Category: Barack Obama

(crossposted from Green Mountain Daily)

Well everybody’s dancin’ in a ring around the sun

Nobody’s finished, we ain’t even begun.

So take off your shoes, child, and take off your hat.

Try on your wings and find out where it’s at.

Hey hey, hey, come right away

Come and join the party every day.

For the past two weeks, ever since it became clear that John Edwards was no longer viable, I have been a precinct captain for Barack Obama in the city of Brea, my current home in north Orange County.  I have two precincts, in fact; as the one next to mine was not spoken for, and I didn’t want to leave it uncovered.  So for much of the past two weeks, I’ve been on the phone, calling voters.  Two precincts is about as much as I could handle; in fact, I didn’t finish calling the last 50 voters in my second precinct.  (I may try to catch some of them tomorrow.)  Still, I called over 600 voters — some of which were wrong numbers, not home, etc. — and now it’s time to reap the benefits of having laid that groundwork.

I didn’t have time to canvass homes in person — I don’t think that my talking to people in my own precinct on their doorsteps would be more useful than leaving messages with a large group of other people in the neighboring one.  But now that we’ve identified supporters and undecided voters, I did have time to do a lit drop this evening — about 70 houses.  I made up my own flyer to include with the campaign literature; it explains what I’m thinking and why I think it’s important.

I don’t think that the issue differences between Obama and Clinton are that significant, frankly.  Take health care, for example.  Both of them are wrong: the way to cover everyone, as Atrios says, is to cover everyone: automatic enrollment, with premiums for the base level of coverage included in taxes.  We don’t need mandates, etc.: we need to make that problem go away.  But because whatever the President proposes is not going to be what Congress passes, and because I think either of them will sign a decent bill, their current difference on that issue doesn’t matter to me.

What matters to me is winning the White House.  And so I wrote this letter, which was slipped into the screen doors of our supporters and to undecided voters.  It represents my own views as a campaign volunteer, and was not paid for the campaign.

Since I have came onto the little place we call the “netroots” I have written 63 blog posts. Many of them have been in favor of Barack Obama’s candidacy for president. So I thought it would be fitting the day before most of the nation votes, to write a sort of closing case for Obama. I have thought about many different ways I could explain my support. I could offer a wrap up of all the diaries I have written for him, I could make a new case, I could attack the other canidate. There were lots of ways I was thinking of doing this. But then this morning I read a article that pretty much summed up why I believe Obama is a better choice, a better choice for our party, our nation and our world.

The article is entitled “The Year of the Organizer” and it appeared on the American Prospect’s website. I’d like to explore that article and what it means to me.

Crossposted at Daily Kos

What I wanna know is this: historically speaking, who’s supporting whom?  With conflicting signals coming from all over the blogosphere, I have compiled a simple guide for undecided voters so that they can make an informed decision tomorrow aka “The Mother of All Election Days.”

No need to read intricate health care proposals.  Or, trying to figure out who’s for or against granting drivers licenses to undocumented aliens.  Or, agonizing over as to who has more experience or better judgment.  Or, wasting your precious time listening to talking heads on this or that cable news show.  Or, keeping track of which of the numerous Kennedys is for Obama or for Hillary.    

Folks, it ain’t that difficult to figure all of this out.  

Simply read my one-minute guide and I’m hopeful that you’ll do the right thing.  

Still not decided on who you might cast your ballot, or whatever, for?

Well The Real News have a few interviews with Jonathan Schell on his take on the candidates and their possible Foreign Policy Directions.

Who is Jonathan Schell, if you didn’t already know:

Based in New York City, USA, Jonathan Schell is a renowned anti-nuclear activist, prolific journalist, lecturer and best-selling author. He is a frequent contributor to The Nation, The New Yorker, Harper’s Magazine and Atlantic Monthly. He is also the author of The Fate of the Earth, nominated for the Pulitzer Prize. Schell is a board member of IWT – The Real News.

My four year old son is having his adenoids and tonsils out early tomorrow, leaving me no time to vote in my neighborhood. So I headed to San Francisco City Hall today and underwent my own surgery. On myself. With a dull scalpel, a dirty sponge, and no anesthesia whatsoever. With eyes squinched I extracted my vote. It wasn’t joyless, but it still hurts.

I’ve posted long and often about my indecision.  I believe we have two excellent candidates, two great Democrats.  They differ on some details, but they both want healthcare for all, a clean and living planet, better schools, and repeal of the tax cut for the richest Americans.  And the war? Yeah, I know Clinton voted for it, but they both want us out now and, as much as I disagreed with her vote, I’m glad she understands the need to end this fiasco.

Obama captures an excitement that will be his to lose if he gets the nomination and, if he does, he better be prepared, lose that stutter, and get smooth in the face of attack.  He has the potential to be one of the most influential leaders of our century or the biggest disappointment in our lifetimes.

