riverdaughter spells it out

She writes about John Judis' article in The New Republic, "The Autopsy Report". Judis actually admits to the press being in the bag for Obama, but he explains why in this snippet:

Clinton’s second great political mistake lay in how she dealt with Obama’s challenge. Sometime in December, having realized that Obama was going to be a genuine rival for the nomination, she and her campaign decided to go negative on him. They did the usual thing politicians do to each other: They ran attack ads taking his words somewhat out of context (Obama calling Reagan a “transformative politician”); they somewhat distorted old votes (voting “present” in Illinois on abortion bills); and they questioned old associations (Obama’s connection with real estate developer Tony Rezko).

John McCain and Mitt Romney were doing similar things to each other—and Obama did some of it to Clinton, too. But there a was difference between her doing this to Obama and McCain’s doing it to Romney—a difference that eluded Clinton, her husband, and her campaign staff. My friend David Kusnet, Bill Clinton’s former speechwriter, explained the difference to me by citing what ex-heavyweight champion Floyd Patterson had once said about Muhammad Ali. “I was just a fighter,” Patterson had said, “but he was history.” Obama, too, was, and is, history—the first viable African-American presidential candidate. Yes, Hillary Clinton was the first viable female candidate, but it is still different. Race is the deepest and oldest and most bitter conflict in American history—the cause of our great Civil War and of the upheavals of the 1950s and ’60s. And if some voters didn’t appreciate the potential breakthrough that Obama’s candidacy represented, many in the Democratic primaries and caucuses did—and so did the members of the media and Obama’s fellow politicians. And as Clinton began treating Obama as just another politician, they recoiled and threw their support to him.

Her response is so fucking spot on...

Is this true? Did Clinton go unfairly negative on Obama? The answer to this is unfortunately yes. See, while we weren’t watching, standards were recalibrated to adjust for the African-American candidate. There is no need to do this for the female candidate because it is expected that if she wants to play in the big boyz game, she will have to demonstrate that she can be beaten to a bloody pulp and still remain standing. This is a universal truth. It’s like gravity. The African-American male got the right to vote before females did. We are only following precedent. Plus, we must acknowledge the collective guilt that we Democrats share regarding the status of African-Americans in America. If it weren’t for Republicans pushing through all that civil rights legislation back in the 60’s, we would still be living with segregation. We must atone for our sins, therefore, Hillary is absolutely forbidden from saying anything negative about Obama. This includes saying something about him that is true because that might make him look like just an average politician and that would be negative.

She must also not compare herself to him as this may reveal him to be wanting in some capacity and that would be mean and prejudicial. Some people would say that this gives Obama an advantage that Hillary doesn’t have, that he starts off with a handicap of sorts. But this comes too close to saying that he is benefitting from affirmative action and that just shows that you are a bigot.

"Gloating, unshackled sexism of the ugliest kind..."

Andrew Stephens, of the New Stateman, sums it up beautifully in his column, "Hating Hillary".

(Emphasis mine)

The danger is that, in their headlong rush to stop the first major female candidate (aka "Hildebeast" and "Hitlery") from becoming president, the punditocracy may have landed the Democrats with perhaps the least qualified presidential nominee ever. But that creeping realisation has probably come too late, and many of the Democratic super-delegates now fear there would be widespread outrage and increased racial tension if they thwart the first biracial presidential hopeful in US history.

But will Obama live up to the hype? That, I fear, may not happen: he is a deeply flawed candidate. Rampant sexism may have triumphed only to make way for racism to rear its gruesome head in America yet again. By election day on 4 November, I suspect, the US media and their would-be-macho commentators may have a lot of soul-searching to do.

And this is what I've been saying over and over. They (the DNC, MSM, progblogs) are all foisting an unvetted, inexperienced, little known, "hope" candidate on us because they think there's no way they can lose in November. Oh, but just wait until the GOP starts in on The Precious. Forget about comparing McCain to Bush. The Obama they'll be running against has way more in common with the GWB who ran in 2000; he's a "uniter", who's going to bring "hope" and "change", who misspeaks on more than a few occasions. 

What Obama will find out, and is already getting a taste of, is that he has also something in common with the Bill Clinton of 1992; he's married to a professional woman in her own right, who is outspoken, and has made comments that don't sit well with a lot of voters. Oh, dear. Imagine how that is going to play out. Hmm... And just imagine the outrage of the Obamaphiles. They will be shocked, just shocked at the rampant sexism and vilification of the Democratic nominee and his spouse. And they will be look to the Hillary supporters to 'call out' the media and the people making these outrageous claims! 

And to them I will say, "Good luck with that."

DissNfranChise?



Great job Hire Heels!

You say you want a Revolution?

I sure as hell do!

