Here is a third-party observation for you:
"I have not paid that much attention to Obama. My focus was on getting the Bush/Clinton duopoly out of power. and I am very worried that Hillary's speech tonight was not that of someone who thinks they have lost.
But tonight was the first time I sat through one of Obama's speeches. I don't agree with everything he says. But there is no question that he captures the imagination of the American people. I can understand why people see echoes of JFK, MLK, and Reagan in him. It is very hard not to be excited about him and his candidacy.
In contrast, McCain looked like a tired old man in his speech tonight. I comprehend why Rush Limbaugh and his ilk worked so hard to get Hillary the nomination. McCain might have beaten her. But short of a bullet, McCain doesn't stand a snowball's chance in hell against Obama." -- Mike Rivero of What Really Happened
I guess I'm one he has captured from time-to-time, although I hated his AIPAC speech.
"Obama clinches nomination; Clinton not conceding defeat; Surge of delegates creates a historic first for a black candidate"by Scott Helman, Globe Staff | June 4, 2008
ST. PAUL - Making history and promising change for the future, Senator Barack Obama clinched the Democratic presidential nomination last night, setting the stage for an intense five-month campaign against Republican John McCain that will offer voters starkly different visions for the country....
They started losing me right there. Starkly different versions?
Who is cutting Israel loose?
A McCain-Obama race promises sharp distinctions: McCain wants to make permanent the tax cuts President Bush implemented early in his administration, while Obama wants to eliminate them to pay for his healthcare plan and other domestic programs. McCain is a strong supporter of the war in Iraq and says Obama's pledge to bring troops home amounts to "surrender." And the two candidates have fought fiercely in recent days over Obama's stated willingness to meet with leaders of rogue nations without precondition.
Ummm, John? WE AGREE with OBAMA, big-time!!!
McCain, in a speech last night in Kenner, La., blasted Obama for constantly trying to link him with President Bush, who is unpopular among voters.
"You will hear from my opponent's campaign in every speech, in every interview, every press release that I'm running for President Bush's third term. You'll hear every policy of the president described as the Bush-McCain policy," McCain said. "Why does Senator Obama believe it's so important to repeat that idea over and over again? Because he knows it's very difficult to get Americans to believe something that they know is false."
Actually, it doesn't seem that difficult, John. I mean, what with Iraq and the shit-shoveling of the Zionist-controlled AmeriKan MSM, it seems pretty easy!
The general election battle will also surely turn on character, biography, and record....
Translation: McCain will win.
Even if it is a rigged and damnable lie!!!!
Check it out!!!!
Supporters lined up on the streets of St. Paul for hours yesterday for a chance to witness history first hand.
"It could be pouring rain, we wouldn't care," said Jo Brown, a retired executive secretary from Minneapolis. "I'm 67 years old, and I do not remember the last time I was this excited about anything."
"It's time to inject change," said John McMahon, a 23-year-old political science student at St. Cloud State University. "He's definitely leading the masses."
.... Howard Dean, chairman of the Democratic National Committee, is slated to be in Boston today for a meeting with Obama's leading fund-raisers in New England. There have also been informal discussions among top Clinton and Obama donors about working together in November, and some of Clinton's leading fund-raisers may even join a gathering of Obama's national finance committee in Chicago this month...."
So all the vitriol and tension regarding the Obama-Clinton split is just more bullshit fooleys?
What, a deal already been struck for her to be Veep?
Meanwhile, the Globe puts the LOSER Hitlery on the FRONT PAGE and buries Obama's great story on page A12!!
Yeah, but the media has been biased against Mrs. Clinton, right.
I'm so sick of that bullshit lie, readers!
"Confidence, calm were key to Obama's success; Candidate 'simply fit the time very well'" by Scott Helman, Globe Staff | June 4, 2008
Until one night in Charleston, S.C., 10 months ago, Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama were just shadowboxing, politely charting separate paths to the Democratic nomination. Clinton was the establishment choice, next in line, the clear favorite. Obama was the political upstart who dared challenge convention.
Their worldviews finally clashed in a July 23 debate at the Citadel. Asked whether he would meet unconditionally with leaders of rogue nations, Obama said yes. Clinton read it as an "ah-ha" moment revealing his fatal flaws: inexperience on the world stage, and a misunderstanding of how Washington worked. Surely, she figured, the Obama fad would fade as he stumbled. But Obama stood his ground and never looked back. He responded coolly and forcefully to Clinton's criticism, calling her "Bush-Cheney lite."
Yeah, and AMERICA LOVED IT!!!!!
The episode helps explain how Obama, a 46-year-old first-term senator not four years out of the Illinois General Assembly, pulled off the feat of capturing his party's presidential nomination. Displaying preternatural self-assurance and confidence in his game plan - especially in the rocky weeks this spring when it looked as if his star was dimming - Obama proved he could be uplifting, resilient, and tough when he had to.
Clinton and her campaign, meanwhile, mistook Obama's embrace of hope for timidity and lack of substance, and they failed to fully grasp two key things: the yearning for a clean break from the politics of the past and the extent to which voters believed she embodied those politics.
AB-SO-LUTELY!!!!!!!
What Clinton and her aides repeatedly tried to dismiss as a mere infatuation was in fact a lasting and resonant movement for change....
Same with RON PAUL!!!
Obama got the tangibles right, too, assembling fund-raising and organizational machines unmatched in the history of American politics.
Foremost, his campaign built a donor base of more than 1.5 million people, raising an eye-popping $265 million over 14 months. His fund-raising strength served notice early on that, although he began far back in the polls, he would never be an underdog financially. That allowed him to spread his message widely through TV and radio advertising, something analysts said would be prohibitively expensive given how many states would be in play during the primary.
