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Barack Obama Wins Democratic Nomination
Posted by
CmdrTaco
on Wed Jun 04, 2008 08:00 AM
from the well-sorta-i-guess dept.
from the well-sorta-i-guess dept.
An anonymous reader was one of many who noted that Barack Obama has claimed the Democratic nomination having secured enough delegates and super-delegates to claim victory. Of course, technically this assumes that the supers all vote as they say they will and they are free to change their minds. So no doubt we'll continue to hear debate on this subject until either the convention or Hillary steps down.
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Submission: Barrack Obama Wins Democratic Nomination by Anonymous Coward
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...but Hillary still won't leave. (Score:5, Informative)
Obama may have the nomination, but someone really ought to tell Hillary. Last night, during her non-concession speech, she stated that she's "making no decisions tonight" [rawstory.com]. Today I heard on NPR that she is "open to the Vice-Presidential spot", even though she may not take it...she "just wants to be considered".
Sweet Zombie Jesus...what will it take to make this woman go away???
Re:...but Hillary still won't leave. (Score:5, Funny)
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Why should she go away? (Score:5, Insightful)
Clinton has no practical reason to "go away" - Obama's victory was surprisingly narrow. Over the last few months the Obama campaign lost momentum - Clinton's victories were quite substantial in several key states that would be essential to a Democratic victory (Ohio and Pennsylvania especially).
Given Obama's weakness in three key Democratic demographics - women, white blue collar workers, and Hispanics - Clinton still has a substantial role to play in the election.
Her supporters are bitter about how they perceive Clinton's treatment versus how Obama has been treated by the press. I realize it's anecdotal, but talking to a number of my friends who were ardent Clinton supporters I've become worried that they simply won't vote Democrat due to what they perceive was the unfairness and sexism of the campaign.
Clinton's in a strong position to request the VP slot. If she concedes to Obama then she simply becomes an also-ran, and has no negotiating power.
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Re:Why should she go away? (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:Why should she go away? (Score:5, Informative)
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Re:Why should she go away? (Score:5, Insightful)
I say this as a dedicated third-party supporter who thinks that every serious Presidential candidate fielded over the past decade or so has been completely useless, from either major party.
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Re:Why should she go away? (Score:5, Interesting)
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Re:...but Hillary still won't leave. (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:...but Hillary still won't leave. (Score:5, Insightful)
The party is truly split between the two candidates, and for the Obama team to take a small winning margin and run all the way to the general election while ignoring Hillary and keeping her out of the team, it will majorly turn off roughly half of the Democratic Party. The Obama team just wants Hillary to go away, but when she has the support of half the party, how can she just give up and disappear? That would be irresponsible to her supporters.
Another argument that the Obama team has been making for the past few months is that Clinton is ruining Obama's chances in the general election by keeping the election going, and that she's been mean to him with her campaign. The sad thing is that what Hillary has thrown at Obama is nothing compared to what the Republicans will throw at him starting now. If they cannot stand Hillary's attacks, they're going to crumple under McCain and the whole Republican propaganda machine.
It certainly is an interesting time in politics, seeing such a split in the Democratic party. Hopefully it can come together, but it won't happen if Obama just runs fully with it, leaving HIllary in the dust. Or, as you put it, to "make this woman go away".
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Re:...but Hillary still won't leave. (Score:5, Insightful)
I am SO FUCKIGN GLAD its not going to be another 8 years of Clinton -- followed by what, Jeb Bush then Chelsey Clinton?
Bush Sr. and Clinton palling around...
but yeah, study hard, stay away from drugs and out of cyber-porn on the internet and YOU could be President of the United States some day.... pfft
sure.
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Re:...but Hillary still won't leave. (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:...but Hillary still won't leave. (Score:5, Funny)
Hillary Clinton, America's Psycho Ex-girlfriend
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Someone help me with this... (Score:5, Funny)
Its going to be a landslide FOR Obama (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:People don't learn from history (Score:5, Interesting)
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Re:People don't learn from history (Score:5, Funny)
what's the price of gas over there?
