Obama '08?

cicerone imposter wrote:

We still have over a year, so we can't let every bad or good news determine what'll happen in 12 months.

NOT TRUE!

No, c.i., we do not have over a year. Please do not spread this false information. It is part of the problem we are having getting people to realize that conventional primary season electioneering theory will not work this time. It is a huge mistake to focus on the first few states and then think we have a year to go after the rest. The primary season's landscape has drastically changed.

Take a look at the 2008 Democratic primary calendar here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democratic_Party_(United_States)_presidential_primaries,_2008

In January, 2008 we have Iowa, Michigan, Nevada, New Hampshire, South Carolina and Florida voting for allocation of a total of 540 delegates.

Then, just ONE WEEK LATER, we have the big clump of newly designated February 5th primary elections in the states of: Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Georgia, Idaho, Illinois, Minnesota, Missouri, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Tennessee, amd Utah for allocation of 1553 delegates.

Then just ONE WEEK after that we have the rest of the February primaries in Lousiana, Nebraska, Washington, Maine, DC, Maryland, Virginia, Wisconsin and Hawaii.

And in March we have American Samoa, Democrats Abroad, Guam, Virgin Islands, Wyoming, Massachusetts, Ohio, Rhode Island, Texas, Kansas, and Mississippi.

The remaining 9 states hold their primary elections mostly in May, and a couple in June.

By the end of February it will mostly be all over with until the August convention.

We have a LOT of work to do and only 4 or 5 months left to do it in.

That's where Clinton gets the advantage with her national name recognition. That's why Obama is now (much too slowly) shifting into the second phase of his campaign strategy and why the pundits think he is fading away and will be surprised by the outcome of all the work being done away from the spotlights in spite of his campaign manager's strategy.

0 Replies

This is an excellent FAQs and tutorial for anyone not familiar with the caucus process. It is much different from a primary election vote. Nevada will be the second state in the nation to hold a caucus in the 2008 election year.

http://www.nvdemscaucus.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=blogcategory&id=13&Itemid=30

0 Replies

Hello... this all used to happen in a shorter time, or, in my memory, seemed to. It's hard to frighten Cicerone with your timeline.

0 Replies

Couple of good speeches on taxes and our economy from Obama in the last few days.

Here are links to the transcripts:

Remarks of Senator Barack Obama: Our Common Stake in America's Prosperity - New York, New York | September 17, 2007

Remarks of Senator Barack Obama: Tax Fairness for the Middle Class - Washington, DC | September 18, 2007

And three articles about the plan:

Obama Economic Plan Includes Tax Breaks - The Associated Press | September 18, 2007

Nevadans weigh in on Obama's proposed tax plan - The Reno Gazette-Journal September 19, 2007

Obama unveils tax cuts for middle class - The Portsmouth Herald | September 19, 2007

0 Replies

ossobuco wrote:

Hello... this all used to happen in a shorter time, or, in my memory, seemed to. It's hard to frighten Cicerone with your timeline.

Frighten?

Thanks for the giggle. Your presumptions are funny. Laughing

0 Replies

Hey, nothing frightens CI... don't forget, he's met quite a few of us! Laughing

0 Replies

Yeah, if I can go at it with OBill and georgeob, I must be fearless. LOL

0 Replies

I agree with both nimh and Butrflynet that there is urgency now, and that the Obama campaign is well-served to reflect that urgency (OK not "reflect," can't think of a better word right now though).

I thought I'd noticed an increase in intensity in the campaign recently, but Butrflynet knows better than I do there.

I also agree, from what has been said here (it's not a subject I know a lot about), re: 50 states with grassrootsers or focus on a few states with out-of-town hordes.

It would suck if Obama the guy is sunk by Obama the campaign.

We'll see, though.

By the way I think that some of the Obama-is-sunk stuff, without mentioning Edwards, is that Edwards has been a steady presence. Obama pretty much came out of nowhere and had momentum for a while -- I think the sense is that the momentum had to continue rather than stall for him to be viable. With Edwards it's not stalling, it's just steady.

0 Replies

sozobe wrote:

By the way I think that some of the Obama-is-sunk stuff, without mentioning Edwards, is that Edwards has been a steady presence. Obama pretty much came out of nowhere and had momentum for a while -- I think the sense is that the momentum had to continue rather than stall for him to be viable. With Edwards it's not stalling, it's just steady.

Yeah.. in a way, though, actually, the news for Edwards is even worse: they're not even talking about him.

My impression is that Edwards is just trucking on and the pundits kinda acknowledge it but otherwise dont take it much into account. They havent quite written off the chance that he will still surge up out of nowhere in the end (if he manages to scoop Iowa, which is basically his only chance to go anywhere), but in the meantime they cover him as a matter of routine but just dont see him as an important factor.

I guess they basically do see this as primarily a Hillary vs Obama race, and in that race Obama is falling back, so thats the story. But at least they see him as the actual contender.

0 Replies

Yeah.

