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Barack Obama Faces An Untested Set Of Hurdles
latimes.com ^ | May 11, 2008 | Doyle Mcmanus and Peter Wallsten

Posted on 05/11/2008 12:53:12 PM PDT by Free ThinkerNY

If he's chosen as the Democratic nominee, his race might be an issue, but experience and social issues loom much larger.

By Doyle Mcmanus and Peter Wallsten, Los Angeles Times Staff Writers

May 11, 2008

WASHINGTON -- For the first time, a major political party is on the brink of choosing an African American as its candidate for president, but when Democratic strategists and other analysts look ahead, they don't see race as Barack Obama's biggest challenge.

They worry more, they say, about other issues: Will swing voters view him as too young? Too inexperienced? Or too liberal?

"I am sure there are people in Missouri that won't vote for Barack Obama because he's black, but there are not that many of them," said Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.), a swing-state leader who endorsed Obama early. "I don't think that's going be a deal breaker."

Instead, she said, Obama's most important test should he lock up the nomination will come from Republican efforts to paint him as an elitist, a social and cultural liberal outside the mainstream of American life. "The key is going to be whether Barack can avoid getting on defense on social 'wedge' issues and can stay on the offense on economic issues," McCaskill said.

(Excerpt) Read more at latimes.com ...


TOPICS: Extended News; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: 2008; obama

1 posted on 05/11/2008 12:53:12 PM PDT by Free ThinkerNY
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To: Free ThinkerNY

The more pictures that I see of this guy..the more that I think he is a little light in his lofers. I’ve never really seen him live on TV.
Anybody seen him live and is it true?


2 posted on 05/11/2008 12:56:56 PM PDT by Oldexpat
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To: Free ThinkerNY
The man is nothing more than a novice naivete nincompoop elitist racists but other than that he couldn't find his butt with 3 hands.
3 posted on 05/11/2008 12:58:35 PM PDT by OKIEDOC (Kalifornia, a red state wannabe. I don't take Ex Lax I just read the New York Times.)
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To: Free ThinkerNY
The man hates white people. His racism, creepy personality, and hatred for the county certainly are “hurdles.” lol
4 posted on 05/11/2008 12:59:49 PM PDT by Vision ("If God so clothes the grass of the field...will He not much more clothe you...?" -Matthew 6:30)
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To: Free ThinkerNY
I am under the impression that Barack Obama's name was misspelled on his birth certificate. The hospital must have accidently left out an "r" in his name.

A quick visit to my trusty dictionary cleared up all misconceptions. Here is what my 'ol Webster says:

Barrack

  • A structure resembling a shed or barn that provides temporary housing
  • Jeer, heckle, to shout at derisively or sarcastically

    Sound accurate?

    Definition complements of Webster's Seventh New Collegiate Dictionary, c.1970


  • 5 posted on 05/11/2008 1:07:42 PM PDT by BloodOrFreedom
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    To: Free ThinkerNY
    "I am sure there are people in Missouri that won't vote for Barack Obama because he's black, but there are not that many of them," said Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.)

    Wow the Democrats are playing the race card on flyover America. Who would of thunk it?

    6 posted on 05/11/2008 1:13:38 PM PDT by rocksblues (Folks we are in trouble, "Mark Levin" 03/26/08)
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    To: Free ThinkerNY
    when Democratic strategists and other analysts look ahead, they don't see race as Barack Obama's biggest challenge.

    What? Ya mean they are going to stop screaming Racist! at every white thing that's not voting for Obama? I'll believe it when I don't hear it.

    Republican strategists are already working to paint [Obama] as a liberal.

    Working to paint.. can't they just get a copy of his community organizing doings, speeches, voting record, friends -- why did the newspaper employee suggest that opponents why to work to paint Obama as a liberal?

    I KNEW IT. As I read through the article and the newspaper employee typed in more and more about race, I knew that before I got to the end there'd be a scream of Racists! -- though somewhat subdued. To wit,

    Given that as recently as 1963 [there] was the stronghold of Southern segregation[.] "It means this campaign is going to be, in part, a running national conversation about race. You can't escape it.

