Karol,

I'd like to believe you, I really would. However, there are two things I believe:

1.) Obama is not going to remain an empty suit for the next 7 months.

2.) McCain's accomplishments will not trump Obama's appeal to the younger generation.

I think #2 is key. Yes, "youth vote has never materialized," blah, blah, blah. As I've said before, it only has to happen once. More importantly, all the times the youth vote hasn't happened before, I think aforementioned youths didn't vote in the primary either. Not the case at the moment.

Finally, I think you're speaking from the persepctive of someone who has been taught things like morals, responsibility, historical significance of choices, etc., etc.. On the other hand, I'd argue that there are a significant number of folks who don't appreciate that various parties promised change to the Russian people in 1917, and that's what precipitated the various revolutions. Then the Bolsheviks showed up with the knives and commitment and there was all sorts of change.

McCain's "accomplishments" are mostly too far back for people to remember or, for that matter, they may not agree with. Moreover, he's got the right approach on national security but I think many Americans are tired of being at war, constant reminders that there are folks out to kill us and, most of all, just not that concerned with the allegedly conservative agenda when they have the price of everything going up while their wages remain the same. Especially since the GOP in Washington (a group that includes McCain) seems to be content to do everything possible to just p*ss the base off. Anyone wonder why Shadegg is hanging it up? Read his press release and in it you will see the seeds of what could grow to be a full-blown defeat come November.

"his 25+ years in Congress have produced actual, tangible results"

In the immortal words of Arnold Schwarzenegger (before he went soft), "Yes, but they were all bad!"

He can't not be an empty suit. Plus, when he does speak to issues, he shows himself as a leftist. It'll be much easier to dismantle his points than Hillary's rather moderate ones.

The biggest problem with the Obama candidacy, again, is that when he loses it will be because we're all racists and now because he is completely vacant. I'm not looking forward to race relations being set back in this way.

Yeah, the race relations issue is one I'm seriously not happy about. Especially as the media is already prepping this narrative with regards to their reporting on the Dem primary voting.

We'll see on the issues. I'm not even sure if the whole leftist thing is as much a kiss of death as it has been previously. John Kerry was about as left as you can get--and he basically only lost through a succession of own goals.

To his credit, Obama does have his take on the issues on his website. Of course, the Achilles heel there is that not everyone has a computer and/or Internet access.

I'll be surprised if the same rhetoric is out in front after the DNC.

Karol is in complete denial...the only hope the Republicans had was the huckster...he can actually inspire people...he can actually debate people....McCain is old and angry...I'll support him, but obama will win the election easily...unless he makes mistakes.

If he can be nominated, he can win. And if he can win, he can certainly drive us all mad with those self-righteous circular lectures he's so adept at giving while his fanbase of hope-mongers run around waving his little book of quotations at us.

I think if we successfully define Obama as the left wing nut that he is, we can win.

However, I still assert that Hillary would be easier to beat. She has enormously high negatives, she has little endearing charisma, and the Clintons back in the White House would be the best "get out the vote" motivation that conservatives would have.

That's been precisely my point on HRC--she's got all the charisma of an annoyed cottonmouth. Don't believe me? Watch her go on the attack between now and March 4th and you'll understand why I firmly believed Clinton Part III: Bypassing the 23rd would have been an excellent fight for the GOP.

Killing Hope: The Candidate will be a lot trickier, especially since the chosen slayer is a cranky old guy one or two barbs away from blowing his top.

I have to agree with James.

With the exception of Bill Clinton pretty much every Dem. nominee since McGovern-who actually wasn't as far-left as his successors-has been a byproduct of the 60s.

I don't think Obama's Kandy-kolored socialism and barely suppressed antipathy for America are much different from Kerry's personal views. The only major distinction between the two candidates being that Obama is much more charismatic and likely to accomplish his nebulous goals.

The interesting aspect of the Obamas is how two buppies have successfully portrayed themselves as victims of Jim Crow and the black codes, as if Michelle Obama not getting the federal government to subsidize her student loans to an Ivy League university is comparable to John Lewis getting his skull fractured by a state trooper from Alabama during his march over the Edmund Pettus Bridge. Barack Obama is somehow the moral equivalent of James Farmer because of the fact that white Iowans voted for him in a statewide caucus.

"Yes, but they were all bad!"

bahahahahahahahah

Clareified motto: Better Obama than McCain

"An empty suit can never become president."

Jimmy Carter part duex?

"I think #2 is key. Yes, "youth vote has never materialized," blah, blah, blah. As I've said before, it only has to happen once. More importantly, all the times the youth vote hasn't happened before, I think aforementioned youths didn't vote in the primary either. Not the case at the moment."

Are more youths voting in primaries now than in 2004? Yes, overall its up a few percent. A few percent more than the miserable 2004 and previous presidential primaries. It could be 100% increase and it still wouldn't mean much when you look at the raw numbers of voters. A 500% increase of nothing is still zero.

Most of my friends are wacko left wing lunatics (gimme a break, I live in NY). They talk a really big game about Obama. They really convinced me that they cared, with their teary eyed rhetoric about Change and Hope, and their indignant wrath at the current administration and the GOP in general.

Can they get out to vote though?

No, They Can't.

Not a single one of the 15 or so super Obama supporters I know actually voted in the primary. They all had some stupid excuse. Half thought their vote didn't matter (obviously not understanding the DNC delegate process), some said they never registered, and others had really lame excuses like they forgot, or were busy.

They talk big, and get very emotional about the upcoming election, but it's votes that matter, not rhetoric. In that way, I guess they are much like the candidate they support - all talk, no substance.

Obama remained an empty suit for his entire Senatoral election (primary and general).

Perpahs Obama is waiting for McCain to get a divorce from Cindy? That's the only way Obama has been winning apparantly.

Ah yes the 25 plus years of Washington experience will save McCain.....

Because experience did so well for Al Gore, Bob Dole, and Bush 41 back in 1992.....seriously look at Bush's 92 campaign. He had pissed off conservatives and kept talking about his experience. McCain can learn what not to do from it (and don't give me the Perot excuse-Bush would have needed 2 out of 3 of them and most of them would have stayed home).

Obama may be an empty suit but he is taking on the dirtiest player in the game (and his wife) and doing well so far. I don't think we should underestimate him. And McCain's demand to stay in Iraq for a century is going to be played over and over again. That may be music to the neocon sons of neocons on the East Side and the Beltway (we should call them neptocons) but it won't play well at Walmarts, the burbs and the heartland.

What was Jimmy Carter, then, if not an empty suit? We've got some real problems.

Just one example.
Sorry this is probably to too long for most of the closed minds here.

Consider a bill into which Obama clearly put his heart and soul.

The problem he wanted to address was that too many confessions, rather than being voluntary, were coerced -- by beating the daylights out of the accused.
Obama proposed requiring that interrogations and confessions be videotaped.
This seemed likely to stop the beatings, but the bill itself aroused immediate opposition. There were Republicans who were automatically tough on crime and Democrats who feared being thought soft on crime. There were death penalty abolitionists, some of whom worried that Obama's bill, by preventing the execution of innocents, would deprive them of their best argument. Vigorous opposition came from the police, too many of whom had become accustomed to using muscle to "solve" crimes. And the incoming governor, Rod Blagojevich, announced that he was against it.
Obama had his work cut out for him.
He responded with an all-out campaign of cajolery. It had not been easy for a Harvard man to become a regular guy to his colleagues. Obama had managed to do so by playing basketball and poker with them and, most of all, by listening to their concerns. Even Republicans came to respect him. One Republican state senator, Kirk Dillard, has said that "Barack had a way both intellectually and in demeanor that defused skeptics."
The police proved to be Obama's toughest opponent. Legislators tend to quail when cops say things like, "This means we won't be able to protect your children." The police tried to limit the videotaping to confessions, but Obama, knowing that the beatings were most likely to occur during questioning, fought -- successfully -- to keep interrogations included in the required videotaping.
By showing officers that he shared many of their concerns, even going so far as to help pass other legislation they wanted, he was able to quiet the fears of many.
Obama proved persuasive enough that the bill passed both houses of the legislature, the Senate by an incredible 35 to 0. Then he talked Blagojevich into signing the bill, making Illinois the first state to require such videotaping."
Getting legislation like this passed is a real achievement. Getting it passed unanimously is nothing short of astonishing.
Mark Kleiman, who knows this stuff extremely well, put it best:
"1. Obama was completely right, and on an issue directly relevant to the more recent debates about torture. Taping interrogations is an issue that really only has one legitimate side, since there's no reason to think it prevents any true confessions, while it certainly prevents false confessions (over and above the legal and moral reasons for disapproving of police use of "enhanced interrogation methods").
2. Pursuing it had very little political payoff, as evidenced by the fact that Obama has not (as far as I know) so much as mentioned this on the campaign. Standing up for the rights of accused criminals in a contemporary American legislature requires brass balls.
3. Getting it through required both courage and skill. The notion that Obama is "too nice" to get things done can hardly survive this story: he won't face tougher or less scrupulous political opponents than the self-proclaimed forces of law and order. Yes, in this case the change was helpful to the cause of crime control, since every innocent person imprisoned displaces a guilty person. But that didn't make the politics of it any easier."

