BS: Popular Views on Obama

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views on Obama
From: Alice
Date: 26 Jul 08 - 03:58 PM

don't hold back, Sawzaw, ;-)

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views on Obama
From: Little Hawk
Date: 26 Jul 08 - 07:58 PM

If you act confident and certain of yourself, you're accused of being "arrogant" and "an elitist".

If you don't, however, you're accused of being "a wimp" and "a loser". You are said to be "too weak" to make a good president.

It's just impossible to please some people. ;-) It wouldn't matter what you did.

Pierre Trudeau (former prime minister of Canada from period of late 60s through early 80s)) acted confident and certain. He acted downright cocky, as a matter of fact. He was definitely a member of the elite, and he made no bones about it. People either loved him or hated him for it, but he got elected several times and he remains Canada's most famous Prime Minister.

Sort of like Batman. ;-) He has his detractors too. If you do really well at anything, certain people will hate you for it...specially in politics.

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views on Obama
From: Amos
Date: 26 Jul 08 - 08:02 PM

Sawzaw:

He's acting like a candidate, not a president, and says so. and there is nothing arrogant or elitist about him. You have been putting your ear up against the sewer outlet.

I would like you to detail specific acts you think he has done, or things he has said, that constitute elitism or arrogance.

Put yourself in his shoes, and you'll notice he;s doing a pretty good job of the job he's doing.



A

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views on Obama
From: GUEST,Jack the Sailor
Date: 26 Jul 08 - 08:42 PM

Is Obama an Elitist?

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views on Obama
From: GUEST,Jack the Sailor
Date: 26 Jul 08 - 08:53 PM

If he does well in his job. They might carve his face in a mountain. We need to elect the intellectual elite. The past seven years is what you get by electing Joe six pack.

Obama deserves to be arrogant and this trip was his answer to a dare by John McCain. Is it Obama's fault that he did ten times better than McCain did on his trip? Its McCain's fault!

Like Stewart said we need to elect someone who is embarrassingly smarter than us.

Since the little alien with the big brain from Star Trek, was not born in the US, our next best choice is Obama.

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views on Obama
From: Riginslinger
Date: 27 Jul 08 - 10:17 AM

"'If you act confident and certain of yourself, you're accused of being "arrogant" and "an elitist".'


                Maybe, but I think Obama's arrogance goes way beyond that. He's like what Jesse Jackson says: he talks down to people.
                He acts like there is only one solution to any problem, and only he has it, and there's no room for debate.
                Speaking of that, he was like that in the debates with the other Democrats as well.

                With an attitude like that, he will never win over working class voters, I don't think, so he shouldn't waste his time with them and look for votes other places.

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views on Obama
From: GUEST,Jack the Sailor
Date: 27 Jul 08 - 01:07 PM

Obama is saying that his "one solution" is to look at all the options, and to choose the best one.

That is the right approach. It is way better than McCain and Bush who get lobbiest and oil companies to write their policy.

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views on Obama
From: Amos
Date: 27 Jul 08 - 02:10 PM

I am amazed ast these accusations of arrogance which are being drummed up.

You are characterizing how "he acts" with some opinion, which does not relate to any event or fact. What, specifically, has he said that you felt was arrogant? Because I have seen him trying to reason, or trying to rebut counter arguments, or dispel false rumors, and I have seen him talking with peple of every stripe, and I just haven't seen this alleged attitude you keep projecting on him. So I wonder either what I am missing or what you are inventing and postulating.


A

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views on Obama
From: Little Hawk
Date: 27 Jul 08 - 02:22 PM

I think, Rig, that the perfect candidate for the working class voters you are referring to might be Sylvester Stallone...he'll never talk down to them! ;-) Arnold Schwarzenneger would also be great, only he was born in Austria (sigh)...that is a danged shame, eh? He would make the ultimate Republican presidential candidate.

The anti-intellectual streak that runs deeply through American society is a peculiar phenomenon. I think it has something to do with the frontier heritage. That and almost a hundred years of westerns and dumb action movies.

