Letters to the Editor
logicalresponse
Published Letters: 162 Editor's Choice: 19
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Three points
[Read the article: Is Obama playing the race card?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]First, as I have said many times in other comments (and I supposed poeple are getting tired of me, but I need attention), it was Clyburn's two faced non-endorsement of Obama that first raised the race card. Whether the Obama campaign had anything to do with it in the beginning, they certainly have taken advantage of it.
You may want to skip this next point, if you don't like someone breaching political correctness. Do you suppose Oprah would have supported Obama if he had been white?
As a Clinton supporter, the bottom line from my point of view is that Obama may have gotten away with a lot, but let's face it, Clinton's campaign has done little to effectively counter him. Granted she may have been at an impossible disadvantage because of the press, but that is only part of it, and would not have been such a factor if not for underestimating Obama earlier last year. While it is possible that there is nothing she could have done, but the effort was not there in many ways. I do hope she pulls something off in Texas and Ohio, because I think she will make a good president, and I am frankly not so sure of Obama. But Obama's campaign has not done anything that was unexpected or even abnormal in politics.
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My two cents
[Read the article: Anonymous no more]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]I really do hope that you come up with some good itdeas on web2ifying the comments. On download.com they have a dual rating system where editors can rate a program from one to five and readers can rate the program as well. It is fun to see the difference in opinion between the two groups.
Also, in articles that have three digit numbers of comments you could make it so the comments are sorted by rating as an option, instead of just oldest or newest or editor's choice.
You could even have a special page where highly rated comments are gathered.
You could have a page where people could post any comment they want as if they were contributing to a blog and the highest rated would appear on the first page.
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Coins -- two sides
[Read the article: New Clinton spin: March 4 states must-wins for Obama]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]It's true, no? If one side must win then the other side must also win.
The media, including war room, act as if the fact that Obama is ahead and has had a string of state primary leads, somehow MEANS he will win. If the media builds that frame and everyone else buys into it, then it becomes the test. In fact, however, the two candidates are VERY close in both popular vote and deligates. If the media framed the test differently (neurtally) we would be talking about a tied race.
Texas and Ohio are important to Obama. He knows that, even if everyone else does not, which is WHY he has spent so much in those states.
However, if Obama does not win those states, it will still be close. It won't mean that there are suddenly huge numbers of people having doubts about him. It WILL mean that there comes a point when more spending is just overkill with diminishing effects on the outcome.
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At the risk of sounding "whiney"
[Read the article: Dean says he's concerned about a prolonged race]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]The recent poll that shows that 25% of Clinton voters SAY they would vote for a Republican over Obama (as opposed to 10% of Obama supporters switching to a Republican over Clinton), is saying something that the media and Obama’s campaign are missing. It is this: Clinton supporters are not stupid. They know when their candidate is being treated unfairly by the media and that Obama is taking advantage of it. Obama supporters don’t see it, of course, because they like the unfair treatment. The media doesn’t see it, because they think in 24 hour news cycles.
The thing is that when someone is treating you or someone you like unfairly, you tend not to like the person that is doing it and dislike anyone who is willing to go along with it. As a Clinton supporter, I doubt I will ever watch Keith Olbermann again, and I no longer see Obama as a second best alternative to Clinton. I see him as a Machiavellian politician who never gets challenged on the absurd responses he makes to criticism and never gets challenged on the arrogance and utter snideness of his campaign officials.
There is danger in railroading someone, and that is that they won’t like it. The Democratic leadership had better remember that. If for example, the nomination is still close after today and the DNC decides to pressure superdelegates to support Obama in order to force Clinton out of the race, the ramifications of that may not be pretty.
I think that the Clinton supporters who now say they would vote Republican will probably come to their senses, but if Obama and the media continue to play like Republicans (making personal attacks and then trying to claim it is the other side that is making personal attacks), former Clinton supports might decide there is no difference. If Clinton does get the nomination, no one will be able to say it was handed to her; not so with Obama.