An empty suit can never become president.

You mean I just imagined the last seven years?

I'm actually pondering the idea of Obama not as an empty suit, but rather a blank slate, for whom the populace will line up for a chance to stamp their own image of the idealized president of their own conception on.

Who could resist such temptation?

To root for the guy they can "believe in", because he mirrors their own "hopes" and "dreams" right back at them?

Steve M, get a life other than the lies. Not one quarter that hasn't shown growth and historical low unemployment. I hope you have a good time living on Hope in a totally destroyed economy if the Arab (6.25% black doesn't qualify as black) Obama is elected. He is also a believer in the UK style of 'free' medical care which now requires some patients to stay in the ambulance in front of the ER for hours to prevent the ER from looking bad because they can't treat the patient. Maybe dying in the back of an ambulance when medical care should be available (and is currently in the U.S) is acceptable to you, if you are a true democrat, aka idiot.

My Republican friends that are worried about Obama should look to the fact that there's over 7 months between now and election day.

They should be. That gives McCain more time to flipflop on issues to appeal to everyone. Obama won't do that.

The hope and change blah blah will start to grate.

No, it won't. That's what people want to hear. It inspired 2,000 people in Texas to walk 7.3 miles to vote recently. If you don't see how Obama is energizing voters, you're blind.

He will be challenged on actual accomplishments.

I'm betting his campaign has a strategy for that sort of challenge, just like they've quietly been putting out his proposals on issues while his opponents have been calling him an "empty suit" or talking about his lack of experience.

I want us to run against Obama.

If I'm looking for a GOP win, I want to run against Hillary more than Obama. Hillary is an opponent who has concrete points that can be refuted and a reputation which preceeds her. Obama represents change, has less concrete points to attack, and is the complete opposite of McCain in almost every way. Most importantly, Obama is causing Democratic voters to show in en masse and he's also getting Independents to vote for him. Winning a Presidency is a numbers game, and I don't see how McCain can combat Obama's ability to get people to vote.

Gerard -Accusing Obama of "barely concealed antipathy for America"? Let's make up our minds here - he can be a big old false hope monger, OR he can be anti-American(c'mon now -really?! His super duper patriotism for the masses is part of his(gasp horror)crossover appeal), but the two together don't really gel now do they. If we're pillorying the guy let's at least get things straight.

he can be a big old false hope monger, OR he can be anti-American

I fail to see how those things are mutually exclusive. In fact, I think both describe Obama pretty well. Take all the talk of "hope" out of his speeches, and you get the sense that he doesn't care for this country all that much. Not that he hates it, exactly, just that he sees it as deeply, deeply flawed (but he's just the one who can change all that!).

Also, there's no such thing as having "patriotism for the masses". Patriotism is love of country, not a strong willingness to pander to a certain group of people over others.

Scrapiron,

I find it ironic that you're telling someone to get a life and stop believing in lies when, judging from your post, you're running around with not one but several fish hooks in your mouth.
One, while it speaks volumes about your intellect that it even matters, Obama's racial makeup has quite a bit more than 6.25% black. I'd be interested to see what crack team of genealogists provided you with that information. Actually, I wouldn't, as I'm sure they used to write newsletters for Ron Paul. Regardless, if you're best argument is "he's an Arab" then this is going to be a worst a**-whuppin' come November than I thought. It's going to be hard enough to overcome the, "Vote for Obama or you're a racist"-meme and knuckleheads who keep quoting what percentage of what race the man is are doing the Dem's work for them.

Second, the UK health care crisis has as much to do with the professional flight they are experiencing as any flaws with the system. Trying to cite occassional anecdotes as an example of why people shouldn't be behind a system, while scoring the occasional snarky point, isn't going to persuade anyone who doesn't have readily available, cheap insurance _not_ to vote for Obama. After all, if you're like several poor people I know, the fact that you're even in the ambulance is a step up. However, when you point out that attempting to apply the UK health care system to the United States will bankrupt our government in about a decade unless taxes are raised tends to make them reconsider. But, hey, you just keep on keeping on with the scare tactics, and I'll keep on hoping that you're not a McCain policy writer.

Finally, last time I checked, it was an article of GOP faith that the president had nothing to do with the economy in at least two elections ('92 and '96). Magically, this changed in 2000 and 2004. Personally, I think the President has about as about as much direct effect on the economy as he has on the weather (a Keynesian I am not) other than providing intelligent, steadfast leadership from the bully pulpit. In this case, I'm sorry, the current Chief Executive has been a bit of an empty suit. Gee, we have a sub-prime crisis that was based on cheap credit, wild speculation, and people who had no business getting easy money being provided with it in butt loads. Hey, I know, let's borrow even more money to give taxpayers a stimulus (WTF? Oh, thanks for giving me my money back!), start tossing around a "bailout" plan, and generally have the government run around like chickens with their heads cut off rather than letting the market adjust itself.

On second thought, I take that back, Bush has not been an empty suit. Instead, he's been someone who seems to have forgotten what his job is, which is to lead. Sometimes leadership means stopping the panic, even if it makes people unhappy. In my heart, I think that McCain has a far greater chance of making that happen. Unfortunately, in my head, I think that Obama has a far greater ability to make enough people _think_ he will cause that to happen. If the best the Republicans have is "He's an Arab!" (Subtext: Oh, the brown peril! The brown peril! Grab your wives and daughters!) and "The economy will be doomed!" then, sorry, I think more people are tired of being afraid than there are folks who may see the incorrectness of the man's policies before it's too late.

Steve M, get a life other than the lies.

No, Scrapiron, Steve M. is right. Bush won two elections on the basis of his rhetorical skills alone. We all know he's one of the best communicators in the world.

Pokerwolf, I think it will be difficult to paint McCain as a flipflopper. Lord knows I've got my problems with the man but it's not because he isn't consistent, it's because he isn't consistenly conservative.

If you don't see how Obama is energizing voters, you're blind.

I see how he's energizing Democratic primary voters, sure. Again, the general is a very different beast.

Ok, you got me, I am sure that Obama really does hate the country that he has thus far devoted his life to improving, as opposed to lining his own pockets with oil money or special interest groups. He doesn't make people feel fear or anger to manipulate their patriotism, he calls on people to rise above being petty and divisive and take back patriotism from those who would give it a narrow definition that excludes many. He's already been called and Arab and a "buppy" in these comments, I really don't think more needs to be said on the moral integrity of these attacks. By all means try to tear apart his policies, which are not as liberal as Hilary's in many cases, but please don't be so pathetic so early in the game.

Personally, I kind of think that that Obama will be more difficult to defeat than Hillary, as Hillary is not particularly inspiring and has some definite negatives. Also, people tend to prefer the "greener" politican over more entrenched politicans, which is why attacks on Obama's lack of experience won't work, just as they didn't work on Clinton or GWB.

Hillary sort of has both going against her since she can be viewed as being somewhat inexperienced from one point of view, which will hurt her among the few that cosider experience important, and she can also be seen as an entrenched Washington insider, which will hurt her among a much larger group.

On the other hand, I do think that his talk of hope and change will grow tiresome and less inspiring over time, especially when people take a closer look at his actual proposals, most of which don't look so much like "change" as tweaking the margins of existing programs, generally by spending more money on them.

Although, people do tend to prefer talk of change rather than actual change, so Obama has that going for him.

He doesn't have policies, just grand gestures of hope and change.

I have no idea what "taking back patriotism" means. Obama's wife has said she's never been proud of America but we're not supposed to question her patriotism, it's just her own personal not-exactly-patriotic-patriotism.

Look, I have no doubt that Obama, and Hillary, and most Democrats, want what's best for America. Elections are an argument over what that is and how we accomplish our goals. Obama's goal is some vague "change" thing but the fact is, and this is why I think he will plummet in the general, Americans don't actually want change. We've already got it pretty damn good. It's like when they poll people to see what kind of coffee they like and everyone says they like strong, good coffee but then everyone actually drinks weak, milked-up coffee (this is from Malcolm Gladwell, either Tipping Point or Blink, can't remember which). Americans may say they want change to pollsters but I'm betting that when presented with an opportunity for this change to happen (say, to go to universal healthcare), they'll choose to not change.

Ok, you got me, I am sure that Obama really does hate the country

I didn't say he hated the country. The undercurrent of many of his speeches though, is a profound disappointment in the country and many of it's people.

as opposed to lining his own pockets with oil money or special interest groups.