You know, Jesse Jackson has always really annoyed me. Why? He's got a really BIG mouth and he panders to people's lower instincts with his emotional dramatics all the time. No wonder he wants to "cut Obama's balls off"...that tells you what you need to know about Jesse Jackson right there. No chance of Jesse Jackson being mistaken for an intellectual, right? No chance of Jesse Jackson being mistaken for a person who can think outside of the narrow definition of his own racial heritage.

If working class people feel safer with a primitive like that than they do with someone who has a bit more class and who doesn't deliberately dumb down the dialogue to appear like "just plain folks"...as so many politicians do...well, then working class people have consented unwittingly to their own enslavement by hucksters like Jesse Jackson, Ronald Reagan, and George Bush. A lot of those guys talk a lot "dumber" than they really are (Bush being a possible exception). You know why? They figure it will get them votes.

That is just sad.

Obama doesn't do that. He doesn't pander to a pre-calculated "working class" style of lingo just to get votes from people who fear intellectuals or anyone who is different from themselves. He doesn't engage in the sort of crass, imitative supposedly "Black" histrionics of a Jesse Jackson. He talks like an educated man who is of no particular race whatsoever. That's refreshing to me.

What he does do, though, that concerns me is he talks mostly in very broad generalities that sound good...but it's hard to figure out the specifics from what he says. This worries me some. It doesn't worry me anthing like McCain does.... (grin) But it worries me some.

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views on Obama
From: Riginslinger
Date: 27 Jul 08 - 07:50 PM

"Obama doesn't do that. He doesn't pander to a pre-calculated "working class" style of lingo just to get votes from people who fear intellectuals..."


             Obama is one of the most pandering people I've ever seen in public life, but he panders to people who would like to consider themselves to be intellectuals, but don't really have the brain wattage. That's why they hang together in all-knowing groups and go through so many gyrations to prevent themselves from being outed.


                   Personally, I'm still trying to get Jesse Ventura to enter the race, and of course, he's independent.

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views on Obama
From: GUEST,Jack the Sailor
Date: 27 Jul 08 - 09:11 PM

I'd like to see Jesse Ventura in there too. With Bob Barr, he'll draw off the rest of the "know-it-all/jackass" vote from McCain.

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views on Obama
From: Amos
Date: 27 Jul 08 - 10:00 PM

Rig:

I notice you still don't have any examples or particulars for your highly judgemental dismissal.

Shame. It might lend substance your argument.


A

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views on Obama
From: Riginslinger
Date: 27 Jul 08 - 10:36 PM

I suppose the problem I have is the only people I know who are still adamant about voting for Obama fit the description. The problem is, only a small circle of people know the people I know who are taking that position, so to name them wouldn't really get us anywhere.

                   One could put the network news anchors in that slot, but that doesn't really do the anchors justice either. If we knew some network news anchor wannabe's, they would fit, but I don't know any.

                   At the end of it all, I don't really relish the idea of becoming an advocate for McCain, but the alternative is so distasteful...?

                  I'll just have to mention that I think McCain taking a position in favor of the anit-affirmative action petition in Arizona will get him a lot of votes.

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views on Obama
From: Little Hawk
Date: 28 Jul 08 - 12:22 AM

I'd love to see Jesse Ventura in the race. He is a genuine independent and I'm all for that.

But, Rig, all successful politicians pander to people. That's how they get enough votes to win. McCain (and the Republicans generally) pander to people through emotional appeals to people's jingoistic patriotism and their fears, for example. That makes me sick, because the USA is already awash in jingoistic patriotism and fear, it's what the USA has built itself on, and that's partly what makes the USA so dangerous to other nations.

Obama panders to people who like a much more intellectual and positive sounding approach. A much more international sounding approach. Well, fine. Great. ;-) I'd rather be pandered to that way than be pandered to by anti-intellectual chest-pounding and the politics of fear.

I'd rather vote for a guy who sounds intellectual and positive than a guy who sounds like Joe Blow over at the bar on Friday night raving about how tough he is and how the other guy is "a pussy".

Perhaps I am in a minority (among Americans) when it comes to that? Well...I don't mind. I'm Canadian anyway. Being seen as an intellectual is not a detriment when you are running for office in Canada...or Europe...it's an asset. Being seen as an internationalist is an asset. That may be why Canadians and Europeans are massively in favor of Obama over John McCain. We are not impressed by plain-talkin' tough-guy "war heroes" (who simply got captured by someone and held prisoner), we are impressed by well spoken people who can string a series of reasonably complex sentences together and express a reasonably complex idea...and who can SEE shades of gray instead of insisting that everything be either black or white.

