US 2008 Presidential Campaign/Debate Discussion Thread - The Fifth Installment

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MrsSpringsteen said:


Thesaurus working overtime again I see. Don't wear out the pages.
Click to expand...

it's almost like automatic writing , bear in mind i peck like 17.25 words a minute, so there.
:angry:

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2861U2 said:


Fair enough. But where does it end, though? When referencing my African-American neighbors 2 houses away, can I say "they have a cute little baby boy?"
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why are you being obnoxiously obtuse?

calling a grown black man "boy" is absolutely a racist term.

Rep. Davis agrees with this. that's why he apologized in no uncertain terms.
 
2861U2 said:


Fair enough. But where does it end, though? When referencing my African-American neighbors 2 houses away, can I say "they have a cute little baby boy?"
Click to expand...

Do you honestly not see the difference in describing a child as a boy and calling an adult male, one who has worked hard to get to where he is today, a boy?

You can't possibly be that ignorant.
 
You dumb fool #286.

Youre suppose to say,

"That's a handsome little man you have there"

Haven't you figured out that crackers are geneticly inferior race yet?

:angry:

<>
 
Off Topic

Congrats to Trevor Immelman's win at the Master's golf championship.

He's from the country South Africa. Only the 2nd South African to win the Masters besides Gary Player.

QUESTIONS

If he moved to the United States of America, would his children be considered African Americans or South African Americans?

And since he is only the 2nd person from the continent of Africa to win the Masters...Does that mean that he's the third to win it behind Gary Player and Tiger Woods?

Interesting... Two men from Africa have won the Masters. They are caucasian. Tiger Woods from America won it and he is one-quarter Chinese, one quarter Thai, one quarter African American, one-eighth Native American, and one-eighth Dutch. But he's considered an African American even though he's only 25% from Africa.

INTERESTING

Barack Obama was born on August 4, 1961 in Honolulu, Hawaii to Barack Hussein Obama, Sr., of Nyangoma-Kogelo, Siaya District, Kenya, and Ann Dunham, of Wichita, Kansas. His parents separated when he was two years old and later divorced and raised by his mother's family. Yet he's considered black.

I'd be more inclined to vote for him if he considered himself an American and not an African-American....like the rest of the immigrants who have came here and made a life for themselves.
 
You think when he grew up and later throughout his career he was considered white?
There was a discussion about a year ago about him not being "black enough".
 
2861U2 said:
I guess I can't walk up to one of my black friends and say "Whats up, boy" anymore.

Click to expand...

No, you really shouldn't. Your black friends probably don't want to "make an issue of it" but I promise you there isn't an American black man alive who is okay with being called "boy." Your friends probably recognize that you don't intend harm and choose to leave it alone but that doesn't in any way make them "okay with it." I should know because I had a lot of friends like you growing up and I never said a word. I knew they didn't mean to be hurtful and didn't think of themselves as racist and I also knew they wouldn't understand if I tried to explain it to them.

But it still hurt.

I'm really shocked that you don't understand the racial signficance of this term. If he'd said "that kid shouldn't have his hand on the button" it wouldn't be near the issue it is.
 
Back to this election:

below is a piece from a WSJ article that reflects some of my thoughts about the Obama campaign

Mr. Obama is the closest thing to a rookie candidate on the national stage since Dwight Eisenhower, who was a beloved war leader. Candidates as green as Mr. Obama make first-timer mistakes under the searing scrutiny of a national campaign. Even seasoned pols don't understand how unforgiving that scrutiny can be. Ask John Kerry, who had won five statewide elections before running for president.

For all his winning ways and natural appeal to the camera, Mr. Obama hasn't really been tested in a major campaign. In 2000, then-state Sen. Obama challenged Congressman Bobby Rush, who was vulnerable after having been crushed in a bid to become mayor of Chicago. Mr. Rush, a former Black Panther, painted Mr. Obama as "inauthentic" and beat him 2-1.

