5/23/07
Well, I made my first donation of the campaign season yesterday. $25 to the campaign of (suprise!) Barack Obama. It was the first donation I have made to any political candidate since Howard Dean in 2004.
For me, the donation means that, unless something very drastic changes, I am firmly entrenched in the Obama camp. If I was penciled in to his campaign before, now I'm in there in pen. This should come as no suprise to anyone who has been reading my blog over these past few months - Obama has been my guy for some time now, and I had called him the "Big Winner" of the first Democratic debate just a couple of weeks ago. Ultimately, my decision to support Obama has come down to several factors:
- I feel that Barack Obama is the most electable candidate, Democrat or Republican, in this field right now. He has a charisma that at least approaches, and arguably exceeds, that of Bill Clinton. He gives well-thought out, intelligent answers to every question he is asked, whether by an interviewer or by a debate moderator. His speeches are impassioned yet substantive, informative yet exciting, motivational yet not preachy, and artfully constructed without being pretentious or bombastic. People just love this guy. And the race thing does not concern me one bit. Anyone who wouldn't vote for a guy because he isn't 100% white isn't going to vote for a woman, or probably any Democrat at all. And while the African-American voters aren't lining up behind this guy quite yet, when push comes to shove you had better believe they'll be there.
- The war. I know a lot of Democrats are tired of hearing about how Obama is the only candidate among the Big Three to have opposed the invasion of Iraq from the beginning, but you really cannot overstress the importance of this. Most Democrats, the ones on the street, not the ones in office, knew that going into Iraq was not a good idea. They knew that the intelligence that was being peddled to us and to the world by the Bush Administration as rock-solid evidence that Sadam Huessein had/was building weapons of mass destruction (and, even more ludicrously, a nuclear weapons program) was anything but, and that Huessein and Osama bin Laden were mortal enemies who would never cooperate on anything, even if they were bridge partners, and that the notion that we could march into a country full of people who did not like us to begin with, kill a slew of them in the invasion, and then start up a government in a western image, and they would just accept it all was complete fallacy. We KNEW this, and yet our elected officials in Congress, House and Senate, overwhelmingly rolled over and voted with the Republican majority to support the invasion. This whole business of "if I knew then what I know now" being spat at us by Edwards and Clinton is cynical, self-serving bullshit. WE knew then, so why the fuck didn't they? Why were they marginalizing us, calling us hopeless idealogues and saying that we didn't know the realities of the situation? Because they wanted to cover their political asses, that's why. We're trying to elect the President of the United States - the Leader of the Free World (or at least it used to be, back when the Free World still respected us). He or she should be concerned with doing what they know is right, not with doing that which is politically expedient. By the way, Edwards and Clinton both also voted for the Patriot Act. If only they knew then what they know now, eh?
- Every other issue. I can't tell you about all the diaries I've read on DailyKos that start off like this. "Well, I'm not very happy with the mainstream Democratic Candidates. When it comes to (issue here), they all look just like Republican Lite. Oh, all except for Barack Obama." Here's an example. From the war to health care to civil rights and right on down the line, Obama routinely finds himself on the correct side, and all the way over on the correct side, of every issue. This isn't about finding a candidate who is central enough to be "electable". This is about a candidate who is electable and for whom we do not have to sacrifice ANY of the virtues we look for in a President.
And for the record, I'm not concerned with the supposed issues of specifics or experience. First, the specifics is a slander the media has been pumping out about the Obama campaign since its inception. If you have any questions as to the specifics about Obama's plan, please go to his website and check it out. It's all there. He doesn't go around listing them in all of his speeches because, well, that makes for boring speeches (see Gore, Al). But the plans are there, detailed and practical, and clear as day.
As for experience, well, the last President from Illinois was a one-term Representative who lost his only previous Senate bid. In terms of legislative experience, Obama has him trumped. And that other guy, named Lincoln, he turned out ok. And even if you want to comapre him to his rivals, he still comes out pretty solid. Hillary Clinton has only been in the Senate since 2000. John Edwards was a one-term Senator who hasn't even been in government since 2004. I don't see how one full-term means that either Clinton or Edwards is prepared to run the country while a half-term isn't enough out of Obama.
So, anyway, that's where I am right now. You'll see Obama's website linked on my page until something changes. Tomorrow I'm back to my personal log. Till then...
