May 12, 2008
Column: In hope of a principled campaign
Hillary Clinton’s failure of momentum in Indiana and North Carolina last week as good as assured Barack Obama of the Democratic party’s nomination. Regardless of what happens in West Virginia tomorrow (Mrs Clinton expects an easy win), the question is no longer whether she has a chance of deflecting her rival. It is whether the manner of her exit will support or undermine him – and then what kind of contest the battle between Mr Obama and John McCain, the Republican nominee, will be.
The nomination fight has left the Democratic party divided. Mr Obama hardly swept the board in last week’s primaries: he won comfortably in a state he expected to win and held Mrs Clinton to a close result in the other. In other words, he triumphed only in denying her the big results she needed.
He made no inroads into her base of support. He merely shored up his own – among black people, the young and the urban middle class – and (against the run of recent poll results) stopped the rot elsewhere. It was enough to win and to calm the nerves of party leaders who were starting to question Mr Obama’s electability.
The remainder of this column can be read here. Please post your comments below.
Clive Crook states that Senator John McCain may actually mean it when he says that he would rather lose an election than betray a core principle. One could ask, however, whether it is possible to come up with some examples of this. Certainly, Mr. McCain’s change of heart on the Bush tax cuts, which the Senator originally voted against but now supports, would not seem to bolster Mr. Crook’s contention.
Unfortunately, Mr. Crook has chosen an even worse example to support his statement, namely immigration. Along with almost every other immigration lawyer in America, I followed the progress of last year’s McCain/Kennedy sponsored “Comprehensive Immigration Reform” bill and hoped that some sort of meaningful legalization program for illegal immigrants would emerge, along with measures to relieve the shortage of legal visas and green cards, especially for skilled workers and relatives of legal immigrants.
As Mr. Crook states, Senator McCain showed a great deal of political courage in promoting this bill, even though what finally emerged, and was defeated, was a deeply flawed bill that, in many respects, would have been a great setback for immigrant rights and would have actually made it more difficult for many people to become legal residents of the US than is the case now.
This, however, was not the fault of Senator McCain. Where he is at fault, however, is in having changed his mind during his campaign to accept the strategy of the same immigration opponents who defeated his bill last year. This strategy is to postpone all immigration reform until the Mexican border is “secure”. When will this be? A good guess is that it will be around the same time that the “war on terror” comes to an end or that a US “victory” is achieved in Iraq, i.e. never.
The core principle of the McCain/Kennedy immigration reform bill was to provide relief for legal and illegal immigrants at the same time as enhancing enforcement of the immigration laws. With the defeat of that bill, America has opted for an “enforcement only” approach, consisting of border fences instead of visas, dentention facilities, sometimes in inhuman conditions that have led to over sixty deaths in custody, increased workplace raids instead of due process, and breaking up families instead of reuniting them. Senator McCain, by going along with a Republican strategy of using race to court white votes that goes back to the infamous “Southern Strategy” of the Nixon era, has now bought into this approach.
Nothing could show more clearly that, instead of sticking to his “core principles”, John McCain will do anything to win the election. Or is it possible that, in abandoning his earlier commitment to immigration reform, Senator McCain has only betrayed one of his temporary principles, not a “core” one?
Roger Algase
Posted by: algasema | May 12th, 2008 at 11:36 am | Report this commentMy apologies for yet another typo in misspelling “detention”.
Posted by: algasema | May 12th, 2008 at 11:42 am | Report this commentI dearly wish this proves to be the case.
But McCain’s record is one of stating principles he later backs off from or ignores.
Time and again we see that pattern of behavior: the Keating Five Scandal; campaign finance reform; and criticism of the Religious Right’s manipulations in politics are just a few examples.
The trouble is that even if McCain does “take the high road,” his party is full of pug-uglies who never do anything but the opposite. The numbers are in the hundreds but incluse Hastert, Gramm, Delay, Gingrich, Rove, Cheney, Lott, and many others.
They are expert at character assassination. And there is always tons of Republican money to carry off such operations, as when they virtually subsidized a woman - including providing her plastic surgery - who had accusations against Bill Clinton. The spectacle they provided against the poor Cuban boy Elian being reunited with his father was awesome. Remember the “Swiftboaters” in Kerry’s campaign?
