Letters to the Editor
Picko
Published Letters: 272 Editor's Choice: 11
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indigo218
[Read the article: NARAL endorses Obama]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Oh yes, I forgot the last refuge of an Clinton apologist: if you don't have legitimate counter-arguments when someone challenges you on one of your points, just default to the accusation that Obama supporters are cultists and hope that nobody notices that you haven't engaged them on the substance of what they've said.
Please, feel free to make whatever ridiculous criticisms of Obama you care to make. Maybe you can string it out all the way through the general election....
Then the Democrats will lose, John McCain can appoint a couple of Supreme Court justices, and Roe v. Woe will be consigned to the dustbin of history.
And then when women complain that they've lost the freedom of reproductive choice, I'll just have to remind them that their animosity towards to Barack Obama was more important to them when it mattered than their right to an abortion.
Do you really think that John McCain will be better for women than John McCain? You do realize that he recently voted against a bill to ensure equal pay for women because he is afraid it will lead to lawsuits?
You really are entirely free not to like Obama, just as I am entirely free not to like Hillary Clinton. If you feel it is worthwhile to lose this election just so you can "get back" at Obama for beating Hillary in the primaries, there's nothing I can do to stop you.
Rationalize it to yourself however you want.
(Just realize that if Obama loses and Hillary miraculously wins the presidency in 2012, she doesn't get a "do-over" on McCain's Supreme Court nominees - we're stuck with them until they die or choose to retire.)
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Me Tarzan
[Read the article: In new message, McCain tries on the hope mantle]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]The thing I love about this ad is that the only grammatically complete sentence in the whole thing is "I'm John McCain and I approve this message."
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MrEdCT
[Read the article: In new message, McCain tries on the hope mantle]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]All I can say is please please please please please let John McCain be stupid enough to actually pick Condi Rice as his running mate.
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An officer and a gentleman
[Read the article: Senate passes expanded GI bill despite Bush, McCain opposition]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Alex left out one of McCain's comments which I found particularly obnoxious: "And I will not accept from Senator Obama, who did not feel it was his responsibility to serve our country in uniform, any lectures on my regard for those who did," McCain said.
In other words, "don't criticize me on military issues because you never served in the military."
Barack Obama was thirteen years old when we did away with the draft, so it's not a case of Obama shirking military duty during the height of the Vietnam War. Throughout Obama's adult life, we have had a professional military. The first Iraq war happened when Obama was 29 and in his last year in Harvard Law School; the second began when he was 41 and a member of the Illinois State Senate.
Does John McCain mean to imply that the vast majority of Americans - who have not chosen military careers since the rescension of the draft - should have no say in the matter of how veterans are treated? I would imagine that this would disqualify something like 95% percent of people under a certain age. Is the implication that only members of the military have full rights of citizenship in this country? That only the small percentage who have chosen to have military careers are qualified for public office?
Actually, I think it was John McCain who was taking the cheap shot here. Obviously he's aware (1) that the militarism that he and his party embrace is unsustainable if members of the military can easily return to civilian life, and (2) that denying an expansion of G.I. benefits is going to make him look bad. So he labels Obama's valid criticisms as "taking a cheap shot" and tries to impugn Obama's patriotism in order to divert our attention away from a position that it's embarassing for McCain to defend on its own merits.
But that's what the Republican party always does - make ostentatious displays of 'respect' for the people they're screwing and hope that we're all too stupid to notice. "I respect our troops..." "I respect hardworking Americans..."
And I daresay that John McCain, as the son of an admiral and grandson of another admiral, has never had to worry about paying for his education with money from the G.I. Bill.
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Oh, put her on the ticket already
[Read the article: CNN reports Clinton, Obama camps in talks]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]If for no other reason than that an Obama/Clinton ticket is probably the quickest route to ameliorating intraparty tensions, which is one of Obama's biggest vulnerabilities. It's unrealistic to think that you can snub your opponent with impunity after a primary campaign that has been this close and this hotly-contested. True, Obama has run as a change candidate, but he has also run as a candidate to heal the country's divides. Well, this is the first divide he has to heal. And he's not going to change anything if he's isn't elected. So maybe we need to set aside idealism, do the pragmatic thing, and put her on the ticket.
In the end, I don't think that there are many people who would vote for Obama in the first place who would refrain from doing so because Clinton was in the V.P. slot, but I think there is a significant number of people who won't vote for him unless he has her on the ticket.
It might be time for the Obama camp to show some humility and respect. We've won the top of ticket - against some long odds - let's not become drunk on hubris and think we can sweep into the White House without a little help from our friends on the Clinton side of the divide.
(I am worried that the Clintons would be loose cannons in an Obama administration. Obama has been known for eschewing drama in his campaign organization, and Bill and Hillary are drama personified.)