings and the rest is history.

WRT to 2nd Amendment, everyone "knows" it is big cities that restrict use and ownership. The Feds uphold the Constitution elsewhere. Local anti-Republicans just don't see a danger of Obama taking their piece.

Elitism? Yawn so long as it isn't rich CEOs.

Affirmitive action? Bitch quietly in umixed company but, again, the Repubs are no better than Dems.

The heartland working class will vote Obama. God help us.

2/20/2008 01:55:00 PM  
Blogger newscaper said...

Fred said
"What's frustrating for me, given my own evolution away from the Left many years ago, is that the kids aspire to a kind of Euro-socialism, when across the pond it is failing badly.

Why do we want to imitate failure?"

Exactly the same phenomenon goes on in public education. I'm in Alabama and you wouldn't believe the way the educrats here are so eager falling all over themselves to embrace the latest education fad out of California every few years to look like they're doing something.

Then about the time we've got it fully implemented even California educrats are givign up on it.

"Whole language" instead of phonics really turned out well, NOT.

2/20/2008 02:07:00 PM  
Blogger PeterBoston said...

fred

There is no basis to believe that there will be fewer federal employees, fewer pages of federal regulations, or a smaller federal budget next year than this year or any year thereafter. If the vitality of conservatism as a political philosophy is based upon shrinking the federal government it's a dead philosophy. Anybody would end up happier learning Classical Greek which would also prove immensely more useful.

Social conservatism is another matter entirely. Because of No.1 the battle to preserve individual liberties in the face of rolling collectivism must be fought every day lest we be overwhelmed by the do-gooders. But even here the battleground is in the legislature and the court house.

2/20/2008 02:18:00 PM  
Blogger RWE said...

The Big Question in regards to Obama is:

1. Is there nothing really under that empty, eloquent Nostradmous-like prose?
2. Or is there something he does not want us to see?

In the case of Hillary it is about 50% of No. 1 and 50% of No. 2.

There is a very good chance that Obama is made of 100% No. 2. And in every sense of the term.

2/20/2008 04:09:00 PM  
Blogger newscaper said...

rwe,

I agree about door #2 WRT Obama. far too many think "empty suit" whereas I see a deeper than usual level of deception at work.

People, even his many of his critics, tend to look at you funny.

2/20/2008 05:20:00 PM  
Blogger Whiskey said...

Lugh -- I seriously doubt that white working/middle class men are going to vote for Barack Hussein Obama. Given his explicit racialism, and his wife/pastor/associates going on to radical rhetoric.

Moreover, Bill Clinton felt that Gun Control LOST Al Gore the election. Gore concurred. Obama's own statements will be everywhere you may count on it -- and people have too much capital invested in their guns to give them up.

And the backers of Obama, being socially elite will turn people off. Just like media embrace of Lindsay, Britney, Paris etc. creates it's own backlash.

To get elected, a Presidential candidate must pretend to be embodiment of the average guy, and his goals and values. That's not Obama and never will be. Obama is the rock star of the Left, but that's a self-limiting position.

EMOTIONALLY as well as rationally he's a threat to the average white guy. Particularly those with substantial amounts of blacks and racial strife from cutting a limited pie into spoils politics.

NYC after David Dinkins has not elected another Black Mayor. Nor has Chicago after Harold Washington. Even if it means in NYC voting a Republican into office. That alone should tell you something.

Because Obama is the candidate of the media, Hollywood, Union Leadership, and trendy-hip yuppies the Dunkin Donuts crowd will vote against him the same way they loathe Starbucks.

2/20/2008 05:42:00 PM  
Blogger Alexis said...

It's not just any politician who can inspire people by blowing his nose.

Interestingly, I've never been able to blow my own nose in such an uplifting way.

2/20/2008 07:18:00 PM  
Blogger Charles said...

The great skill of obama is to not to paint word pictures but rather to draw a white screen upon which his listeners can conjure any thing they like.

2/20/2008 07:28:00 PM  
Blogger Mad Fiddler said...

"The Whole World is WATCHING!"

"The Whole World is WATCHING!"

"The Whole World is WATCHING!"

"The Whole World is WATCHING!"

"The Whole World is WATCHING!"

(Recalling the Democratic National Convention of '68...)

"La plus ça change, la plus c’est la même chose..."

2/20/2008 10:27:00 PM  
Blogger Mad Fiddler said...

Wake up, Mister Gitout; if you think the United Nations actually gives a shit about justice, or protection of the weak, provision of care to refugees, or opposition to tyrants, torture, corruption, pimping, drugs, rape, child abuse, malnutrition, global warming, AIDS, illiteracy, or incorrectly labeled food products, you really are a sad little excuse for a thinking person.

If you'd bothered to read even the Leftward-hurtling "Blame Bush for Everything" New York Times, you would have noted that even Pimple Sulzberger and his trained monkeys have acknowledged the following:

• Bush actually won EVERY SINGLE RECOUNT of the Florida portion of the 2000 presidential election.

• Not a SINGLE Democratic Party Senator was willing to be recorded voting in favor of the Kyoto Accord when it was submitted to the Senate; it was rejected by a vote of 95 - 0 (Look up the Byrd-Hagel Resolution, Senate Resolution 98.) Al Gore later made the TOKEN gesture of signing the piece of trash, but President "I-can't-control-my-own-willie" never bothered to submit the treaty to a Senate which had already made it clear they would embarrass him if he did.

