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ker 4/23/2008 3:27:32 PM

Pat Buchanan said of Obama, he's "faculty lounge." This was in the connect of why Obama can't close the deal or draw the Catholic vote. I think that when Obama and his wife try to talk about the hardships of their younger lives they run the risk of projecting more "militant" energy than blue collar "He's still one of us."

Maybe this would be easier for him if he had moved in circles where "middleclassness" was not cause for disavowal.

link

"Any black person who identifies himself as middle-class psychologically withdraws from the group and becomes a proponent of strengthening and sustaining the system," link

It is sort of late to start learning how to bowl and fit in with the blue color folk.

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ker 4/27/2008 10:00:29 PM

Dem's nomination process has been sloppy. They are still making up the rules and the voting is largely over. When police departments hire a new officer they like to look at the applicants private car to see how he might take care of a patrol car. Voters who want to see how the Dem's might run the executive branch might watch how they run their own party.

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Bill got the whip. Represenitive James E. Clyburn reminded Bill how happy he was to have the support of black Americans during impeachment. Clyburn didn't like Bill marginalizing Obamas coming primary victory because it was in a state with many black Democrats. It's standard Clinton form to argue that things don't mean what they mean. Delegates from a state Jessy Jackson won should count less that Delegates from important states that rejected Jackson???

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Dance with them that brought you. Obamas "Crazy Uncial" (Obamas description) is back up on the air. He's got a new talking point, it's all Fox News' fault. He also said that Obama was just another politician saying what would get the press off his back. I was only in that church because it had good parking? "Crazy Uncial" writes his own talking points. So don't go around telling people you sat in a mans church for 20 years but didn't listen and then ask him for favors.

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Chris Matthews, Hardballer that he is, said, "I just love the fact that the catholics are now being studied like some kind of, I wanta (sic) call it, New Guinea tribe. Were trying to figure them out." This might explain his ratings. More importantly, the Dem's may have the same problem. Do they know if the Catholic vote is going to Hillrod because they like her or because they dislike what the Barack is cooking? Really the problem is not understanding but actions. The party has cut the observant Catholic Americans out of the party decision making and then looked for sophomoric arguments to keep them voting blue.

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They also use super delegates to prevent the teachers unions and trial lawyers from picking a candidate who would rub the centrists noses in the fact that they are out. They know they need a candidate who can pass as a centrist, like Jimmy "Blood Libel" Carter did. Maybe the Jews and the catholics vote together way this year? Jimmy writes his own talking points now too.

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We may be witnessing a big divorce. In Europe standard political language describes center left Christan Democrats and hard left Social Democrats. Senators Obama and Clinton currently represent hard left and center left support bases in the Democratic party. The practices that held those two factions together are under strain. Obama is bringing new people into the party. I questioning if those people are really Republicans and moderates. At this point in the game they may be politically unformed young people and non-voters who had rejected the democrat's for being to much like the Republicans. Obama and the net roots set are moving the parties center of gravity left. That movement has been going on for a long time. Remember all the elected Democrats who jumped party during the Clinton administration. Then well before that people like Ronald Reagan and Phil Gram were left out of the Democrats moving camp. When Obama consolidates the nomination another class of Democrats may leave. This time they may become a New Independent Democratic Party rather than joining with the GOP. That political formation could dramatically increase the numbers that go out. In either case the lose of ballast in the center promotes the tilt left which speeds the positive feed back loop. There is a need for some countervailing force to pull the party back into homeostases, stability. You tell me where that comes from. Former Presidents? Joe Lieberman? Zell Miller? Ann Richards?

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ker 4/30/2008 7:33:33 PM

I know that a politician might write a less than academicly serious book. Obama used a sermon tittle, "The Audacity of Hope" as the tittle of his second book. A serious author doing that would have a better than fair understanding of the career and thought of the person he lifts the tittle from. Obama lied about not knowing who Write was. OR His situational awareness is so impaired as to make him a threat to the nation should he become POTUS.

Write is not just setting up a book contract. He is positioning him self perfectly for a high profile position in the American university system.

I do think that they had a falling out over who was top dog.

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ker 4/30/2008 8:12:16 PM

This link which kind of county go for which democrat.

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ker 5/1/2008 4:15:48 PM

You have heard of the starter wife. You marry a woman and use her family and social contacts for your work wile letting her decorate your arm. Then when your ship comes in and your worth some real money you trade her in for this years module and lawyer her out of your life. Well Obama had the "Audacity of Hope" that he could make a career in politics networking with Wright and then trade up to Howard Dean once the inter net money rolled in.

