When Hillary wraps up South Dakota tonight, she will have won all the states of Obama's biggest power broker supporters:
California - Pelosi
Massachusetts - Kerry & Kennedy
Nevada - Harry Reid
South Dakota - Daschle
This gave me a giggle at lunch today.
Anglachel
20 comments:
The write in period starts now.
Kool-Aid jokes aside, this really is like a mass suicide, with an element of the "forced"... just like Jonestown.
BTB: Anglachel, your observations have impressed the hell outta me. I know we disagree on things, but I'm keeping this bookmark regardless.
Thank you.
I'm particularly disappointed in Kerry and Kennedy as their constituants made their preferance crystal clear, and don't forget Byrd. It must be galling to those Dem. voters to be told that their elected reps know so much better than they do.
beautiful point, Anglachel! ...
I find it a bittersweet irony that, earlier in the game, those in support of Obama were crying foul when they thought that superdelegates might "overturn the will of the people" to give the nomination to Hillary. Now that many supers have done that to support Obama, none of his supporters have a word to say about it, as far as I know.
Sorry to butt in again, but this comments comes from my spouse: How about going after these leaders (minus the nothing Daschel)?
Being nice will buy us more Obamas and then we will have to go and find a European country that'll accept refugees like us.
Why I will never vote for Barack Obama:
Many of us actually think BO will be WORSE than McCain. Why? Obama has no experience - only his ego - upon which to base this candidacy. Plain. And. Simple.
He is a political lurker...always in the picture, but never out front, never leading the charge. Even his "famous" speech resulted in not a single attempt by BO to end the war once he got into the Senate. But then, he was so busy on day one running for his next promotion he forgot that little issue, didn't he?
I remember reading about him running into committee members on their way to a press conference about something they had just accomplished. He said, "What's up" and they told him and he said, "Can I come along"? They said sure - they wanted people on the podium for pictures and then he had the audacity (whoops!) to take the mic and speak as if he had been personally involved in the accomplishment. Staffers were pissed as hell at what he did.
He lurked in CT in 2006 (never really coming out and supporting Ned Lamont). He lurks on pro-choice (using weasel words and voting present). He lurks on race (demanding a dialog and now saying we should all move on - pun intended!). Condemning the Gas Tax Holiday proposal when he supported other such proposals three times.
Where in the world does he really stand on things? I don't know. And I'm not willing to take a chance.
If we elect a lurker then Repugs will rule the day anyway because he lurks right as much as he lurks left.
NOT what we must have for this country if we are expected to move forward.
Plus, he has destroyed any improvements we have made in race relations since 1960. He should be ashamed of himself.
And, this is now my response on Roe v Wade...(not my words...those of another poster whom I know and respect...and with whom I agree!):
"If my younger sisters lose Roe Wade it will be their own fault for taking the rights they have for granted, because they didn't fight for them. They are complacent and can take the time to swoon over a sexy empty suit who has already set gender relations back a minimum of 30 years, and we haven't even gotten to the General Election campaign yet. Serves them right. Not my problem. I know how not to get pregnant.
It's my job to protect the rights I fought for that matter to me. This is a misogynist's campaign and if younger women are too busy spawning over Leland Gaunt handing out Needful Things and discussing his vibrating phone when he leans on one of them, then they will have to learn to take the consequences of their own folly along with the consolations. Maybe then they will Get It. I have already done well in my life. Complacency is their enemy, not mine. Let em eat cell phones."