The Brand Called Obama

Check out this piece called "Brand "O" by Robert Zimmer written back in March. He references the article in the April 2008 Issue of Fast Company, "The Brand Called Obama".

Here's a clip from "Brand "O" (emphasis mine):

The Machine Behind Obama's Mystique -- Barack Obama's campaign may claim to be about a new brand of politics, but behind the scenes, the machine that has carefully controlled Brand "O" is anything but.

Next month's issue of Fast Company magazine will include an article entitled "The Brand Called Obama." It's about time.

The mystique surrounding Obama reinforces a sort of mythology that suggests to supporters that their messiah figure rides around on a magic carpet, with perhaps only a single lucky acolyte to assist, the candidate occasionally descending to deliver impromptu spirit-reviving speeches and raise the dead at town hall meetings. This mystique is not an accident. The unusual talent of this first-term Illinois senator is real, but so is a machine designed to ensure its dimensions appear transcendent and larger than life from every angle. The Obama candidacy and campaign, while undeniably substantive, are the result of a very intelligent strategy driven by old-fashioned product marketing techniques and political machinery. That the strategy has been both innovative and successful does not change the fact both components of Obama's campaign are very calculated. Contrary to the brand ID of effortless authenticity, Brand "O" has been masterminded by some very smooth operators who are among the usual suspects in political media consulting.

Check out the whole piece and the Fast Company article. The video above dovetails perfectly.

Is Barack Obama the Messiah?

Check out the website.

They've got the proof.

And for the skeptics they've got, "No, Dear, Barack Obama is not the Messiah"

Here's a video from there: "Barack Obama: Personal Jesus"

(Warning: Assimilate. Resistance is futile!)

"We've Come a Long Way Baby"

Not.

Please check out the video and give it a good rating at You Tube.

John Aravosis wants David to get on the Obama bus...or else

We wrote the other day about how odd it was that the superdelegates from College Democrat of America and Young Democrats of America were refusing to make an endorsement. Obama has overwhelmingly won the youth vote, and he has caused a surge (pardon my French) in youth turnout. So you'd think it would be a no-brainer for the superdelegates who represent the youth vote to endorse the candidate who represents the youth vote. Well, three of the four youth-vote superdelegates - Lauren Wolfe, Crystal Strait, and Awais Khalil - have finally endorsed Obama. And good for them. The final youth-vote superdelegate, David Hardt, is holding out. And that doesn't look good. At some point, you miss your window of opportunity. You still have a chance to get on the Obama bus, David. But the bus isn't going to wait forever. Obama is going to be our nominee, and he's going to be our next president. The only remaining question is whether you're going to announce your endorsement before folks get tired of this little dance. Because at that point, you'll have missed a once in a lifetime opportunity.

Oh, brother. Yeah, David. Better get ON the bus before Obama throws you under it with Rev. Wright, grandma, and the all of the Hillary supporters.

The scales are falling from their eyes?

Steve Soto at the Left Coaster is a little upset with Obama in his new post, "Not Good, Senator"

It is one thing to lose an uncontested race by 20 points or so. It’s another matter entirely when you lose the same race by over 40 points, after the media has anointed you the presumptive nominee. Team Obama can spin this any way they want, but to suggest that being obliterated by that large of a margin as the presumptive nominee means little is a little disingenuous.

I am also troubled this morning by the news that Team Obama wants to control all the Democratic money this campaign cycle themselves. The campaign has apparently put the word out that Obama doesn’t want his supporters to contribute to the pro-Democratic independent committees that make up the emerging part of a counter-GOP infrastructure. The campaign may be arguing that it wants to ensure a unified message consistent with Obama’s own, and therefore doesn’t want any independent players doing a Tier Two negative campaign against McCain, especially if former Clinton people head those groups. However, a successful Democratic candidate at the national level needs a Tier One/Tier Two effort to win, whereby the candidate stays on the high road pitching voters a positive message himself while Tier Two organizations pin the GOP opponent up against the wall and keep them on the defensive through surrogates that have some distance from the campaign. This is the way successful GOP campaigns have operated against Democrats for years, and Democrats had reached the point of parity with the GOP over the last several years, with better funding. It was supposed to be an essential part of the pushback effort against McCain this year, and Obama just pulled the rug out from under it, because he apparently wants to control the whole message, whatever that will be. I guess I wasn’t aware that the whole party was being taken over by the Obama movement.

Regardless of what you may think about Hillary Clinton's campaign, no one can now doubt that she would have thrown the kitchen sink at McCain using every club in the arsenal during the fall campaign. If Obama thinks that controlling everything himself through a single message from one point of attack is what the primary voters endorsed when he won all these contests, then Democrats have a right to know now what exactly that message will be this fall, and how tough and ruthless his campaign will be in carrying it out. I don't want to find out in September after Obama's defunded the progressive infrastructure through unilateral disarmament that he feels it is beneath him to go toe-to-toe with McCain and fight fire with fire.