Wrights a top not a bottom. "Old Solders never die they just fade away" but Wright ain't going down like that. He will not be put away quietly.

There are still other rocks to kick over in Obama's past. If wright was really about throwing Obama under the bus he would talk about where the bodes are buried in the church yard. What he is doing now is just letting us all know he is a man.

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ker 5/4/2008 11:17:29 PM

I heard that Obama was sharing his biggest donors with the DNC/Howard Dean. I think this is to circumvent the campaign finance laws. The big checks from people who want to give to Obama will be redirected to the Party or state party to avoid limits and to conceal just how high Obamas cash burn rate will get. Protect his clean new image and prevent talk about how his returns on investment might now be as high as donors would want.

Another less probable meaning has occurred to me. Dean is positioning to keep the milk if and when he loses the cow. Promising Obama coordination and support now and in the general but hedging the bet. Donner lists are to politics what pattens are to parmasutical corporations. ( What contacts are to drug traffickers. Have you seen the movie Blow?)

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I still think that Obama is the nominee. 85 or 95% certain. Now Obama is easer to beat than Hillary in a vacuum. Obama is more dangerous to the Republicans in the sense that he might brake out and produce a trans formative election that Hillary never could. It's a difference of probability and magnitude. Hillary has a higher probability of winning and doing it in a none trans formative way. Obama has a lower probability of winning but if he wins he could win bigger than Hillary could even imagine. Hill goes twelve rounds and probably loses in a split choice ala Gore/Kerry. Obama is less predictable and either fighter could be out cold in the third round.

The way to beat Obama is to show his "post racial" "post partisan" third way as disingenuous and unrealistic fantasy. Without looking like the "Grinch that Stole Christmas." The question is weather the 2008 swift boats will connect him with white color crime or mob/street gang him up. Did he ever speak or act against the Vice Lords? Or did he play patty cake with them like he plans to do with Iran?

At the same time McCain needs to promise "provincial reconstruction" teams with generous use of FBI assets committed to serve locations with concentrated black poverty. The law enforcement component would focus on protecting people on the street and the social service side would be bigger and focus on direct service. Micro finance link replace payday loans, local none profit food distribution www.sharecolorado.com to replace Mad Dog booze stores, and family friendly public library like internet cafés to replace midnight basketball drug deal spots. Call it a community based vision and tie it to faith and community based programs if your talking to people who like it that way.

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McCain needs to have a plan to get more votes than anyone has ever gotten before. The Dems will get more votes than Bush got last time unless they explode and split in to two different party. He need the son of the Rove turn out machine to be running well in the hands of many of Roves students and McCain needs to bring a new and impressive national operation to attract and hold and activate none Republicans. Bushs father was sure the nation would never elect a draft dodger (Bill Clinton) and was wrong. (Barbra Bush, "have you heard the news, my son is running for president. The bad news is that it's Gorge.")

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ker 5/12/2008 3:52:30 PM

I found a tool for calculating the effects of changing the out come of the election in particular states. It also has good history of past elections.

link

Rove has released some poll numbers comparing how the demarcates would fair differently again McCain in state by state comparison. Roves partisan but the numbers are pear reviewed because the poll data is open and Dems can do the same math. Buzz is rove is being careful and could have called Ohio and Michigan for McCain but did not.

Obama needs a new plan.

Swapping for Clinton at this point would be like a heart transplant. The gain (she looks to win Florida and AR) is not worth the risk and trauma of the operation needed to make the swap. Among other gifts the change would give to the GOP is that it would open the door to black voters wanting to leave the Dems plantation. When the pro bowl wide reviver got into a fight with the pro bowl center the quarter back smacked the reviver in the head and said, "you may keep me in the sports pages but he keeps me out of the obituary". White suburban educated voters might put Dems in victory in good years but blacks keep them out of the obits in bad years. This is most true in house races where Dems drew the district maps.

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When I look at possible GOP VPs they all look like great cabinet appointments.

When I look at Dems VP options they all look like perfect reminders of whats wrong with Obama.