In 2004, when Mr. Obama ran for the U.S. Senate, he had the good luck of watching both Blair Hull, the front-runner for the Democratic nomination, and Jack Ryan, the GOP nominee, self-destruct in sex scandals. Mr. Obama's eventual Republican opponent, Alan Keyes, was an unserious candidate who won the votes of only 56% of Republican voters.

Mr. Obama has prospered in Democratic primaries. But as John Harris and Jim VandeHei note in Politico.com, that's in part because these primaries have "been an exercise in self-censorship" about Mr. Obama's weaknesses. It is "indisputably true," they write, that "Obama is on the brink of the Democratic nomination without having had to confront head-on the evidence about his general election challenges."
Click to expand...


link here
 
It is too early to call the race
polls (this early out) can and will change






I am sure those polls include McCain taking FL, OH and PENN

any 2 would flip it for Hillary
(and the polls have her close in all 3)

I am not sure if 2 are enough for Obama



regardless, I expect Obama to be the Dem nominee
and his campaign will have to figure out how to win from this perceived disadvantage
 
Yeah, I know the polls change, I just like to post that poll whenever it changes.

I think my strong desire to face Hillary has faded. I'd be equally happy with Obama. Like you said, against Clinton, Florida and Ohio would be a toss-up, whereas against Obama, McCain would safely win those.
 
Black Clinton supporter joins race debate
Bob Johnson: Obama wouldn't be presidential candidate if he were white
The Associated Press
updated 5:12 a.m. ET, Tues., April. 15, 2008

CHARLOTTE, N.C. - The billionaire founder of Black Entertainment Television says Barack Obama would not be a leading presidential candidate if he were white and that the Illinois senator's campaign has "a hair-trigger on anything racial."

The Charlotte Observer reported on its Web site Monday that Bob Johnson, one of Hillary Rodham Clinton's top black supporters, was commenting on remarks previously made by Geraldine Ferraro, another Clinton supporter.

"What I believe Geraldine Ferraro meant is that if you take a freshman senator from Illinois called 'Jerry Smith' and he says I'm going to run for president, would he start off with 90 percent of the black vote?" Johnson said. "And the answer is, probably not."

"Geraldine Ferraro said it right," Johnson added. "The problem is, Geraldine Ferraro is white. This campaign has such a hair-trigger on anything racial it is almost impossible for anybody to say anything."

Ferraro, a Democratic candidate for vice president in 1984, stepped down last month as an adviser to Clinton amid controversy over comments she made to the Daily Breeze newspaper in Torrance, Calif. "If Obama was a white man, he would not be in this position," Ferraro said. "And if he was a woman (of any color) he would not be in this position. He happens to be very lucky to be who he is. And the country is caught up in the concept."

'Absurd comments'

Obama campaign spokesman Dan Leistikow called Johnson's remarks "just one in a long line of absurd comments by Bob Johnson and other Clinton supporters who will say or do anything to get the nomination. The American people are tired of this and are ready to turn the page on these kind of attack politics."

Johnson is a longtime friend of both Hillary Clinton and former President Bill Clinton.

In January, Johnson seemed to refer to Obama's acknowledged teenage drug use while introducing Clinton at a South Carolina event. He said the Clintons "have been deeply and emotionally involved in black issues — when Barack Obama was doing something in the neighborhood; I won't say what he was doing, but he said it in his book — when they have been involved."

Obama wrote about his youthful drug use — marijuana, alcohol and sometimes cocaine — in his memoir, "Dreams From My Father." Johnson later denied that he was talking about Obama using drugs.
 
U2democrat said:
:|
Mr. Johnson isn't helping anything.
Click to expand...

at this stage
I agree

but I do think is was unfair to throw Geraldine Ferraro under the bus


If you take a freshman senator from Illinois called 'Jerry Smith' and he says I'm going to run for president, would he start off with 90 percent of the black vote?" Johnson said. "And the answer is, probably not."
Click to expand...