Fanatics see everything in black or white. Fanatics don't want to talk about differences with another nation like Iran, they want to fight. They don't want to negotiate a mutually agreeable solution, they want unconditional surrender. I don't vote for fanatics. They're dangerous.

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views on Obama
From: GUEST,Jack the Sailor
Date: 28 Jul 08 - 01:49 AM

LH

McCain was a much better man and a much better candidate 8 years ago when Rove's dirty tricks stole the nomination from him.

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views on Obama
From: Little Hawk
Date: 28 Jul 08 - 02:31 AM

Yes, that could be, Jack. Either he's gotten too old and brittle...or the party system itself has compromised him badly.

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views on Obama
From: GUEST,DV
Date: 28 Jul 08 - 07:36 AM

Hmmmm, not much light here, but I'm certainly learning a lot about the biases of the men of Mudcat! LOL!

The working class masses want to vote for Sylvester Stallone or Arnold Schwarzenegger? Really?

LOL!

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views on Obama
From: Amos
Date: 28 Jul 08 - 09:28 AM

Well...I don't mind. I'm Canadian anyway

Never have you said so much in so few words, my friend.


A

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views on Obama
From: Amos
Date: 28 Jul 08 - 10:07 AM

So good luck to Barack Obama. If he is chosen, then France will be delighted. And if it's somebody else, then France will be the friend of the United States of America."

If that's not an Obama endorsement from the Élysée Palace, I don't know what is. Fair enough: the world has shrunk.

Obama, all silky brilliance, merited the endorsement. He dissected the caricatures that have undermined U.S.-European relations (Europe's militaristic America, and America's won't-get-their-hands-dirty Europeans). He noted Sarkozy's merit in shattering "many of these stereotypes."

He offered a succinct summary of how to wield American might: "An effective U.S. foreign policy will be based on our ability not only to project power, but also to listen and to build consensus."

On specifics, he aced every item, identifying a nascent peace quest between Israel and Syria as a potential "game changer" that has received insufficient U.S. attention; calling for a "steady and prudent" troop withdrawal from Iraq in the light of improved security; pairing two additional U.S. brigades in Afghanistan with a call for greater commitment there from NATO allies "not restrained in terms of their rules of engagement;" and warning Iran not to wait for the next president to stop its "illicit nuclear program" because pressure "is only going to build."

This was a winning performance. .."

---

(NYT Op-Ed)

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views on Obama
From: GUEST,Sawzaw
Date: 28 Jul 08 - 11:02 AM

Any body that does not agree with Amos is wrong. They are this type or that type. They draw their conclusions for a sewer outlet while he gets his intelligence all predigested from RSS feeds and the like, thereby avoiding any thought processes.

"Amos is obviously the smartest man in the world. So smart he does not even have to think anymore.

He just gleefully reposts his "News articles" and bashes anybody that disagrees.

By the way Amos, Where was McCain's last Op Ed in the NYT? The NYT is not one of those sewer outlets is it?

"When a writer for the New York Times questions his own paper for refusing to publish an editorial by John McCain, and a former Clinton press secretary questions the "balance" of the coverage of Obama's foreign tour, you know the media has reached a bias tilting point.

On Tuesday night's "Hardball," Times political writer John Harwood said of the Times decision to spike a McCain editorial: "I was surprised that they did not take it, especially having just run Barack Obama."

And former Bill Clinton press secretary, Dee Dee Myers, called the press coverage of Obama overseas, "extraordinary" and admitted: "It's a legitimate question. Is the press coverage between the two candidates balanced?"

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views on Obama
From: Amos
Date: 28 Jul 08 - 11:12 AM

McCain submitted an OpEd to the Times, Swz, but the editor rejected it for explicit reasons which he gave at the time. Sound editorial reasons. Namely, the op-ed piece said nothing new or original, and gave no new positions, or ideas.

The NYT is not a blog. They publish against standards of newsworthiness, which McCain's piece did not meet. He could get one published in the NYT tomorrow if he sent one in that did meet that standard.