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Re:People don't learn from history (Score:5, Insightful)
http://blog.wired.com/27bstroke6/2008/06/mccain-id-spy-o.html [wired.com]
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Re:People don't learn from history (Score:5, Interesting)
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Re:People don't learn from history (Score:5, Insightful)
The current crop of politicians have their own agendas, and in many cases, those agendas cross the borders between the party lines, and in some cases, quite far across those borders.
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Re:People don't learn from history (Score:5, Insightful)
I didn't turn my back on the Republicans. They turned their backs on me. I wanted fiscal conservatives. I got spending that made the liberals turn green with envy. I wanted strong foriegn policy. I got a war over non-existant WMDs, which has weakened both our military and our political capital with other nations. I wanted to escape the Democrats fear-mongering. I got Republican fear-mongering.
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Re:People don't learn from history (Score:5, Informative)
This is exactly why Hillary lost the game and Obama got it. People in US(and around the world , though irrelevant) were fed up of the status-co politics. They wanted something different and someone who can make a change. As citizens and consumers, people want products which are different. Especially when they realize that the product they have currently(Bush) sucks so bad. Hillary miserably failed to understand this pulse and stuck with same old crap. There is no perceivable difference between Hillary and Bush. The differences are really cosmetic. Iraq is just one example where there is a striking parallel between the policies of Bush/Mcain and Hillary.
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Re:People don't learn from history (Score:5, Insightful)
Uh, that's what the American government is all about. Right or Left, everybody's stealing from one group and giving it to some others, many of whom haven't earned it in any way. On the left you have the welfare system, which gives free money to poor people, and on the right you have super-rich tax breaks and "back room corporate deals", which gives free money to the fabulously wealthy.
You have two choices - either accept this premise, and decide which system of redistribution you think is "least unfair", or reject it entirely, and work to radically change our government and socio-economic system so that all kinds of involuntary redistribution are unnecessary and impossible to execute.
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Re:People don't learn from history (Score:5, Insightful)
So does Rightism. I'd rather my money went to the homeless alcoholic living under a railway bridge than the CEO of some megacorporation who has just wangled himself a massive tax break.
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Re:People don't learn from history (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:People don't learn from history (Score:5, Insightful)
You may be right that Obama can't win, but in times like this I think sometimes you have to just roll the dice and go for it otherwise nothing changes.
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Re:People don't learn from history (Score:5, Interesting)
However, the counterpoint is that attitudes such as yours result in stagnation. There can be no change if those who would support change abandon their causes.
Even if Obama loses, the attention his campaign has been getting (and will get) will make it that much easier for the next candidate to break through the bigotry.
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Re:People don't learn from history (Score:5, Insightful)
However, the counterpoint is that attitudes such as yours result in stagnation. There can be no change if those who would support change abandon their causes.
In fact, the dean who I went up against told me something that I haven't forgotten "Its a big ship and if you want to turn it you have to slow it down first." So with a ship the size of a country, unless you want to pick up guns and force change, change takes time.
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Re:People don't learn from history (Score:5, Insightful)
True, but if she only cares about being elected in 2012, the best thing for her to do is to stay in as long as possible so as to reduce Obama's chances in the general election, thereby saving herself from the nearly impossible task of wresting the Democrat nomination from a sitting president.
Unfortunately, the Clintons very often seem to default to the most politically expedient course of action, so this wouldn't surprise me.
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Re:People don't learn from history (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:People don't learn from history (Score:5, Insightful)
What makes you think that democrat bullshit is any better? Neither party serves the interests of the people in this country.
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Re:People don't learn from history (Score:5, Interesting)
The point is that it sucks that the government that we've got isn't as concerned with the citizens as it should be, but unless you've got some brilliant way to change it, we just need to work with what we've got, and make the best of it. Whatever the motivations of the democrats or the republicans are, they do tend to do some things differently, and there's certain areas where the goals of each party might align with my personal goals. What a senator in DC gets out of that whole deal might be completely different from what I get out of it, but that doesn't mean that the end result doesn't affect me and that I can't have an opinion on it.
