Crossing the line [Republicans thinking of voting for Obama]

[BrainGlutton]

@stolichnaya

It’s classic politics- Obama’s standout strength in this field is his oratory and his personal charm, so, well, time to attack it as if it is a weakness.

No, attacking your opponent’s strengths is not classic politics, it’s politics as pioneered by Karl Rove.

[XT]

@Diogenes the Cynic

You want ideas from Obama? Immediately ending the occupation of Iraq, UHC and energy independence (and at least starting to try to wean the country off the oil tit) are three ideas I can think of off the top of my head which are all completely necessary, all long overdue and all of which would continue to be ignored under another Republican regime.

I like Obama. I’m probably going to vote for him despite his politics. However…would you like to place a little side bet on him actually getting any of that implemented? Immediately end the occupation of Iraq?? Not a chance…unless by ‘immediately’ you mean sometime in his second term (if we are lucky). UHC? I won’t hold my breath for that one either. Energy independence? You mean DURING his (assumed) 2 terms in office?? Or working towards energy independence sometime in the next, oh, say 50 years?

Seriously you are putting WAY to many expectations on the man if you actually think he’s going to do any of that…certainly if you think he will actually accomplish any of that in his first term. You are setting yourself up for disappointment IMHO. Just like on the other side of the coin folks are afraid he WILL do all that stuff if elected…which is equally unrealistic.

-XT

[Diogenes_the_Cynic]

So what’s McCain’s strength? His war hero status? I guess we can’t attack that. You’d have to be an unbelievable slimeball to attack a candidate’s war service.

[BrainGlutton]

@Diogenes the Cynic

So what’s McCain’s strength? His war hero status? I guess we can’t attack that. You’d have to be an unbelievable slimeball to attack a candidate’s war service.

No need, when somebody else, not even vaguely associated with your own camp, will do it for you.

[Liberal]

@Diogenes the Cynic

Reagan’s one “idea” was the thoroughly discredited and disastrous attack on the working class that was “Trickle-Down Economics.” He was essentially just an affable B-movie actor who manged (with the help of the media) to maintain an illusion of likeability and decency despite the runaway corruption of his administration and the abject failure of his economic policies to do anything but destroy the middle class. Nothing shows the right wing’s capacity for self-delusion and self-pacifying fantasy in the face of brutal reality than the mythologization of Reagan. The denial of evolution almost seems rational compared to reimagining of Ronald Reagan as a visionary – or even lucid — President.

That’s just ridiculous. Absolute rhetorical trash.

[Diogenes_the_Cynic]

@xtisme

I like Obama. I’m probably going to vote for him despite his politics. However…would you like to place a little side bet on him actually getting any of that implemented? Immediately end the occupation of Iraq?? Not a chance…unless by ‘immediately’ you mean sometime in his second term (if we are lucky). UHC? I won’t hold my breath for that one either. Energy independence? You mean DURING his (assumed) 2 terms in office?? Or working towards energy independence sometime in the next, oh, say 50 years?

Seriously you are putting WAY to many expectations on the man if you actually think he’s going to do any of that…certainly if you think he will actually accomplish any of that in his first term. You are setting yourself up for disappointment IMHO. Just like on the other side of the coin folks are afraid he WILL do all that stuff if elected…which is equally unrealistic.

-XT

It’s enough for me that he’s even going to tryto do those things (and the energy independence is a long term thing, incidentally, with a target, IRRC, of being independent within 18 years).

It’s a hugely unpopular war and his proposal for a graduated withdrawal of troops is not going to be problematic. If he goes into office with a mandatre for anything, it will be to get out of Iraq.

UHC is going to have to happen sooner or later anyway, it’s needed, it’s right and Obama is a better personality to run point in that political war than Hillary is.
*We have been told we cannot do this by a chorus of cynics who will
only grow louder and more dissonant in the weeks to come. We’ve been
asked to pause for a reality check. We’ve been warned against
offering the people of this nation false hope.

