This is bigger than just race relations right T_J? Obama's father looks like my father and his mother looks like your mother. Hell, Iowa proved me wrong, I would have NEVER thought that a state full of white people would have put Obama over the top. I grew up a little last night...join me? "There is not a liberal America and a conservative America - there is the United States of America. There is not a black America and a white America and latino America and asian America - there's the United States of America." -Barack Obama BE AN EXAMPLE.
Politics aside, things like these are what make me proud to be an American. Be it long overdue, or in some people's minds not a big deal, my heart swells with pride as we inch closer to being a stronger, more unified country.
Regarding race: I was reading several comments by other democrat posters on other boards who don't want Obama to get the nod because they think a black man could never win a presidential election in this country. That would suggest that voters who are against a black president would be motivated to vote against him. Kind of like the anti-Bush vote in 2004, we'd have the anti-black vote. Who was the guy, just last month, who insinuated that Obama couldn't win the election because the repubs would go after his past drug use and his middle name (Hussein)? It was a democrat who said it, maybe someone with Clinton's campaign. It backfired horribly. Obama took it all in stride, looked like the bigger man, and the other guy had to apologize, ashamed. The thought occurred to me- what if Obama's race works to his advantage? The political correctness of our country actually offers him protection. If anyone were to even insinuate criticism of him because of his race, or even his middle name, that person would get trashed. Even if they tried to do it obliquely, with "push-poll" calls and such, if it were traced back to anyone even remotely connected to an opponent's campaign... they would be toast. Rove/Bush got away with it in South Carolina with the whole 'black baby' thing against Mccain back in 2000. But I don't see it working against Obama. That isn't to say that there aren't plenty of people who don't want a black president, and that there will be some organized attempt to get them to vote against Obama. But any organized effort to round up the anti-black vote can never gain steam because people would be ashamed to be openly associated with it, and even the most tenuous connection between it and another candidate would sink that candidate. Compare that to the massive organized effort by the democrats to get out the anti-Bush vote in 2004. Past black candidates for president made their race part of their campaign. Because it was already out there, it was okay for others to discuss it. Obama has not made it part of his campaign at all. For others to bring it up in that context would be incredibly awkward at best. None of his opponenets get to touch the topic, because Obama hasn't put it out there.
Nobody is going to dismantle NASA. But you have to admit that in the face of huge deficits some things are going to have to be rolled back, and a mission to Mars would have to be pretty low on the priorities list. However, I would say the monitoring of the condition Of Mother Earth from space should keep NASA on the leading edge of innovation. I, however do make my living from passive investing. Tax rates on capital gains would go up under an Obama administration and I still support him. It would be worth some personal sacrifice to me to return our nation to a beacon of humanity, represented to the world with intelligence, passion and meritocracy rather than the current bumbling hamfisted comedy of good ol' boys and nepotism or the other options that offer 'politics as usual' devisiveness.
True. But you vote in private, allowing you to be a guilt-free racist to your heart's content. This was discussed very well (with some supporting data) in the book Freakonomics.
I sure hope Obama if elected can straighten out some of the mess in Washington, but I am not sure the establishment will allow him to accomplish that even with a democratic congress (they are just as bad as the Republican congress at wasting our money). There are many program that should be cut or reduced in my opion.
If Obama wins the nomination, there will finally be a candidate on either side that I don't hate for the first time in a couple decades.
Yeah, my family members and I are just going to willingly give up our jobs and the magnificence of human space exploration so Obama can fund a national daycare system. Not going to happen.
Thanks to Bush and the hole he has dug for our economic situation, cutting out certain programs are going to be necessary for us to attempt to get back on our feet as a nation. I believe all candidates will cut back on NASA, but Obama is the only one honest enough to say it right now. This should not be a deciding factor on whether or not you vote for him. If it is, you are a highly selfish individual. Vote Oboma '08. Time for Change.
political correctness will not affect anyone's vote, they will vote for who they feel represents them and their beliefs bes and that's the way it should be
It is absolutely the deciding factor. **** federally funded daycare. It makes me sick. Don't have kids you can't afford in '08.
Are you a Fed or a contractor? As I said in a previous post, NASA's going nowhere... but I wouldn't be surprised if there is some contraction in the contracting over the next 8 years.
Why Everyone Has a Reason to Celebrate Tonight Even if your candidate didn't win tonight, you have reason to celebrate. We all do. Barack Obama's stirring victory in Iowa -- down home, folksy, farm-fed, Midwestern, and 92 percent white Iowa -- says a lot about America, and also about the current mindset of the American voter. Because tonight voters decided that they didn't want to look back. They wanted to look into the future -- as if a country exhausted by the last seven years wanted to recapture its youth. Bush's re-election in 2004 was a monument to the power of fear and fear-mongering. Be Very Afraid was Bush/Cheney's Plans A through Z. The only card in the Rove-dealt deck. And it worked. America, its vision distorted by the mushroom clouds conjured by Bush and Cheney, made a collective sprint to the bomb shelters in our minds, our lizard brains responding to fear rather than hope. And the Clintons -- their Hillary-as-incumbent-strategy sputtering -- followed the Bush blueprint in Iowa and played the fear card again and again and again. Be afraid of Obama, they warned us. Be afraid of something new, something different. He might meet with our enemies. His middle name is Hussein. He went to a madrassa school. A vote for him would be like rolling the dice, the former president said on Charlie Rose. And the people of Iowa heard him, and chose to roll the dice. Obama's win might not have legs. Hope could give way to fear once again. But, for tonight at least, it holds a mirror up to the face of America, and we can look at ourselves with pride. This is the kind of country America was meant to be, even if you are for Clinton or Edwards -- or even Huckabee or Giuliani. It's the kind of country we've always imagined ourselves being -- even if in the last seven years we fell horribly short: a young country, an optimistic country, a forward-looking country, a country not afraid to take risks or to dream big. Bill Clinton has privately told friends that if Hillary didn't win, it would be because of the two weeks that followed her shaky performance in the Philadelphia debate. But it wasn't those two weeks. Indeed, if we were to pinpoint one decisive moment, it would be Bill Clinton on Charlie Rose, arrogant and entitled, dismissive and fear-mongering. And then Bill Clinton giving us a refresher course in '90s-style truth-twisting and obfuscation -- making stuff up about always having been against the war, and about Hillary having always been for every good decision during his presidency and against every bad one, from Ireland to Sarajevo to Rwanda. So voters in Iowa remembered the past and decided that they didn't want to go back. They wanted to move ahead. Even if that meant rolling the dice. Again, this moment may not last. But, for tonight, I am going to savor it -- and cross my fingers that it may stand as the day that fear as a winning political tactic died. Killed by an "unlikely" candidate -- as Obama called himself again and again -- who seized the moment, and reminded America of its youth and the optimism it longs to recapture http://www.huffingtonpost.com/arianna-huffington/obama-wins-iowa-why-ever_b_79663.html?view=print
To consider what a total charlatan Obama is, consider the following: Obama keeps claiming that there aren't red states and blue states, but rather the United States. Great. So he is characterizing himself as beyond partisan politics. Great. Now let's look at reality. Obama's stances on the issues are exceedingly liberal. No where near the center. So tell me, Bwak, which issues are you going to compromise your beliefs on so that you can legislate in a bi-partisan fashion? Are you going to magically adopt pro-life policies? Are you going to extend the wildly successful Bush tax cuts? You see folks, when a politician says he's above partisan politics, that implies that he will compromise on issues that he believes in to pass bills. You telling me Bwak is going to do that? That's just funny. Just another liberal...