Of course, the likely route is to have both these things happening at the same time, parallel political universes. Having your cake and eating it too.
Posted by: JOHN CHUCKMAN, TORONTO | May 12th, 2008 at 2:04 pm | Report this commentIt is all well to think that the 2 men will fight equally - but is it possible for the electorate to evaluate these 2 in equanimity? Perhaps not - reading the ‘literateness’ of the white voter in W Virgina (just a sample) - Obama is a Muslim; his wife is an atheist; he is not a patriot etc; expect Obama to lose the election hands down. In 2012 it is going to Hillary Clinton on a come back ticket and will win the nomination against McCain. She has a better chance in 2012 and she is the only person who can defeat McCain!
Posted by: MP | May 12th, 2008 at 2:43 pm | Report this commentAndrew Ward’s article today is disturbing for all Democrats. If large numbers of blue collar white voters will not vote for Obama under any circumstances because they think he is a Muslim, unpatriotic, or, more likely, simply because he is black, the Democrats are in big trouble, no matter how civil Senator McCain might turn out to be in the campaign. And I am not sure that accusing Obama of being the preferred candidate of Hamas is a very good start to McCain’s hoped for “civility”.
At any rate, Obama is making a very big mistake by not campaigning in West Virginia. This is sending a message to white, small town voters that he either doesn’t care about them or doesn’t think that any of them have the potential to rise above their prejudices and vote for their economic interests. Besides, if he could take even a few percentage points away from Hillary, that would still be a big deal.
I remember 1960, when Kennedy and Humphrey both fought for West Virginia as if it were the only state in the Union. Instead, Obama seems to be saying, “No we can’t”. And I say this as a dedicated Obama supporter. Obama’s baseball image the other day was not very apt either. He seemed to be saying that it was the ninth inning and therefore the game was over. Certainly it is - after three outs.
Even if it is the bottom of the ninth inning, no one can possibly say that Hillary has three outs. Indeed, she campaigns as if she still had six outs to go in the same inning - or nine political lives. One has to respect her for that, whatever else her shortcomings may be, and there are certainly more than enough of those.
Posted by: algasema | May 12th, 2008 at 4:38 pm | Report this commentHillary Clinton is history.
She’s blown it entirely.
Her decisions during this campaign show clearly faulty tactics, bad judgments, and underestimating the strength of an opponent.
And after recognizing these things and in trying to set things right, she demonstrated herself to be the exact ethical equivalent of Nixon.
No one will seriously consider her again.
Too bad she couldn’t have gone down with just a little grace.
Posted by: JOHN CHUCKMAN, TORONTO | May 12th, 2008 at 7:33 pm | Report this commentJohn Chuckman, I thought we had all forgotten about Elian (was it Gonzales? I have also forgotten his last name). Returning him to Cuba against the will of his only relatives who were free to speak out, namely the US ones, not his father in Cuba, was a cheap political ploy that violated every principle of family law in this country, namely that all custody questions are to be decided in the child’s best interests, not those of the Clintons. This is one of the few cases where the right wing demagogues were right and President Clinton and his Attorney General, Janet Reno, were entirely to blame for their hypocritical handling of this affair. They merely gave amunition to their right wing opponents.
President Clinton was also responsible for some other unfortunate decisions on immigration, not the least of which was his unprecedented blockade of Haiti to prevent refugees, not from coming to America illegally, but from leaving their own country legally. And this from the man who claims to have been America’a first “black” president.
In fairness, of course, one must point out that President Clinton subsequently invaded Haiti and threw out its dictatorship, which President Bush later tried to reinstall because it was more friendly to US business interests in that unhappy country.
Posted by: algasema | May 12th, 2008 at 8:33 pm | Report this commentSorry, algasema, you really are posting nonsense here.
The rights of a living parent always take precedence over the rights of others in every Family Court system worth considering.
There is a basic assumption that a loving parent is the best thing for a child, and no one ever questioned that Elian’s father was anything but exceptionally loving. A decent man in all respects.
Family Courts are not in the business of judging international political matters.
His mother was effectively killed by the crazy U.S. policy that used to allow any Cuban an automatic Green Card who landed on the beach. It lured a number to their deaths.