--------------------------------------
As Abraham Lincoln said:
"I am not bound to win, but I am bound to be true. I am not bound to succeed, but I am bound to live by the light that I have. I must stand with anybody that stands right, and stand with him while he is right, and part with him when he goes wrong."
this nomination campaign has been about reversal of reality, or at least, reversal of roles and expectations -
an
inside turned out,
upside turned down,
left turned right,
campaign.
senator obama was really running as an outside-the-party candidate, the rebel.
as it happened, however, he was given a big insider assist by (and probably recruited by)
former dean campaign folks, and by former gore campaign folks, e.g., donna brazile.
senator clinton was the inside-the-party candidate with lots of state level demo support,
but
as it turned out,
it was sen clinton who became the outsider and the rebel.
and senator obama who became the inside candidate, the candidate of the dnc.
there is, i believe, a reason for this reversal.
i believe it is this:
the dnc and the superdelegates voted to support senator obama
because he had acquired a technical delegate mandate
and, given that technical lead,
because they came to believe that if, under these circumstance, sen obama were not offered the nomination,
there would be loud protests, street demonstrations for the balance of the demo campaign,
possibly for the balance of the presidential race.
sen clinton, the democratic power brokers well understood, would not fight all the way to denver,
or,
if she did, she would never turn to calculated disruption such as street demonstrations.
the superdelegates' calculations were all about who would cause the least problems if they lost?
not about
who would be the strongest candidate
nor about
who would be the best president.
that is a very telling observation. i think it shows how completely disconnected to their states those people are... how knee deep in the d.c. power scene and self interest they are.
great point! thanks
Some additional little facts to point out the ridiculous nature of this campaign.
Hillary Clinton won 20 primaries. Obama won 18. Clinton won 3 caucuses. Obama won 15. Forty-five percent of Obama's wins came in unrepresentative contests dominated by goon squads.
The total population of primary states won by Hillary Clinton is:
181,630,032. The total population of primary states won by Obama is:
84,855,342.
Or: Hillary Clinton won 68.15% of the total. Obama won 31.84% of the total.
Total population of all states won in all contest types:
Hillary Clinton - 186,165,329 or 61.72%
Obama - 115,455,828 or 38.27%
The caucus states have a combined population of 35,135,783 or 11.64% of the total.
Population is from states and DC only.
Some Superdelegates must be crazy.
Soo, it appears from what I've been reading around the web that the scary ROE specter is going to make us run screaming back to the Obama Messiah.
So, in the end, are we all just going to fall and vote for our scary reproductive rights?
(Me, I'm menopausal so they can kiss my ass)
I understand that the Democrats have long been very disappointing to most of us, that this is a Clinton blog, and that most of you feel particularly betrayed by both Obama and the Democrats right now. That said, I think the sarcasm about Roe and the other profound dangers of a McCain presidency is misplaced and ill-advised. The hostility will not do anything to build the movement so many of you say you hope for. Moreover, it diminishes your credibility with other progressives, who may otherwise be sympathetic to your perspective.
I've also recently started reading No Quarter for the first time, my curiosity piqued by the discussion here about the alleged video of Michelle Obama. I am dismayed that so many of you cite this hateful website as authority for your opposition to Obama. It is pure bottom-feeding, filled with racist and sexist slurs and violent language. (Not to mention that its principle argument is that Obama is a closet Marxist while here most of you seem to think he is a neoliberal and/or right wing fascist.) I urge you to reconsider giving Larry Johnson any more publicity.
missplsd --
For many of us, women who have faithfully voted Democratic, whether the candidate at the top of the ticket was our preferred candidate or not, and contributed time, money, etc., to the party, this primary season has been a revelation. It has explained why, despite 42 (out of the last 50) years of dominance in Congress (much of that time including control of the Senate, too), 12 years out of the last 40 in control of the Executive branch, etc., the Democratic party has made so little or no progress on the issues that have been of vital importance to us, to the welfare of our families, to the survival of the American middle class, to the ability of the poor to move into the middle class; health care, wage equity, child care, family leave, etc. And, why we have gone backward on reproductive rights.
The reason is now crystal clear; the male establishment has never seen these issues, or our interests, as vital interests. (Or seen us as a vital and respected constituency.) They have never paid more than lip service to our interests -- expecting to get our votes based on nothing more than empty promises and this; "the Republicans will be worse."