But in the unlikely story that is America, there has never been
anything false about hope. For when we have faced down impossible
odds; when we’ve been told that we’re not ready, or that we shouldn’t
try, or that we can’t, generations of Americans have responded with a
simple creed that sums up the spirit of a people.

Yes we can.*

[Diogenes_the_Cynic]

@Liberal

That’s just ridiculous. Absolute rhetorical trash.

I was there. I voted for the guy. One of the dumbest things I ever did.

[Liberal]

@Diogenes the Cynic

I was there. I voted for the guy. One of the dumbest things I ever did.

Please don’t hand me those kinds of straight lines.

[XT]

@Diogenes the Cynic

It’s enough for me that he’s even going to tryto do those things (and the energy independence is a long term thing, incidentally, with a target, IRRC, of being independent within 18 years).

Fair enough. FWIW I think he WILL try and do those things. But I expect that most of them will be substantially modified or even dropped by the end of his term. This isn’t to say that what he WILL accomplish won’t be good or meaning full…I think it will.

YMMV, but what I learned from Bush’s presidency is that even a president who’s party has control of the house and senate AND who has a high popularity (as he did right after 9/11) can’t really accomplish all of the grandiose things those on the fringe hope he can. As an example, one of the big hand wringers about Bush prior to the 2000 election that I remember was how Bush was going to get abortion to be illegal. Never happened despite the fact that the SCOTUS is ALSO (relatively) conservative these days. Most of the social conservative agenda in fact never happened with Bush in power…despite the fact that Bush IS a big time social conservative AND he had all that other stuff as well.

I set my expectations about a president (any president) much lower these days. For my part it will be enough that Obama can inspire and can build new bridges from America back to the world (who seem to love the guy already). If he does no more than that this will be a really good 8 year ride…

-XT

[stolichnaya]

@BrainGlutton

No, attacking your opponent’s strengths is not classic politics, it’s politics as pioneered by Karl Rove.

Fair enough. How about, for me, it’s quickly becoming classic politics. Rove and my political awareness arrived on the scene at about the same time.

[Shayna]

@Shodan

I really don’t understand this. If both Obama and Clinton hold the same positions - and, AFAICT, they do - then what difference does it make what their intentions are?

They don’t. For one, Obama wants to change how health insurance is run, from the top down, to make it more affordable and more widely available and “accessible” to everyone, including subsidizing some, based on level of income, and forbidding insurance companies from refusing insurance coverage to anyone, including people with pre-existing conditions. He believes that in doing all of that, the pool of insured will naturally grow to where most people are covered. This is a reasonable goal, and one not as likely to be met with strong resistance from Republicans.

On the other hand, Hillary wants to revisit the “shove-it-down-their-throats-and-garnish-wages-to-make-it-mandatory” crap she tried and failed to get through in 1993. It’s a shitty model and has a shitty chance of ever seeing the light of day.

BIG, BIG difference in positions, AFAIC.

And their Economic Stimulus packages are so different as to have garnered him an A- on his, whereas Hillary’s got a C+

@Shodan

I was talking primarily about their positions on the issues. Although nobody on the SDMB really cared about Kerry’s positions - he just wasn’t Bush.

that is completely incorrect.

@Shodan

Likewise, nobody seems to care what Obama’s positions are on the issues - he’s so inspiring!

. . .

AFAICT, it’s “change”. Well, that’s fine as far as it goes. But what specifically does he mean by it?

The most common response I have gotten has been the same for Kerry - 'he’s a change from Bush". As I have mentioned a time or two, that goes over big on the SDMB, and always has.

Again, Not so. As explained in detail in that post, the change that Obama wants to bring to Washington, starts with the basics of how it’s run. Get rid of the lobbyists and special interests, make the work government does more transparent to the public (which, by the way, he has a record of accomplishing during his Illinois Legislative tenure), pass sweeping ethics reform, and make our elected officials more answerable to us, the people who put them there and can take them out.