"Edward G. Rendell, Pennsylvania?s 45th Governor, began a second term of office on January 16, 2007, following a landslide re-election victory. As Governor, Rendell serves as chief executive of the nation?s 6th-most-populous state and oversees a $27.5 billion budget." From the Governors web site link

I think Rendell would be a good pick because he brings PA, a drop dead can't lose state, and has executive experience. VP Rendell would make Cheney look inactive and unimportant. Rendell would need lots of Valiums to keep from overwhelming President Obama in every way. Having Rendell run with Obama is like having the Pope run errands for a Bishop. But we all knew that something was wrong with the Dems nomination process. Remember Carter (297 electoral votes with Watergate to run on, 49 as incumbent), Dukakis (111), Mondale (13).

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ker 5/16/2008 6:06:49 PM

I just lifted this off bwana but it made me think so much of this thread.

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link lang=EN>Posted by bwana on August 1, 2007
?Among the many books I am reading is Boyd: The Fighter Pilot Who Changed the Art of War. The late John Boyd was an Air Force fighter pilot who moved from being a crack pilot to being on the cutting edge of military purchasing reform to becoming a lead advocate in manuver warfare.
?Boyd offered many presentations and briefings in his search for the origins of creativity and how that capability can best be translated to military operations. He ultimately created a model called the OODA Loop (Observe, Orient, Decide, Act)?

??which represents a continuing cycle of decision making. This concept has been put into effect by the Marine Corps as part of their basic combat methodology, and has been adapted by many corporations as a management model.
?As I read this, I thought how this would fit perfectly into the sturm and drang of a political campaign. In fact, one could say the entire Macaca incident of the 2006 campaign and the manner in which the Webb campaign took advantage of the gaffe, and then followed up as the Allen campaign stumbled, was the OODA loop in action.
?There is some irony in this. John Boyd had a group of six ?Acolytes? who carried his methodolgy into the fields of purchasing, weapons planning, and manuver theory. One of these six was retired Marine Corps Colonel Michael Wyly, who spearheaded bringing manuver warfare to the Corps. Wyly was a company comander in Vietnam and turned a unit that suffered high casualties into one of the crack combat forces in Southeast Asia. A young lieutenant under his command later wrote a novel about his experiences in Vietnam, and wrote glowingly of his commander. Years later, that Wyly in turn a different kind of epistle about his lieutenant?when he endorsed his former lieutenant for the US Senate.
?As you may have guessed, the young lieutenant was James Webb, Jr?.creating a different kind of loop!"

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Then the writer goes on to claim that it woun't realy work. Check the link if you want to read that part.

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ker 6/2/2008 9:17:18 PM

The great uniter severed from his church home. Can he have God as his father with out the church as your mother. Will he join a better church or be a lone ranger Christin indefinitely? Start the count of days Obama has been unchurched. Why couldn't he correct his church and lead it in the way it should go? Is he saving all that mojo for something big? What has this man ever united and why hasn't he told us already?

Will the weakly mags still show him in glorious angelic light on their covers?

If Iran makes fun of Hillary's tears will Obama stop talking for them...I mean to them?

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ker 6/20/2008 7:38:21 PM

Dutch land or a jelly donut.

A paperhanging SOB with a messiah complex once said, ?I am Germany.? Another quisa-messiah who never dirtied his hands to hang paper tried to say, ?I am a citizen of Berlin? but offered up ?I am a jelly donut!? They loved him anyway. Like Obama who once or twice got a standing ovation for blowing his nose if you get the rep for being a passionate speaker you can make any mistake and people will praise it as innovation.

IDF 2nd lieutenants say ?either a medal or a corporal? meaning they are going to be very heroic and very very successful or they will get demoted so far their girlfriend won?t need to bother telling them that she doesn?t date below her tax bracket. Obama is going to be a medal or a corporal - the embodiment of the nation or a jelly donut.

Obama will be the second coming of Franklin Roosevelt or warmed over Jimmy Carter. Unless he loses in which case he will be warmed over McGovern.

Obama is to the Democrats what Bush was to the GOP 8 years ago. He represents old school liberalism in a palatable young package. He unites and energizes the left and amuses the middle wile making the right worry. That?s the mirror image of what Bush did in 00. In time we may find that Obama raises false hope in the left, enrages the middle and empowers the right. Remember Bush was a ?uniter not a divider? with a plan for a modest foreign police and great distain for his predecessor. In symbolism Obama is reaching out to everybody from Regan to Khomeini. In fact Obama?s political horizon reaches from Howard Dean to Rev. Jackson with an open door to Nancy Pelosi and Mayor Daley.

?I?m skinny but I?m tough, I?m from Chicago!? "Change we can believe in."