I know people just love to say crap like this, but truly, honestly, if you want to make money, going into politics isn't the best way to do it. GWB could have ended up far wealthier, not to mention enjoyed his wealth much more, had he not gone into politics. And you can't tell me that Obama takes no money from special interest groups. Every group has it's own interests and as such, is a special interest group.

He doesn't make people feel fear or anger to manipulate their patriotism

I think, to a large degree he does do this. He constantly plays to people's fear, while simultaneously claiming only others do it. He demonizes companies that "move jobs overseas," for example. He may be right to do so, but the message is that many of us could be victims of such companies, and only he'll do something about it. How does this not make people feel fear or anger? Sure, he combines this fear with hope, but a message of hope doesn't really work on people who are largely happy and content.

he calls on people to rise above being petty and divisive

Yes, you all should stop being "petty and divisive" and all get together and vote for me. Not self-serving at all. Sure, the pettiness I could get rid of, but I kind of want politics to be divisive, as I'd rather have that than a one-party state.

Karol,

I just sense a different energy about this election. I mean, I've heard people who are utterly apathetic engaged and talking about this election. Problem? They're usually talking about Obama. Now, whether the "new" will wear off by November is up for debate--but it's pretty clear people are tired of our current government.
You may not want a one party state, but that's because you know which way that leads. However, thanks to a relentless media as well as major, repeated unforced errors many folks in the middle say they can't tell the difference between the parties. Other than national security, I can't say that argument is patently false in _actions_ not words. The Republicans were in charge for 12 years, with a friendly White House for 6. At the conclusion of this period, OBL is still not dead, the government can still seize my house and give it to a developer, and Federal courts are still allowed to review whether or not I get to bear arms. Sorry, but that's three _big_ reasons I think the argument can be made the GOP brand is a little broken right now. The fact that around 45 Congressmen, to include conservative stalwarts, aren't running for reelection tells me that I'm not alone in perceiving a sense of rot about the elephant.

So, sorry, I can definitely see a situation where Obama's going to win the middle against McCain provided he doesn't stumble mightily between here and the nom. Oh, sure, you're probably correct that we'll really regret things in the morning--but when was the last time _that_ stopped mischief and idiocy? As sure as there are still naive college freshmen attending the beer parties at fraternities there will be voters who think, "Oh, he can't be _that_ bad...". Especially those voters to whom the last few years have not been kind (what's Ohio's unemployment again?).

Unless the GOP steps up its game beyond national security or folks wanting stability, we're all going to be looking for our clothes prior to doing the walk of shame post election day. Counting on the American populace to "wake up" is like waiting on the Second Coming to save you from your credit card bills. This is the same electorate that decided in 1996 to reelect a man who, up to that point, had already been scandal central over a decorated, committed war hero. Now you've got a similarly eloquent speaker who, at least to date, is minus the scandal versus a decorated, committed war hero...and you're expecting a different result why, again? Oh, that's right, because no one's dumb enough to fall for "Hope" as a message. Well, other than the 18-year-old who can name the last five American Idol award winners but can't tell you the three branches of government or a worker who lost his job and for whom hope is all he has left. Unfortunately, those folks vote count for just as much as yours and mine--more so, actually, if they're in a elector-rich state.

He doesn't have policies, just grand gestures of hope and change.

He's got policies: improving health care for veterans, assuring net neutrality, mandating health care for children and working to end racial profiling. Not to mention co-sponsoring S.22, which will revamp the current GI Bill.

Posted by: Steff

First of all, I haven't accused him of being a "hopemonger," whatever that ridiculous neologism implies.

Secondly, patriotism is not despising what this country stands for, wanting to completely alter the fabric of this country, then taking pride in it.

Thirdly, I know you hate Bush. That has nothing to do with this discussion though, mmkay?

Finally, what's wrong with describing him and his wife as buppies? That's not a derogatory remark, it's descriptive. Like calling McCain "old" or saying that Tommy Thompson is overweight. You still haven't refuted anything I've written.

Gerry- My apologies for not addressing your sly racist spew with more candor, I would not want to offend such fine sensibilities.Obama may have been categorized as such by those who dismissed him from the start as not being "black enough" but clearly they underestimated most people's abilities to look beyond stereotypes. As for his "Kandy Kolored" (eh?) socialism, he's a lot more centrist than Hilary on many issues including health care and immigration. Funny I never mentioned Bush, clearly you recognized him though. I don't hate the man, I don't hate anyone, although I must have hate attributed to me for disagreeing with him, polarize away. The original post here was dismissive of the hope/change element of Obama's speeches, you jumping in to call him anti-American as well does not exactly support the ideology being attacked. Trashing a man for being from a certain background and attaining a certain lifestyle, so that's fair dues I guess but Bush's own laissez faire ride through life is off limits? Pur-lease. Jason - Thanks for clarifying Obama's reign of fear, I will lie in bed awake at night waiting to be put on Orange alert over his scary obsession with keeping Americans in jobs. woooh.

1.) Buppies is not a racist term. Sorry, it's shorthand for saying "Black Yuppies" and, considering I've heard more than my share of black professionals use it to describe themselves, I'm going to call that one a draw.

2.) While I don't agree with Michelle Obama, I can see where people may not feel "proud" of this nation. We've done some f*cked up sh*t over the last 26 years. However, as I've said before, "We're better than all the alternatives. Period." The problem is that, yes Steff, people like the Obamas do believe that there is something that needs "fixing" and they've got just the solution.

3.) Which leads to the socialism problem. Socialism, unfortunately, doesn't work. Great in theory, abhorrent in practice. Why? Usually because either you have freeloaders or you get a draconian enforcement system controlled by a few "enlightened" bureaucrats. In the rare case where things get really f-ed up, you get both (see "Union, Soviet, 1925-1941", or "How the Germans saved Stalin from himself"). Thanks, I'd like not to start down that path.

4.) Now, that's not to say I think the current system is working. Far from it. And, at the risk of ticking off our erstwhile host, I think the GOP's had their chance to fix things and spectacularly crapped the bed. Thanks, but the party that allowed panic and the need to "Just do something!" lead to that monstrosity known as Homeland Security and a botched war in Iraq is not going to get me to automatically agree they're the adults. Sometimes, just once in awhile, it's about the harder right than the easier wrong.

5.) Which is why I agree with Karol that, for his numerous faults, McCain is not a flip-flopper. Dreadfully wrong, muleheaded, short-tempered, yes. Flip-flopper, no. I will have problems voting for him in November, namely because I think he's likely to get a fratricidal immigration bill passed thanks to the fact the Senators will close ranks behind one of their own. It's a close one between which will be more destructive, Obama's social policies or McCain's immigration stance--but I'm willing to maybe take my chances.

6.) It is unfortunate that, when given a golden opportunity to maybe find and present a responsible adult, the parties have given us a choice between a man with potentially fatal flaws ("You can just f*ck off!"), an almost equally flawed woman who is almost treating her ascension to the people's house as her marital right ("I stuck with _that man_ for all these years for this! How dare you people question what is mine!"), and a charismatic demagogue ("Follow me to Hope!").

1.) Buppies is not a racist term. Sorry, it's shorthand for saying "Black Yuppies" and, considering I've heard more than my share of black professionals use it to describe themselves, I'm going to call that one a draw.

2.) While I don't agree with Michelle Obama, I can see where people may not feel "proud" of this nation. We've done some f*cked up sh*t over the last 26 years. However, as I've said before, "We're better than all the alternatives. Period." The problem is that, yes Steff, people like the Obamas do believe that there is something that needs "fixing" and they've got just the solution.

3.) Which leads to the socialism problem. Socialism, unfortunately, doesn't work. Great in theory, abhorrent in practice. Why? Usually because either you have freeloaders or you get a draconian enforcement system controlled by a few "enlightened" bureaucrats. In the rare case where things get really f-ed up, you get both (see "Union, Soviet, 1925-1941", or "How the Germans saved Stalin from himself"). Thanks, I'd like not to start down that path.

4.) Now, that's not to say I think the current system is working. Far from it. And, at the risk of ticking off our erstwhile host, I think the GOP's had their chance to fix things and spectacularly crapped the bed. Thanks, but the party that allowed panic and the need to "Just do something!" lead to that monstrosity known as Homeland Security and a botched war in Iraq is not going to get me to automatically agree they're the adults. Sometimes, just once in awhile, it's about the harder right than the easier wrong.

5.) Which is why I agree with Karol that, for his numerous faults, McCain is not a flip-flopper. Dreadfully wrong, muleheaded, short-tempered, yes. Flip-flopper, no. I will have problems voting for him in November, namely because I think he's likely to get a fratricidal immigration bill passed thanks to the fact the Senators will close ranks behind one of their own. It's a close one between which will be more destructive, Obama's social policies or McCain's immigration stance--but I'm willing to maybe take my chances.