The spectacle in Florida was a disgrace. The boy was abused in the name of international politics. Just shameful.
But then there were years of stupid behavior in Miami, including a great deal of terrorist activity, both against Cuba and against Americans who spoke out against their insanity. A gang of criminals really.
The matter had little to do with Bill Clinton. In fact, I thought he was ridiculously slow at settling the matter justly.
When he finally got around to it, it was one of the few unqualified successes of his rather sad administration.
The very people blubbering over his situation would have said the same thing had the circumstances been differeent.
Posted by: JOHN CHUCKMAN, TORONTO | May 12th, 2008 at 8:52 pm | Report this comment“Against the odds”
But at the low-low price of only $300 Million in spending by David Axelrod and Barack Obama to shift the odds a bit in Sen. Obama’s “grassroots” campaign.
JBP
Posted by: John Powers | May 12th, 2008 at 10:19 pm | Report this comment“Family courts are not in the business of judging international political matters”. Quite right, John Chuckman. This is exactly why the Florida family court should have been allowed, without any international political interference, to determine whether Elian’s interests would have been better served by living in freedom with his relatives or returning to live in poverty under dictatorship with his admittedly loving father in Cuba, who claimed to want him back, but was obviously not able to speak freely.
Perhaps, after a full hearing and investigation, using the normal resources of the family court system, the judge would have decided that returning to Cuba was in the child’s best emotional, psychological and other interests. In that case, no one would have had any reason to complain.
But the court was not allowed to do its job. Instead, Elian was used as a pawn in President Clinton’s politically motivated gambit to stay in the good graces of Fidel Castro so that Castro would not make good on his threat to flood the US with unwanted Spanish-speaking refugees, giving the Clinton administration yet one more politcal headache. If President Clinton had had the courage and the honesty to say, “Look, I can’t afford to concern myself with this child’s welfare, but I just want to get him back to Cuba as fast as possible to save myself some major political pain”, at least he would have earned a few points for honesty.
But that is not the way the Clintons operate. Instead, Elian was seized by federal agents in the middle of the night and packed off to Cuba, while we were all forced to endure hypocritical posturings by Bill Clinton and Janet Reno about “Isn’t it wonderful that the boy is back with his Daddy?” Sure it was wonderful - for the Clintons. Was it wonderful for Elian? Maybe it was. But we will never know, because that question is the last thing that Bill Clinton or Janet Reno cared about.
By the way, I have never been an anti-Castro diehard. I believe that US hardline policy towards Cuba has been ineffective and self-defeating for a long, long time. But these questions are exactly the ones that should have been kept out of the Elian Gonzales case. President Clinton is the one who dragged them in, for his own political reasons.
Posted by: algasema | May 13th, 2008 at 3:39 am | Report this commentGetting back to to main point of this blog, namely whether there will a civil campaign, I recommend to everyone today’s Washington Post article entitled “Racism Worries Obama Supporters”, detailing many racist incidents, including not only verbal attacks, but also vandalism, directed against Obama campaign workers by working class whites in states like Indiana, Pennsylvania and Ohio. It seems that many Americans are not yet “ready” to vote for a black person as president.
It is all too easy, however, to blame less educated, lower income people for being racist. But what about the media, controlled by large corporations and well educated, highly paid pundits? True, we are unlikely to hear the crude racial epithets used by some working class whites against blacks and Latinos from our well trained television anchors and their reporters.
But does not the saturation coverage of the Wright affair that we have recently endured, especially on the same network that initially tried to blame African-American looters for the disastrous response to Katrina, not to mention the ongoing hostility to both legal and illegal immigrants in most of the media, indicate that a more sophisticated, and therefore more insidious, form of racism may be rampant among millions of voters who piously disavow having any such feeling? And is this not likely to affect the tone of the upcoming general election campaign far more that the pro forma promises of the candidates to engage only in a “civil” discussion of the issues? Just ask Willie Horton.
Posted by: algasema | May 13th, 2008 at 2:26 pm | Report this commentYesterday’s NYT op-ed by E. luttwak argued that the election of Obama, the apostate president!!!? might be a threat to the US and its relationship with the muslim world on the grounds that Muslims around the world might not appreciate the fact that his father renounced the faith and might just decide to murder him….! I am very pessimistic as regards the prospects of a “principled” and issue based campaign.
