Letters to the Editor
jtanneru
Published Letters: 59 Editor's Choice: 1
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Electoral Map
[Read the article: Clinton gets her party started]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]I voted for Hillary, but it was very close for me. I alternate between voter's remorse and confidence that I chose the right candidate. I am one of the people who identified with Rebecca Traister's last column. Finally, I chose the person who I felt would be a better president, although I feel Obama is probably a better candidate.
Last night and this morning, I was thinking about the electoral map. I live in Alabama where Huckabee narrowly beat McCain and Obama trounced Clinton. That tells me that, at least in this state, support for McCain is soft and support for Clinton is non-existent. Conventional wisdom says that Huckabee voters will stay home in a McCain-Obama contest, but will get out the vote for McCain over Clinton.
Alabama doesn't matter. I don't think Obama can carry Alabama. But what about swing states with strong evangelical populations? What about Tennessee and West Virginia? The Democrats will need to expand their support outside of New England and California to beat the Republicans in the fall. In a year that seems like a can't-lose for the Democrats, are we nominating a candidate that so alienates red-state voters that she reproduces Kerry's loss in 2004? What was I thinking to assume that any year could be a can't-lose for Democrats?
When it comes down to it, I think Obama has a better chance in November than Clinton. I think Obama is a candidate who can win discouraged Republicans over to the Democratic side, and there are a lot of discouraged Republicans this year. Clinton can't do that.
Personally, I was heartened to take another look at the map this morning and see that Clinton carried Tennessee and came very close to winning Missouri and New Mexico. She will need these states in the fall if she is the nominee. Exit polls show she did well among Hispanics. Maybe the Hispanic vote will decide the election this year.
Arrrgh! I so badly want the Democrats to take my country back that I can't think about anything else!
(I guess if Michigan and Florida could do it over again, they might not mind having a late primary this year.)
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Go Mike!
[Read the article: Huckabee disputing Washington results]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]I'm for counting all the votes. Even the Republican ones.
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Powers IS a Whiz
[Read the article: Getting through these dark times]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]I've been impressed with Samantha Powers since I heard her promoting her genocide book on NPR three or so years ago. She struck me as incredibly level-headed and sensitive to the nuances of international relations, as well as the difficulties of using political policy to confront human evil.
If I had known Powers was advising Obama, I probably would have voted for Obama instead of Clinton. The candidates are so close in their qualifications, this would actually have been enough to make a difference for me. All you letter-writers who are stuck in your Clinton-Obama hyperbole should get out into the sunlight a little more.
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Fuck you people
[Read the article: Curious George]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Not one by one. Just as a group.
That's probably an old one, but it made me laugh.
The other thing that generally makes me laugh is people who say "Humans are the only animals that..." as if the particular activity were somehow more noble because we, exclusively, do it. But laugh? Give me a break. How do you know? I'll bet we eat animals that laugh.
Humans are the only animals that videotape audience members laughing at a comedy concert, though. I can say that with confidence.
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After a few months of silence
[Read the article: War? What war?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Suddenly Cheney and McCain are able to travel to Iraq to say we're winning.
Whoops! Just when we looked away, the surging Americans and their Iraqi allies pushed the terrorists and extremists and foreign meddlers and other dead-enders back into their hidey holes.
Of course, if we had been paying attention, we might have noticed the ethnic cleansing of Sunnis out of Baghdad neighborhoods, General Petraeus's distinctly darker estimate of the state of things in Iraq, and the fact that our year-long surge is hard to call a "surge" when we can't bring any of them home. More like an "escalation" after all, isn't it?
The November elections can't ignore this war, but I wonder how voters will see it. Republicans will use the propaganda of the current moment to argue that we can't squander the gains of the past year by withdrawing, just when we're finally turning the corner toward victory. Democrats need to keep questioning the Republican definition of victory, and convince the American public that the solution needs to be an Iraqi solution after all.
The Democratic argument is going to be difficult to sustain, in my opinion. Americans will understandably feel remorseful about abandoning our purple-fingered friends in their vulnerable situation. We need the media to run more stories about Iraq in the months to come, so we can finally humanize the Iraqi public and see the occupation for what it really is.