What's behind Obama?

[Frylock]

@BrainGlutton

No reason he would have needed outside help to rise in Illinois politics and become a U.S. senator. As it happened, his bid was highly nationally publicized, and a lot of people liked what they saw. Do you really think a conspiracy-theory explanation is the most economical one for that?

I’m not talking about a conspiracy of the sort generally connoted by the phrase “conspiracy theory.”

-FrL-

[Damuri_Ajashi]

@Anduril

The Obama phenomenon is a media creation. A study supports this contention. He’s not as progressive as Hillary when it comes to healthcare. He’s a greenhorn when it comes to National Security. He lacks the grasp that Hillary has on economic issues. He only does well in speeches where he has teleprompters but in debates fairs poorly against people who actually know their stuff.

All he ever touts is his vote on Iraq when the Illinois State Legislature had a majority against the war, when a year later he pulled down the speech off his website because it is “dated”, when he voted exactly like Hillary Clinton ever since, when he said he didn’t know how he would have voted in their stead. The fact is, the rationale for the vote on Iraq was credibly presented and at a time like that, who would have expected that Bush would lie about the intelligence and betray them into a war. Nobody.

This is his strongest case for his presidency - a speech that he pulled down a year later because it is “dated”.

You know an awful lot about all this for being a non-American in the Phillipines. Are you sure you aren’t a rabid Hillary supporter in the beltway?

[Damuri_Ajashi]

@Frylock

My question wasn’t whether Obama has “staged plans,” but rather, to what extent his rise to celebrity and subsequent presidential bid were staged (i.e., planned in such a way as to give the false appearance of spontaneity) by others. I don’t think one can generally just up and do such things in Washington without a lot of help.

-FrL-

You are being understandably cynical. This isn’t about OBAMA, this is about the idea that government can work better than it does. That government can be more accountable and more transparent to the people. The idea that the influence of special interests will only be felt when their interests correspond to the interests of the American people. Obama isn’t a candidate, he is a movement. I am a Beltway brat and I am pretty jaded about politics and I have never been this excited about a candidate in my life. Maybe its the juxtaposition of the last 7 years and my hunger for a break from “politics as usual”

Obama has had a lot of help from a LOT of people, $100 at a time in most cases.

[ComeToTheDarkSideWeHaveCookies]

I can only give you my anecdotal perspective.

I saw his DNC speech by chance. I was completely disallusioned with “the system” at the time, and I couldn’t give a crap what the f*cking politicians were saying. I happened to catch his speech, live, while flipping channels, and I pretty much fell in love at first sight. He was like a breath of fresh air to me, immediately, before I knew much of anything about him, and before I had heard anything from the media about him. As I got to know him (to the best of my ability) I liked him more and more. Like many, I really didn’t expect him to run, because what I want rarely actually happens in politics. I hope he continues to pleasantly surprise me. He is the first candidate I’ve ever contributed to.

[MovieMogul]

A great piece from Andrew Sullivan:

Perhaps the most telling critique of Obama, to my mind, is his lack of executive experience. (The same can be said for Clinton, of course, if you don’t count the First Lady period, when she insists her husband was the president.) I asked him directly last year why a voter should back someone who has never run anything bigger than a legislative office. He responded by pointing to his nascent campaign. He observed out that he was up against the full Clinton establishment, all the chits she and her husband had acquired over the years, and the apparatus they had constructed within the party. He had to build a national campaign from scratch, raise money, staff an extremely complex electoral map, and make key decisions on spending and travel. He asked me to judge his executive skills by observing how he was managing a campaign.

By that standard, who isn’t impressed? A first term senator - a black urban liberal - raised more money, and continues to raise much more money, than Senator Clinton. More to the point, the money he has raised has not come from the well-connected fat-cats who do things like donate to the Clinton library. His base is much wider, broader and internet-based than hers. It has many more small donors.

Now look at the strategy he laid out last year, as he explained it to me and others. Iowa was the key. If he didn’t win Iowa, it was over. But if he could win Iowa, he would prove the principle that a black man could transcend the racial issue, helping in New Hampshire, and then also helping him peel off what was then majority black support for the Clintons in South Carolina. Then his strategy was meticulous organization - and you saw that in Iowa, as well as yesterday’s caucus states. Everything he told me has been followed through. And the attention to detail - from the Alaska caucus to the Nevada cooks - has been striking.

Now consider the psychological and emotional challenges of this campaign. It has been brutal. It has included many highly emotional moments - and occasions when racism and sexism and all sorts of hot-button issues have emerged. Then there was the extraordinary spectacle of a former president and spouse bringing the full weight of ther Democratic establishment and the full prestige to two terms in the White House to dismiss some of Obama’s arguments as a “fairy tale” and dismiss him as another Jesse Jackson.

How did the candidates deal with this? The vastly more experienced and nerves-of-steel Clinton clearly went through some wild mood-swings. Obama gave an appearance at least of preternatural coolness under fire, a steady message that others came to mimic, and a level of oratory that still stuns this longtime debater. In the middle of this very hot zone, he exhibit a coolness and steeliness that is a mark of presidential timber. He played tough - but he didn’t play nasty. Keeping the high road in a contest like this - without ever playing the race card or the victim card - is an achievement. Building a movement on top of that is more impressive still. So far, he has combined Romney’s money with Clinton’s organizational skills and Ron Paul’s grass-roots enthusiasm. No other campaign has brought so many dimensions into play.

