The Morning Dose today comes from a guest post by Scan over at Taylor Marsh, titled, What It's All About:
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I think we need to take a step back from this contentious primary season and remember what is really important.
All the debates, all this inter-party strife, all the "hit diaries" on behalf of both candidates, all the controversy about race and gender issues, and everything else we've been talking about for the past year...all of it will not matter a year from now. The only thing of true significance is what happens on November 4th, 2008. The only thing that matters is whether or not we will have a conservative Republican running the country for the next 4-8 years, or a progressive Democrat there instead. I don't need to list all the reasons why, but it's the difference between:
*No end in sight for our involvement in Iraq, or a swift withdrawal
*A Supreme Court full of Alitos and Scalias, or one full of Ginsburgs and Breyers.
*A continuation of Bush economics, or digging ourselves out from it
*Environmental issues on the back burner, or front-and-center
*The status quo indefinitely, or universal health care for all Americans
I had a conversation with a pro-Obama coworker just before the New Hampshire primary. At that time, I was for Hillary but Barack was my second choice, and I was prepared to back him strongly if it became clear it was over for Clinton. But I told my coworker that there was one clear, strong reason why I was so solidly pro-Hillary: My brain and my gut were telling me that she could definitely beat the Republicans in November, and I simply could not say the same thing about Obama. There was just too much we didn't know about him, and the stakes were too high for me to take that risk. That, and the Clintons don't know how to lose.
I see echoes of 2004 in our current election season. Back then, I saw one candidate that could have easily beaten Bush. That candidate was Wes Clark. When it became clear that John Kerry was on his way to the nomination, I saw him as a strong but beatable candidate, and all I could say to the Democrats of Iowa and New Hampshire was "Umm, guys...I hope you know what you're doing here." And sure enough, our hearts were eventually broken. I still firmly believe that if Clark was our nominee back then, he would be our president right now and perhaps coasting his way to reelection. There's no way to prove it, it's just what I think.
The point I am getting to is this: It has become clear to me that Obama will not be elected president. If he goes against McCain, he will lose. I've been leaning towards this line of thinking for about about a month now, but the controversy surrounding Rev. Wright has sealed the deal. I'm not sure that everyone appreciates just how deadly this sort of stuff is. His ties to him are deep, profound, influential, and probably unbreakable. To have such inflammatory and offensive rhetoric as "God Damn America!" and "U.S. of KKK A." coming from Obama's spiritual adviser and mentor is deeply troubling to the average American voter and should not be dismissed.
I had an interesting talk with my mom about this a couple of nights ago. She lives in Anson Texas, a small conservative town just north of Abilene (where I grew up). She is deeply religious and conservative (very common for Anson) but is not dizzy with love for McCain, either. As soon as I mentioned something about politics, she immediately wanted to talk about Obama and his pastor. She was completely outraged about it. Despite living in a small town in Texas and not being an avid viewer of cable news, she knew quite a lot about the situation. For instance, she knew that Obama had listened to Rev. Wright's tapes even in his youth at Harvard. Somewhat compassionately, I thought, she said she attempted to look at this in an understanding way but simply could not. I got the feeling that this was definitely the political talk of the town, and if Anson Texas is at all representative of small-town America, this is a big deal and big trouble for Obama. This may be tough for some to hear, but the truth is he might as well be Farrakhan to a great many people at this point. And the more people talk about this, the worse it will get, I believe. So I asked her, as a Republican, who she would choose if the options were only Clinton and Obama. "Hillary, in a heartbeat" she said. This coming from a woman who has HATED Clintons unabated since 1992.
I take no joy in the downfall of Obama. I will never forget where I was when he delivered his '04 Convention speech. It brought me to my feet and brought tears to my eyes. It was the best political speech of my adult life(...)
(...)These were the words of a future president, I thought. But it is clear that his campaign has not lived up to these words. As soon as I saw his co-chair on national television the day after New Hampshire questioning why Hillary did not cry for Katrina victims, but did cry over her physical appearance, I knew that his convention speech was just words...just a speech. And as soon as the information regarding Rev. Wright and Rezko came to light, I knew he did not have the judgment to be elected by the American people, or even to be the kind of president we need him to be.
But the good news is that we have another Democratic candidate in this race that can and will win in November.
That person is Mike Gravel.