Well, so far, in actuality, the Republicans haven't been worse -- most of the betrayal has come from our own side.
The fact that the Republicans are worse, in rhetoric if not always in practice, doesn't make the Democrats acceptable. Not when we have example after example of our Democratic leaders selling us out TO THE REPUBLICANS on these issues over the years. Not when the depth of their disrespect for us not only as voters BUT AS PERSONS has been revealed by the misogyny of this campaign.
Don't threaten me with a further undermining of Roe v. Wade -- the party deserves to be punished for how much it has already allowed Roe v. Wade to be undermined.
And don't tell me that a candidate who has run explicitly on "reaching across the aisle" especially on these kind of "divisive" issues (that to him are merely "cultural"), intends to fight for women's reproductive rights.
These issues, the issues that are of vital interest to women, are EXACTLY the issues that "bi-partisan" compromisers like Obama and those elements of the party establishmemt who encouraged his candidacy have always been first and foremost willing to throw out the window and under the bus.
Esmense,
I respect your perspective. I very seldom support Democratic candidates (at least for national office) for precisely some of the reasons you offer.
I have at times been less sensitive about this issue on this blog, and for that, I do apologize. That said, I don't think anythng I have said in this thread or elsewhere (in my less charming days) could be characterized as a threat. I have described some of my fears about what I believe will happen if erstwhile Democrats or progressives vote for McCain. It's not as if I will somehow manage to put Edith Clement on the Court or start a war in Iran if you don't do what I want.
Finally, my post here was not about whether you will vote for Obama or McCain, abstain, or vote for a third-party candidate. It was merely about the tone of the discourse, the "younger women who didn't stand by Hillary can kiss my grits when they can't get abortions" stuff.
You have made a serious argument that Court membership is not enough reason for you to support Obama, and there is nothing wrong with that (though I may disagree with your conclusion -- indeed, I do). But I do think there's something wrong with telling other feminists and progressives that their concerns aren't important to you anymore because Clinton has been treated so unfairly, that you will wag an "I told you so" finger when they suffer. And it is not a conversation starter.
(Note, I am not suggesting that you in particular have engaged in this discourse, just that it's something I've seen here and on other Clinton blogs recently.)
p.s. I noticed (at least) one typo in my last post. "Principle" should obvioulsy be "principal."
First, excellent observation about Clinton's opponents being so completely out of touch with their own Democratic supporters. Losers every single one.
Second, mssplsd, you are completely off-topic, which makes you a troll from the git. But I will still address you to explain this point as a lesson to others. Any group or campaign which conducts or condones racism or sexism, or lies, or knowingly and falsely accuses their opponent of racism or sexism, is in fact NOT PROGRESSIVE BY ANY DEFINITION. On that basis I would submit that Barack Obama, Michele Obama, nearly every element of his campaign, and the portion of the blogosphere that supported him using those methods and tactics is NOT PROGRESSIVE BY ANY DEFINITION.
Now, if you want to claim YOU are a progressive you could start by acknowledging my initial premise of what constitutes a progressive.
Then we can talk and you can put forward your case for why I am mistaken in my characterization of those you hold dear.
But not on this comment thread. Get your own damn blog and we will hash it out there. It's pretty easy to start your own blog if you don't have one, just go to blogger and do it (since you already have an account to post here).
Herb,
missplcd is not a troll. She's talked offline with me about a few things, and I'm fine with her commenting. She does not agree with me nor I with her, which is also fine with me. Given that there really isn't much of a "topic" in my post, it's kind of difficult to go off topic.
If you don't find her argument compelling, then explain your position in no less civil a tone as she has, or else ignore the post.
The basic logic of her argument is sound - the victimization of one figure, no matter how beloved, is not grounds for dismissing out of hand something that is a serious concern for an entire class of people. I may be a menopausal old bitch, but my niece is not and I am concerned about the general erosion of reproductive freedom, not just abortion.