A

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views on Obama
From: Amos
Date: 28 Jul 08 - 11:24 AM

Sawz:

What I asked for was specifics instead of blind opinionation about his arrogance and so on. It is cheap and easy to throw arouond huge adjectives--I'm an expert at it!--buit it does not support a reasoned comparison of viewpoints.

I listened,for example to the Berlin speech and found it was a fine example of statesmanship, addressing common roots and common cause witht he people of Europe and giving them hope for a rational, dynamic mutual commitment with America for a better future. This is so different than Mister Bush's classic approach that it musthave come as a great refreshing change tot he Europeans. He wa snot being arrogant --and this is evident in the response he got. The Germans know when they are being spoken down to, I'm sure. Buty they also knwo when someone is speaking coherently and intelligently and with an appreciation ofhistory. Perhaps this is what strikes you as arrogant? To his audience, it seemed to qualify him all the more to speak to them.

All this emotional arm-waving couched in spiteful generalizations does not make us understand each other any better. I woudl like to know specifically on what you base your accusations of arrogance, if there are specifics. Because I dn't see what you keep pointing at.


A

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views on Obama
From: GUEST,Sawzaw
Date: 28 Jul 08 - 11:51 AM

That answers the question once and for all.

Amos rules folks.

He did not have to ponder the question at all. He knew the answer immediately, instinctively, just like built in reflex reaction when you do something automatically without thinking about it.

He knows beyond a shadow of a doubt what the NYT would do if Mac sent another one tomorrow.

I assume that Amos, knowing everything, knows exactly what was in that McCain op-ed and can confidently and professionally say it was not "newsworthy". He would never rely solely on what a newspaper with a declining circulation would say in it's own defense.

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views on Obama
From: Amos
Date: 28 Jul 08 - 12:03 PM

Oh, BS, Sawz. The whole issue was discussed thoroughly on the NYT's pages, including the editor's reasoning, and I am simply reporting what they said.

Dear Gawd, what a lot of sarcasm!!

Maybe you should spend your time doing homework, instead.


A

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views on Obama
From: GUEST,Sawzaw
Date: 28 Jul 08 - 01:15 PM

Are you endorsing the NYT statements as the truth?

Either you do or you don't know what was in Mac's piece. Either you do or you don't rely in the defensive statements of a for profit corporation.


Speaking of Op-eds, here is one from F. Castro in a totaly unbiased publication known as Granma. I am sure they publish against standards of newsworthiness and they did not send it back to the author with a list of requirements.

Castro wrote that Obama "portrays the Cuban Revolution as anti-democratic and lacking in respect for freedom and human rights. It is the exact same argument which, almost without exception, U.S. administrations have used again and again to justify their crimes against our country." He also offered a summarization of Obama's speech, saying: "Presidential candidate Obama's speech may be formulated as follows: hunger for the nation, remittances as charitable hand-outs and visits to Cuba as propaganda for consumerism and the unsustainable way of life behind it."

Look, I am just reporting what was written. Don't ask me if I believe it to be true or if I can verify if it is true or not. I don't have the superior knowledge, reasoning or judgement of an Amos type.

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views on Obama
From: Amos
Date: 28 Jul 08 - 01:37 PM

When the editor says that he rejected a submitted piece, and gives his reasoning for doing so, I accept it as the truth. Sure. Why not?

Do you have some reason to think it wasn't? Share the facts.

On the Cuban question, I have no opinion. I suspect Obama's speech is being seriously mischaracterized, though, on the face of it.


A

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views on Obama
From: GUEST,Jack the Sailor
Date: 28 Jul 08 - 01:43 PM

Sawzaw...

You quoted your own article out of context to make your dubious point. Why didn't you include the rest of Harwood's words? Because they would negate what you said? If that's the best that "Timeswatch" has on the issue, it isn't much. If it was anything other than a tempest in a teapot. it wouldn't have faded so quickly.

We know the pattern here. The Republicans and their conscienceless little minion monkeys are going to constantly throw pooh at Obama from now til November in hope that some of it will stick. Its what they did to Kerry. Its what they did to Gore. Its what they did to Clinton and Dukakis. I don't think that it will work this time. But i know that won't stop you from trying.