....just kidding. It's Hillary.
If a progressive Democrat as president from 2009-2017 sounds like a good idea to you, I believe the time may be arriving to unite behind a candidate that can win and save our beloved country from the brink of disaster.
Madame President?
2 comments :
Keep slinging the mud guys!! The only one it seems to be hurting is the Clintonistas!!
Washington Post
Wednesday, April 16, 2008; Page A01
Sen. Barack Obama holds a 10-point lead over Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton when Democrats are asked whom they would prefer to see emerge as the party's presidential nominee, but there is little public pressure to bring the long and increasingly heated contest to an end, according to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll.
The fierce battle, however, appears to have taken a toll on the image of Clinton, who was once seen as the favorite. And Obama has widened his lead since early February on several key qualities that voters are looking for in a candidate and has narrowed sizable advantages for Clinton on others.
He now has a 2-to-1 edge on who is considered more electable in a general contest -- a major reversal from the last poll -- and has dramatically reduced a large Clinton lead on which of the two is the "stronger leader."
While Clinton retains a big edge over Obama on experience, public impressions of her have taken a sharply negative turn. Today, more Americans have an unfavorable view of her than at any time since The Post and ABC began asking the question, in 1992. Impressions of her husband, former president Bill Clinton, also have grown negative by a small margin.
In the new poll, 54 percent said they have an unfavorable view of Sen. Clinton, up from 40 percent a few days after she won the New Hampshire primary in early January. Her favorability rating has dropped among both Democrats and independents over the past three months, although her overall such rating among Democrats remains high. Nearly six in 10 independents now view her unfavorably.
Obama's favorability rating also has declined over the same period but remains, on balance, more positive than negative.
The findings come as the two contenders prepare to meet tonight in Philadelphia for their first debate in more than a month and their final direct encounter before Tuesday's Pennsylvania primary. The exchange will begin at 8 p.m. Eastern time and will air on ABC News.
A likely centerpiece of the debate will be a controversy over comments Obama made April 6 at a San Francisco fundraiser in which he described residents of economically hard-hit small towns as "bitter" and said they "cling" to guns or religion. The Clinton campaign quickly seized the opportunity to tag Obama as an elitist who is out of touch with the values of rural America.
Obama said that while he may have chosen his words poorly, he was correct in saying that many Americans in these communities are rightly angry about the failure of the government and politicians to do more to improve economic conditions in their areas. His campaign also released an ad yesterday that criticizes Clinton. The spot opens with a narrator saying: "There's a reason people are rejecting Hillary Clinton's attacks. Because the same old Washington politics won't lower the price of gas or help our struggling economy. Barack Obama will represent all Americans."
Overall, 51 percent of Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents said they would prefer to see Obama win the nomination and face Sen. John McCain, the presumptive Republican nominee, in the November general election; 41 percent would rather have Clinton atop the Democratic ticket. Post-ABC polling just before Clinton won the Ohio primary and the popular vote in the Texas primary on March 4 showed nearly the same results.
In hypothetical general-election matchups, Obama holds a slim, five-point lead over McCain, while McCain is three points ahead of Clinton, which is within poll's margin of error. But in the past six weeks, McCain has gained ground on each of his potential rivals.
Obama 'Gets It' on Trade
Maybe being accused of being an "elitist" is a good thing.
After taking hits from Democratic primary foe Hillary Clinton and presumptive Republican presidential nominee John McCain for suggesting, somewhat clumsily, that Americans who are suffering economically may turn "bitter," Barack Obama has come back with a speech that goes to the heart of the current crisis.
Speaking on trade policy to the Alliance for American Manufacturing today in Pittsburgh this morning, the Illinois senator said what he has been needing to say for more than a month: He understands that America needs a new approach to trade -- an approach that breaks with those of the Bush and Clinton administrations -- if this country is going to begin to address its many economic challenges.
And he did it in the context of the current debate about elitism.
"Senator Clinton and Senator McCain are singing from the same hymn book, saying that I'm 'out of touch' – an 'elitist' – because I said a lot of folks are bitter about their economic circumstances," Obama explained. "Now it may be that I chose my words badly. It wasn't the first time and it won't be the last. But when I hear my opponents, both of whom have spent decades in Washington, saying I'm out of touch, it's time to cut through their rhetoric and look at the reality."