6.) It is unfortunate that, when given a golden opportunity to maybe find and present a responsible adult, the parties have given us a choice between a man with potentially fatal flaws ("You can just f*ck off!"), an almost equally flawed woman who is almost treating her ascension to the people's house as her marital right ("I stuck with _that man_ for all these years for this! How dare you people question what is mine!"), and a charismatic demagogue ("Follow me to Hope!").

Senator Obama has sponsored or co-sponsored 570 bills in the 109th and 110th Congress.

Senator Obama has sponsored or co-sponsored 15 bills that have become LAW since he joined the Senate in 2005.

Senator Obama has also introduced amendments to 50 bills, of which 16 were adopted by the Senate.

His record is in fact quite impressive for a junior Senator from Illinois.
Details below.

Of the 15 bills Senator Obama sponsored or co-sponsored in 2005-7 that became law:

Two addressed foreign policy:
Promote relief, security and democracy in the Congo (2125)
Develop democratic institutions in areas under Palestinian control (2370).

Three addressed public health:
Improve mine safety (2803)
Increased breast cancer funding (597)
Reduce preterm delivery and complications, reduce infant mortality (707).

Two addressed openness and accountability in government:
Strengthening the Freedom of Information Act (2488)
Full disclosure of all entities receiving federal funds (2590)

Two addressed national security
Extend Terrorist Risk Insurance (467)
Amend the Patriot Act (2167)

One addressed the needs of the Armed Forces
Wave passport fees to visit graves, attend memorials/funerals of veterans abroad (1184).

Develop democratic institutions in areas under Palestinian control.

How is that working out for them?

BTW, not that I expect the Father Divine/Jim Jones shock troops to actually make a coherent, cogent argument on behalf of their messiah, but could you do a little bit better than throwing down the tiresome, tendentious "you're a racist" card?

Stephanie, or whatever the inane diminutive you've chosen for this site stands for, explain to me how someone who's never held a job in the private sector-hence, knows nothing about how a largely free market economy operates-is going to "manage" the U.S. economy.

"I know black people who call themselves buppy" does not make it automatically cool for a white person to do so (Gerard, apologies for the misnomer, Steff is short for Steffany, shockingly my name is spelled differently than some others, unheard of I know). Using it in a DEROGATORY manner (in the build up to portraying the Obamas as self serving intellectuals who dared to take advantage of affirmative action) is not o.k. Your were using it in a negative context and you're even more of a coward for not admitting it. The last I checked Obama was a member of the Democratic Party running for President, an African American man with a unique upbringing which he has done nothing but put to good use. He is not the Messiah, but I get why people get excited about him and that scares the bejeezus out of a lot of people for some reason. Are there some people out there who are more impressed with his feelgood factor than is wise? Sure, that's politics. Politics has been very gray for a long time for alot of people. I would have happily voted for Hilary, especially after her debate performance, so I am by no means blinded by the light of Obama. I actually am well aware that his campaign style (for I believe that is what it is, not some scary plot to poison us all with socialist kool-aid -really who's the whack job here!)could turn many off. I was defending him for what I believed to be pretty shallow attacks, forgive me for daring to speak out against your socialist slag off. Guess what, alot of Democrats have some socialist leanings, but if you think that all the Republicans in the House and big business are going to allow Obama to do whatever he pleases you are more naive than you believe Obama supporters to be. What he does bring is quite a relentless drive to try and improve, yes improve a country that guess what, needs improving! Formerly prosperous towns and cities can't give away houses, the dollar is continuing to fall in value (how does that make us better than anyone exactly?), and the world at large is looking at America as a loose cannon due to Bush's "foreign policy" and snubbing Kyoto. We're not the most popular kid in school anymore, get used to it. America needs change, period. Has that point been hammered to death by the Democrats, yes, but people seem to be listening. People who can't sell their houses, people whose houses have been reposessed- the bubble has burst. Paint Obama as a lunatic cultist all you want, people are looking for someone new, and his formidable support is going to take some beating. Hilary's campaign folded like a house of cards due to over-arrogance, while Obama had planned for Pennsylvania a year ago. Keep underestimating him, he likes that.

Gerard,

I'd say that Peregrine's mounted a pretty coherent argument. Might want to orient fires on him rather than trying to jab at Steff. Unless the site was posting slow, Peregrine's argument was up for about 40 minutes--plenty of time to find the holes in what is a serious remark.
I would also point out that your argument about Obama could sort of apply to the current President. After all, what jobs did the current President Bush hold outside of those that could be tied somehow to his father? That's not a slap from a Bush-hater (to save you from typing what appears to be the typical response when someone questions the current President), it's a serious question. Furthermore, remind me again what jobs in the private sector Reagan, Bush '41, and Clinton held in a chronologically significant period (i.e., within a decade) of their being President? We've seemed to have tossed "actually have done something with your life outside of politics" out the window with "should have worn the uniform at least once" as a precondition for being Chief Executive lately.

As you can see, I'm not playing the "you're a racist" card but trying to actively engage the points you're raising. Personally I think you're both barking up the wrong tree. Outside of broad guidance and what bills he or she may introduce to Congress, the President has very little effect on the economy other than staving off panic. Which, incidentally, is how we should all want things.

Part of the big problem I have with Mr. Obama is that he seems to want to meddle via protectionism or "keeping companies from taking jobs overseas" (read: putting in a place a crazy regulatory mechanism). Both of these are laudible goals and, if he's elected, arguably what the people (you know, his nominal boss) are asking him to do. Unfortunately, the execution of them, at least with the approaches he's stated so far, is likely to go rather poorly in my opinion. I'm no economist (*insert shudder of revulsion here*), but I think a rampant protectionist stance will have second and third order effects that he may not have thought about.

Gerard, apologies for the misnomer, Steff is short for Steffany, shockingly my name is spelled differently than some others, unheard of I know. I had no more say in the matter than you did at birth."I know black people who call themselves buppy" does not make it automatically cool for a white person to do so, sorry. Using it in a DEROGATORY manner (in the build up to portraying the Obamas as self serving intellectuals who dared to take advantage of affirmative action) is not o.k. Your were using it in a negative context and you're even more of a coward for not admitting it. The last I checked Obama was a member of the Democratic Party running for President, an African American man with a unique upbringing which he has done nothing but put to good use. He is not the Messiah, but I get why people get excited about him and that scares the bejeezus out of a lot of people. Are there some people out there who are more impressed with his feel good factor than is wise? Sure, that's politics. Politics have been very gray for a long time for alot of people. I would have happily voted for Hilary, especially after her California debate performance, so I am by no means blinded by the light of Obama. I actually am well aware that his campaign style (for I believe that is what it is, not some scary plot to poison us all with socialist kool-aid -really who's the whack job here!)could turn many off. I was defending him for what I believed to be pretty shallow attacks, forgive me for daring to speak out against your socialist slag off. Guess what, plenty of people have some socialist leanings, this doesn't mean America will ever become a socialist state. If you think that all the Republicans in the House and big business are going to allow Obama to do whatever he pleases you are more naive than you believe Obama supporters to be. What he does bring is quite a relentless drive to try and improve, yes improve a country that guess what, needs improving! Formerly prosperous towns and cities can't give away houses, the dollar is continuing to fall in value(how does that make us better than anyone exactly?), and the world at large is looking at America as a loose cannon due to Bush's foreign policy and snubbing Kyoto. We're not the most popular kid in school anymore, get used to it. America needs change, period. Has that point been hammered to death by the Democrats, yes, but people seem to be listening. People who can't sell their houses, people whose houses have been reposessed- the bubble has burst. Paint Obama as a kooky cultist all you want, people are looking for someone new, and his formidable support and yes popular to many policies are going to take some beating. Hilary's campaign folded like a house of cards due to over-arrogance, while Obama had planned for Pennsylvania a year ago. Keep underestimating him, he likes that.

Steff,

You're being silly. He's not trying to scare people with his obsession with keeping jobs in America (although how he plans on doing that could end up being quite scary). He's scaring people into thinking that if they don't vote for him, their jobs are going to be shipped overseas. He's certainly not unique in using this tactic, but let's not pretend he's not using it. And this is just one example.

Steff,

I apologize that I am going to have to use quotation marks as I'm just not that good with quotes and such.

"'I know black people who call themselves buppy" does not make it automatically cool for a white person to do so (Gerard, apologies for the misnomer, Steff is short for Steffany, shockingly my name is spelled differently than some others, unheard of I know).'"

