Obama supporters! - A positive place to talk about his campaign

[aplejax76]

Could someone please explain how people think Hillary can win the nomination without disenfranchising the African American and young vote? I don't understand why this is talked about only in passing.

African Americans are not going to vote for her in the general election if Superdelgates take it away from Obama. They probably will not vote at all.


Say she "wins" the nomination. She will not win the GE.

 

[Planogirl]

I agree...I am not losing hope, Barack is still ahead, still has a lot of support nationwide. Yes, it is disappointing to have lost in Pa, but he turned it around and made inroads in a state that Clinton had all the advantages in, namely the support of Ed Rendell.

I am not "falling apart" over the loss, there is no need to because Obama's camapign is still strong. However, what is bothering me immensely is the fact that Democrats are tearing the Democratic Party apart, last nights exit polls in Pennsylvania prove this out....for example 29% of newly registered Democrats who voted Obama would not vote for Hillary if she was the nominee. Democrats in Pa signed up thousands of new Democrats, however, if these new and mostly young voters sense that the DNC is not interested in the will of the voters and choose Hillary over Barack, these new voters will be getting the feeling that their vote made no difference and they will most likely go back to being apathetic about elections. I am so sick of hearing how this is good for the party when it clearly is not. Last night my husband and I were talking and he, who already had said to me that if Obama doesn't win he would have to vote for Hillary, has now altered his position because it wears on you to hear a fellow democrat trash a another democrat, that's all that is going on now. Sometimes it seems like there will be no Republican nominee at all...all the hate and vitriloic speech is against a Democrat...anyone out there want to attack McCain????!!!! All of the bickering and arguing amongst people who supposedly share the same ideologies makes me sick, as well as many other Democrats who now are beginning to feel that if their candidate doesn't get the nomination they will not vote at all or, like my husband, vowed last night, to write Obama in if he's not the Dems choice(even though he acknowledged that it would be commiting political suicide)....he even said he would change his affiliation to Independent. I am beginning to agree because I have never been so disgusted with the lack of leadership on the part of the DNC. I am so sad and disappointed that this will most likely go on till late August, when the convention begins. I always think of 1968 when I think about this...the year that dems had a chance but let their bickering help to lead Nixon on to the White House.....and we all know how that turned out.

Favorite candidate aside, the Democrats who would not vote for the other candidate really trouble me. This Gallup Poll article really illustrates what you're saying: http://www.gallup.com/poll/105691/McCain-vs-Obama-28-Clinton-Backers-McCain.aspx

This one shows that 19% of Obama supporters would vote for McCain over Hillary and 28% of Hillary supporters would vote for McCain over Obama. These numbers seem to be getting worse and worse as time goes on.

Aside of accusing Hillary for being responsible for all of this, how can the Democrats stop this? I know that many of you think that Hillary is heavily responsible for the hard feelings but it appears that at least many Hillary supporters believe that Obama's side is the guilty party. I don't see how pointing fingers at the other side is doing anything to mend fences.

 

[MassJester]

Take notice no one has asked you to leave yet. It would be nice if you extended that courtesy.

Btw, many of us here read the "other" thread who's posters consist of people who wouldn't vote for a Democrat if the vote came with a $100 bill and have picked apart Hillary Clinton and will continue to do so.

And I don't think any Obama supporter has fallen apart as you claimed they would on that other thread.

I think you will find that the large majority of HC supporters are quite reasonable and a pleasure to read, even if we disagree on candidates. I read the HC thread regularly, but have taken the added step of blocking out the commentary of posters who are more shrill than substance. It greatly improves my enjoyment of the thread.

 

[LuvDuke]

I agree...I am not losing hope, Barack is still ahead, still has a lot of support nationwide. Yes, it is disappointing to have lost in Pa, but he turned it around and made inroads in a state that Clinton had all the advantages in, namely the support of Ed Rendell.

