Barack Obama Is In
By Justin Gardner | Related entries in 2008 Election, Elections
Again, like Hillary’s announcement, this is no surprise.
Barack Obama announced his bid for president Saturday, a black man evoking Abraham Lincoln’s ability to unite a nation and a Democrat portraying himself as a fresh face capable of leading a new generation.“Let us transform this nation,” he told thousands shivering in the cold at the campaign’s kickoff.
Obama, 45, is the youngest candidate in the Democrats’ 2008 primary field dominated by front-runner Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton and filled with more experienced lawmakers. In an address from the state capital where he began his elective career 10 years ago, the first-term U.S. senator sought to distinguish himself as a staunch opponent of the Iraq war and a White House hopeful whose lack of political experience is an asset.
“I know I haven’t spent a lot of time learning the ways of Washington. But I’ve been there long enough to know that the ways of Washington must change,” Obama said to some of the loudest applause of his 20-minute speech.
I second the “change” issue, but can it really? I guess we’ll have to wait and see what ideas Obama puts out there until we can really judge for sure.
Still, I think he has a much better shot at winning than Hillary ever would, although given our political climate right now, things aren’t looking good for the Repubs in ‘08. Only more moderate conservatives would be able to sway the independents, but we all know full well that the evanglicals will have their say in the primaries.
One thing’s for sure…it’s gonna be a hell of a race.
Now, Obama’s about to endure a going-over that would make a proctologist blush. Why has he sometimes said his first name is Arabic, and other times Swahili? Why did he make up names in his first book, as the introduction acknowledges? Why did he say two years ago that he would “absolutely” serve out his Senate term, which ends in 2011, and that the idea of him running for president this cycle was “silly” and hype that’s been a little overblown?”In interviews, strategists in both parties pointed to four big vulnerabilities: Obama’s inexperience, the thinness of his policy record, his frank liberalism in a time when the party needs centrist voters and the wealth of targets that are provided by the personal recollections in his first book, from past drug use to conversations that cannot be documented.
Sure, Obama’s in, but is he up for it? Howard Dean certainly wasn’t.
And away we go…
This entry was posted on Saturday, February 10th, 2007 and is filed under 2008 Election, Elections. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
February 11th, 2007 at 5:43 am
>Sure, Obama’s in, but is he up for it?
Ummm. The reference point isn’t Dean, it’s George “can’t do anything right” Bush.
Bush has set the bar so low it’s below ground level as to who can be president. I think ya need ground radar to find it.
But if people still need that “experience” try New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson as a side kick for Obama. He’s probably got more real experience in government than the entire White House of today.
[Kinda be like a Captain Kirk, and a Mr Spock; Who always, (nearly), had the answers that Kirk needed for making life and death decisions.]
Obama’s ready. Lets see if he chokes at the plate in the next two years.
Play Ball!
February 12th, 2007 at 1:07 am
James - we are all above that kind of bittersome politics around here. We have the audacity of hope that that kind of shrill hatred may be replaced with a synergy of cooperation fueled with mutual respect and aimed at a common vision of these United States. Now join a team son, jump on board, for every A-rab there is an American waiting to get out.
Out of curiosity, does anyone else contribute the similarity in names between “Osama” and “Obama” to Carol Jung’s conception of sychronocity? That there is an acausal principle that links events with a similar meaning by their coincidence in time, i.e. there is a synchrony between the mind and the physical world. Don’t tell me this is just a coincidence. If we vote in Obama, what kind of weird spiritual signal does that send the jihadist - who are prone to weird signals signals.
I saw Barack on 60 Minutes tonight. He’s done a little blow — well, who hasn’t, I say. The fact that your nose (better known as The Oreck 2000), sucked up 7 fat rails of primo on the ass of Tijuana hocker — should have no bearing on this race at all. The honey-coated blunts at the Wu-Tang show don’t have anything to do with who you are. We must focus on the issues; being the phased-redeployment of our troops over the next five minutes to anyplace other than Iraq and immediate universal healthcare and foot-messagers.