• Koffi Annan as Secretary-General of the United Nations allowed the so-called "Oil-for-Food" program to be abused by scores of his friends and even his own son, lining their pockets with money that was supposed to be going to aid the Iraqi people; especially allowing Saddam to piss away hundreds of millions of dollars on more palaces, fortresses, hidey holes, prostitutes, liquor, whatnot. This went on for most of ten years, and Annan and his UN mafia insisted throughout that the United Nations was not subject to any other monitoring authority, nor required to make any public accounting of its finances. (That's particularly rich considering it's the United States that have throughout the life of the United Nations paid more than half its expenses.) Finally, as the United States was ready to actually enforce the sanctions that the U.N. Security Council had been issuing for years, the U.N. admitted that it may have been a teeny bit sloppy in administering the program, which would inevitably have come to light as a result of the imminent invasion anyway.

• It was the United States through its Naval ships and helicopters, with many hundreds of ship's crew and 200 combat engineers *And* $350 Million that delivered the greatest portion of aid to the victims of the December 2004 tsunami in the immediate aftermath, NOT the United Nations. The stinking bureaucrats of the United Nations flew in on their chartered jets, accompanied by hundreds of stenographers and photographers to record their highly important speeches about the importance of setting up commissions to study the disaster, with a view to making certain recommendations toward the development of plans to ameliorate the suffering of the victims descendants, if any. They occupied the best rooms available, using tons of electrical generators that might have helped the over-burdened hospitals with the tens of thousands of injured victims, instead cooling their rooms, making ice cubes for their drinks, and powering the fax machines and satellite uplinks, which allowed them to (a) get sodden drunk for their partying while flunkies wrote up glowing reports of their brave and self-sacrificing efforts on behalf of the world's victims, to be (b) faxed and (c) beamed to breathless news organizations round the world.

• In the last fifteen years hundreds of United Nations staff and troops have been documented by investigations reported by the BBC, AP, and UPI in many countries as pedophiles, torturers, rapists, and participants in the widespread trafficking and use of children and refugee women as forced sex workers.

And what the hell was that slur against "homosexual traitors?" How does revealing the truth make someone a traitor? (If it's not truth, he'll be exposed NOT as a traitor, but as a LIAR.) Anyway, since when does the Left abandon its embrace and celebration of homosexuality? So what if Obama likes men? It's not his sexuality that will destroy the country --- it's his inability to grasp that Islamic Jihad is a mortal danger to the West and all the freedoms that have been secured by the blood, toil, and sacrifices of millions of Westerners.

What an utter waste of effort to argue with someone too dim-witted to even acknowledge facts from sources he agrees with.

Charles Gitout is probably one of the regular commenters here anyhow, just stirring things up.

Grrrrr.

2/21/2008 12:52:00 AM  
Blogger mouse said...

The question most people have is not if the Obama bubble will burst but when, and how do you go about giving it a poke.

Hillary can't believe she's losing to this guy. Empty suit, empty rhetoric, and no wonky knowledge at all. Still, he's effective, so she's adopted his mantra, "change". Unfortunately, change mostly means getting rid of Hillary. She's personally as unpleasant to a normal Democrat as she is to a Republican. As she calls for change she calls for a vote for Obama.

Change also means getting rid of Republicans. Not the party, but the world they have created. The Obama devotee knows that the world is Republican, and they know that the world is bad. Get rid of the Republican and the lion will lie down with the lamb.

Unfortunately, Hillary can't do that. Every time she calls on her experience she identifies herself as establishment, the well meaning part, for certain, but the same political part that has created this very bad world we live in.

Obama, however, is outside of experience, and outside of policy. He is not of this world. His only message is transformation. The Democrats have found their messiah.

This is nuts of course, but how do you pop the bubble of the savior?

Who says you have to pop it? How many people in the general election are going to vote for the second coming? Obama in the primaries is probably getting nearly the vote he's going to get in the general.

There are more Americans who are sane than are nuts, though the nuts we will have always with us.

2/21/2008 02:22:00 AM  
Blogger peterike said...

Obama = Manchurian Candidate

2/21/2008 05:43:00 PM  
Blogger Moneyrunner said...

Let’s be honest. Barak Obama may be an inspiring speaker mouthing empty platitudes, but the real reason he is the leading contender for the Democratic nomination is the fact that the heir-apparent to the nomination got her husband involved. The Clintons were under the impression that the country could hardly wait for the return of Team Clinton. But things have changed since Bill and Hillary took the White House furniture and departed for Chappaqua.

For one thing, Bill Clinton lost his “charm” and showed the mean streak that was carefully cloaked during his first presidency. Combine that with the fact that Hillary by herself is has all the rhetorical skills of a high school valedictorian; when the Deadly Duo hit the campaign trail and exposed themselves to the American people the response was “anyone but Billary.”

So why not Edwards? Simple, on a national level, class warfare really does not sell well. It may rock the rubes in the backwoods hollows and urban slums where poverty is always someone else’s fault. But on the national stage where most people consider themselves middle class, putting it to “the man” does not get majority support, especially when the message comes from an oily trial lawyer with a band new multi-million dollar mansion and a $400 haircut.

So the race for the nomination is being lost by Billary and Obama is the improbable beneficiary of this self-immolation.

And this is a danger for the Democrats, because they are about to nominate an empty suit. I could not be more happy about this because no matter what happens, the MSM is going to go all out to support whoever gets the Democrat’s nod. The hit job on John McCain in the NY Times today is only an example of what the general election will be like.

2/21/2008 06:32:00 PM  

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