If he were a democrat against George W Bush

he would and should get 80-90 % of the vote

that group includes people that care about fair-play, all people having the same rights, and not protecting a certain class

imo, that is why Dems tend to get 80+ per cent of the:

black vote
jewish vote
gay vote
and a majority portion of the hispanic vote
and lately my vote

but, there is not a good reason why Hillary only deserves a 10 % vote from any of those groups

she has a very strong record of being one that supports equal rights for all
 
boston.com

Posted by Scott Helman, Political Reporter April 15, 2008 05:18 PM

QUAKERTOWN, Pa. -- Older voters gravitate to Hillary Clinton because they're too wise to be fooled by Barack Obama's rhetoric, former president Bill Clinton told Pennsylvania voters today.

Clinton's comments, to a packed high school gym about an hour north of Philadelphia, were one part presidential politics and one part legacy protection. His beef was with Obama's contention that many of the problems facing the country today were simmering long before President Bush took office seven-plus years ago.

"I think there is a big reason there's an age difference in a lot of these polls," he said. "Because once you've reached a certain age, you won't sit there and listen to somebody tell you there's really no difference between what happened in the Bush years and the Clinton years; that there's not much difference in how small-town Pennsylvania fared when I was president, and in this decade."

"So I think it's important that we get to the truth of this," Clinton continued, going on to compare his and Bush's record on jobs, family incomes, and other measures.

Last week, however, Clinton seemed to suggest that older voters might be more absent-minded than wise. Defending Hillary Clinton's faulty recollection of landing under sniper fire during a 1996 humanitarian visit to Bosnia, the former president said of her critics, "When they're 60, they'll forget something when they're tired at 11 o'clock at night, too."

At various points in his nearly hour-long appearance at Quakertown Community High School, Clinton cautioned the hundreds gathered to hear him against voting on history. (His defense of his White House record notwithstanding, of course.) Despite press coverage about how historic a campaign this is, Clinton said, "the history doesn't amount to a hill of beans. All that matters is the future. Who will make the best future for you?"

And later, after he had run through, in great detail, the ins and outs of America's foreign and domestic policy challenges, Clinton returned to the theme of substance versus abstraction. Hillary Clinton, he said, would be a "servant leader," and voters had to decide whether that was more important than electing a "symbolic leader." "You gotta decide," he said, as if he had laid out even arguments for each.
 
:drool: ~ just cause I have to

The Boss backs Obama
Posted: 09:40 AM ET

(CNN) — Rocker Bruce Springsteen has endorsed Barack Obama for president.

“At the moment, critics have tried to diminish Senator Obama through the exaggeration of certain of his comments and relationships,” said the New Jersey native, in a statement posted on his Web site Wednesday. “While these matters are worthy of some discussion, they have been ripped out of the context and fabric of the man's life and vision… Over here on E Street, we're proud to support Obama for President.”

In February, Springsteen had resisted making a choice between Obama and Hillary Clinton, telling USA Today that "there are two really good Democratic candidates for president. I admire and respect them both enough to wait and see what happens."

But he praised Obama, who cited Springsteen as the person he would most like to meet in an interview with People magazine.

"I always look at my work as trying to measure the distance between American promise and American reality," he told the paper. "And I think (Obama's) inspired a lot of people with that idea: How do you make that distance shorter? …”

Springsteen backed Sen. John Kerry's unsuccessful 2004 presidential bid.


Dear Friends and Fans:

LIke most of you, I've been following the campaign and I have now seen and heard enough to know where I stand. Senator Obama, in my view, is head and shoulders above the rest.

He has the depth, the reflectiveness, and the resilience to be our next President. He speaks to the America I've envisioned in my music for the past 35 years, a generous nation with a citizenry willing to tackle nuanced and complex problems, a country that's interested in its collective destiny and in the potential of its gathered spirit. A place where "...nobody crowds you, and nobody goes it alone."

At the moment, critics have tried to diminish Senator Obama through the exaggeration of certain of his comments and relationships. While these matters are worthy of some discussion, they have been ripped out of the context and fabric of the man's life and vision, so well described in his excellent book, Dreams of My Father, often in order to distract us from discussing the real issues: war and peace, the fight for economic and racial justice, reaffirming our Constitution, and the protection and enhancement of our environment.