I am not "falling apart" over the loss, there is no need to because Obama's camapign is still strong. However, what is bothering me immensely is the fact that Democrats are tearing the Democratic Party apart, last nights exit polls in Pennsylvania prove this out....for example 29% of newly registered Democrats who voted Obama would not vote for Hillary if she was the nominee. Democrats in Pa signed up thousands of new Democrats, however, if these new and mostly young voters sense that the DNC is not interested in the will of the voters and choose Hillary over Barack, these new voters will be getting the feeling that their vote made no difference and they will most likely go back to being apathetic about elections. I am so sick of hearing how this is good for the party when it clearly is not. Last night my husband and I were talking and he, who already had said to me that if Obama doesn't win he would have to vote for Hillary, has now altered his position because it wears on you to hear a fellow democrat trash a another democrat, that's all that is going on now. Sometimes it seems like there will be no Republican nominee at all...all the hate and vitriloic speech is against a Democrat...anyone out there want to attack McCain????!!!! All of the bickering and arguing amongst people who supposedly share the same ideologies makes me sick, as well as many other Democrats who now are beginning to feel that if their candidate doesn't get the nomination they will not vote at all or, like my husband, vowed last night, to write Obama in if he's not the Dems choice(even though he acknowledged that it would be commiting political suicide)....he even said he would change his affiliation to Independent. I am beginning to agree because I have never been so disgusted with the lack of leadership on the part of the DNC. I am so sad and disappointed that this will most likely go on till late August, when the convention begins. I always think of 1968 when I think about this...the year that dems had a chance but let their bickering help to lead Nixon on to the White House.....and we all know how that turned out.

1968 was different than 2008. In 1968 the Democrats were saddled with:

1) a Democratic president (LBJ) who waged an unpopular and a perceived unwinnable war that was started on lies

2) the assassination of a major candidate (RFK)

3) a compromise candidate who was who never campaigned (VP Hubert Humphrey) and was part of the administration who waged the unpopular war.

This is not 1968. McCain is saddled with that unpopular war that he supports and an economy that is falling apart everywhere EXCEPT in McCain's mind.

This is what awaits McCain big time when he no longer has the stage all to himself.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TFDc4M_PMNk

 

[transparant]

oops - meant to post that on the Hillary thread LOL!

 

[Laugh O. Grams]

Favorite candidate aside, the Democrats who would not vote for the other candidate really trouble me. This Gallup Poll article really illustrates what you're saying: http://www.gallup.com/poll/105691/McCain-vs-Obama-28-Clinton-Backers-McCain.aspx

This one shows that 19% of Obama supporters would vote for McCain over Hillary and 28% of Hillary supporters would vote for McCain over Obama. These numbers seem to be getting worse and worse as time goes on.

Aside of accusing Hillary for being responsible for all of this, how can the Democrats stop this? I know that many of you think that Hillary is heavily responsible for the hard feelings but it appears that at least many Hillary supporters believe that Obama's side is the guilty party. I don't see how pointing fingers at the other side is doing anything to mend fences.

In recent weeks, didn't some grand puba in the DNC float the idea of doing a superdelegate "primary" after NC and IN that required all supers make their decision so we can move on?

 

[LuvDuke]

I think you will find that the large majority of HC supporters are quite reasonable and a pleasure to read, even if we disagree on candidates. I read the HC thread regularly, but have taken the added step of blocking out the commentary of posters who are more shrill than substance. It greatly improves my enjoyment of the thread.

Lest we forget, the vast majority of Hillary supporters don't go over to the thread for our friends on the other side of the political aisle and talk trash about Obama supporters.

I don't block out anyone as even shrill can have it's entertainment value.

 

[MassJester]

Could someone please explain how people think Hillary can win the nomination without disenfranchising the African American and young vote? I don't understand why this is talked about only in passing.

African Americans are not going to vote for her in the general election if Superdelgates take it away from Obama. They probably will not vote at all.


Say she "wins" the nomination. She will not win the GE.

I think it is a mistake to say that if one candidate wins, a certain population is disenfranchised. We have two great candidates, and certain demographics are "choosing sides." It does not logically follow that if one wins, the others have been excluded from the process.

It is divisive to suggest that the voters that line up behind a candidate that does not eventually win have been marginalized. They took part in a democratic process and their side did not win that day.

 

[chobie]

Favorite candidate aside, the Democrats who would not vote for the other candidate really trouble me. This Gallup Poll article really illustrates what you're saying: http://www.gallup.com/poll/105691/McCain-vs-Obama-28-Clinton-Backers-McCain.aspx

This one shows that 19% of Obama supporters would vote for McCain over Hillary and 28% of Hillary supporters would vote for McCain over Obama. These numbers seem to be getting worse and worse as time goes on.

Aside of accusing Hillary for being responsible for all of this, how can the Democrats stop this? I know that many of you think that Hillary is heavily responsible for the hard feelings but it appears that at least many Hillary supporters believe that Obama's side is the guilty party. I don't see how pointing fingers at the other side is doing anything to mend fences.