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views on Obama
From: GUEST,Jack the Sailor
Date: 28 Jul 08 - 01:47 PM

I suspect that Obama is about where every other US politician is on Cuba. None of them want communism and dictatorship to thrive 90 miles away.

Castro calls is "crimes" against his country. US politicians call it sanctions and point to Castro's "crimes" against his country. Could it be any more straight forward?

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views on Obama
From: GUEST,Sawzaw
Date: 28 Jul 08 - 02:33 PM

So Amos tells me I am wrong because of what he thinks or fails to think about himself. I mistrust the defensive statements of a failing corporation that pretends to be a beacon of truth. At one time the NYT criticized the Bush administration for ingoring the Iraq threat. All of that is conveniently gone from their website.

People like to say that Obama will change US relations with foreign contries while Castro claims he is using "the exact same argument which, almost without exception, U.S. administrations have used again and again to justify their crimes against our country."

"Obama is about where every other US politician is on Cuba" does not jive with his "Hope and Change" mantra.

And what were Harwood's words that I omitted that defends the actions of the NYT?

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views on Obama
From: GUEST
Date: 28 Jul 08 - 02:40 PM

>>And what were Harwood's words that I omitted that defends the actions of the NYT?<<

I think you ought to stop trying to read Amos mind and try reading the article you posted. its closer to your grade level.

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views on Obama
From: Little Hawk
Date: 28 Jul 08 - 02:44 PM

It isn't the USA's business if a country 90 miles away has a different form of government. The USA has no rightful jurisdiction over the internal affairs of Cuba or any other country outside the USA.

Obama, however, is an American politician and he knows the realities, so naturally he will repeat the usual disingenuous line about Cuba in order to get himself elected.

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views on Obama
From: beardedbruce
Date: 28 Jul 08 - 04:22 PM

Details missing from Obama's Social Security plan
Monday, July 28, 2008 11:05:57 PM
By CHARLES BABINGTON

Barack Obama's bid to place a new Social Security tax on very high incomes is either a bold or foolhardy plan, depending on who critiques it. But its potential impact is almost impossible to gauge because he is providing few details on basic questions such as what the tax rate might be, what types of income would be taxed and how the taxpayers' benefits would be affected.

The Democratic presidential candidate says he would work with lawmakers from both parties to resolve such matters. Voters generally applaud bipartisan cooperation, but they apparently will go to the polls this fall with only a vague notion of what Obama has in mind.

Obama made headlines June 13 when he called for a Social Security payroll tax on incomes above $250,000 a year. Currently, the tax is levied only on the first $102,000 of each worker's income. That covers the entire salary of most Americans.

Obama would not apply the Social Security tax to annual incomes between $102,000 and $250,000, a move meant to avoid alienating several million upper-income voters. His proposed change would apply only to those earning more than $250,000 a year, or about 3 percent of all taxpayers.

When he outlined his idea in the battleground state of Ohio, Obama said it is unfair for middle-class earners to pay the Social Security tax "on every dime they make," while millionaires and billionaires pay it on "only a very small percentage of their income." He also said the Social Security program needs revamping to bolster its long-term viability.

With Obama offering few details, several news accounts suggested that his proposed tax on very high incomes would be applied just as the existing Social Security tax is levied on incomes up to $102,000.

All workers pay a 6.2 percent Social Security payroll tax on such income. Their employers match it, for a total tax of 12.4 percent. The tax applies only to earned income, not to passive income such as dividends and interest.

In recent weeks, Obama aides have quietly indicated that the proposed tax on incomes above $250,000 might be different in key aspects. The rate probably would be about 2 percent to 4 percent, not 6.2 percent, they said. It's also possible that it would apply to more types of income, including dividends and investments.

As for benefits, the campaign has not said how the proposed tax on very high incomes would translate into new retirement income, if any, for those who pay it.

The campaign "has not put forth a specific plan" for Social Security, Obama economic adviser Austan Goolsbee said in an interview.

Obama's Republican opponent, Sen. John McCain, has called Social Security's funding formula "a disgrace," saying young workers will be shortchanged. But he says specific remedies must be worked out with Congress after the next president takes office. He repeatedly has said "everything is on the table," including the possibility of a Social Security tax increase.