I must say, he is articulate. Well, except when it comes to his Tiger Woodish Uncle Tom perception within the black community — but I don’t think this actually exists in anybody serious, so who cares.
Hillary will lose. Hillary will lose. Hillary will lose. All Democrats should say that 500 times a day until your primary is over. Hillary will lose. Nominate Obama - a Hail Mary is better than surrender. Obama may get better with time and since we obviously have some weird synchrony going on - his chances in the general are a complete unknown.
I can’t wait for a President Obama to bomba Osama.
February 12th, 2007 at 3:05 am
I listened to Mr O’s speach. He comes off like he’s our savior. Going to do all these wonderful things - universal healthcare, exit Iraq, bring back unions, more money for education, end global warming, and etc. Of course he doesn’t say how he’s gonna do all that. But if he’s the real savior, doing all that will be simple. I think he needs to get out more.
Nothing like biting off more than you can chew.
February 12th, 2007 at 4:01 pm
Here’s an article on Obama someone of you might appreciate:
http://www.politicsplease.com/2007/02/in-his-continued-quest-to-mold-himself.html
February 12th, 2007 at 7:06 pm
If Obama is really as fresh and a-political as he appears, the Clinton machine will eat him alive. If he’s really a tough-ass politico (with a populist vaneer) capable of being as underhandedly nasty as Clinton’s people will surely be then, well, he’s a fraud.
Maybe I over-estimate the precision of the Clinton machine but does anyone think the “he’s not really black” story is coming from anyone other than Clinton’s black backers? Just saying….
February 26th, 2007 at 5:49 pm
[...] Senator Barack Obama Launches Social Network February 11th, 2007 Senator Barack Obama recently announced that he will be running for president in 2008. Obama has gone a step farther than the other candidates by including his own social network on the BarackObama.com site. Fortunately, Obama’s campaign team spared us a silly name like Obamaster or ObamaSpace. The social network is simply called MyBarackObama. Obama is doing very well on Facebook (thx Bivings Report) but running your own social network is much more complex than having a popular page on MySpace or a popular Facebook group. Mathew Ingram says their is a risk the social networks Obama and other candidates may build in the 2008 race could become Potemkin villages. There is also a good chance Obama’s staff will find themselves wasting time fighting off spammers and trolls that set up MyBarackObama profiles. On the positive side for Senator Obama the social network launch does get them in the news. They might also be able to get a traffic boost from the social network if lots of people starting setting up profiles there. Many of today’s teens and young adults have a transitory connection with the profiles they establish. They like setting up new profiles and trying new social networks so there is a chance this could happen on Obama’s site. More discussion of Obama’s new social network can be found at IP Democracy, Mashable, Drew Meyers, Profy, Blogher and Techmeme. Posted in Politics | Permalink | MyBlogLog Community | Recent Headlines ADVERTISEMENT Visit Writers Write for writing news and writer’s resources. [...]
March 14th, 2007 at 5:48 am
Yeah I’ve heard some good things about Barack Obama. I heard he had an Iraq de-escalation act. Even people who supported the Iraq war when it began, would probably now agree that it resulted badly, with civil unrest and violence still occurring in Iraq: so probably Obama’s policy is favourable, there. I heard he also wanted to improve the schools, and increase literacy rates, and all of that. I guess I’ll have to read what some of his detractors have to say, to learn the negative side. I’m trying to decide whom it would be best to vote for!
April 8th, 2007 at 8:39 pm
I am a seventy-five year old African American man who has been and continues to be enthralled by the presence of Barack Obama on the American political scene. Since his electrifying speech to the Democratic National Convention in 2004 I have seen Senator Obama as a unifying gift in our severely polarized nation. In August, 2006 River’s Bend Press of Stillwater, Minnesota published my first book, When White is Black, which is a memoir of my own mixed race heritage. In the concluding pages of When White is Black (pages 190-191) I note Senator Obama’s powerful reminder in his 2004 keynote address that we are One America. And Barack Obama, the next President of the United States, is the personal embodiment of that reality—one nation indivisible. John A. Martin, Jr.