In all fairness, this not voting for the other candidate really took off when Hillary started comparing herself to McCain and basically saying if you can't have me, McCain is your next best choice. Obama has done/said anything close to that. And the result is that Hillary supporters are much more likley say they will vote for McCain.

 

[WildernessBride]

1968 was different than 2008. In 1968 the Democrats were saddled with:

1) a Democratic president (LBJ) who waged an unpopular and a perceived unwinnable war that was started on lies

2) the assassination of a major candidate (RFK)

3) a compromise candidate who was who never campaigned (VP Hubert Humphrey) and was part of the administration who waged the unpopular war.

This is not 1968. McCain is saddled with that unpopular war that he supports and an economy that is falling apart everywhere EXCEPT in McCain's mind.

This is what awaits McCain big time when he no longer has the stage all to himself.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TFDc4M_PMNk

I know...it's not 1968, but the scenario scares me nonetheless. We have got to be a united front representing the Democratic party. If it were a little more like 1968, i.e. college kids had to worry about a draft...we would have no troubles at all...dems would rule the day. 1968 was a whole different time and place but it gives us the example...don't squabble with your own party for months on end and then expect everone to just unite and get behind one person...that will be a hard task to accomplish!

 

[wvrevy]

Todays editorial from the New York Times (the NY paper that once endorsed Hillary Clinton) :

The Low Road to Victory

The Pennsylvania campaign, which produced yet another inconclusive result on Tuesday, was even meaner, more vacuous, more desperate, and more filled with pandering than the mean, vacuous, desperate, pander-filled contests that preceded it.

Voters are getting tired of it; it is demeaning the political process; and it does not work. It is past time for Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton to acknowledge that the negativity, for which she is mostly responsible, does nothing but harm to her, her opponent, her party and the 2008 election.

If nothing else, self interest should push her in that direction. Mrs. Clinton did not get the big win in Pennsylvania that she needed to challenge the calculus of the Democratic race. It is true that Senator Barack Obama outspent her 2-to-1. But Mrs. Clinton and her advisers should mainly blame themselves, because, as the political operatives say, they went heavily negative and ended up squandering a good part of what was once a 20-point lead.

On the eve of this crucial primary, Mrs. Clinton became the first Democratic candidate to wave the bloody shirt of 9/11. A Clinton television ad — torn right from Karl Rove’s playbook — evoked the 1929 stock market crash, Pearl Harbor, the Cuban missile crisis, the cold war and the 9/11 attacks, complete with video of Osama bin Laden. “If you can’t stand the heat, get out of the kitchen,” the narrator intoned.

If that was supposed to bolster Mrs. Clinton’s argument that she is the better prepared to be president in a dangerous world, she sent the opposite message on Tuesday morning by declaring in an interview on ABC News that if Iran attacked Israel while she were president: “We would be able to totally obliterate them.”

By staying on the attack and not engaging Mr. Obama on the substance of issues like terrorism, the economy and how to organize an orderly exit from Iraq, Mrs. Clinton does more than just turn off voters who don’t like negative campaigning. She undercuts the rationale for her candidacy that led this page and others to support her: that she is more qualified, right now, to be president than Mr. Obama.

Mr. Obama is not blameless when it comes to the negative and vapid nature of this campaign. He is increasingly rising to Mrs. Clinton’s bait, undercutting his own claims that he is offering a higher more inclusive form of politics. When she criticized his comments about “bitter” voters, Mr. Obama mocked her as an Annie Oakley wannabe. All that does is remind Americans who are on the fence about his relative youth and inexperience.

No matter what the high-priced political operatives (from both camps) may think, it is not a disadvantage that Mr. Obama and Mrs. Clinton share many of the same essential values and sensible policy prescriptions. It is their strength, and they are doing their best to make voters forget it. And if they think that only Democrats are paying attention to this spectacle, they’re wrong.

After seven years of George W. Bush’s failed with-us-or-against-us presidency, all American voters deserve to hear a nuanced debate — right now and through the general campaign — about how each candidate will combat terrorism, protect civil liberties, address the housing crisis and end the war in Iraq.

It is getting to be time for the superdelegates to do what the Democrats had in mind when they created superdelegates: settle a bloody race that cannot be won at the ballot box. Mrs. Clinton once had a big lead among the party elders, but has been steadily losing it, in large part because of her negative campaign. If she is ever to have a hope of persuading these most loyal of Democrats to come back to her side, let alone win over the larger body of voters, she has to call off the dogs.