That drew fire Monday from the Club for Growth, an anti-tax group in Washington. His comments, the group said in a letter, are "shocking because you have been adamant in your opposition to raising taxes under any circumstances."

With McCain refusing to embrace or reject proposed changes to Social Security, and Obama offering a plan with few details, the issue has generated relatively little debate on the campaign trail. But any change to the massive program could have far-reaching effects.

Many Americans rely on Social Security for much or all of their retirement income. Some workers, meanwhile, do not realize how much is withheld from each paycheck for Social Security and, to a lesser degree, Medicare.

Nearly three-fourths of all workers pay more in these payroll taxes than in federal income taxes, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. The center assumes that workers pay the full 12.4 percent in Social Security taxes, contending that employers would devote their half of the total to salaries if they did not have to make the 50-50 match.

Given the dearth of details about Obama's plans, some Republicans have criticized it, using assumptions that Democrats reject. Lawrence B. Lindsey, a former economic adviser to President Bush, argues that high earners would pay the full 12.4 percent tax rate on income above $250,000 while receiving no added benefits.

"A high-income entrepreneur would see his or her federal marginal tax rate rise to 53 percent from 37.7 percent," Lindsey wrote in a June 20 Wall Street Journal op-ed column.

The marginal tax rate is what a person pays on each additional dollar earned. Lindsey wrote that Obama's plans would provide a powerful incentive for the highest-earning Americans to work less, invest less and contribute less to the economy.

Former Oklahoma Sen. Don Nickles, a Republican, agreed. A person who owns two restaurants and makes $500,000 a year would have little incentive to open a third restaurant under Obama's tax plans, and might even close one, Nickles said in an interview. "He's not going to be hiring more people," Nickles said.

Obama economic adviser Jason Furman, responding to Lindsey in a letter published by The Wall Street Journal, said Obama would "work with Congress on a bipartisan basis to design the details" of his Social Security plan, "including the tax rate, how it is phased in over time, the linkage between these tax payments and benefits, and other critical design elements of this plan."

Furman wrote that Obama "has not proposed a 12.4-percentage point tax increase on earnings above $250,000."

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views on Obama
From: Amos
Date: 28 Jul 08 - 04:44 PM

Seems pretty obvious tha the time for hammering out the details is when one is president, not in the media, so it may be he is saying as much as need be.


A

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views on Obama
From: Amos
Date: 28 Jul 08 - 04:50 PM

Democratic presidential hopeful Barack Obama turned his attention to the troubled US economy after he surged to his largest-ever lead over his Republican rival John McCain following his high-profile overseas tour.

(Press Assocn)

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views on Obama
From: GUEST,Sawzaw
Date: 28 Jul 08 - 09:21 PM

Amos:

You sure are getting tight lipped when it comes to 'splanin' things you say. Could it be that you just like to repeat things but you don't really want to discuss them in detail? Hell I know parrots that can do that. You have to be way smarter that anybody. Quit holding out on us.

What critic of the Bush administration wrote this? You do know don't you?

"I find it ironic that he is emulating the worst mistake of the Bush administration by waving the "Mission Accomplished" banner prematurely."

And to the Guest: What is my grade level? And please disclose yours.

Can you come up with the words you claim negates the words I "selected" or not?

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views on Obama
From: GUEST,Sawzaw
Date: 28 Jul 08 - 10:16 PM

What percentage of the mainstream media is in-the-tank for Barack Obama? Oh, 90 percent, McAuliffe replied.

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views on Obama
From: GUEST,Jack the Sailor
Date: 28 Jul 08 - 10:45 PM

Today on
Morning Joe, He went back on those words. McAuliffe also predicted that Obama would take 50 States in the general election. He also predicted that Hillary would win the nomination right up to the day she dropped out.

Is McAuliffe at all credible on this?

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views on Obama
From: GUEST,Jack the Sailor
Date: 28 Jul 08 - 10:50 PM

>>Can you come up with the words you claim negates the words I "selected" or not?<<

Read it for yourself. Don't be so lazy.

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views on Obama
From: GUEST,Jack the Sailor
Date: 28 Jul 08 - 10:53 PM

Media Bias. Hell yeah!

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views on Obama
From: GUEST,Sawzaw
Date: 28 Jul 08 - 10:58 PM

Obama: I don't take money from oil companies or Washington lobbyists, and I won't let them block change anymore.