Too bad you don’t like it, since it seems you’re going to have to live with it for at least 4 to 8 years.

[Shayna]

Is Businessweek one of the nobodies who don’t care what Obama’s positions are on the issues? Seems they think someone cares and will read about it. And whaddaya know, they commend him for playing well with conservative! :eek:

Is Obama Good for Business?

On Sunday, Feb. 10, after he found out he’d won that day’s Democratic Presidential caucuses in Maine, but before his appearance on CBS’s 60 Minutes, Senator Barack Obama (D-Ill.) sat down at the keyboard of his computer to write an e-mail. Not to a media consultant or a delegate counter, but to banker Robert Wolf, CEO of UBS Americas (UBS). The two men exchanged notes about the Senate-passed economic stimulus package and that weekend’s G-7 economic summit, Wolf says.

A banker as Obama’s pen pal? Hard to believe, given the senator’s liberal image. . .

<snip>

But Obama has also taken several steps that aren’t typical of his fellow liberal senators. He has stocked his Capitol Hill staff with employees whose résumés include McKinsey, the old Andersen Consulting, and other nonpartisan business advisory firms. He joined forces with conservatives on bills designed to improve ethics and transparency in Washington. He voted for a bill in 2005 that made life harder for trial lawyers—a traditional Democratic constituency—by allowing defendants to shift cases more easily to federal court, which can be less favorable to plaintiffs. And he pushed an outside-the-box proposal that would help Detroit automakers pay legacy health-care costs on the condition they reinvest the subsequent savings into hybrids and other fuel-efficient cars. “His whole style of governing is less confrontational,” says Bob Shrum, a long-time Democratic Presidential campaign strategist who’s unaligned in 2008.

During his earlier eight years in the Illinois state senate, Obama also posted a record leavened with both traditional Democratic solutions and more pro-business efforts. He backed long-touted programs like expanding the earned income tax credit for poor families and expanding enterprise zones to boost development in depressed areas. But he pushed for a technology development fund to recruit sophisticated companies to the state and for tax incentives to businesses. “He was as liberal as could be at times, but he still worked with us,” says Jerry Roper, president and CEO of the Chicagoland Chamber of Commerce. “We’d talk on the phone, or I’d go see him. He’s a good guy.”

Just yet another reason he’d be a much better President than Clinton. Even if they had the same positions, he’d be the one more likely to get them passed!

Oh, and that article goes on to point out yet another distinction between Obama and Clinton.

Some of the names that might fill in the org chart in an Obama Administration are also telling. Obama—whose own father was a Kenyan economist with a PhD from Harvard University—has cultivated a group of economic advisers. They’re generally careful technocrats, and are led by University of Chicago professor Austan Goolsbee. Among the others: Jeffrey Liebman and David Cutler of Harvard and Christina and David Romer of the University of California, Berkeley. Goolsbee has shown a preference for making economic initiatives easier to understand and use, an effort Obama calls “iPod government.”

On the campaign trail, Obama and Goolsbee have crafted proposals to streamline government programs like the Medicare Part D prescription drug benefit, which Goolsbee feels is too complicated. Same with student loan applications and tax forms. Goolsbee says the distinction with Clinton is most evident in the candidates’ plans to increase the personal savings rate. Obama would create an automatic 3% savings withholding from every paycheck that employees could opt out of if they want to. Clinton, on the other hand, proposes a targeted tax break to incentivize savings. **The Clinton plan, says Goolsbee, “is what the playbook says to do. But the research says tax credits won’t induce very many people to actually open savings accounts.” **

The woman is incapable of any new or innovative thoughts or proposals. She keeps regurgitating the same things that have been tried before and failed.

Yes, I’d say she and Obama are very, very different indeed.