It might be as simple as drawing up a list of the pros and cons of some of the basic direction that each party can be expected to go in when you see how it might affect you. Because it will affect you. Even if you believe that everyone at the top is motivated purely by greed, their selfishness leads them in different directions from each other, and one of those directions is bound to be more useful to you than the others.
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He's a Democrat, so who he is doesn't matter now (Score:5, Insightful)
Anyway, Obama would be demonized with any name, and regardless of his hue. No matter who he is, if he's a D and he's running, then he'll be the "single most liberal member of Congress" since Che Guavera or whoever, an "elite" know-it-all who is out of touch with the heartland of America, will have gotten a "free pass" from our "overwhelmingly liberal media," would put us in danger of "appeasing" the terrorists, "emboldening our enemies," etc. It's the same script, every time, all the time. The Republicans always use the same words to galvanize their base, because, well, it works. Who or what Obama is or isn't has little to do with how the Republicans will vote.
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Re:People don't learn from history (Score:5, Funny)
Leaving gender out of the issue, how many republicans do you think would vote for someone named Hillary Rodham Clinton? A name that rings with the sounds of two recent so called enemies (Dennis Rodman is one, you figure out the other). See how stupid that sounds, troll?
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I'd say the opposite is true (Score:5, Insightful)
Regardless I am what you might call a moderate conservative. I have and will certainly cross party lines. I vote based on who I think will do the best job, not a D or an R. So I'm the kind of voter that the democrats need to be after. In my case, I'll almost certainly vote for Obama if he's nominated. If not, I'll probably vote for McCain. I don't like Clinton at all. She seems very totalitarian, in that she thinks she knows what's best for the economy, for you personally (her video game stance for example) and so on. That is opposite to what I think. I think in general government should try and stay out of things, when practical. They should be a force that guides the economy, not controls it, and that ensures people have freedoms but that they don't infringe on others, not that hands out a list of what is right and wrong.
So for me, Obama is good. I don't agree with him 100%, but then I don't agree with anyone but myself 100%. However over all I like his policies, and I think he'll be good for the nation. Clinton, no, sorry, I won't go that route. While I don't think McCain is as good a candidate as Obama, I think he's better than Clinton.
I'm not the only person I know who's the same way either. I have a number of friends with similar political views and the thing I hear is "I hope Obama wins because I'll vote for him, but if not I'll vote for McCain."
Hardcore republicans are a lost cause. They'll vote R no matter what. So while they might hate Obama more, it doesn't matter since they won't vote for Hillary either. They are all R all the time. The people who matter are those who come down on the conservative side, but aren't caught up in party dogma.
Now I have no empirical evidence as to who will vote what way, but this assumption that Clinton has the ability win win republicans where as Obama doesn't is just silly. Neither will win the party voters, and I and my friends are proof that there are at least some out there who feel Obama yes, Clinton no. We probably aren't the only ones either.
No candidate is going to have a walk in the park this time around, all of them have something that a non-trivial portion of America has a problem with. However that doesn't mean Obama has no chance, in fact I'd say it is quite the opposite.
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Re:People don't learn from history (Score:5, Interesting)
He's only 37, is Indian but converted from Hindu to catholic a while back, has run many businesses, was a Congressman and then won a special election to be Governor of Louisiana.
He's younger than Obama, equally not white, and has actually done a thing or two that are worth while.
Frankly, I'd be totally OK with him as President -- then again, I am still trying to figure out if I hate McCain or Obama more.
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Re:People don't learn from history (Score:5, Interesting)
I believe the USA should be a beacon of hope and civilization, not a crowd of barbarians that so much of the world as been for so long.
That issue alone is enough to decide who I vote for.
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Re:People don't learn from history (Score:5, Insightful)
What's that? Oh...well that's not torture.
Oh and that? Hm...well see, that wasn't technically "the US".
Convenient how that works, huh?
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Re:People don't learn from history (Score:5, Insightful)
Because, for some unknown reason, a large portion of the people in the U.S. equate a person's religion with who they are. It's as if one of the reasons we broke from you folks has been completely forgotten.