We'll be fighting in the streets
With our children at our feet
And the morals that they worship will be gone
And the men who spurred us on
Sit in judgement of all wrong
They decide and the shotgun sings the song

I'll tip my hat to the new constitution
Take a bow for the new revolution
Smile and grin at the change all around me
Pick up my guitar and play
Just like yesterday
Then I'll get on my knees and pray
We don't get fooled again

The change, it had to come
We knew it all along
We were liberated from the foe, that' all
And the world looks just the same
And history ain't changed
'Cause the banners, they all flown in the next war

I'll tip my hat to the new constitution
Take a bow for the new revolution
Smile and grin at the change all around me
Pick up my guitar and play
Just like yesterday
Then I'll get on my knees and pray
We don't get fooled again
No, no!

I'll move myself and my family aside
If we happen to be left half alive
I'll get all my papers and smile at the sky
For I know that the hypnotized never lie

Do ya?

YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!

There's nothing in the street
Looks any different to me
And the slogans are replaced, by-the-bye
And the parting on the left
Is now the parting on the right
And the beards have all grown longer overnight

I'll tip my hat to the new constitution
Take a bow for the new revolution
Smile and grin at the change all around me
Pick up my guitar and play
Just like yesterday
Then I'll get on my knees and pray
We don't get fooled again
Don't get fooled again
No, no!

YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!

Meet the new boss
Same as the old boss

Woun't get Fooled Again-The Who

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Rick9719 Obama landslide NOT 7/17/2008 12:05:18 AM

Obama barely won the Democratic nomination. He has serious problems getting Democrats to vote for him ( a serious defection problem with the Hillary supporters). Black candidates traditionally do much worse in real elections than they do in the polls. He's about the most liberal candidate they could have picked, never a winning strategy. He's relying on people who traditionally don't vote to win the election for him (never a bankable strategy). Where is the real evidence that Obama is going to win this election? Some of the polls I've seen lately have been outstaningly rigged if you look at the numbers, and even his democratic supporters are now acknoledging that he's got some demographics problems. McCain may be a weak Republican candidate with his base, but he's actually pretty popular with the Hillary democrats that Obama badly needs to have a chance in this election.

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ker 7/21/2008 5:18:36 PM

McCain is running ahead of the generic Republican.

Obamma is running behind the generic Dem.

McCains secret weapon may be the split ticket voter. The predictions for congress are daunting for Republicans. I can see voters passing over the top of the ticket and voting for dems and then to balance them selves out emotionaly going back up and voting McCain. It's a way to hedge their bets.

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ker How I learned to relax and love the Obama 7/25/2008 4:07:40 PM

Let me confess that I have a much higher opinion of Bush and the prosecution of the Iraq war than almost any one.

I feared that Obama would destroy what Bush had created. Not any more. If Obama wins election President Obama will be under great pressure to be more impressive than campaign Obama. That will drive him into Wilsonian internationalism. Obaqma is in studied denial of the military implications of his political trajectory just like Wilson and Roosevelt before him. That works to the betterment of the world. McCain says we will fight as long as we must. Obama says we will stop fighting as soon as we are able. It is exactly that turn of sly semantics that makes a great leader. Obama will get us into the wars we need with out being war like. Soft power, unity, activity and change. Faith, Hope and Change. McCain says no evil won't and Obama says YES we can. McCain is against the oppressors in Iran, Burma, Zimbaway and Darfor(Sudan). Obama is with and for the oppressed of Iran, Burma, Zimbaway and Darfor(Sudan) as they blog and protest and vote. Obama vision of Iran, Burma, Zimbaway and Darfor(Sudan) is not an axis of evil but as a net work of good opposition. The walls between our hearts must come down. They are us and we will join with them in their struggle against the Bushes of the world. We will fight for peace. We will fight as blessed peace makers. No barriers of poverty, ignorance, religion or immigration statute will prevent our efforts.

Nether will the details. Standing at Brandenburg gate, praising the air lift and pretending that Berlin, West Germany even the world was saved by candy is a lie. A very presidential lie. The world was saved by lots of fighters with lots of weapons. Many of them covert organizers in East Germany, Poland and through out the Communist world. Dissidents who resisted power for truth. Obama feels this dissident spirit and sees in it our new program for the world. When America changes they too will change. They will be stronger. They will win. Sendding in American troops will only be an after though.