[Ocean_Annie]

@Shodan

But as Starving Artist has mentioned hereabouts, there is going to come a time when Obama is going to be required to be specific. Maybe he can make it to the White House by adding his personal charm to standard-issue Democratic boilerplate - I don’t know. But for the first time since, what, Eisenhower, there is no incumbent in the race (unless you count Hilary). Change? We’re gonna get that, no doubt about it.

Regards,
Shodan

Kerry was a weak candidate and a terrible choice. The Democrats aren’t the only voters swayed by vision and a philosophical message. Bush won with a message of freedom and democracy, liberty at home and abroad. People like the message more than the details. The same can be said about Reagan’s speeches which focused on patriotism, American pride, the family, etc.

[Shodan]

@Liberal

But lifting a people’s spirit is the first step in restoring their vigilance. Our nation could not have had a revolution without that kind of inspiration. I wouldn’t be at all surprised to see Obama become fiscally conservative over the course of time.

With all due respect - if ever there was a case of wishful political thinking, this is it.

I’ve explained this now to a fare-thee-well. The contrast between them could not be sharper — she is a conniving wealth seeker, while he is a person who desires to lead America out of her funk. That is how I see it, and I don’t know why you keep rephrasing what I’m saying as “He’s a nice guy and talks good”

If I understand you correctly, the fact that Obama means well outweighs the fact that his platform and Hilary’s are essentially the same. They’re all authoritarians, so you are going for the most inspiring one. Well, OK. It will be interesting to see how long his ability to inspire survives the shock of life inside the Beltway.

Regards,
Shodan

[Sam_Stone]

@Shayna

Is Businessweek one of the nobodies who don’t care what Obama’s positions are on the issues? Seems they think someone cares and will read about it. And whaddaya know, they commend him for playing well with conservative! :eek:

Just yet another reason he’d be a much better President than Clinton. Even if they had the same positions, he’d be the one more likely to get them passed!

Oh, and that article goes on to point out yet another distinction between Obama and Clinton. The woman is incapable of any new or innovative thoughts or proposals. She keeps regurgitating the same things that have been tried before and failed.

Yes, I’d say she and Obama are very, very different indeed.

I notice you didn’t post the part of the article that actually answers the question they ask in the title (is Obama good for business):

In its most recent Senate tally, the Chamber of Commerce gave likely GOP nominee McCain an 80% favorable rating, compared with Clinton at 67% and Obama at 55%. Even worse for the two main Democrats, the National Association of Manufacturers rated both a zero, while McCain garnered 100%.

Isn’t it a little worrying that a time when people claim to be worried about the state of the manufacturing industry, they are supporting a candidate who gets a 0% rating from the main association of American manufacturers?

And are you seriously happy about the plan to force employers to withhold 3% of your salary and put it in a savings account for you, because you can’t be trusted to save for yourself? Of course, we mustn’t be authoritarian about it, so you’ll have to option of taking the money out afterwards if you really want to. So the people with spending problems won’t be helped a bit, but businesses everywhere will have yet another burden they have to deal with, and employees will have one more form they have to fill out to get their own money.

This is the kind of creeping social interventionism I just hate. It’s none of the government’s damned business how much money I choose to save. A much better solution to the ‘problem’ of lack of savings would be to stop providing all these freaking entitlements to everyone, and stop bailing people out when they make stupid choices. No, instead we’re going to ‘protect them’, and then when they react to that protection logically by spending their savings, we’re going to take their money aside like little children and make them ask for it back. Bah.

I find the logic in this thread from Conservatives and Libertarians baffling. No, the candidates are NOT all the same. They have very different plans. John McCain can be counted on to resist tax increases, spending increases, and to fight hard against pork (he’s one of the only Senators who refuses to place earmarks in spending bills, for example). He’s a free trader. And he’s not a social conservative. The social conservatives hate him, remember? And why? Because he supported stem cell funding. He opposes torture. He supports reasonable immigration reform. He has a record of reaching across the aisle and working with the other side on common goals. The only social conservative position he really has is that he’s pro-life.