Well, as the person who said that, Steff, I'm afraid I gotta disagree with you there. That is, unless you're going to argue that saying "yuppie" is not okay (i.e., classist) if it is used in front of a derogatory statement. A word is either derogatory or it isn't, regardless of place. This is why the "n" word is always stupid, regardless of who is using it--on it's face it is derogatory. However, "buppie" merely means a yuppie who happens to be black. Now, you want to tell me that "black" is derogatory, I will simply refer you to my wife, a foreigner, who regularly says, "No wonder you guys can't solve race--people are too worried that they'll offend if they don't use precisely the right word." (This usually said after she gets called a racist.)

"(in the build up to portraying the Obamas as self serving intellectuals who dared to take advantage of affirmative action) is not o.k. "

And thank you for illustrating the precise problem with affirmative action. Were you, pray tell, in the Harvard admissions office with the Obamas applications were provided? Just asking, as unless you happen to have known Barack and Michelle's LSAT score when you typed this (not when you googled it), you've basically made the assumption that the only way they could have gotten in was through affirmative action. Quite an intriguing leap for someone who is busy calling people "racists" for using the term "buppie."

We will not progress past this morass displayed by some of the folks you are calling out as well as yourself until we just stop talking about it. Why not just say, "In the build up to besmirching two intellectuals who went to Harvard" and let that stand for itself?

"The last I checked Obama was a member of the Democratic Party running for President, an African American man with a unique upbringing which he has done nothing but put to good use. He is not the Messiah, but I get why people get excited about him and that scares the bejeezus out of a lot of people for some reason."

*taps microphone* This thing on? Check above, I've laid out _my_ reasons, I presume not to speak for anyone else. To recap: Man on the white horse syndrome run amok. Protectionism doesn't work. Etc., etc..

"Guess what, alot of Democrats have some socialist leanings, but if you think that all the Republicans in the House and big business are going to allow Obama to do whatever he pleases you are more naive than you believe Obama supporters to be."

Or, alternatively, some of us could be well aware of what happens when desperate people vote. The Republicans in the House (whose numbers will likely dwindle by next election) are the minority. Check the House rules--the minority has about as much power as you or I do. Given that Ms. Pelosi, she who promised us a change in how the House would be run, has given few indications she's interested in bipartisanship, I think that the House isn't what you meant.

Now, if you meant the Senate--well, let's see, isn't it just nine seats that have to change hands before basically the filibuster is useless? I'm no political guru, but last thing I saw predicted a worst case scenario is the GOP may lose as many as 12 seats due to retirement or well-deserved a**-whuppin's. (Yeah, good thing thing Bill Frist is doing commercials with Democrats--he was probably the best thing to happen to them since the current President). So, what was that about Congress stopping socialist programs again?

"What he does bring is quite a relentless drive to try and improve, yes improve a country that guess what, needs improving! "

Now, this is probably the first time I'm agreeing with you. Grudgingly, of course, but still agreeing. There are things that do need improving. Adults in both parties would be nice, and that is one thing I will acknowledge is that Obama, for all his idealism, does seem to be an adult. He doesn't demonize the GOP, he doesn't run around and pick 51/49 positions, and he (on his website) is quite clear what he stands for.

"Formerly prosperous towns and cities can't give away houses,"

Um, okay, and you are indicating that this is something the government should fix? Because, yeah, it's normal that the average house in Washington State, the two years I was there, went up something like 55% on average. Oh, wait, that's not normal, and this is called a market correction. It's what capitalism does. It's all it does! You can't stop it! It'll wade right through the market, reach down your checkbook, and pull your f*cking equity out…oh, wait, sorry, it seemed like an appropriate time to throw in a quote regarding unstoppable forces. (Bonus if you can tell what movie the paraphrase is from.)

Anyway, where was I--oh, that's right--America is a capitalist nation. You can either go capitalist or you can go socialist, but hybrids don't work (see Europe, financial state of)--so, as painful as it is, people are going to have to just bite down on the leather strap until pain is over.

"the dollar is continuing to fall in value (how does that make us better than anyone exactly?),"

Uh, okay, and the President controls this how again? Other than wielding that blunt instrument which is the veto pen? (Yeah, really worked on that water bill, didn't it?!) Don't get me wrong--the Chief Executive ain't hapless in this one, but he doesn't quite crack the top 10 of folks most responsible.

"and the world at large is looking at America as a loose cannon due to Bush's "foreign policy" and snubbing Kyoto. We're not the most popular kid in school anymore, get used to it. America needs change, period."

And we have another fundamental difference here. Sorry, I don't give a rat's a** if the world likes us--and I'm willing to compare my list of countries visited at any time. Heck, I've even held dual citizenship for seventeen years.

When said countries that have brought us, within living memory, such feats of brilliance as two World Wars, Treaty of Versailles, the current world map, Fascism, the Bolsheviks, the Holocaust, Rape of Nanking, Pol Pot, and the Ukraine Famine, are not liking us, I'm not sure that's a bad thing. I don’t agree with the President's foreign policy on a lot of things (

"People who can't sell their houses, people whose houses have been reposessed- the bubble has burst."

Are you a homeowner, Steff? I mean, I'm just asking in general. I happen to be one. When my wife and I were buying our home, we were offered an adjustable rate mortgage with all the bells and whistles that was three times the fixed rate one we actually got. I'd love to have a house three times the size of the one we have now, if for no other reason than it's fun to watch felines play in open space and we are blessed with multiple ones. You know why we don't have that house? Because, upon doing a little research as well as consulting with folks who'd been around longer than we had, we found out about interest rates rising to higher than current credit card rates during the Carter years and a phenomenon known as jingle change. Doing some simple math, the Budget Officer and myself figured out that, hey, we couldn't afford that loan!

So, tell me, how is Obama going to save the people who have lost said houses and had the "bubble" burst (as they usually are wont to do--it's the only reason soap is still sold in stores, you know)? Because if he is going to take the tax dollars that I send up to that great black hole on the Potomac and give them to the village idiots who apparently don't read what they sign and/or the lenders who willfully took them for a ride, I'm calling BS. Quite frankly, I think there are more _responsible_ folks than irresponsible (at least at the moment) and, once Obama floats this trial balloon, he'll realize that he doesn't want to end up like Bill did in '94 ("Look Mommy, Congress is changing colors right before our eyes!")--and nothing will get done.

Which is a good thing. The housing bubble is not the President's problem. Now, criminal activity that may have happened during the period is, and I can get behind a thorough and in-depth colonoscopy being conducted on the housing industry by Dr. Justice Department. However, if you're going to say we should vote for Barack Obama simply because he'll solve the housing bubble, I gotta wonder how he had time to become a neurosurgeon or if he got a patent on that "anti-stupid" juice.

"Paint Obama as a lunatic cultist all you want, people are looking for someone new, and his formidable support is going to take some beating. Hilary's campaign folded like a house of cards due to over-arrogance, while Obama had planned for Pennsylvania a year ago. Keep underestimating him, he likes that."

Obama's support is going to take a fatal beating if he cannot prove that his arguments are not simply refined arguments from the '60s. Now, whether or not that beating will be administered in the general election or at the '10 mid-terms is open for debate, but it's going to happen based on what I see now. I see lots of hope, but not much personal responsibility in his policies. Well someone's going to have to pay the freight, and people who find out that their taxes are going up or, should he go with the borrow and spend method favored by our current political elite, see their stagnant wages not buy as much are going to be pissed off. As anyone who has gone through a bitter divorce can tell you, nothing fuels anger like shattered hope--and Obama is going to have a very short window to keep that from happening if he gets elected.

Because, hey, none of us are expecting much from McCain. Oh, wait, did I type that. Whoops.

Boy you have a lot of time, I'm impressed! Right, so without hesitation you would approach an African American friend or colleague and say "Hey, how's it going buppy!". Whatever, I was responding to the use of the word in the context of a negative attack on the Obamas, which to me does indeed give it a less than pleasant tone, but seeing as you are taking each sentence apart for individual analysis I guess you would have missed that. It was implied in Gerard's original post that Michelle Obama was seeking some sort of race related college funding, that was the impression I got anyway, if I am mistaken then fair enough - I would never presume anything of the sort. Hm so the many other Americans who weren't as terribly clever as you in their housing purchases/decisions, or the ones whose properties have been devalued due to a falsely inflated market, who bought in this market because there was no other choice if they wanted to get on the property ladder, or those who simply want to move and can't sell - well they're just crap out of luck,eh? Yeah, that'll sort itself out no problem. I never said Obama would fix it personally, I was saying that it contradicts all of this chirruping about how fantastic the U.S. is doing right now.The dollar is falling, has been specifically whipped by the Euro in recent years, so that supposed shithole Europe is doing quite well actually - by the way I too am a dual citizen, touche! ;-) Your not giving a rat's ass what the rest of the world thinks is not surprising, well done to you on that. I agree Obama, if elected would be under far greater scrutiny than McCain. I do not by any means think it will be a smooth ride, what with the current stagnant wages and all the rest of it, there is a whole lot of mess to clean up. I bow to you in your superior knowledge of all things Washington, forgive me for reserving the right to express an opinion on a blog, I'm not worthy.