Dammit, I don't want Hillary to be the nominee!

Argh.

It's not over 'til it's over but it's not looking so great.

0 Replies

sozobe wrote:

It would suck if Obama the guy is sunk by Obama the campaign.

I think this is a bit too uncritical, kind of the "good Tsar" thing. Much of the criticism that is levelled at the Obama campaign goes right back to Obama's own personality, the way he approaches things - I'm thinking specifically of Kevin Drum's and Ezra Klein's criticisms above, for example.

That's what's losing Obama some of these people, the way Drum says he's losing him for example. It's obviously also what made my opinion of him shift from him being a very good second choice to not being much better, in practice, than Hillary.

0 Replies

nimh wrote:

sozobe wrote:
It would suck if Obama the guy is sunk by Obama the campaign.

I think this is a bit too uncritical, kind of the "good Tsar" thing. Much of the criticism that is levelled at the Obama campaign goes right back to Obama's own personality, the way he approaches things - I'm thinking specifically of Kevin Drum's and Ezra Klein's criticisms above, for example.

I know you're sick to death of me saying this, but can you read the first book, pretty please?

If you're willing to read all this other stuff (Kevin Drum, Ezra Klein, etc., etc.), is that really such a stretch?

I think the book says a lot more about his personality than the actions he's taking (or not taking) in the midst of a campaign, if personality is what we're talking about.

0 Replies

My overall take on things so far is something like this:

He has a lot of personality traits that I think would make for a great, great president.

He's used to doing this stuff on his own. He writes his own speeches, he makes his own decisions. That's been his career up until recently. That's served him well.

Due to unusual circumstances (the Ryan sex club scandal, etc.), he was able to do things his way with the Senate bid. Work hard, but not have it take over his life. Still be a husband, a dad.

When the president thing started coming up -- and I think it dovetailed with his own ambitions, I don't think it just happened -- he had to think long and hard about it for several reasons. I think he didn't want campaigning to become his life. Had to think a lot about how much control he was willing to give up, how much he was willing to delegate. Decided that the only way that a presidential bid was realistic was to delegate quite a lot. Reconciled himself to that idea.

The last months before the actual announcement involved getting together a team ASAP. A lot of the best people were already taken, involved in other campaigns that had been announced earlier. Many, many things make me think that this campaign team is not the best.

Basically, what I'm saying is that I think with a better, savvier team -- more worthy of being delegated to -- he could easily be in better position right now. Stripped of their campaigns -- just the candidate, standing alone -- I think Obama is far better candidate than Hillary. I think Hillary has the better campaign, and that the difference in campaigns is not so much that Hillary is managing her campaign better, but that she's the establishment candidate and is afforded a lot of perks as such, including getting the really good campaign strategists.

0 Replies

sozobe wrote:

I know you're sick to death of me saying this, but can you read the first book, pretty please?

If you're willing to read all this other stuff (Kevin Drum, Ezra Klein, etc., etc.), is that really such a stretch?

Uhm.. yes. I can read Ezra, Drum and four others in 20 mins in the morning while drinking coffee before I get to work. In the same pace I would finish Obama's book just after the New Hampshire primaries.

But more to the point, how is it relevant to my comment? You said that it would be a pity if Obama the person would be sunk by Obama the campaign. But it's Obama the person who is responsible for some of the very things that most turn people off from his campaign. Butrflynet has good points about organisational matters, for sure, but what lost Obama my sympathy, or Kevin Drum's or X's and Y's, is not a lack of local campaigners in Maine. It's the basic choices in his campaign and in his major policy proposals, and those are choices that apparently go straight back to the way his personality is wired (again, referring to the discussion we had earlier about his instinctive political philosophy, the Niebuhr influence and all, the whole cautious/conservative/compromise-oriented/step-by-step thing).

Hence why I wouldnt buy the good-Tsar type "he's just being dragged down by his campaign" argument. The success or lack of success of Obama's campaign right now, in my opinion, is all about Obama the guy - about the way his personality, his choices and instincts, play out in the campaign. Campaign team choices and organisational issues sound like they also play a role, but even if they were top-notch they wouldnt solve his basic dilemmas.

0 Replies

I think I already replied, above.

What are Drum and Klein saying that are specifically about his personality as opposed to choices his campaign is making?

0 Replies

sozobe wrote:

I think I already replied, above.

What are Drum and Klein saying that are specifically about his personality as opposed to choices his campaign is making?

"I know the Obama fans out there are going to jump all over this, but I have to say that the guy's losing me. He's an inspiring speaker [..]. But he sure is cautious to a fault. His big foreign policy speech was fine, but cautious and mainstream. His big healthcare speech was fine, but cautious and mainstream. And now his big tax speech is....just cautious and mainstream. I really want to hear something big and controversial from Obama, something that demonstrates a desire to shake up the status quo. But he just doesn't seem to be willing to take any chances."