Well, I made my first donation of the campaign season yesterday. $25 to the campaign of (suprise!) Barack Obama. It was the first donation I have made to any political candidate since Howard Dean in 2004.
For me, the donation means that, unless something very drastic changes, I am firmly entrenched in the Obama camp. If I was penciled in to his campaign before, now I'm in there in pen. This should come as no suprise to anyone who has been reading my blog over these past few months - Obama has been my guy for some time now, and I had called him the "Big Winner" of the first Democratic debate just a couple of weeks ago. Ultimately, my decision to support Obama has come down to several factors:
- I feel that Barack Obama is the most electable candidate, Democrat or Republican, in this field right now. He has a charisma that at least approaches, and arguably exceeds, that of Bill Clinton. He gives well-thought out, intelligent answers to every question he is asked, whether by an interviewer or by a debate moderator. His speeches are impassioned yet substantive, informative yet exciting, motivational yet not preachy, and artfully constructed without being pretentious or bombastic. People just love this guy. And the race thing does not concern me one bit. Anyone who wouldn't vote for a guy because he isn't 100% white isn't going to vote for a woman, or probably any Democrat at all. And while the African-American voters aren't lining up behind this guy quite yet, when push comes to shove you had better believe they'll be there.
- The war. I know a lot of Democrats are tired of hearing about how Obama is the only candidate among the Big Three to have opposed the invasion of Iraq from the beginning, but you really cannot overstress the importance of this. Most Democrats, the ones on the street, not the ones in office, knew that going into Iraq was not a good idea. They knew that the intelligence that was being peddled to us and to the world by the Bush Administration as rock-solid evidence that Sadam Huessein had/was building weapons of mass destruction (and, even more ludicrously, a nuclear weapons program) was anything but, and that Huessein and Osama bin Laden were mortal enemies who would never cooperate on anything, even if they were bridge partners, and that the notion that we could march into a country full of people who did not like us to begin with, kill a slew of them in the invasion, and then start up a government in a western image, and they would just accept it all was complete fallacy. We KNEW this, and yet our elected officials in Congress, House and Senate, overwhelmingly rolled over and voted with the Republican majority to support the invasion. This whole business of "if I knew then what I know now" being spat at us by Edwards and Clinton is cynical, self-serving bullshit. WE knew then, so why the fuck didn't they? Why were they marginalizing us, calling us hopeless idealogues and saying that we didn't know the realities of the situation? Because they wanted to cover their political asses, that's why. We're trying to elect the President of the United States - the Leader of the Free World (or at least it used to be, back when the Free World still respected us). He or she should be concerned with doing what they know is right, not with doing that which is politically expedient. By the way, Edwards and Clinton both also voted for the Patriot Act. If only they knew then what they know now, eh?
- Every other issue. I can't tell you about all the diaries I've read on DailyKos that start off like this. "Well, I'm not very happy with the mainstream Democratic Candidates. When it comes to (issue here), they all look just like Republican Lite. Oh, all except for Barack Obama." Here's an example. From the war to health care to civil rights and right on down the line, Obama routinely finds himself on the correct side, and all the way over on the correct side, of every issue. This isn't about finding a candidate who is central enough to be "electable". This is about a candidate who is electable and for whom we do not have to sacrifice ANY of the virtues we look for in a President.
And for the record, I'm not concerned with the supposed issues of specifics or experience. First, the specifics is a slander the media has been pumping out about the Obama campaign since its inception. If you have any questions as to the specifics about Obama's plan, please go to his website and check it out. It's all there. He doesn't go around listing them in all of his speeches because, well, that makes for boring speeches (see Gore, Al). But the plans are there, detailed and practical, and clear as day.
As for experience, well, the last President from Illinois was a one-term Representative who lost his only previous Senate bid. In terms of legislative experience, Obama has him trumped. And that other guy, named Lincoln, he turned out ok. And even if you want to comapre him to his rivals, he still comes out pretty solid. Hillary Clinton has only been in the Senate since 2000. John Edwards was a one-term Senator who hasn't even been in government since 2004. I don't see how one full-term means that either Clinton or Edwards is prepared to run the country while a half-term isn't enough out of Obama.
So, anyway, that's where I am right now. You'll see Obama's website linked on my page until something changes. Tomorrow I'm back to my personal log. Till then...
posted by k - L - g at 4:09 AM
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