Steff,

You wound me. Well, not really. Yes, I did parse most of what you said. It's why I try to put this funny thing called "thought" into my sentences, so that most of them will hopefully lead to "substantive debate." Okay, I lie--I apply thought so someone doesn't administer a thorough undressing of my argument--the substantive debate is just more fun ("...and the pig likes it" applies here). I see that you have chosen to retreat behind a smoke screen of snark, so I'll allow you to withdraw in peace into the realm of rhetorical impotence and self-pity. Well, relative peace other than the following Parthian shots since you seem to be concerned with time.

1.) Yes, I can say with 100% sincerity I would be completely okay with saying, "What's up buppy" if it applied or, hey, I even used the term "yuppy." I dropped plenty of clues to my comfort level in my last retort, but I understand when you're getting your arguments ritually sacrificed it might be hard to note small details about your assailant. Feel free to scan back through and see if you can put the math together--I'm not going to spell it out for you. ;)

2.) Yes, it is "tough luck" and it has nothing to do with being "clever" or "smart"--it's called being able to evaluate consequences. For instance, why do you look both ways before you cross the street? Don't like being a hood ornament, no? Figure life's hard with both your legs broken?

Assuming that you haven't been a pedestrian accident victim, I ask you the following question: Why wouldn't you put the same due diligence into making a decision that will likely be somewhere in the top 10 of "Most Important Decisions You Will Make In Your Life"? With freedom comes responsibility, and after a 20th Century alone that's chock-full of examples of why you don't want the government doing your planning for you I think you'd much rather go with the "tough luck" approach than the "Oh great and benevolent state, save me!" one. If not, you really need to read the Pessimist's Guide to History. It _will_ sort itself out, as it's done it before.

3.) Anyone who says the U.S. is doing great right now is delusional. Like, "Hey, man, stop with the vacuum lungs!" crossed with "I tried to drink Ted Kennedy under the table"-delusional. Thought I sorta indicated I believed that.

4.) As to that sh*thole Europe, try running that by someone who didn't live there 2+ years. Or, hell, just look at the numbers of people fleeing the continent in droves. There's going to be something ugly in Europe soon, and I'm not just talking the fact that there's an off chance we're about to make Otto Von Bismark a prophet again re: Kosovo.

5.) I don't give a rat's a** what the rest of the world thinks because, sorry, that's not the President's job. Funny piece of parchment says that the President is elected by the American people. While I'm not a Buchananist isolationist ("Mmm, yeah, has anyone told you about this wonderful device called the airplane, Mr. Buchanan? Or it's cousin the ballistic missile?"), I do think there is a little too much attention paid by our political elites to how dreadful we'll look to the old countries. Um, yeah, when I hear a SCOTUS justice claiming "world opinion" should influence our actions on things like the death penalty, pardon me if I'm happy we've got a Chief Executive who has managed to at least get that much right.

6.) You're welcome to have an opinion, but don't go getting your feelings hurt when someone runs up the BS flag. You think I'm out to lunch? Bring the examples and the proof, then get ready for the counterargument or me to say, "Whoa, you're right, I'm a soup sandwich with extra mayonnaise."

To recap:

You claimed someone was a racist for saying buppy, and I called foul.

You assumed Barack and Michelle got into Harvard on affirmative action--I called foul.

You stated your reasons for believing America needed change, in part, was because the world doesn't like us--again, I called foul.

Finally, throughout your message, you indicated that you're perfectly okay with a campaign ran either on false hope or someone who is going to continue our run of Chief Executives claiming extra-Constitutional powers in an effort to fix things--I not only called foul, I implied the whole lot of you Obama supporters are out of your mind. That may have been a bit excessive as, using my own logic, I have not been subject to all of your psychological evaluations--but other than that, I stand by my logic.

Your response to the above is, "Wow, you have way too much time on your hands" and "You big meanie, you're attacking me for having an opinion." No, I was attacking the logic on which your opinion is based in an earnest effort to seek knowledge and learn about the opposition. Given that I live with a socialist, I find that you can learn a lot from debating them--provided they're going to bring reasons behind their ideals to the table. So far you have brought whimpering and snark.

7.) BTW, _this reply_ is called a coffee break. A few years spent in a controlled population Federal facility has, despite a few broken fingers, led to me being able to type rather quickly. That's why this response took me all of 10 minutes--and now my coffee break is over. If you prefer me to deliver jabs instead of slow moving hooks, I'll be happy to--feel free to break this up into pieces if you're pressed for time and I'll get right back to you.

The three things you "called foul" on I addressed and in my opinion refuted, so not sure what else you're waiting for. Oh well as to the world's opinion of the U.S., your substantive attitude of "I don't give a rat's arse, Europe sucks" I did not feel demanded much more debate. If you really don't think the rest of the world matters to the future of the U.S. I highly doubt there's anything I could say that would change your untroubled mind. You took my comments out of context and then slam me for not spending precious time trying to play catch up with some apparent clues. You implied your own house purchasing decision involved taking extra measures of thought to contravert being swindled -hence my impression that you were indicating the process does require some heightened level of intelligence to avoid the pitfalls. I was genuinely retreating, admitting I was punching above my weight with you in terms of political knowledge; if you are sensitive about being perceived as a bully then perhaps rethink your bombardment of world class typing (I hold my hands up, I am a shit typist)and obvious need to exhibit superiority and exhaustive point making- obviously you will not be happy until you draw blood. I have many personal reasons for appreciating certain aspects of a more socialist attitude, none of which are your business. My defense of Obama was because he was being called simultaneously an empty suit and anti-American, not to mention some sort of opportunist martyr when it comes to race was the implication of Gerard's post, which to me was pretty ludicrous. There have already been several other posts outlining points of policy far more eloquently than I could, so forgive me for thinking I could dip my toe in the lake without getting drawn into a quagmire.

Wow, this thread has really got the foaming mouths going.

Nah, hashdaddy and Perry really know how to burn up a comment string. This reads like the earlier parts of Pride and Prejudice.

Shawn,

Ow! I mean, ow! That was a good one. Seriously. *bows* I am slain. ;)

So I got really busy last week, and I missed all the fun here! :(

Thursday February 28, 2008
OBAMA CHAMPIONS “CULTURE OF DEATH”

February 27, 2008

In last night’s debate between Senator Barack Obama and Senator Hillary Clinton, MSNBC moderator Tim Russert asked both presidential candidates whether there was “any word or vote that you’d like to take back” in your “careers in public service.” Senator Obama cited his role in a unanimous decision by the U.S. Senate regarding the Terry Schiavo case. He said it was “a mistake” for the Congress “to interject itself into that decision-making process of the families” to settle her fate.

Catholic League president Bill Donohue addressed this issue today:

“So now we know that Obama thinks it was a mistake—the biggest mistake he’s ever made in public life—to allow Schiavo’s parents the right to petition a federal court over the withdrawal of food and medical services necessary to save her life. Never mind that the vote was merely procedural: it simply allowed the patient’s parents the right to ask for federal review, never guaranteeing a particular outcome. Moreover, the bill was case specific—it had no bearing on any case other than Schiavo’s, and it explicitly said that ‘nothing in this Act shall constitute a precedent with respect to future legislation.’ Yet Obama now says his vote ‘was not something I was comfortable with, but it was not something that I stood on the floor and stopped.’ How revealing.

“Just as important as what Obama said is what he didn’t say: He could have taken the opportunity to say that the biggest blunder of his career in public life was his vote to kill a bill in the Illinois legislature that would have provided medical care for infants who survive abortions. In 2003, while chairman of the Health and Human Services Committee of the Illinois Senate, he led the fight to oppose a bill that would have mandated health care for a baby who survived an abortion, and he did so even though the bill explicitly said it would not imperil Roe v. Wade.

“In conclusion, Senator Obama thinks it is none of the federal government’s business to allow doctors to intentionally starve a person to death, nor is it the law’s business to require doctors to attend to the health care of a fully born baby who has survived an abortion. All this from the Minister of Hope.”

I am afraid, "my dear republicans", that in November 2008 you will come in second, even if you brought your hero Reagan (actually one of the worst presidents in American history) and the "I'm not a crook" Nixon, from the dead, to put them on the republican ticket.
You see, the American people (those who use their brains to think with, instead of just filling the void inside their skuls, like some "writers" on this page) are sick of electoral fraud, although you republicans will attempt to use it successfully in 2008 as you did in 2000 and 2004, of semi-illiterate idiots like George W. Bush leading a country, while he couldn't lead a lousy baseball team, of supporting an illegal war with their taxes and last but not least, of being a nation much more hated all over the globe than the Soviet Union was, during the Cold War Era.
Do these simple ideas fit in your chicken brains?
I doubt it, but I had to write this.