This post is from the same guy who wrote, "Hillary, It's Time to Leave!" on the last primary night. Nice to see that opinions can be changed. Way to go, Steve!

Stronger

Two chances

Way, way, way too soon - on Tuesday night - Steve Soto, on The Left Coaster, posted "Hillary, It's Time to Leave".

Here are a couple of points he made that really sent me over the edge:

"However, he now has a clear path to the nomination at a time when we need to start destroying John McCain and the GOP every single day between now and November. It will be a challenge, as the party is about to test the proposition that his core voters can lead the party to a general election victory.

Nevertheless, the time for that experiment to begin is now, regardless of our feelings about how we got here. Again, no matter how you feel now, in the fall it will simply come down to Obama against a doddering, pandering, Bush ass-kissing sack of shit. If you vote for the sack of shit out of rage at how Obama won this thing over Clinton, we are all screwed. We cannot endure another four years of disaster capitalist elites running this country into the ground, aided by a Supreme Court full of corporatists. If you are a Clinton supporter, please leave your disappointment behind as you enter the voting booth in November. Your opponent is not Barack Obama, but rather the bastards across the aisle that got us here."

In comments I responded:

Hey Steve,
Thanks for telling me who my “real” opponents are. And thanks also for kicking me in the ass on my way out the door and reminding me not to be mad.

I’ll tell you what - The Precious and his “core voters” can lead the way to their own general election victory. They’ve decided to alienate half of the Democratic base. Let’s see how well that works out for them. I’m already a registered Independent and will be watching from the sidelines. I’ve been disenfranchised for the last time.

The next comment was a sarcastic one from a MisterOpus1:

Darrow, if McCain wins, I don’t ever want to hear one gripe, one bitch, one moan out of you, because you are the last person on earth to have any credibility to do so. I hope that certainly makes you feel good, allowing another Bush-like President into the office, just because your widdle feelings got all hurt between these two great candidates.
Something tells me, however, that you were never too terribly aligned with Democratic values in the first place. Can’t imagine why I think that…..”

Don't you just love the dripping threats and accusations of me not being a true Democrat?

My response to him:

MisterOpus,
Don’t worry. I won’t be bitching, griping or moaning about the general election. I’m not allowing another Bush into the White House. The pie-eyed idiots who think Obama can beat McCain after they’ve alienated half of the Democratic base are.

So I don’t want to hear any whining or bitching from you when Barry and his core voters go down in flames this fall because they were in a rush to coronate their unvetted, inexperienced Precious and decided that disenfranchising half of their party was the way to victory.

These Obamaphiles are so manic that they can’t even see that they’re backing a sure loser. Now they want us to get onboard and back their loser after they’ve insulted us and told us they don’t need us. I say screw ‘em. They've got exactly two chances to get me to vote for their loser in November: slim and none.

Here's a song for the Obamaphiles

Obamaphile makes Fox's Cavuto seem like the sane and rational one

Jesus Christ in a jumpsuit - these Obama fools drive me to drink. 

Watch as Flavia gets schooled. (h/t to Uppity Woman)

Bill-O's Hillary convert

My husband and I have a group of social friends who usually avoid the discussion of politics or religion because, let's face it, you're not going to change anyone's mind about either one so why ruin a perfectly good friendship? But we've had one friend who still insists on talking politics in social settings. In the last couple of weeks he'd bring up politics and shout loudly, "HILLARY - NOOOOO!!!", with a huge gesticulating thumbs down gesture. Kind of hard to have a rational discussion with someone like that so we would try and steer the conversation to a less controversial subject. 

Well, last night,  I just about fell out of my chair at dinner.  The same man, who for the last few weeks has been trashing Clinton, said that he watched her interview on Bill O'Reilly's show and he totally changed his opinion of her. He said that he really didn't know much about her before except what he'd heard from second or third-hand sources and he admitted that she was nothing like he expected her to be. He said that after watching the interview he was really impressed with her and how she stood up to O'Reilly, and he said that he really "admires and respects" her now. That is a word-for-word quote. Wow.

Like Melissa said:

The one thing KenBlogz and I just couldn't. get. over. was how profoundly not the Dragon Lady she is, despite what we are meant to believe. KenBlogz's comment was, approximately, "The way the media represents her is a complete lie; they might as well say she stabbed someone onstage, which would be just as truthful as the way she is represented." This, from an 18-year-old.

That's why I'm glad to see Hillary in so many different venues; townhalls meetings, debates (come on Obama!) and, yes, even on Fox. If her interview could change the opinion of such a rabid Republican just imagine what it could do to someone more moderate?