The rhetoric -- especially Clinton's remake of herself as a populist champion of fair-trade responses that she opposed as the first lady, a senate candidate and a senator -- is designed to suggest that Obama is not in tune with workers who have seen their jobs, their industries and their communities devastated by trade policies that favored Wall Street over Main Street.
But Obama is not willing to accept the characterization. And he has challenged it with a speech that -- while it certainly will not get parallel coverage -- is important as his recent addresses of racial division and foreign policy.
"Senator Clinton and Senator McCain question my respect for the workers of Pennsylvania. Well, let me tell you how I believe you demonstrate your respect. You do it by telling the truth and keeping your word, so folks can know that where you stand today is where you'll stand tomorrow," said Obama. "The truth is, trade is here to stay. We live in a global economy. For America's future to be as bright as our past, we have to compete. We have to win."
Then Obama did something that rarely happens in the trade debate.
He spoke to worried American employers and workers as adults.
He treated their concerns seriously.
He said:
Not every job that has left is coming back. And not every job lost is due to trade –automation has made plants more efficient so they can make the same amount of steel with few workers. These are the realities.
I also don't oppose all trade deals. I voted for two of them because they have the worker and environmental agreements I believe in. Some of you disagreed with me on this but I did what I thought was right.
That's the truth. But let me tell you what else I believe in:
For America to win, American workers have to win, too. If CEO pay keeps rising, while the standard of living for their workers continues to decline, that's not a win for America.
That's why I opposed NAFTA, it's why I opposed CAFTA, and it's why I said any trade agreement I would support had to contain real, enforceable standards for workers.
That's why I believe the Permanent Normalized Trade agreement with China didn't do enough to ensure fairness and compliance.
Now, you can have a debate about whether my position is right or wrong. But here's what you can't do. You can't spend the better part of two decades campaigning for NAFTA and PNTR for China, and then come here to Pennsylvania, and tell the steelworkers you've been with them all along. You can't say you are opposed to the Columbia Trade deal, while your key strategist is working for the Columbian government to get the deal passed.
That's not respect. That's just more of the same old Washington politics. And we can't afford more of the same.
We need real change, and that's what I'm offering. I'm offering a new, more transparent and more inclusive path on trade so we can help promote an integrated global economy where the costs and benefits are distributed more equitably. And it starts with a principle I've always believed in – that trade should work for all Americans.
That's why we need to finally confront the issue of trade with China. As I've said before, America and the world can benefit from trade with China. But trade with China will only be good for you if China itself plays by the rules and acts as a positive force for balanced world growth.
Seeing the living standards of the Chinese people improve is a good thing – good because we want a stable China, and good because China can be a powerful market for American exports. But too often, China has been competing in ways that are tilting the playing field.
It's not just that China is following the path taken by so many other countries before it, and dumping goods into our market while not opening their own markets, something I've spoken out against. It's not just that they're violating intellectual property rights. They're also grossly undervaluing their currency, and giving their goods yet another unfair advantage. Each year they've had the chance, the Bush administration has failed to do anything about this. That's unacceptable. That's why I co-sponsored the Currency Exchange Rate Oversight Reform Act. And that's why as President, I'll use all the diplomatic avenues open to me to insist that China stop manipulating its currency.
We also have to make sure that whatever goods we're importing are safe for our families. We all saw the harm that was caused by lead toys from China that were reaching our store shelves. A few months ago, when I called for a ban on any toys that have more than a trace amount of lead, an official at China's foreign ministry said I was being "unobjective, unreasonable, and unfair." But I don't think protecting our children is "unreasonable" – I think it's our obligation as parents and as Americans.
When it comes to trade, there's no one-size-fits-all approach. If countries are committed to reciprocity, if they are abiding by basic rules of the road, then we should welcome trade. Many poor countries need access to our markets and pose no threat to our workers.
But what all trade agreements I negotiate as President will have in common is that they'll all put American workers first. We won't ignore violence against union organizers in Columbia, or the non-tariff barriers that keep U.S. cars out of South Korea.
And we won't just negotiate fair trade agreements, we'll make sure they're being fully enforced. George Bush has been far too slow to press American rights. That's an outrage. When our trading partners sign an agreement with the Obama administration, you can trust that we'll hold them to it.
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