Posted by: jackie | May 13th, 2008 at 2:27 pm | Report this commentSo am I, jackie. I cannot believe the that Times actually published such a piece of hatchet writing. What purpose could it have possibly served except to reignite the smear that Obama, despite his long membership in a Christion church that is the subject of a different set of smear attacks, is really a “Muslim” who is somehow sympathetic to the likes of Saddam and bin Laden?
I think that this was the real purpose of the article, not any real or imagined fears for Obama’s safety while travelling in Middle Eastern areas where no US president, white or black, Christian, Jewish, or Muslim would ever venture to go without the highest level of security. All this, of course, makes Clive Crook’s call for a civilized campaign all the more pertinent. Let us hope against hope that his cautious optimism turns out to be justified.
Posted by: algasema | May 13th, 2008 at 3:19 pm | Report this commentHow much is Mr Crook paid by the Obama camp?
Posted by: Christine | May 13th, 2008 at 3:43 pm | Report this commentHe is nothing but smearing Mrs Clinton and campaigning for Obama.
Christine, I hardly think that Clive Crook needs me or anyone else to defend him, but do I detect just a slight note of pique in your letter over the fact that, even though there may still be one or two outs to go in the bottom of the ninth inning, as I have suggested previously, Hillary Clinton does not really have much of a chance of being nominated?
She does, however, have a real opportunity to gain stature as a force in the Democratic party, and, more importantly as a person, by withdrawing from the race before she damages Obama further and throwing her entire support behind him in his battle to fend off racist attacks and take back the White House for the benefit of, not only his party, but the entire nation.
Let us hope that Senator Clinton will have the dignity and grace to put aside her own ego, abandon her hopeless (and, unfortunately, not always principled) fight and instead “seize the moment” to render this critical service to her country.
Posted by: algasema | May 13th, 2008 at 4:18 pm | Report this commentSing along; courtesy of Lucky Dube R.I.P
Breaking those barriers
All over the world
Was not an easy thing
Yesterday your mouth was shut yeah
Couldn’ t make a sound eh boy
But it’ s such a good feeling today
When I can hear them from
Across the ocean singing this song
That the whole world should be singing
All the time
Chorus: (x3)
We’ re…
Different colours / one people
Different colours / one people
Hey you government
Never try to seperate the people
Hey you politician
Never try to seperate the people
They were created in the image of God
And who are you to seperate them
Bible says, he made man in his image
But it didn’ t say black or white
Look at me you see BLACK
I look at you I see WHITE
Now is the time to kick that away
And join me in my song
Chorus: (x3)
Hey you politician
Never seperate the people here
Hey you man hey you man
Never try to seperate the people
Some were from America
We were from South Africa
Some were from Japan
We were from China
Some were from Australia
We were from the U.K.
Some were from Zimbabwe
We were from Ghana
Some were from Jamaica
We were from Russia
Some were from Aha-ha-ha
We were from Uhu-hu-hu
Dedicated to West Virginia,Indiana, Pennsylvania and Ohio there is nothing new in the naked sun.
Posted by: steven | May 13th, 2008 at 4:37 pm | Report this commentCorrections and Additions:
“President Clinton is the one who dragged them in, for his own political reasons.”
Just dead wrong.
The Republicans and Cuban Exile Mafia in Miami were screaming these political issues from day one. Officials tasked with the responsibility for restoring the boy to his father were treated horribly. Court orders were ignored. It was a savage bout of Right-wing vicious stupidity, all carried out in the name of the boy’s interests.
After Elian was finally rescued from his torturers, one of the biggest bone-head Republicans, ex-Sen. Ball, actually made the public statement that the government was “holding the kid in a damned concentration camp.”
______________________________________________
To the person quoting Ed Luttwak, this man’s judgment is about as sound as that of a mad dog. Some of his pronouncements on other topics of world affairs are embarrassing.
I heard him speak once and during the speech, amongst other ridiculous statements, he called the Iranians too stupid to build a bomb. He said this twice. I thought at the time, in view of his contorted face, he must have forgot his meds.
He is one of the most vociferous, unrelenting advocates for all things Israeli in the U.S., and any comment of his about Obama can only be seen in this light.
