Letters to the Editor
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He is a breath of fresh air
He is dynamic, thoughtful, and is unencumbered with political baggage. I hope he wins the nomination. Hillary would be a disaster for the Democrats and for America.
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The REAL Issue
My problem with everybody's campaign (except that of the guy who isn't running, Al Gore) is that they aren't ene talking about the most important issue of all, climate change, aka global warming.
I see Barack as the person best able to be a truth teller without alienating the audience. There is a fine art here. It isn't enough to point out what is clearly in the voter's best interest. Somehow the winning candidate has to convince the voter who is normally inclined to vote the other way that it's ok to vote for him THIS TIME. My gut feeling is that that person is Obama.
Personal history: I have voted for the Democrat every tine since Stevenson -- except in '88. I had the gut feeling that Dukakis wasn't up to the foreign policy challenges he would face. I have never regretted that vote.
Charlie
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@anyonymous (and hitlery, too, for that matter)
There's more to changing the world than rehashing what's already been rehashed a thousand times. Cynicism, fatalism, devotion to the past and all it drags along with it, keep us precisely where we are. The "insider" view of how our government works is precisely why we are where we are today. It is our obesession with what has already happened that keeps us repeating history, not the fact that we don't learn from it. We just fail to learn that history is what has already happened.
If one cannot tell the difference between an idiot who calls himself a "uniter" yet can't string together a coherent sentence, and a man like Barack Obama, then we will, indeed, continue to get the government we deserve.
Or maybe I'm just getting old.
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Achieve peace boldly and with certainty
I'm amazed that after 8 years of hell under the son of George Bush, so many people want more of the same instead of a different, more serene but assertive approach to our democracy. The only way to win battles is to elect a steroid candidate--a scrappy pit bull, a bellicose weight thrower. Those candidates come with a lot of baggage, and they didn't win fights by their menacing stance, either. Ultimately, they traded, sold out some things in order to gain a profile. War is producing few winners whereever they are fought these days.
Obama's competitors are so predictable--you know exactly how the story will unfold once they are elected. Obama's only true competition, Hillary, is already writing her destiny in office: she won't leave Iraq, not the way you want, because she owes Israel; she won't overhaul the health care system because she'll compromise with insurers and then sell us on what could reasonably be done. And like Bush, she'll clam up; she won't take questions; she'll walk on by while the reporters shout: "You promised you would leave Iraq! You promised you would transform health care. You promised you would support the American worker, but you ratcheted up the Nafta agreements your husband put in place!
But Hillary won't get elected even if she wins the nomination, which all those scrappy Republicans already know. The primary is one thing; the general election is another. And Thompson entered this race for a reason.
You really want peace, elect someone with peace in his sights and the persistence to arrange it no matter what. But, please, no more presidents spawned from the same families. It never works out.
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rodham and cheney
both secretive, both tough as israeli settlers in the west bank, both first rate political hacks.
once back in the white house first thing she'll do is barricade herself in cheney's bunker downstairs.
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The Democratic weakness.
The Democratic party's greatest weakness is that it doesn't understand that being branded "lite" is about the worst mistake you can make. By trying to be the same as the Republicans, they alienated the liberal vote in 2000, 2002 and in 2004 while failing to grab the conservative vote's attention.
What America want's is a different candidate, a candidate who really is an alternative to the Republicans, and that candidate is Obama.
Obama is not different simply because he holds differing views on the Iraq war to the rest of the Democrats, but because he holds a differing philosophy on just how to govern altogether.
While the rest of the candidates, left and right, seem to be shouting angrily and really showing no signs of changing the things they rail against, Obama talks softly and shows more steel in him then the lot of them, except maybe Kucinich.
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Honeymoons
There's a political shift occurring in Iowa. It's normal and predictable. And Walter Shapiro has described Barack Obama's place in it perfectly.
Every election cycle, during the run-up to the caucuses, every viable candidate enjoys a splendid Iowa honeymoon. Each one is of uncertain length, but eventually it ends, and someone else's begins. These honeymoons do not accurately predict ultimate success, although they drive pundits into spasms of certainty while the glow lasts.
John Edwards' honeymoon started four years ago but has collapsed since he started attacking the other candidates. He was best liked when he was "the positive one." Now that he has remade himself as a fiery populist, running down his competitors, he's less appealing.
Then Obama got his honeymoon. He drew huge crowds. He was so relaxed, so elegantly persuasive and so charming that he created a sensation. His positions were straightforward and he didn't pander when taking questions. He drew 7000 people on a Sunday afternoon in Ames, and the 25,000 ISU college kids weren't even in town yet!
Then he fumbled a question about experience in a debate, and Clinton quickly took advantage, calling him "naive." Then, in the next debate (it might have been the third - but, who's counting) Obama suggested that using nuclear weapons against Osama Bin Laden in Pakistan was a bad idea. Clinton chided him for taking any options off the table - despite the fact, as Joe Biden pointed out in exasperation at another debate, Obama's position is the current US policy.
The mainstream media reflexively applauded these Clinton positions (which are the sorts of things normally said by candidates, by commentators, and by pundits around Washington), and the extended honeymoon Obama had been enjoying in Iowa came to a end.
Currently, it's Hillary's turn. When she said "I'm your girl" in the last debate, she reminded everyone of her femininity and the trailblazing status her campaign enjoys. Now one can hear among Democratic activists in Iowa murmurs of how she's "so" polished and knowledgeable that she's inevitable. People who were worried sick a month ago that she was too divisive and untrustworthy, now think she's the best thing since buttered popcorn.
This honeymoon too shall pass.
Unfortunately for them, Biden, Dodd and Richardson were left stranded at the altar, and Kucinich never even got a first date. Gravel.... Oh! never mind.
The political reality remains that too many Iowa Democrats and independents can't get past Hillary Clinton's obvious lifelong desire for power, and her exquisitely hedged positions on just about everything important. Edwards, now that he is being scrutinized more closely, looks a lot more like an opportunist with a great smile than a President.
But, Barack Obama is still firmly planted where he's always been, preaching the gospel of redemption and hope, spinning a seductive tale of change, and carefully planning for the greatest political upset since JFK. The golden opportunity for generational change in our political leadership that Obama represents, and his promise to restore our pride in American leadership will carry him through to the Presidency. And Iowa will be the beginning.