Apparently, people believe that if you believe in some man-made myth of a supreme being who sits high in the sky watching everything you do, who tells you you must follow a set of rules they have set down or else you will be condemned to an eternity of pain and torture yet, who still cares and loves you*, you are somehow more worthy of an elected office than the atheistic heathens who do not believe in a supreme being.
And we can all see what a great job those religious-minded folks who have been elected to office have done.
*My apologies to George Carlin fans for not quoting his diatribe accurately. I just wanted to get the gist of his comments.
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Re:People don't learn from history (Score:5, Interesting)
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Re:People don't learn from history (Score:5, Insightful)
P.S. I think the opening lines of The Communist Manifesto may have an effect along these lines: "Communists think that religion is a drug and they condemn in. We need to be high on it all the time if we are NOT Communists"
Cheers!
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Re:People don't learn from history (Score:5, Interesting)
McCain: no change
Romney: no change
Huckabee: Had the best 'Obama-like' way of speaking (refreshing after 8 years of Bushisms), but unfortunately was the christian-religion candidate.
Paul: In general, most people can agree with him, but the man couldn't debate his way out of a paper bag. You can have the best ideas in the world, but if you can't convince anyone, then even if elected you won't change a thing.
To be honest, I don't know if Obama will change anything internal to the United States. He IS a Democrat afterall, and we have no reason to expect him to be anything other than a Democrat just as we have no reason to expect McCain to be anything but a Republican.
He will, however, be our best chance to repair our international reputation. That, at least, is something that I can be thankful for even if I disagree with most of his policy.
I just wish that I could vote for him.
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Re:People don't seem to learn from reading, either (Score:5, Funny)
Are you suggesting that the spell chequer was somehow wrong?
Don't you know that the Computer is your friend, and any deviation from its approved spelling can lead to your being used as reactor shielding?
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Re:People don't seem to learn from reading, either (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:People don't learn from history (Score:5, Funny)
You say that like it's a bad thing.
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Re:Race relations in the US. (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:Spelling? (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:Please explain us ... (Score:5, Informative)
You don't need to win one of the primaries to run for president, but you need to win one if you want the support of one of the major political parties. For various reasons, it's currently not particularly practical for a candidate to win the general election unless they are a candidate from one of the two main parties.
The two major parties in the US are the Democrats and the Republicans. Each party creates the specific rules that are used in their own primaries to select their candidates. The democrats, for various reasons, have come up with a complicated system that not only has regular delegates, but also has "super-delegates." Supers are usually (but not always) individuals considered particularly important to the democratic party (elected officials, party leaders, etc), and they are free to put their delegate vote towards whichever candidate they wish. Basically, they're individuals who's vote counts for way more than the average person's. Their role is restricted purely to the democratic primary however, in a general election, their vote counts for no more than anyone else's.
That's just a brief overview, without the history of why super-delegates exist, but there's plenty of information out there to be found on that.
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Ha! (Score:5, Insightful)
That's a quaint assumption backed up by no rationale whatsoever. I am a taxpayer and a US citizen, so I have every right to persuade other members of society to effect changes I desire. Voting is a right, not a gateway to other rights. On its own, it also happens to be the least effective method of bringing about change. I would rather use my freedom of speech to persuade the public to bring about a candidate that will uphold everyone's rights rather than trample them. Until such a candidate exists, there will be no acceptable choice for president.
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Re:What kind of message? (Score:5, Informative)
Funny how you touch on shit that doesn't matter in the least, yet leave out the one thing that really does paint Obama as an elitist, insensitive bastard: him going on about how people only like guns/religion because they're poor, a month or two ago.
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was it really that condescending? (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, here's the quote:
I guess you and I just read things differently, because I got a bit more nuance out of his statements, and "people only like guns/religion because they're poor" doesn't quite capture it. Seeing the economic viability of your community crumble, seeing the way of life of your parents crumble, can be a polarizing experience, and yes, people cling to things, things they consider symbolic of their way of life. I don't see anything especially patronizing about saying that people are pissed off and that when they're pissed off the symbolic things matter more than they might in times of prosperity.
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