Obama has accepted more than $213,000 from individuals who work for companies in the oil and gas industry and their spouses.

Two of Obama's bundlers are top executives at oil companies and are listed on his Web site as raising between $50,000 and $100,000 for the presidential hopeful.

Obama has raised more than $1.4 million from members of law and consultancy firms led by partners who are lobbyists, The Los Angeles Times reported last week. And The Hill, a Washington newspaper, reported earlier this year that Obama's campaign had reached out to lobbyists' networks to use their contacts to help build his fund-raising base.

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views on Obama
From: Little Hawk
Date: 28 Jul 08 - 11:05 PM

Any politician would be happy to get campaign funds from any source whatsoever. If it's a source he'd prefer not to be seen getting it from, then it will be camouflaged somehow. That's how the game works.

What they all want is the money. Do you think they give a hoot who it comes from? Hell, no, as long as it comes.

Now, if it is the case that Obama is getting an unusually large amount of small donations from private citizens, then the Democrats would want people to know about that...because it looks good. So they would play it up as much as they can.

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views on Obama
From: Riginslinger
Date: 28 Jul 08 - 11:25 PM

As long as they don't have to acknowledge that the donations are being bundled, like sub-prime mortgages.

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views on Obama
From: Little Hawk
Date: 28 Jul 08 - 11:32 PM

Yeah, exactly.

Look, they will say anything that looks good for their cause. So will the Republicans.

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views on Obama
From: Amos
Date: 28 Jul 08 - 11:33 PM

I'm not being tight-lipped, Swaz, I just don't have any data, and all I can offer is a suspicion, based on general patterns in the past, that what is being flung about is probably distorted in the usual ways--altered context, altered importance, false data, mangled sequences, innuendo and miscellaneous inaccurate associating and identifying of things properly kept distinct.

A

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views on Obama
From: GUEST,Jack the Sailor
Date: 29 Jul 08 - 12:07 AM

McAuliffe on June 3

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views on Obama
From: GUEST,Jack the Sailor
Date: 29 Jul 08 - 09:46 AM

Obamamania grips Europe - the Economist

"Mr Obama's view of the world is no sunnier than George Bush's: it is equally menaced by terrorists and weapons of mass destruction and genocide and more so by global warming. But Mr Obama promises—in fact demands—a more co-operative approach to solving such problems. New walls threaten to divide religions, tribes and classes. The answer, he said, attempting to sound like Kennedy and Reagan rolled into one, is to tear them down."

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views on Obama
From: Riginslinger
Date: 29 Jul 08 - 10:35 AM

If you're trying to roll Kennedy and Reagan into one, you've got your work cut out for you.

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views on Obama
From: GUEST,Jack the Sailor
Date: 29 Jul 08 - 10:37 AM

From a foreign policy point of view, the only real difference was that Kennedy was more bold.

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views on Obama
From: beardedbruce
Date: 29 Jul 08 - 11:23 AM

Washington Post:

Obama the Unknown
By Richard Cohen
Tuesday, July 29, 2008; Page A17

"Just tell me one thing Barack Obama has done that you admire," I asked a prominent Democrat. He paused and then said that he admired Obama's speech to the Democratic convention in 2004. I agreed. It was a hell of a speech, but it was just a speech.

On the other hand, I continued, I could cite four or five actions -- not speeches -- that John McCain has taken that elicit my admiration, even my awe. First, of course, is his decision as a Vietnam prisoner of war to refuse freedom out of concern that he would be exploited for propaganda purposes. To paraphrase what Kipling said about Gunga Din, John McCain is a better man than most.

But I would not stop there. I would include campaign finance reform, which infuriated so many in his own party; opposition to earmarks, which won him no friends; his politically imprudent opposition to the Medicare prescription drug bill (Medicare has about $35 trillion in unfunded obligations); and, last but not least, his very early call for additional troops in Iraq. His was a lonely position -- virtually suicidal for an all-but-certain presidential candidate and no help when his campaign nearly expired last summer. In all these cases, McCain stuck to his guns.