Sen. Boxer and her fabulous new hair style were on CNN saying, "Obama is already leading and he isn't even President yet." She was crediting Obama with the removal of troops in Iraq, the moving of troops to Afghanistan and America almost negotiating with Iran. I find special comfort in Obamas call for more strength in Afghanistan and for attacks inside Pakistan. He like force as long as the right people though of it. Obama is a protector. He protects his wife and children. He carries that same spirit of protection to the whole human family. His struggle for a safer planet will be much better than the war on terror. It won't be a war. It will feel much more positive. It will be friendlier. People will like us. We won't need to be alone any more.

Obama is such a great leader before he is a leader that he got pro-Americans elected in Germany and France. He is such a good pre-leader that he sparked color revolutions like Georgia, Ukraine, Kyrgyzstan and Lebanon.

Our moment has already begun.

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ker 8/18/2008 6:00:25 PM

The O was standing for overexposed so he took a vacation. I can hear the future now, "why can't O close the deal?"

O Berlin. It was way 2 obvious. I wasn't engaged by it. Is it presumption or insecurity? Will he need to take 3,000 supporters and a church choir with him to sit down with Putin the Great?

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Choose your Obama jokes carefully. "Why can't Jesse Jackson ever cut off Obamas almond joys? Because Obamas racist white grandmother beat him to it." This is the kind of joke not to use. It reinforces the idea that O is victim and it's unfair to have an election against him. It reinforces his argument at all opposition to him is based in discomfort with his "funny name" and different look. It reinforces his image as sweet coco flavored wiped cream. Instead say, "O looks like money to me, he's green."

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ker 8/18/2008 7:31:11 PM

At this time in history America is redefining the cultural meaning of being black. Obama is riding the wave more than he is steering it. Remember that Irish were a separate race not so long ago. In parts of America a mixed marriage was an Irish catholic and a German catholic up until the 70's. I had sociology professor who told me blacks roles couldn't change that way because they were identified by skin color rather than more concealable traits. I think she was wrong.

Gangster Paradise and It's all about the Benjamin's have slipped into Amish Paradise and It's all about the Pentium's. link

In political terms Republicans have been challenging the role of blacks in America. Sean wilentz (not a bush supporter) says of Bush's first convention, "I was there. Every brake dancer in south Philly was rounded up and put on stage." beyond asking for black votes and putting them on stage the Bush family has used the power of it's appointments to put black conservatives in the highest posts in the land. Judge Thomas and SecState Rice were subject to tabloid-style attacks from white and black democrat's. Some of these attacks keyed back to the post civil war attempt to justifies keeping blacks in there place because they were sexually dangerous. The fights were experienced differently by different interest groups. An over looked response to the style of opposition to Bush family black appointees was the strain between the democratic party worthies and the conservative black pastors who were expected to invite white democrat's into there pulpits every two years but never talk to the GOP. Bush and his marketing/campaign people were working hard to talk to those pastors and their flocks. Bush contrasted him self with the Dems by demonstrating that freedom of religion was not just for new age protesters but for everybody even if they were in the unwashed majority. Bush argued that diversity included the need to recognize that black people had more than one political opinion.

More important than Bushes actions was the fact that the same old song and dance was getting old. The tools of communication that were allowing people to get to each other with out the help of mainstream institutions were available to blacks as well. Hispanics were undercutting blacks role as the most high profile minority.

The war pushed these changes back down away from the radar of public discussion. It also created an opportunity for a law professor turned state senator to begin a national role as the anti-war, race healer, post partisan, post race young leader.

"Nostalgia isn't what it used to be" said Pen and Teller.

Wile the dems are learning how to micro target and data mine voters and convert from policy messages to lifestyle messages they can close the gape with the GOP and win elections again. But that is a bad message. Come with us we are learning the evil tricks of Rove. They need a cover for the operation. Rather than being a dentist who gives the patient a lecture on how the drill will be used they want some soothing music to play. Obama is romantic, soothing music. Obama is nostalgia for a past when good guys were good. When the new deal was new and affordable. When the great society was great and friendly. When we didn't know who Anita Hill and Monica Lewinsky were. (The white guy with the great hair and the love child ain't gonna cut it.)

Dems need to bring the black vote home and turn it out like old school. Not just because it's 12% of the population. Also because when the blacks are all on message suburban women are more easily activated for liberal candidates.

So wile what it means to be black is going through a natural cultural evolution the dems need to keep the one party mentality the same. So they needed to come up with a bigger prize than SecState.

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