(more beneath the scar)

In the middle of the mandate pie-fight (which just had a big ole can of gas dumped on it today by Paul Krugman), I think it’s important for folks to understand that – mandates aside – there’s still issues with both Hillary Clinton’s and Barack Obama’s health care plans that need to be addressed. I’m going to pick the big, blank area of each plan that leaves it open to attack, because my primary goal is to have a viable universal health care plan introduced by whoever wins the Democratic nomination (and then hopefully the presidency) as quickly as possible.

Cross posted at Kos

This is short for a diary but I had to share.

Today s Sunday and this is the day that Gun Shows like to reserve for their displays. A gun Show is a swap meet/ flea market for gun nuts. Once a month, there is a Gun Show in Northern Illinois for all the gun “aficionados” to buy/sell/swap their wares to other gun crazies.

My Husband is a gun nut. He is a member of the NRA and has been since he was a teen. He is also a Veteran, serving in Korea in 1969 as a Medic. he is also a card carrying member of the Democratic Party and the ACLU and has been for all his adult life.

I live in Washington State.  Our vote-by-mail primary is on February 19th, and the ballots were mailed out by the Secretary of State’s office a couple of days ago.  I’ll probably get mine on Monday.

The ballots were printed before Edwards suspended his campaign, so I know his name will still be on it.  And I’m going to vote for him.

Admit it: You’ve done it before.

No, not that; that’s gross.  What I meant was, every once in while, you creep over to the wing of the house that you’ve been told not to got to, the one about which the rumors swirl dark and evil.  In the dead of night, perhaps, or for a few minutes from the anonymity of a work computer, you click over to Free Republic or Little Green Footballs or Michelle Malkin (sorry no links; I seem to have momentarily forgotten how to do that), and you marvel at the vapidity.  Bereft of ideas and unencumbered by conscience, these last defenders of the indefensible are a case study in the death of a political movement, and in their final throes (heh) they’re apt to say the darndest things.

But every once in a while, a post like this one (danger: RedState) can actually do some good, either by helping a progressive see things in a different light or by exposing the vitriol that is the sole foundation of the “philosophy” of some wingnuts.  The one linked above, entitled Freakin’ Awesome Obama Music Video did both for this moonbat, and I just gotta tip my hat to author Ericka Andersen.

Cross-posted from the Daily Kos.

(my original post at Kos needed a huge update because I inadvertently left out a big chunk of Obama’s proposals. This is the updated essay)

Even though I have a very strong personal opinion based on my position as an anti-war voter, I want to present both Obama’s and Clinton’s policy proposals on Native American issues.  

I believe that Amnesty International did a lot through its report, United States of America: Maze of Injustice: The failure to protect indigenous women from violence, and follow-up work with State and National legislators to give these issues more national attention.

So, whomever you support right now, all of this is great news. Below I have blockquoted each set of proposals from the Clinton and Obama campaigns. They are long, but I wanted to give you the complete statements.

The Democratic Party won, last night. The Republican race is growing increasingly acrimonious, with Mitt Romney yesterday accusing John McCain of using “Nixonian tactics,” while, by contrast, debate host CNN and others headlined the comity displayed by Senators Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama. This is great for the Democratic party, and helpful to both candidates.

As Senator Clinton said, in the debate itself:

So we have differences both at home and around the world, but, again, I would emphasize that what really is important here, because the Republicans were in California debating yesterday, they are more of the same.

Neither of us, just by looking at us, you can tell, we are not more of the same. We will change our country.

Big Tent Democrat concurs:

From the moment they walked out on the stage, an African American and a woman, the Democrats won. Whomever wins the nomination, whomever wins the election, Democrats won. And America won.

He referred to Eugene Robinson’s comment, during the post-debate analysis, that the most electrifying moment came when the two candidates simply walked out on the stage. This is a new America and a better America. I remember the electricity in 1984, when Walter Mondale chose Geraldine Ferraro as his running-mate; those at the San Francisco convention said it was palpable. Everyone knew the ticket was doomed to lose to media darling Ronald Reagan, but having a woman on a major party’s ticket was an achingly long-overdue revolution. That same year, Jesse Jackson won five primaries or caucuses. He won 13 in 1988. Even with the nation regressing, under the Reagan Administration, the Democratic Party was courageously moving forward.

This year makes the advances of 1984 seem trivial. Big Tent also referenced the withdrawal statement of John Edwards, when he announced he was getting out of the way of history. For all the subtle and not-so-subtle strains of racism and misogyny that have bubbled up, this past month, this nation will never look back. The next time there is a serious candidate who is African American and/or a woman, it won’t even be an issue. That will be the greatest legacy of this historic winter.