Israel and the defenders of its bloody excesses are more than a little concerned that Obama may be too independent-minded on the Middle East. God, wouldn’t that be refreshing. Some independent-mindedness on the part of the U.S. is the only thing that will ever bring peace.
_____________________________________________
To the person claiming: “How much is Mr Crook paid by the Obama camp? He is nothing but smearing Mrs Clinton and campaigning for Obama.”
Oh please, it actually is almost not possible to smear Hillary. She has done this to herself during her despicable campaign.
Fifteen years ago, I would have looked forward to her running, but she has demonstrated herself to be a truly low-life politician, saying anything for power.
I actually gave her credit at least for not playing the “race card” up until recently. Now, she has openly advocated for racial considerations. There is a recording of her recent remarks on whites and Obama.
She is beneath contempt.
Posted by: JOHN CHUCKMAN, TORONTO | May 13th, 2008 at 6:04 pm | Report this comment____________________________________________
I’m intrigued by Clive Crook’s note that McCain “would rather lose an election than betray a core principle”.
This is, presumably the same McCain who has not yet sorted out what his stance is on Hurricane Katrina and its aftermath? Or is it the McCain who now supports wind energy but who voted against supporting it earlier?
Or is it the “friend” of such people as the Rev John Hagee (Hurricane Katrina God’s retribution for organising a gay parade. Roman Catholics “thirsting for Jewish blood”), Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell (9/11 carried out by abortionists, feminists and ACLU lawyers)?
Just which ‘core principles” is Mr McCain going to cling on to?
Posted by: derek tunnicliffe | May 13th, 2008 at 6:46 pm | Report this commentJohn Chuckman and I may differ by an eon about Elian, but we are on the same track about Luttwak.
Posted by: algasema | May 13th, 2008 at 7:36 pm | Report this comment**Or is it the “friend” of such people as the Rev John Hagee (Hurricane Katrina God’s retribution for organising a gay parade. Roman Catholics “thirsting for Jewish blood”), Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell (9/11 carried out by abortionists, feminists and ACLU lawyers)?**
Great example of principled campaigning.
JBP
Posted by: John Powers | May 13th, 2008 at 8:39 pm | Report this comment“Barack Obama didn’t win a single county in West Virginia. Here’s the CNN county map.
With 90% of the vote in, Hillary is leading (by oover 40 points) Obama 67% to 26%. John Edwards has 7%.
West Virginia has 28 pledged and 11 unpledged delegates. It has 5 electoral votes and last voted for a Democrat in 1996.”
Obama outspent Clinton 2:1 in WV.
Obama is a candidate who peaked in February and has been losing ground ever since, particularly with white voters.
Obama loses two-thirds of WV Hillary supporters in the GE should he become the Democratic nominee.
Hello, President McCain!
Posted by: Ann H | May 14th, 2008 at 5:51 am | Report this commentObama’s weak performance among white voters is demonstrated by the numbers below.
“The West Virginia exit polls indicate that he (Obama)lost white voters 69-28. Astounding? Not really. In Ohio, Clinton won white voters 64-34. In Pennsylvania, Clinton won whites 63-37. Indiana? Whites went for Clinton 60-40. Massachusetts? Whites went for Clinton 58-40. Rhode Island? 63-31 for Clinton. North Carolina? 61-37. And the same in Arkansas, Tennessee, Maryland, Alabama, Mississippi, Georgia, Florida, Oklahoma, Arizona, Missouri and so on.”
Hello, President McCain!
http://www.talkleft.com/story/2008/5/13/19523/1855
Posted by: Ann H | May 14th, 2008 at 5:59 am | Report this commentBy numerical measures, Hillary Clinton’s star had fallen when the West Virginia polls opened. Thus, voters there have rejected their own party’s de facto candidate. What has happened?
The Wright-Farrakhan noise–and the subsequent and much deserved criticism of and concern about Barack Obama’s relationship to this protected right-wing black political class–have, in my opinion, dealt a fatal blow to the leading candidate, the Democratic Party, and those of us who had hoped for change in the US’ view of the rest of the world.
Obama may still represent change, but we should ask new questions about where he really wants to go.