Obama argues that he himself stuck to the biggest gun of all: opposition to the war. He took that position when the war was enormously popular, the president who initiated it was even more popular and critics of both were slandered as unpatriotic. But at the time, Obama was a mere Illinois state senator, representing the (very) liberal Hyde Park area of Chicago. He either voiced his conscience or his district's leanings or (lucky fella) both. We will never know.

And we will never know, either, how Obama might have conducted himself had he served in Congress as long as McCain has. Possibly he would have earned a reputation for furious, maybe even sanctimonious, integrity of the sort that often drove McCain's colleagues to dark thoughts of senatorcide, but the record -- scant as it is -- suggests otherwise. Obama is not noted for sticking to a position or a person once that position or person becomes a political liability. (Names available upon request.)

All politicians change their positions, sometimes even because they have changed their minds. McCain must have suffered excruciating whiplash from totally reversing himself on George Bush's tax cuts. He has denounced preachers he later embraced and then, to his chagrin, has had to denounce them all over again. This plasticity has a label: pandering. McCain knows how it's done.

But Obama has shown that in this area, youth is no handicap. He has been for and against gun control, against and for the recent domestic surveillance legislation and, in almost a single day, for a united Jerusalem under Israeli control and then, when apprised of U.S. policy and Palestinian chagrin, against it. He is an accomplished pol -- a statement of both admiration and a bit of regret.

Obama is often likened to John F. Kennedy. The comparison makes sense. He has the requisite physical qualities -- handsome, lean, etc. -- plus wit, intelligence, awesome speaking abilities and a literary bent. He also might be compared to Franklin D. Roosevelt for many of those same qualities. Both FDR and JFK were disparaged early on by their contemporaries for, I think, doing the difficult and making it look easy. Eleanor Roosevelt, playing off the title of Kennedy's Pulitzer Prize-winning book, airily dismissed him as more profile than courage. Similarly, it was Walter Lippmann's enduring misfortune to size up FDR and belittle him: Roosevelt, he wrote, was "a pleasant man who, without any important qualifications for office, would very much like to be president." Lippmann later recognized that he had underestimated Roosevelt.

My guess is that Obama will make a fool of anyone who issues such a judgment about him. Still, the record now, while tissue thin, is troubling. The next president will have to be something of a political Superman, a man of steel who can tell the American people that they will have to pay more for less -- higher taxes, lower benefits of all kinds -- and deal in an ugly way when nuclear weapons seize the imagination of madmen.

The question I posed to that prominent Democrat was just my way of thinking out loud. I know that Barack Obama is a near-perfect political package. I'm still not sure, though, what's in it.

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views on Obama
From: beardedbruce
Date: 29 Jul 08 - 11:25 AM

and

Obama's Files and McCain's Smiles
Dear Stumped:

Why is the media unwilling to vet Obama as they would any other candidate? Isn't it bizarre that Obama gets almost no legitimate criticism from the major news sources (including The Post)? I'm a devoted Democrat who will certainly vote for Obama, and even I wonder what happened to the media's backbone.

Liz

Dear Liz,

I disagree with you. Barack Obama's candidacy took a big hit when the media zeroed in on his church and its controversial pastor Jeremiah Wright. Obama's supporters felt the focus on Wright, and the guilt by association, was overblown. It wasn't -- it was part of the proper vetting of a lesser-known presidential candidate that you suggest has been missing.

Plenty of news articles and editorials, including some in this newspaper, have also raised legitimate questions about Obama's approach to Iraq, especially whether the candidate is willing to adjust his preconceived campaign-trail assessment of the war (and time horizons for an exit) to the realities on the ground over there.

And even with all its excessive hype, the media coverage of Obama's recent globe-trotting amounted to needed vetting. Obama touched down in seven countries without a faux pas, so the coverage was largely positive. It must be said that the potential downsides of the trip were always a bit overstated by the media and Obama's own clever spin masters. But you can be sure all those reporters traveling with him were hoping for a "gotcha" moment that would reveal the young senator's supposed naivete. It didn't happen. Obama didn't confuse Shiites with Sunnis in Iraq (as John McCain sometimes does), nor was he lectured by foreign leaders about his failure to understand the complexities of the world. On the contrary, every foreign leader -- including Iraq's -- appeared willing and eager to work with the man in coming years, which is what made the trip such a glaring success.