 

[chobie]

oops - meant to post that on the Hillary thread LOL!

That's okay. If any poster on the Dis thinks for a moment that any con thread poster has any iota of respect for any Democratic candidate, then they are truly drinking kool-aid, and perhaps smoking something too.

 

[WildernessBride]

In all fairness, this not voting for the other candidate really took off when Hillary started comparing herself to McCain and basically saying if you can't have me, McCain is your next best choice. Obama has done/said anything close to that. And the result is that Hillary supporters are much more likley say they will vote for McCain.

They are fools then because they are saying that this is just a personality contest...if you believe in the principles of the Democratic party how could you go against what you believe in to vote for the other party???

 

[transparant]

That's okay. If any poster on the Dis thinks for a moment that any con thread poster has any iota of respect for any Democratic candidate, then they are truly drinking kool-aid, and perhaps smoking something too.

Oh thats real nice of you.

 

[LuvDuke]

That's okay. If any poster on the Dis thinks for a moment that any con thread poster has any iota of respect for any Democratic candidate, then they are truly drinking kool-aid, and perhaps smoking something too.

No joke.

 

[WildernessBride]

That's okay. If any poster on the Dis thinks for a moment that any con thread poster has any iota of respect for any Democratic candidate, then they are truly drinking kool-aid, and perhaps smoking something too.

How true...it really bothers me how cons will cheer on Hillary supporters and wish them luck...and they take it as being nice. Come on, members of the"vast right wing conspiracy" have love in their hearts for Hill....pleeeeeeease!!!!!!!!!!!!!! What kind of kool aid do they drink????

 

[chris1gill]

Well I'm definitely disappointed but we deserve a congratulations too as we certainly closed a 25 point gap down to 10 points.

We may have lost last night but I think we still will win the nomination - no way are the supers going to take this away from the voters.

Tim, the MSM is rounding the numbers, I prefer to get mine of the PA State website.... they show an 8.6% win... I'm pretty happy with that. That was a huge gap in a territory that was tailor made as they say, for Clinton....

http://www.electionreturns.state.pa...n.aspx?FunctionID=13&ElectionID=27&OfficeID=1

 

[transparant]

How true...it really bothers me how cons will cheer on Hillary supporters and wish them luck...and they take it as being nice. Come on, members of the"vast right wing conspiracy" have love in their hearts for Hill....pleeeeeeease!!!!!!!!!!!!!! What kind of kool aid do they drink????

Sorry. But I'd rather her win over Obama.

 

[chris1gill]

Yeah, but Buchanan's an idiot.

There's a lot of talk this morning that some people in the Obama camp are ready to take the gloves off and stop playing nice. There seems to be a division in the campaign at this point, with about half wanting to really hammer Hillary on things like her NAFTA flip-flop, her Iraq war vote and Iran war-mongering, and everything else, and the other half wanting to continue as they have and stay above it with only minor counter-punching.

Along with the campaign, I'm of two minds about it. I like that he has tried to remain above it all. The question is, will he get credit for that effort if he now goes negative, or will they just call him a hypocrite instead of someone forced into that strategy by another candidate who is obviously more than willing to get down in the slime? At the same time, I almost wish that his creative campaign staff would get to work putting Hillary out of her (and our) misery. I can just see it now:

Fade in: Hillary's latest ad featuring Osama bin Ladin.
Voiceover: The Hillary Clinton rule of politics is that you should vote for her out of fear. We'd like you to see a few people that disagree with that strategy.

Show brief clips of:

FDR - "The only thing we have to fear is...fear itself."
Eleanor Roosevelt - "You gain strength, courage, and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You must do the thing which you think you cannot do."

Voiceover: But Barack Obama believes that this former president probably said it best.
Clip: Bill Clinton saying, "Now one of Clinton’s laws of politics is this: If one candidate’s trying to scare you and the other one’s trying to get you to think...if one candidate’s appealing to your fears and the other one’s appealing to your hopes, you better vote for the person who wants you to think and hope."

Barack: "I'm Barack Obama, and not only do I approve this message, I couldn't have said it better myself."

Email your commercial idea to the website, it's a great idea & they didn't even have to pay for it LOL...

 

[chobie]

Sorry. But I'd rather her win over Obama.

Yes, but that is out of hate for Obama, not love for Hillary.