The Clintons are unacceptable for other reasons; specifically, their lack of vision, modus operandi and indebtedness to AIPAC and other special interests. McCain will look older in November than he does now, but would likely beat the Clintons, rendering more of the same with a questionable temperament. He remains an outsider to the club he now represents.
So, what to do?
Posted by: WCM | May 14th, 2008 at 11:30 am | Report this commentIt is refreshing to see that so many people are taking part in the political process but I must take issue with the claim the certain whites “are not ready to vote for a black candidate”. Let’s call it what it is: Bigotry (”The irrational suspicion or hatred of a particular group, race, or religion.”).
Even the claims made against Sen. Obama are irrational: He is a racist while his chief campaign managers are white and the maternal side of his family is white; he is a Muslim but we’ve been bombarded with stories about his affiliation with pastor Jeremiah Wright and his 20-year affiliation with his Methodist church and he is not patriotic. (My family is full of war veterans and I have never seen any of them wear a lapel pin and you only have to place your hand over your heart when saying the pledge of allegiance, which is the scene depicted in the incriminating picture of his standing with his hands at his side while the national anthem is being played. (It’s interesting that he was the only one in the photograph who knew this.)
It should also be noted that many of the states the Sen. Obama won are majority white states (e.g., Iowa, Vermont, Wisconsin, Utah, Idaho, Wyoming, Maine, etc.) have predominantly white populations.
The only thing that Sen. Obama’s detractors seem to have on him is something that someone else (Rev. Wright) said; not wearing a lapel pin and — as protocol dictates is not required — not putting his hand over his heart when the national anthem is being played; using the word “bitter” instead of angry when describing some Pennsylvania voters and not successfully defending attacks from people who do not take their own duty as citizens of the country serious enough to do a quick Google search in order to confirm the truthfulness of things they hear about the candidates they are going to vote for in November.
This is the guy we throw under the bus after having elected a president who has put this country in debt for generations to come, engaged us in a war that killed over 4,000 soldiers in order to establish an oil pipeline and fill the pockets of war profiteers and used the “Patriot Act” to strip this country’s citizens of their basic civil rights?
I was hoping that the American people were tired of being afraid and oppressed by an administration that exists only to serve itself. Maybe not.
Posted by: wetheridge | May 14th, 2008 at 6:44 pm | Report this commentSuch nonsense,
Why is it that you cannot vote for the candidate of your choice without being condemned as a bigot?
Maybe certain voters are not ready for a highly partisan leftist candidate conjured up by the Chicago Machine? Maybe voters don’t want a candidate with some real crackpots associated all his political life. Sen. Obama bought his house along with one of the most brazen (indicted) felons in the history of Chicago Politics. Perhaps there is a legitimacy to voters concerns rather than the catch all “bigotry”.
JBP
Posted by: John Powers | May 14th, 2008 at 8:28 pm | Report this commentNope, theres not even maybe about it. You, JBP are a racist.
Posted by: Sade | May 14th, 2008 at 8:44 pm | Report this commentDangit,
I was hoping I wasn’t a racist. Oh well, I guess I will just vote for whoever can absolve me from my guilt.
JBP
Posted by: John Powers | May 14th, 2008 at 9:14 pm | Report this comment>>wetheridge. Certainly, a significant segment of “white” voters would always have had trouble voting for black. The “racism” card in the States has its own peculiar nastiness, but Obama has only recently been confronted by the race factor in a potentially decisive way. He is now the black candidate. The shift is his fault, despite the Clinton’s reprehensible efforts to paint him black a long time ago.
In the beginning, conventional wisdom held that Bill Clinton was blacker than Obama, and that Hillary would take the better half of the black vote. After South Carolina, that changed. The transparency of the Clinton strategy backfired a bit.
Obama then recognised the power in the black vote, and he repositioned his campaign away from the Ivy policy wonks and played the sweet talking black hunk. Even then, it looked like he was all the better for this.
Jeremiah Wright is not just his loose-lipped, Separationist minister; he is the man Obama credits his spiritual and political lives to (for more than 20 years). When credible links between the Obamas, Wright, Louis Farrakhan and a monied black right wing appeared in recent weeks, and Obama’s Ivy-League wonks, including the reportedly ill Senator Kennedy went silent, “thinking” whites were in a quandary. They do not want a black president; they wanted a 21st century president.