Seems like a character thing to me. Definitely not a list that can be blamed on his campaign team. I mean, these are much the same character traits that we previously talked about, and that you have even previously described yourself, just from a positive perspective. That he has a strongly instinctive urge to build change step by step, incrementally. That his way of doing things is first building coalitions, tentatively and cautiously then stronger and stronger once he has an established position. That he has a strongly instinctive tendency to seek consensus, to be inclusive. Perhaps not by forging watery compromises, but by personally persuading even the unlikeliest of partners (conservative lawmakers, farmers in South Illinois). That he's all about forging a new way of doing politics, that he's bipartisan to a fault. That he sees it as his role to end the time of bitter polarisation and camp thinking. That he is instinctively averse of big grand plans and wants to focus on the feasible.

That all sounds dandy, but from the start it turned me off because I saw these all as laudable, even admirable personality traits, but the opposite of what the country needs now, faced with having to overcome a veritable rightwing revolution that's ravaged the system in the past eight (and in a broader sense, 27) years, and faced with deeply powerful, entrenched conservative machine politics. I thought that these instincts were ones that made Obama a good guy, and the perfect leader of, say, Germany, but that his approach was a deeply naive one in the context of America's politics today. That it was his approach that would be unfeasible, and could lead to losing the chance to really change things even if he were elected.

And this is what I immediately recognize in what Drum says about Obama.: that he is cautious to a fault. That he consistently opts for programs that are more incremental, mainstream and moderate than is necessary now - to the extent that Hillary has now passed him on the left on health care! He is either scared or just averse to anything "big and controversial". He routinely expresses a "desire to shake up the status quo", but seems to envision the change primarily in the way politics are done, bipartisanism etc, while refraining from any such desire in his actual policy plans. As Klein says, "he just doesn't seem to be willing to take any chances." That's personality.

0 Replies

As for getting sick of you saying I should just read the book -- but dont let this post get in the way of the previous one, which is more substantive and on-topic -- yeah you're right. But it's mostly because I just dont get the logic, and you didnt really address that the last time I mentioned it.

I mean, if he expressed a different persona in the book he wrote three years ago than he does now when he's running for President, then good for him. I just dont get what it's supposed to have to do with the price of tea in China. I mean, have you read Hillary's book? If not, do you consider yourself to lack the necessary information to say much about "Hillary the gal" because of that? (I dont know of course, but I dont think it would stop you from making pronouncements about her.) What about lesser known candidates? Would you tell anyone criticizing Bill Richardson that he cant really tell about the kind of guy he is until he or she read his books?

There's my problem with that response. What about all the other candidates who've written books? Should we read all those too, or is it only Obama whom we can't properly judge until we've read his book?

0 Replies

nimh wrote:

Uhm.. yes. I can read Ezra, Drum and four others in 20 mins in the morning while drinking coffee before I get to work. In the same pace I would finish Obama's book just after the New Hampshire primaries.

In that case, why don't you listen to the audiobook while you're getting to work? In my experience, working from primary sources is a larger time investment at first, but it generously pays you back in pundit gossip you don't have to listen to. But to each his own, of course.

0 Replies

I disagree -- not sure how to best express my disagreement. Start quoting from the book?

He's taken lots of chances, seems to like to take chances, has had success with taking chances. Seems to love talking about chances he's taken that have worked out, things that he was told were impossible that he made happen. (I'm thinking about stuff he did in Illinois re: procedures for questioning suspects here, for example.)

I think that there is a bipartisanship that is different from risk-aversion. Try the collaborative, proactive way first, and if it doesn't work, back it up with some elbows -- but keep the elbows in reserve.

These speeches Drum refers to -- they're campaign speeches. They're written for him, they're part of campaign strategy. (When the speech-writer forgets about an event and Obama has to do his own, we get a good strong rabble-rouser like the black fathers speech.)

nimh wrote:

I mean, if he expressed a different persona in the book he wrote three years ago than he does now when he's running for President, then good for him.

While I've mentioned "The Audacity of Hope" a lot when the beef was that Obama was all generalities (lots of specifics there), here I'm talking about "Dreams from my Father" -- the first book. It's personal, quite unusually so for a politician. And personality is what we're talking about. Certainly seems to be pertinent.

You keep talking about how well every voter can't be bothered with reading the book... sure, of course. YOU can't find time to read it? Hmm.

Often when I've brought it up it's because there has been some variation of you saying "I don't get why you're so enthused about him" and me responding with "If you read the book, I think you'd get it."

That doesn't seem unreasonable to me. It's a cumulative thing -- voice, approach to issues, ways of thinking, things he did -- and I don't think I can really summarize it better than I already have, which you obviously find unconvincing.

0 Replies

Look, you can't win an election based upon the book. You need to be able to take the things in the book, and say them out loud for people to hear in the news.

I'm as big an Obama supporter as anyone, but I really need to see him step his game up.

Cycloptichorn

0 Replies

Related Topics

Quick Links

My Account

able2know