Taxes under Clinton 1999 Taxes under Bush 2008

Single making 30K - tax $8,400 Single making 30K - tax $4,500

Single making 50K - tax $14,000 Single making 50K - tax $12,500

Single making 75K - tax $23,250 Single making 75K - tax $18,750

Married making 60K - tax $16,800 Married making 60K- tax $9,000

Married making 75K - tax $21,000 Married making 75K - tax $18,750

Married making 125K - tax $38,750 Married making 125K - tax $31,250

also...military deaths for the past 16 years

1992 ......... 1,293
1993 ......... 1,213
1994 ......... 1,075
1995 ......... 2,465
1996 ........ 2,318
1997 ......... 817
1998 ........ 2,252
1999 ......... 1,984

8 Clinton years @13,417 deaths

-------------------------------------------------
2000 .......... 1,983
2001 .......... 890
2002 .......... 1,007
2003 .......... 1,410
2004 .......... 1,887
2005 ......... 919
2006.......... 920

7 BUSH years @ 9,016 deaths

Bush has had taxes right, but his spending is out of control (regardless of the war). Obama and Hillary are going to expand the size of government like crazy and raise taxes for EVERYONE...and if they choose to lower the taxes for middle americans at the expense of higher income americans (like the 70% tax in the 1970s), our economy is going to spin back like it was in the late 70s and early 80s.

Reagan is the one that got us out of the deep recession of the early 80s through his policy of low taxes and deregulating the government (how are founding fathers would want this country run). The only negative side to the Reagan administration was the increase in our National Debt which was partly due to our military build-up, but that was necessary to end the cold war...but mostly due to the drastic drop in inflation that reduced the federal receipts...any economist will understand that, read up on it. Bush Sr. and Clinton reversed the progress made by Reagan and despite Hillary's claim that the people in America did great under him, our economy was much much slower than with Reagan (growth rates under Reagan averaged about 1% higher) and the people were taxed much heavier.

Brandon,

You have incorrect numbers both about military deaths and about taxes under Clinton and under Bush.

Correct information about taxes
Income Before cuts After cuts
30,000 single $3,157.50 $2,756.25
50,000 single $7,262.50 $6,606.25
50,000 married $5,085.00 $4,012.50
60,000 married $6,585.00 $5,512.50
75,000 single $14,262.50 $12,856.25
75,000 married $9,426.50 $7,762.50
125,000 single $29,378.50 $26,472.25
125,000 married $23,426.50 $19,462.50

http://www.taxfoundation.org/blog/show/22958.html

Data on military deaths
Ronald Reagan (1981 - 1988) ........17,201 deaths

George H. W. Bush (1989 - 1992) ....6,223 deaths

Bill Clinton (1993 - 2000) ....... 7,500 deaths

George W. Bush (2001 - 2006) .... 8,792 deaths

U.S. Active Duty Military Deaths 1980-2006

1980 .... 2,392
1981 .... 2,380
1982 .... 2,319
1983 .... 2,465
1984 .... 1,999
1985 .... 2,252
1986 .... 1,984
1987 .... 1,983
1988 .... 1,819
1989 .... 1,636
1990 .... 1,507
1991 .... 1,787
1992 .... 1,293
1993 .... 1,213
1994 .... 1,075
1995 .... 1,040
1996 ......974
1997 ......817
1998 ......827
1999 ......796
2000 ......758
2001 ......891
2002 ......999
2003 .... 1,228
2004 .... 1,874
2005 .... 1,942
2006 .... 1,858
http://urbanlegends.about.com/library/bl_military_deaths.htm
or check

Brandon,

Your numbers are incorrect.

Correct tax numbers
from http://www.taxfoundation.org/blog/show/22958.html

Income Before cuts After cuts
30,000 single $3,157.50 $2,756.25
50,000 single $7,262.50 $6,606.25
50,000 married $5,085.00 $4,012.50
60,000 married $6,585.00 $5,512.50
75,000 single $14,262.50 $12,856.25
75,000 married $9,426.50 $7,762.50
125,000 single $29,378.50 $26,472.25
125,000 married $23,426.50 $19,462.50

Correct information on military deaths

1980 .... 2,392
1981 .... 2,380
1982 .... 2,319
1983 .... 2,465
1984 .... 1,999
1985 .... 2,252
1986 .... 1,984
1987 .... 1,983
1988 .... 1,819
1989 .... 1,636
1990 .... 1,507
1991 .... 1,787
1992 .... 1,293
1993 .... 1,213
1994 .... 1,075
1995 .... 1,040
1996 .... 974
1997 .... 817
1998 .... 827
1999 .... 796
2000 .... 758
2001 .... 891
2002 .... 999
2003 .... 1,228
2004 .... 1,874
2005 .... 1,942
2006 .... 1,858

Ronald Reagan (1981 - 1988) ........ 17,201 deaths

George H. W. Bush (1989 - 1992) .... 6,223 deaths

Bill Clinton (1993 - 2000) ...........7,500 deaths

George W. Bush (2001 - 2006) .... 8,792 deaths

While it's true Obama has done nothing, McCain has a record of accomplishements that neither Barack or Hillary holds a candle to.

Legislation http://mccain.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=IssuesLegislation.Legislation

Agriculture http://mccain.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Issues.View&Issue_id=9a9181ea-b7c5-4e6a-845f-5824c7b23939

Budget, taxes, and the economy http://mccain.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Issues.View&Issue_id=1172f761-a830-4020-ae1b-7ec3db088fc9

Crime, justice, and judiciary http://mccain.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Issues.View&Issue_id=15a904d0-1277-40f2-843d-904f077cb0fb

Defense http://mccain.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Issues.View&Issue_id=1bd7f3a7-a52b-4ad0-a338-646c6a780d65

Energy and environment http://mccain.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Issues.View&Issue_id=eb39163a-67bf-481f-9adf-9187d55fd3af

Foreign affairs http://mccain.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Issues.View&Issue_id=73379446-ed00-4a32-8ef1-9f1e12737746

Healthcare http://mccain.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Issues.View&Issue_id=766fba58-c762-4e68-bf3d-99163108bb35

Homeland security http://mccain.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Issues.View&Issue_id=e2d83197-0adb-4a53-994a-9eb58268b452

Indian affairs http://mccain.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Issues.View&Issue_id=79a48974-2bd4-4888-be97-e8a445366a84

Pork barrel spending http://mccain.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Issues.View&Issue_id=d1a878d9-f16c-4570-b402-9d1bc3fe6ab9

Technology http://mccain.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Issues.View&Issue_id=6f4c5955-818b-4157-bc80-3b4bef26f7ab

Transportation http://mccain.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Issues.View&Issue_id=b3a8e8b2-187f-4776-ae38-fc0ad8a1d59e

Veterans affairs http://mccain.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Issues.View&Issue_id=d4aef26f-e058-897e-4b4a-5fd1082aeef5

Other issues http://mccain.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Issues.View&Issue_id=f9a5665a-b73f-42fc-91d0-ab93a2876f4c

Legislation http://mccain.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=IssuesLegislation.Legislation

Every day it seems another American soldier is killed in Iraq. These grim statistics have become a favorite of network news anchors and political chat show hosts. Nevermind that they mix deaths from accidents with actual battlefield casualties; or that the average is actually closer to one American death for every two days; or that enemy deaths far outnumber ours. What matters is the overall impression of mounting, pointless deaths.

That is why is important to remember why we fight in Iraq -- and who we fight. Indeed, many of those sniping at U.S. troops are al Qaeda terrorists operating inside Iraq. And many of bin Laden's men were in Iraq prior to the liberation. A wealth of evidence on the public record -- from government reports and congressional testimony to news accounts from major newspapers -- attests to longstanding ties between bin Laden and Saddam going back to 1994.

Those who try to whitewash Saddam's record don't dispute this evidence; they just ignore it. So let's review the evidence, all of it on the public record for months or years:

* Abdul Rahman Yasin was the only member of the al Qaeda cell that detonated the 1993 World Trade Center bomb to remain at large in the Clinton years. He fled to Iraq. U.S. forces recently discovered a cache of documents in Tikrit, Saddam's hometown, that show that Iraq gave Mr. Yasin both a house and monthly salary.

* Bin Laden met at least eight times with officers of Iraq's Special Security Organization, a secret police agency run by Saddam's son Qusay, and met with officials from Saddam's mukhabarat, its external intelligence service, according to intelligence made public by Secretary of State Colin Powell, who was speaking before the United Nations Security Council on February 6, 2003.