From Europe, the Obama we see today does not appear to be the man whom we thought would usher in a refreshing new world view. Many feel quite duped here. I doubt he can win the nation now. Neither can Hillary Clinton, although she is deserving of some credit as I believe she understood the Obama risk early on. Yes. They played on it, but perhaps not so smartly for their agenda, but Hillary doesn’t deserve to go further.
So, it may be likely it will be McCain, certainly a known, if unimpressive entity, versus Obama, now–again–a truly unknown one. Americans will not run to their polls to vote in November with the likely lineups we see today, unless more evidence/question emerges about Obama and Farrakhan.
One never knows, however, and Edward’s endorsement may mark the beginning of a wave of needed traditional Democratic support. But I think many “whites”–led by Jews–will look beyond the domestic issues and choose a “General” to defend them in the larger world. They will not give us a Washington or a Lee. This race will change when Colonel Bush gives the Israelis the go-ahead to bomb, bomb, bomb Iran.
btw–the church is not Methodist; it is United Church of Christ.
Posted by: WCM | May 15th, 2008 at 7:04 am | Report this commentNow that Edwards has endorsed Obama, there is no longer a single scintilla of justification for Hillary to stay in the race. We are witnessing something akin to an epic tragedy in America, in which Hillary’s ego and ambition are bringing down the one Democratic candidate who has the potential to enable this country to overcome the devastation of the Bush years, which is far worse than anything that has been mentioned on the campaign trail by any candidate so far, and, finally, to enter the 21st Century.
It is now clearer than ever that Hillary is an example of old style politics at its worst - of the philosophy that it is better to lose an election than to lose control of the party. Obviously, Hillary does not care whether the Democrats win in the fall or not. Perhaps this is being too kind; it is more likely that she wants them to lose if she is not the standard bearer. How can someone like this claim to be the right person to lead the party to victory?
Posted by: algasema | May 15th, 2008 at 8:26 am | Report this commentEdwards endorsement?
That is a great reason for Hillary to march on. A scheming trial lawyer, with a $300 haircut, who dislikes WalMart, while he parks his lawsuit winnings offshore to avoid taxes should be about as welcome by David Axelrod as a joint press conference by Rev. Wright and Tony Rezko.
I can’t stand about 95% of Sen. Clinton’s policies, but the emergence of a nightmare team of Obama-Edwards makes very clear that the vast majority of Americans will be antagonized by the coalition forming around Sen. Obama.
JBP
Posted by: John Powers | May 15th, 2008 at 12:51 pm | Report this commentJohn Powers, I will only rspond to one of the many inaccuracies in your comment: Edwards’ haircut reportedly cost $400, not $300.
Posted by: algasema | May 15th, 2008 at 6:17 pm | Report this commentSorry, “respond”.
Posted by: algasema | May 15th, 2008 at 6:18 pm | Report this commentThe title of Clive Crook’s article was “In hope of a principled campaign”. Can we keep to a principled debate as well please? Race and politics are emotive issues, but some of the comments are close to crossing the line.
We will keep the debate open for now, but reserve the right to close it if things get too heated.
Many thanks
Rob Minto, Interactive editor, FT.com
Posted by: Robert Minto | May 15th, 2008 at 7:11 pm | Report this commentMy last comment to John Powers was meant to be more humorous than anything else, since the fact that John Edwards’ haircut cost even more than Mr. Powers thought it did only bolsters his position, not mine. However, keeping this debate on a principled tone is admittedly a challenge for all of us, especially since the campaign we are discussing is staring off on a far from principled tone, and is very likely to get worse as the general election approaches.
Certainly, I apologize if anyone has been offended by any of my comments, and I will do my best to focus on civility above all else from now on, in keeping with the tone of Clive Crook’s article and with FT.com policy.
Roger Algase
Posted by: algasema | May 15th, 2008 at 8:47 pm | Report this commentI meant: “starting off, not “staring off”. ( I am still recovering from recent eye surgery.) My apologies again.
Posted by: algasema | May 15th, 2008 at 8:50 pm | Report this commentLet us just see the developments of the ongoing battle of titans in the US politics.
Posted by: Viktor O. Ledenyov | May 16th, 2008 at 4:57 pm | Report this comment