James Dobson has said that he’ll vote for Hillary before he’ll vote for McCain. That’s a big point in McCain’s favor.

I think the fact is that people find Obama electrifying, and he’s a walking Rorschach test - you see in him whatever you want to see. He’s the next great hope, so some people are willing to look the other way and pretend that they don’t know that he believes everything they claim to be against.

I fully understand why liberals like him - if I were a liberal, I’d be ecstatic. And it’s about time they had a candidate that they could be really excited about, after years of lame ducks like Kerry, Dukakis, Mondale, and Gore (at the time, he wasn’t exactly Mr. personality).

But it’s still important to fight for your ideals. I said the same thing about Liberals who supported McCain - I didn’t get it. They saw a ‘Maverick’ who was willing to stick it to the Bush administration on occasion, and someone who had principles, and they were willing to drop what they believed in and vote for him. That didn’t make sense to me.

I do understand the argument that that most important thing is to find a candidate to make a nation feel good about itself again - the Reagan thing. I just think that someone who inspires that kind of emotion is also very dangerous if he has bad ideas. And I think a lot of Obama’s ideas are very bad.

[Diogenes_the_Cynic]

Wahh the poor CEO’s.

I want a candidate who’s going to be as liberal as Jesus on the cross, thank you very much. Obama DOES strand up for my ideals. I am a near socialist and even the most tendentiously “liberal” interpretation of Obama’s political tendencies still puts him to the right of me. “Good for business” is just code for “good for corporations” anyway.

[Sam_Stone]

Totally fair point of view. Like I said, if I was a liberal, I’d be giddy right about now.

[Diogenes_the_Cynic]

@Sam Stone

Totally fair point of view. Like I said, if I was a liberal, I’d be giddy right about now.

A lot of us are. We see a guy who has a chance to be on money some day. All Presidents tend to have to moderate towards the center once they get in office anyway. Pure idealogues don’t get anything done or they self-destruct. I just hope he doesn’t end up getting kneecapped by his own party. If anyone could self-sabotage enough to blow the opportunity of once in a generation candidate like Obama, the Democrats can.

I was reading something earlier today about some kind of appearance that James Carville and Mary Matalin made together speaking at some college. Carville assured the Democrats in the crowd that the only way the Dems could lose this time was by talking their way out of it. He then reassured the Republicans in the crowd that the Dems were quite capable of doing just that. I’m really hoping this is one time where the Dems can stay out of their own way. If they fuck up an election where they have a cross between JFK and MLK (but without their negatives) on their team against a guy who the other team doesn’t much want to vote for then the party needs to shut itself down. I’d like to think even the Dems can’t blow it this time, but I know that they can.

[elucidator]

Resistance will be ferocious, they will pull out all the stops. Because its not a normal election. Normal election, pubbies maybe get the snot kicked out of them, they limp back to Washington, lick their wounds and make calls for bipartisanship.

But this ain’t normal. Just off the top of your head, how many prospective scandals can you think of that haven’t been fully resolved, blocked for national security, etc. etc. I think Keith Olbmermanns got like, what? Fifty?

With a Dem President, Dem Congress and Dem Atty Gen…well, you see where I’m going with this.

In the key of C? From West Side Story

Subpoena! They just handed Dick a subpoena!
And suddenly I’ve found
How pitiful that clown
Can beeeeee

Subpoena! Say it loud and you scare them shitless
Say it soft and you worry them witless
Subpoeana! Can’t wait to start saying…subpoenaaaaaaa!

(Sorry, never could hit that note…)

[Phlosphr]

It’s not long before the dems see that if Clinton keeps up her negative campaigning it is only going to further divide the dems, which would be a check against us in the national race. She is gutting the party with her shennanegans and people are starting to see it. Texas and Ohio are not her saving grace, not even close. It just further tarnishes a fairly decent woman into history as a power grubbing paraquot.