* Sudanese intelligence officials told me that their agents had observed meetings between Iraqi intelligence agents and bin Laden starting in 1994, when bin Laden lived in Khartoum.

* Bin Laden met the director of the Iraqi mukhabarat in 1996 in Khartoum, according to Mr. Powell.

* An al Qaeda operative now held by the U.S. confessed that in the mid-1990s, bin Laden had forged an agreement with Saddam's men to cease all terrorist activities against the Iraqi dictator, Mr. Powell told the United Nations.

* In 1999 the Guardian, a British newspaper, reported that Farouk Hijazi, a senior officer in Iraq's mukhabarat, had journeyed deep into the icy mountains near Kandahar, Afghanistan, in December 1998 to meet with al Qaeda men. Mr. Hijazi is "thought to have offered bin Laden asylum in Iraq," the Guardian reported.

* In October 2000, another Iraqi intelligence operative, Salah Suleiman, was arrested near the Afghan border by Pakistani authorities, according to Jane's Foreign Report, a respected international newsletter. Jane's reported that Suleiman was shuttling between Iraqi intelligence and Ayman al Zawahiri, now al Qaeda's No. 2 man.

(Why are all of those meetings significant? The London Observer reports that FBI investigators cite a captured al Qaeda field manual in Afghanistan, which "emphasizes the value of conducting discussions about pending terrorist attacks face to face, rather than by electronic means.")

* As recently as 2001, Iraq's embassy in Pakistan was used as a "liaison" between the Iraqi dictator and al Qaeda, Mr. Powell told the United Nations.

* Spanish investigators have uncovered documents seized from Yusuf Galan -- who is charged by a Spanish court with being "directly involved with the preparation and planning" of the Sept. 11 attacks -- that show the terrorist was invited to a party at the Iraqi embassy in Madrid. The invitation used his "al Qaeda nom de guerre," London's Independent reports.

* An Iraqi defector to Turkey, known by his cover name as "Abu Mohammed," told Gwynne Roberts of the Sunday Times of London that he saw bin Laden's fighters in camps in Iraq in 1997. At the time, Mohammed was a colonel in Saddam's Fedayeen. He described an encounter at Salman Pak, the training facility southeast of Baghdad. At that vast compound run by Iraqi intelligence, Muslim militants trained to hijack planes with knives -- on a full-size Boeing 707. Col. Mohammed recalls his first visit to Salman Pak this way: "We were met by Colonel Jamil Kamil, the camp manager, and Major Ali Hawas. I noticed that a lot of people were queuing for food. (The major) said to me: 'You'll have nothing to do with these people. They are Osama bin Laden's group and the PKK and Mojahedin-e Khalq.'"

* In 1998, Abbas al-Janabi, a longtime aide to Saddam's son Uday, defected to the West. At the time, he repeatedly told reporters that there was a direct connection between Iraq and al Qaeda.

*The Sunday Times found a Saddam loyalist in a Kurdish prison who claims to have been Dr. Zawahiri's bodyguard during his 1992 visit with Saddam in Baghdad. Dr. Zawahiri was a close associate of bin Laden at the time and was present at the founding of al Qaeda in 1989.

* Following the defeat of the Taliban, almost two dozen bin Laden associates "converged on Baghdad and established a base of operations there," Mr. Powell told the United Nations in February 2003. From their Baghdad base, the secretary said, they supervised the movement of men, materiel and money for al Qaeda's global network.

* In 2001, an al Qaeda member "bragged that the situation in Iraq was 'good,'" according to intelligence made public by Mr. Powell.

* That same year, Saudi Arabian border guards arrested two al Qaeda members entering the kingdom from Iraq.

* Abu Musaab al-Zarqawi oversaw an al Qaeda training camp in Afghanistan, Mr. Powell told the United Nations. His specialty was poisons. Wounded in fighting with U.S. forces, he sought medical treatment in Baghdad in May 2002. When Zarqawi recovered, he restarted a training camp in northern Iraq. Zarqawi's Iraq cell was later tied to the October 2002 murder of Lawrence Foley, an official of the U.S. Agency for International Development, in Amman, Jordan. The captured assassin confessed that he received orders and funds from Zarqawi's cell in Iraq, Mr. Powell said. His accomplice escaped to Iraq.

*Zarqawi met with military chief of al Qaeda, Mohammed Ibrahim Makwai (aka Saif al-Adel) in Iran in February 2003, according to intelligence sources cited by the Washington Post.

* Mohammad Atef, the head of al Qaeda's military wing until the U.S. killed him in Afghanistan in November 2001, told a senior al Qaeda member now in U.S. custody that the terror network needed labs outside of Afghanistan to manufacture chemical weapons, Mr. Powell said. "Where did they go, where did they look?" said the secretary. "They went to Iraq."

* Abu Abdullah al-Iraqi was sent to Iraq by bin Laden to purchase poison gases several times between 1997 and 2000. He called his relationship with Saddam's regime "successful," Mr. Powell told the United Nations.

* Mohamed Mansour Shahab, a smuggler hired by Iraq to transport weapons to bin Laden in Afghanistan, was arrested by anti-Hussein Kurdish forces in May, 2000. He later told his story to American intelligence and a reporter for the New Yorker magazine.

* Documents found among the debris of the Iraqi Intelligence Center show that Baghdad funded the Allied Democratic Forces, a Ugandan terror group led by an Islamist cleric linked to bin Laden. According to a London's Daily Telegraph, the organization offered to recruit "youth to train for the jihad" at a "headquarters for international holy warrior network" to be established in Baghdad.

* Mullah Melan Krekar, ran a terror group (the Ansar al-Islam) linked to both bin Laden and Saddam Hussein. Mr. Krekar admitted to a Kurdish newspaper that he met bin Laden in Afghanistan and other senior al Qaeda officials. His acknowledged meetings with bin Laden go back to 1988. When he organized Ansar al Islam in 2001 to conduct suicide attacks on Americans, "three bin Laden operatives showed up with a gift of $300,000 'to undertake jihad,'" Newsday reported. Mr. Krekar is now in custody in the Netherlands. His group operated in portion of northern Iraq loyal to Saddam Hussein -- and attacked independent Kurdish groups hostile to Saddam. A spokesman for the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan told a United Press International correspondent that Mr. Krekar's group was funded by "Saddam Hussein's regime in Baghdad."

* After October 2001, hundreds of al Qaeda fighters are believed to have holed up in the Ansar al-Islam's strongholds inside northern Iraq.

Some skeptics dismiss the emerging evidence of a longstanding link between Iraq and al Qaeda by contending that Saddam ran a secular dictatorship hated by Islamists like bin Laden.

In fact, there are plenty of "Stalin-Roosevelt" partnerships between international terrorists and Muslim dictators. Saddam and bin Laden had common enemies, common purposes and interlocking needs. They shared a powerful hate for America and the Saudi royal family. They both saw the Gulf War as a turning point. Saddam suffered a crushing defeat which he had repeatedly vowed to avenge. Bin Laden regards the U.S. as guilty of war crimes against Iraqis and believes that non-Muslims shouldn't have military bases on the holy sands of Arabia. Al Qaeda's avowed goal for the past ten years has been the removal of American forces from Saudi Arabia, where they stood in harm's way solely to contain Saddam.

The most compelling reason for bin Laden to work with Saddam is money. Al Qaeda operatives have testified in federal courts that the terror network was always desperate for cash. Senior employees fought bitterly about the $100 difference in pay between Egyptian and Saudis (the Egyptians made more). One al Qaeda member, who was connected to the 1998 embassy bombings, told a U.S. federal court how bitter he was that bin Laden could not pay for his pregnant wife to see a doctor.

Bin Laden's personal wealth alone simply is not enough to support a profligate global organization. Besides, bin Laden's fortune is probably not as large as some imagine. Informed estimates put bin Laden's pre-Sept. 11, 2001 wealth at perhaps $30 million. $30 million is the budget of a small school district, not a global terror conglomerate. Meanwhile, Forbes estimated Saddam's personal fortune at $2 billion.

So a common enemy, a shared goal and powerful need for cash seem to have forged an alliance between Saddam and bin Laden. CIA Director George Tenet recently told the Senate Intelligence Committee: "Iraq has in the past provided training in document forgery and bomb making to al Qaeda. It also provided training in poisons and gasses to two al Qaeda associates; one of these [al Qaeda] associates characterized the relationship as successful. Mr. Chairman, this information is based on a solid foundation of intelligence. It comes to us from credible and reliable sources. Much of it is corroborated by multiple sources."

The Iraqis, who had the Third World's largest poison-gas operations prior to the Gulf War I, have perfected the technique of making hydrogen-cyanide gas, which the Nazis called Zyklon-B. In the hands of al Qaeda, this would be a fearsome weapon in an enclosed space -- like a suburban mall or subway station.