Letters to the Editor
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Naive
Anyone who believes the Republicans can be worked with is simply too naive to be seriously considered for a Congressional internship, let alone the presidency.
A true leader would unite the country against the greed, corruption and incompetence that defines the Republican Party, not capitulate to their narrow interests.
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It's the Possibility of Hope and Change, You Idiot
It is 2008, and now we truly have an opportunity to change this country; for the better. And what does Mr. Shapiro choose to focus on. Barack Obama and his positive message. Who cares if Obama is a hope monger? Or that his "message" proves to be rather shallow? Do you honestly believe that the American voter is that deep? I mean have you seen any of the You Tube debates. Our citizen body is not very deep Mr. Shapiro. The reason why people are attracted to Obama is he symbolizes the possibility of hope and change. Middle America is looking for a candidate like that. Hillary, John Edwards, Rudy "I swear I'm not a Fascist" Guliani, John McCain, and so on represent all of the political failures that have plagued this country since 1988. That is why Obama's political stock rose so dramatically. Kennedy never promised change or hope, he merely challenged Americans to do so. So what is so wrong with Obama's "audacity of hope?" Last time I checked, change is a good thing in a democracy.
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To C. Mosby
I understand, but don't forget that Huckabee is actually from Hope. And he can invoke God. Scary, ain't it?
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Obama for V.P.
As attractive a candidate as he is, and as sorely as this country needs a black President, Barack Obama is not the right candidate for 2008. John Edwards is right: we need a fighter, not a peace-maker. We've had 27 years of corporate dominance, with a little Clintonian progress thrown in. Our country has lurched into a plutocracy. We need a new Teddy Roosevelt, not a new Jimmy Carter.
Moreover, Obama has taken suspiciously Republican stances on Social Security and health care. The last thing we need on those two issue is a President who already starts out on the wrong side.
Edwards-Obama in 2008.
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What Hope?
From the beginning of the 08 campaign cycle, the Media has been fawning all over this guy. The "Rock Star" bit and being the "Media Darling" has been about all there has been any reporting about. For about the past two months, everywhere I go and politics are brought up, I find the same thing expressed as I had thought from the first time I had paid much attention to him. There is no "There There". Something about this guy doesn't ring true and I hear this same thing from Dems and Rpubs alike.
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Re: Target is Upscale Shopping?
FinFangFoom-
Go back and read what Shapiro wrote. You obviously didn't get his comment-that a town of 7500 doesn't have anything BUT Target, which is NOT upscale shopping, so how could they get Obama's reference that a privileged person with a Harvard Law degree would shop at Target? Shapiro's comment is on the mark: that people from this town wouldn't have any other choices with which to compare.
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To AKA Smith @ GOP Monsters
I 'm responding to you because I love your letter about fighting the republican monster and I too am too, to borrow a phrase from Paul Wellstone, the Democratic Wing of the Democratic Party but don't believe all the hype (good or bad) about Obama....
here is why I support him: he is the only candidate who actually intentionally lived and worked in some of the poorest neighborhoods of Chicago working to build communities there (have you read his book...his first book....that book is the one that really convinced me) BEFORE he got into state or national politics, or went to Harvard Law School....
He is the only candidate who lived overseas in Indonesia as a child for several years and saw extreme poverty as it exists over most of the world.....Hillary suggested that this is a reason he is not equipped to be president, but I see the reverse, that he knows the privilege (and the responsibility) our nation has in the world like no other candidate...
He will fight the Republican machine....but he will do it in his own way which is to say he will speak the truth and not back down....Part of the Republican party's power right now is their easy access to lies and their lack of conscience over using them....there has never been any apology or "ooops we're sorry" for the lies leading to war, to use just the most obvious, but hardly the only example.
In fact, new lies are being laid out like a carpet probably for the next war in Iran. (I fear Hill's may be helping to weave that carpet....from what I can tell at least...)
I'm extremely anti-war, but to fight the republican party you need someone honest. Though in some ways I do like hillary and edwards, both messages come across as too manufactured. Too compromised. I can see both of them talking about fighting the GOP and I can even see them arguing....but I don't see either of them WINNING against the GOP monster.
What's different about Obama is not that he's of mixed race or nouvelle vague or any of that media nonsense. I can see him WINNING against the GOP. That's the difference. He isn't reducible to a message of hope....that's just campaign pundit talk. He isn't a pollyanna about the GOP either. He just takes them on as individuals on issues. Hillary probably still sees the right as a vast right wing conspiracy and as much as the science fiction reader in me wants to agree, I'm not sure that even amusing exaggerations like that are going to give her traction against her opponents.
I'm not sure that I can make the point I want to make here, but I guess my main thought is this: that it's ironic if you think that not understanding poverty is the thing that Obama has lacking over the other two leading candidates. It makes me so mad that in the media you can only be one thing....black OR poor....a woman OR black....
Obama's mother was a hippie. He doesn't come from money in any sense, and the media (which we know is compromised to the right....) creates this sanitized picture of a middle class couple aren't they pretty and then they rip them down....
Obama spent years of his life living and working and going to school among the poorest of the poor. I think that if you think he won't fight for the poor, you're mistaken.
He IS a different kind of candidate, to borrow a phrase from the slicking down of Obama campaign, but it's NOT because he's of mixed race origin or he was the first black editor of the Harvard Law Review although maybe these things are not small (in combination). But he fights in his own way by, so far, stating exactly what he means and by sticking by it. He is more truthful in his message. Read the three websites here:
http://www.ontheissues.org/Barack_Obama.htm
http://www.hillaryclinton.com/issues/
http://www.johnedwards.com/issues/
so don't believe the obama is slick thing. To slay the dragon we don't need the same old armor or borrowed rhetoric and charisma. We need someone who knows what the poor need because they have seen it from below. Someone who slays the republicans by telling them the truth. (pow! like a gunshot wound!)
All I'm saying is to please look again before you use an article like Shaprio's or people talking about Obama who don't know what they're talking about to help you to make up your mind...