Obama also paired a grass-roots army with a well-oiled campaign machine - led by hard-nosed veterans of Democratic politics and political organizing - run from the 11th floor of a sleek Chicago high-rise. The marriage of those two power centers allowed Obama to craft a blueprint - based on polling, voter data, and carefully constructed media and ad messages - and apply it effectively on the ground.
Doesn't sound as grass-roots now, does it?
Still, his crowds are impressive!!!!
Novel get-out-the-vote plans targeted not just traditional Democratic constituencies, but independents, Republicans, and high school students; Internet-driven networking tools encouraged supporters to stay connected and recruit their friends; and legions of trained, excited volunteers felt empowered to, in Obama's words, "be the change" they sought.
The work paid off handsomely.... From Super Tuesday, on Feb. 5, to March 4, Obama went on a 10-and-0 romp through states Clinton all but ignored, building a lead in pledged delegates that would become insurmountable.
That momentum became a campaign-saving buffer when Obama struggled through March and April, when Clinton won key primaries in Ohio, Texas, and Pennsylvania and Obama faced two serious obstacles: the emergence of the Rev. Jeremiah A. Wright Jr., his fiery former pastor whose caustic criticism of the United States looped endlessly on TV, and Obama's ill-chosen comments at a San Francisco fund-raiser about "bitter" small-town residents who "cling to guns or religion."
Yeah, slip that all in again!
The controversies over Wright and Obama's "bitter" remarks - together with Clinton's margins among white, working-class voters - threatened to destroy what became Obama's electability argument to voters and superdelegates.
Actually, if you look at the polls, it made him stronger!
Can't the MSM ever tell the truth about anything?
For months, Democratic voters had told pollsters that Clinton was their best hope against the Republicans. But many came to view Obama as the stronger competitor, partly based on his appeal to independents and Republicans - especially after Senator John McCain of Arizona, who promises a strong fight for independents and even Democrats, emerged as the presumptive GOP nominee. In late January, a USA Today/Gallup poll indicated that most Democrats felt Clinton had a better chance in November; three weeks later, the same poll suggested that Democrats considered Obama more electable by a more than 2-to-1 margin.
Amid Obama's setbacks, his resiliency and his supporters' steadfastness became apparent: His standing in polls did not dip much; donations poured in; superdelegates continued endorsing him; and the candidate, even in the depths of the Wright crisis, kept his cool....
His effort to present his biracial, multinational upbringing as a credential for dealing with people of all backgrounds led to accusations by some that he was too identified with the black community, and by others that he was not faithful enough to the black community. His appeals to young voters alienated older ones who felt his campaign lacked gravity. And his sometimes sanctimonious approach to character and ethics invited charges of hypocrisy....
Obama's campaign answered forcefully to broadsides from Clinton's camp, sometimes responding within hours to Clinton's TV ads with ads of its own. Obama was especially effective at turning slights from Clinton against her, as in March, when he ridiculed suggestions that he would make a good running mate.
"If I was in second place right now, I'd understand it. But I'm in first place right now," Obama told voters in Mississippi, and the exchange led to an embarrassing news cycle for Clinton.
One of the rare times they got after her rather promoting her or savaging him.
And now she is going to be VP!
Hitlery Rodham Johnson, I mean, Clinton!
With Obama and Clinton sharing many policy views, Obama's campaign successfully turned the primary into a referendum on his rival's experience and character, forcing her to confront questions about her truthfulness and candor.
And SHE FAILED!!!
Obama painted her Washington tenure, which she pitched as an asset, as a liability, convincing voters that she could not build the bipartisan, transparent government he could.
True!
This bore out a calculation that Obama's top advisers made when they first sketched out his campaign. They knew that Clinton, though respected in the party, was also polarizing. The question was whether, in a crowded primary field, Obama could position himself as that choice. Former senator John Edwards of North Carolina sought the role, too, but Obama outlasted him by building a broader base of supporters....
The general election, of course, presents an entirely new landscape. Obama's message of change - particularly on national security - will be tested like never before.
Why? Why are people like McCain -- who LIED US INTO THIS OCCUPATION and are DESTROYING OUR ARMY -- considered "more credible" on "defense" than the guy who was right?
In other words, pursuing the DESTRUCTION of American armed forces is GOOD for national security? Oh, excuse me, I was upside down there for a minute.
Obama, after all, was just a boy when McCain was being tortured in a North Vietnamese prison.
Should the AmeriKan MSM be using the word boy when referring to Obama?
How about YOUNG MAN or MASTER instead?! :-)
Under fierce attack from McCain for his willingness to negotiate with outcast regimes, he has sought to qualify the self-assured answer he gave in last year's debate.
Strange, because AMERICA AGREES with OBAMA, big-time!!!!
But Obama begins the general election campaign as the favorite in many polls, a sign of just how far he has come in the nearly four years since he first introduced himself to the country with his stirring speech at the Democratic National Convention in Boston. Back then he swatted away suggestions about running for president. Since he began embracing them, in 2006, his ascent has surprised even the most veteran political observers.
And it validates what Rivero commented at the beginning of this post:
"short of a bullet, McCain doesn't stand a snowball's chance in hell against Obama."
During his rise, two defining magazine profiles stand out. Within weeks of each other in the spring of 2007, The New Yorker ran a piece called "The Conciliator" about Obama's unifying power, and The New Republic ran a piece called "The Agitator" about his willingness to employ bare-knuckle politics to advance his agenda.
Melding those two aspects of his character has, at least to this point, made Barack Obama difficult to stop."