What needs to be addressed is the way in which the political operators backing Obama are the same group of spineless politicians who have allowed these protections to be encroached, and to say clearly, without invective or threat, that we have no faith in them when it comes to defending those rights. Thus, their stern warnings that *we* are endangering reproductive rights by failing to vote for *their* candidate are not persuasive, which is why we prefer Hillary.
Anglachel
Mssplsd,
Based on Anglachelg's comment, I apologize for saying you are a troll, and apologize if I was harsh.
I thought the topic of this post was gleeful chortling over Obama's leadership's lack of influence, but that's just me. (laughing again at it).
Onward, I do not find your characterization of Obama as a progressive compelling based not only on the very simple basic criteria of fairness that I put forth, but also based on his positions (when he bothers to state them) and especially the premise of his campaign ("unity") which is not consistent with fighting for progressive causes because to fight for progressive causes you have to, uh, fight.
We also have a check on right-wing wacko judges. It is called the Senate Judiciary Committee, and as it is solidly in Democratic hands for at least the next 4 years, if they grew a back-bone, we wouldn't have to put all our eggs in the presidential basket.
There are other issues rather than Supreme Court judges. Most folks are rather bored with that old tune, especially when there is an alternative. Namely, political courage in the Senate. Maybe Hillary as Senate majority leader can fix that?
Thank you for stepping in, Anglachel.
Herb, I'm afraid I must have been unclear. I did not argue that Obama was a progressive, merely that some of his supporters, and some people (like me) who are not his supporters but will vote for him against McCain if push comes to shove, are. I also wasn't (here) criticizing the choices some of you will make in November. I was merely saying that telling other feminists to "kiss my ass" because they urge you vote for Obama will only isolate you in the end. If what you want -- and I think this is what most of the people here want right now -- is to build a new feminist movement that can fight for its causes outside of the structure of the Democratic party and electoral politics, you will need to respect and engage with the the fears of your sister feminists. Even if you think they have made a mistake in supporting Obama. Even if they don't understand the history of the struggle. Even if their immediate needs appear different from your own.
And you are correct that there was no connection between my comment and Anglachel's post. I was responding in particular to teresa's comment (right above mine), but I don't want to single her out. I have seen iterations of it all over Clinton blogs, including this one, over the last several weeks.
Dear Mssplsd,
I respect your reply, and admit that in the heat of the moment (and I think we can all agree there is heat), I should have taken more time to read your initial comment. A lesson even us oldsters need to learn and relearn is to not be so hasty.
About No Quarter, I agree and will leave it at that. Another sad casualty, but it certainly is enlightening to see where people really stand on both sides, wouldn't you say? *cough*
Regarding "other progressives", well, my point stands and remains un-addressed. Sarcasm "diminishing credibility"? Come on please, compared to what Hillary Clinton has been subjected to that isn't even a starter. If being sarcastic about some 'hope' about Obama's likely performance in the future (and past performance in this case is hopefully NOT predictive of future performance) vs. McCain disqualifies then we really do have some problems in Mudville.
Fair enough. :)
I'm not sure exactly what you mean about "other progressives." There are plenty of people who have witnessed and criticized the horrendous viciousness directed at Clinton throughout this campaign who nonetheless (a) supported Obama or (b) will support any nominee the Democrats put up against McCain. It's not the sarcasm about the "hope" that's so damaging, it's the sarcasm about the issues that are important to them -- issues that should be important to all of us. Like I said, I don't have too much faith in Obama to win or to be a good president. I also think the nomination process is screwed up beyond repair *and* the FL and MI (especially) compromises are a mess. But my concerns about McCain are real enough that I will vote for him if my state comes into play. I'd also like to be part of any progressive or feminist movement that comes out of this disgusting primary season, but I can't build a coalition with people who can't at least engage with my concerns.
You forgot Richardson and NM
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