And he won Missouri.

[Terraplane]

@Mehitabel

I’m listening to his Super Tuesday speech right now and am hearing absolutely no specifics and no real ideas. IMO All he’s doing is mixing Edward’s divisive rhetoric with anti-Repub bromides and vague feel-good promises–he just said he’ll reward teachers with “pay that equals their greatness” which I wasn’t aware was something the federal government had much control over. He just took brave stands against “terrorism, poverty, genocide and disease” and led the crowd in a chant of “we can do this!” Do what? How? I’ve been to his website and I can’t find much there.

What specifics are you finding from Hillary that you aren’t finding from Obama? You mentioned education and say you looked at his web site and didn’t find much but this PDF file from his site seems fairly specific to me. At least as much so as Clinton’s website. Most of the issues on his site have PDF’s at the bottom that are more substantial than the elevator pitch points you see at first.

Right now, I want politics to deliver from the moral ground of someone who’s been tested, and has occasionally failed and been called to account for it, not allowed to coast on charisma. I want somebody who won’t try to fly around the world begging people to like America again using the implicit, unearned power of his heritage, and might blunder into a meeting with much older and wilier opponents. I want somebody who will shut up, hunker down, and be a total policy wonk, who will quietly and ruthlessly and efficiently get rid of people and laws that violate her principles, which to be honest are pretty much the same as Obama’s.

Her principles aren’t the same as Obama’s though. Obama hasn’t ever waffled on torture. He spoke out against the war in Iraq while she authorized it. And while he hasn’t been perfect, in my opinion he’s shown a lot more reluctance to get down in the mud and sling dirt at his opponent than Hillary has. He criticizes her policy issues while she misrepresents things he said about Ronald Reagan, perpetuates the claim that Obama ‘snubbed’ her, misrepresents his ‘present’ votes.

Some people say that’s evidence of his naivety but I think that ignores just how much he’s managed to accomplish. He came out of nowhere to give Hillary Clinton, a deeply entrenched Democratic icon, the fight of her life. He started this race from about as far behind as possible and now he’s in a position where he just might win the nomination. You can think what you want but that makes him a pretty astute politician in my book.

And even if you’re the more cynical type, or if you just don’t believe that Obama is ethically any better than Clinton and that they have the same policies, the fact that he’s managed to do it while wearing the mantle of Grand Uniter and Restorer of Hope to the People, while she has to constantly work just to get people to like her, should at least make you question which of the two is really the master of the political craft. I think the notion that a person like that is some wide eyed innocent that’s going to blunder into a meeting with other leaders is wrong.

[BrainGlutton]

@BrainGlutton

I even recall a contemporary political cartoon – Lincoln is about to lead his followers into the Millennium and asks what they want. A black says, “White people got no rights collud folks is bound to respec’, I jes’ want that understood.” A bum says, “I’d like a hostelry where fellers who ain’t inclined to work can be found in cider and terbacky.” A person of indeterminate gender calls for Free Love. And so on.

Not the cartoon I was thinking of – it features Fremont, not Lincoln – but it gives the general flavor of how Pubs were perceived at the time.

[Phlosphr]

@BrainGlutton

Not the cartoon I was thinking of – it features Fremont, not Lincoln – but it gives the general flavor of how Pubs were perceived at the time.

A completely unrelated sidenote to that cartoon Brainglutton - it’s interesting to read what you can above their heads, but try and see who each of them are looking at…sort of interesting where their line of sight goes.

[Biffy_the_Elephant_Shrew]

Hillary.

[Ignatz]

For me, it’s his “Kennedyesque” manner, speech, and oratory powers.

When I can break away from the Board, I’m getting back to the book I just bought ($22 at Barnes & Noble),

A Bound Man-Why We Are Excited by Barack Obama and Why He Can’t Win,

by Shelby Steele (who, in chapter one, makes a big thing about his own mixed racial heritage).

I, of course, looked for it in the fiction section (because of the “Why He Can’t Win” part).

[Love_Rhombus]

Okay. I don’t generally post in GD; I just feel out of my depth. I’m going to say what I think, and it’s probably the geekiest thing mentioned in a political thread for a long time. deep breath

Barack Obama is Captain America.

I know, stupid. But he is, to me. He gives me the same vibe, the same hope in someone who’s seen the same terror and bad government and unending war that I have and still, still, thinks “We Can Do It.” He believes in the promises and dreams that America offers and symbolizes, and he wants us to work together to make it happen. I think he knows full well that we’ll never get there, that the shining city on the hill will never come to pass, but that 's no reason not to try.

I know, idealism. Naivete. He’s not a kid, though. He’s been in politics, he’s seen how things work. And he’s smart enough to hire good people and not listen to them. And yes, his color is a factor. It gives him a perspective that perhaps America needs. We’ve had a steady procession of white guys in the Big Seat, some good, some bad. Why not a totally clean break from that?

I know, he might not make it. But at least we tried. At least America gave him a shot and showed that we want something else, and perhaps that look in the mirro r will help us see that we must be different, better, more hopeful. Everyone, regular people, politicians, Super Soldiers and Dopers, should want a fresh face for America.

Well, there it is. Laugh if you want.