After the terrible damage done over the past eight years, a great American reclamation project needs to be undertaken. I believe that Senator Obama is the best candidate to lead that project and to lead us into the 21st Century with a renewed sense of moral purpose and of ourselves as Americans.

Over here on E Street, we're proud to support Obama for President.

Bruce Springsteen
 
MrsSpringsteen said:
boston.com

Posted by Scott Helman, Political Reporter April 15, 2008 05:18 PM

QUAKERTOWN, Pa. -- Older voters gravitate to Hillary Clinton because they're too wise to be fooled by Barack Obama's rhetoric, former president Bill Clinton told Pennsylvania voters today.

Clinton's comments, to a packed high school gym about an hour north of Philadelphia, were one part presidential politics and one part legacy protection. His beef was with Obama's contention that many of the problems facing the country today were simmering long before President Bush took office seven-plus years ago.

"I think there is a big reason there's an age difference in a lot of these polls," he said. "Because once you've reached a certain age, you won't sit there and listen to somebody tell you there's really no difference between what happened in the Bush years and the Clinton years; that there's not much difference in how small-town Pennsylvania fared when I was president, and in this decade."

"So I think it's important that we get to the truth of this," Clinton continued, going on to compare his and Bush's record on jobs, family incomes, and other measures.

Last week, however, Clinton seemed to suggest that older voters might be more absent-minded than wise. Defending Hillary Clinton's faulty recollection of landing under sniper fire during a 1996 humanitarian visit to Bosnia, the former president said of her critics, "When they're 60, they'll forget something when they're tired at 11 o'clock at night, too."

At various points in his nearly hour-long appearance at Quakertown Community High School, Clinton cautioned the hundreds gathered to hear him against voting on history. (His defense of his White House record notwithstanding, of course.) Despite press coverage about how historic a campaign this is, Clinton said, "the history doesn't amount to a hill of beans. All that matters is the future. Who will make the best future for you?"

And later, after he had run through, in great detail, the ins and outs of America's foreign and domestic policy challenges, Clinton returned to the theme of substance versus abstraction. Hillary Clinton, he said, would be a "servant leader," and voters had to decide whether that was more important than electing a "symbolic leader." "You gotta decide," he said, as if he had laid out even arguments for each.
Click to expand...

Oh thanks Bill, I'm just a stupid young voter "fooled" into supporting Obama. I guess I'll go to a blissfully ignorant life and not pay attention to politics anymore because obviously I'm too naive and stupid to be involved.

Who will make a better future for me...the co-candidate who insults me or the one who gives me a chance to make the change myself?
 
U2democrat said:

Who will make a better future for me...the co-candidate who insults me or the one who gives me a chance to make the change myself?
Click to expand...




we all know you can't win the election without the bitter old white racist vote.
 
So I'm watching the debate on ABC when I should be doing other more productive things, but just a comment - the American media is disgraceful. The two moderators (Gibson and Stephanopoulos) are either actually genuinely stupid or just complete hacks which is disappointing. Their questions are actually a stunning example of the contempt that the media has for the general public - to ask idiotic stupidities like what they've been asking is not even befitting a high school newspaper.

Awful, awful, awful. What an utter embarrassment. To have some of the finest educational institutions and journalism schools in the whole world and produce this is astonishing.
 
it won't be on here in CA
for 2 more hours
I may watch parts

I don't think I will be able to watch the whole thing



If Obama has a good showing in Penn next Tuesday, I'd say come within 5-6 points

this should be over pretty soon.
 
Really if I was either candidate I would have walked out. That's how stupid it is.
 
anitram said:
the American media is disgraceful

...

genuinely stupid or just complete hacks

...

To have some of the finest educational institutions and journalism schools in the whole world and produce this is astonishing.
Click to expand...

Yup...this sums up American news media alright.
 
anitram said:
The two moderators (Gibson and Stephanopoulos) are either actually genuinely stupid or just complete hacks which is disappointing.
Click to expand...

Stephanopoulos is intelligent enough to know better...Gibson at least has the excuse of bovine stupidity.
 
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