    I have not heard so much race talk out of the MSM employees since the 1960s. Getting things stirred up? A long, hot summer?

    7 posted on 05/11/2008 1:24:15 PM PDT by WilliamofCarmichael (If modern America's Man on Horseback is out there, Get on the damn horse already!)
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    To: Free ThinkerNY

    “Will swing voters view him as too young? Too inexperienced? Or too liberal?”

    And this should prevent anyone from being President? (sarc!)


    8 posted on 05/11/2008 1:39:33 PM PDT by TheBlueMax (A nation that believes in nothing will always lose to an enemy that believes in something.)
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    To: Free ThinkerNY
    Will swing voters view him as too young? Too inexperienced? Or too liberal?... too racist? too muslim? too out-of-touch with main stream Americans?

    You don't spend 20 years in a church of hate and expect people to believe it didn't rub off on you...

    9 posted on 05/11/2008 2:55:47 PM PDT by xtinct (I was the next door neighbor kid's imaginary friend.)
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    To: xtinct

    I don’t think anyone knows who Obama is because he isn’t saying who is and what he stands for. So, we will just have to judge him by his associates, Rev. Wright, Bill Ayers, the recently fired Robert Malley. By the time November gets here, Obama won’t have any associates left, at least not any that we know about.


    10 posted on 05/11/2008 2:59:56 PM PDT by Eva (CHANGE- the post modern euphemism for Marxist revolution.)
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    To: Eva

    Don’t forget mobster, Tony Resko!!!


    11 posted on 05/11/2008 3:01:45 PM PDT by xtinct (I was the next door neighbor kid's imaginary friend.)
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    To: xtinct

    Here’s what the Obama File has to say about Malley, the recently fired adviser:

    Was it a recommendation of Zbigniew Brzezinski to bring Robert Malley, another anti-Israel foreign policy expert, onto Obama’s foreign policy staff?

    Malley’s father, Simon Malley, was born to a Syrian family in Cairo and at an early age found his métier in political journalism. Simon wrote thousands of words in support of the struggle against Western nations. In Paris, he founded the journal Afrique Asie; he and his magazine became advocates for “liberation” struggles throughout the world, particularly for the Palestinians. Simon Malley loathed Israel and anti-Israel activism became a crusade for him — as an internet search would easily show.

    Now, his son, Robert, is following in his father’s footsteps and he represents the next generation of anti-Israel activism, through his writings, that are akin to propaganda. He has written a range of pieces over the years that reveal an agenda at work that should give pause to those Obama supporters who truly care about peace in the Middle Peace and the fate of our ally Israel. He is best known for a controversial series of articles in 2001 blaming Israel and exonerating Arafat for the failure of the Clinton peace efforts.

    Malley is the Director of the Middle East/North Africa Program at the International Crisis Group (ICG). The ICG is funded (in part) by anti-Israel billionaire activist George Soros through his Open Society Institute. Soros serves on its Board and on its Executive Committee. Other members of the Board include Zbigniew Brzezinski (whose anti-Israel credentials are impeccable) and Wesley Clark (who called US support for Israel during the Hezbollah War a “serious mistake”).

    Why would Obama have on his foreign policy staff a man with a record of writing that reveals a willingness to twist facts to serve a political agenda and who has been widely criticized for a revisionist history of the Middle East peace process.

    Why would Obama give credibility to a man who seems to have an agenda that includes empowering our enemies and weakening our friends and allies?


    12 posted on 05/11/2008 3:07:00 PM PDT by Eva (CHANGE- the post modern euphemism for Marxist revolution.)
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    To: Eva
    What's really appalling to me is that Jews for the most part support and vote for the Democrats. I simply don't get that at all.

    Furthermore, Boston colleges and universities are hotbeds of anti-semitic activity... and they're pretty open about it... yet, the liberal Jewish professors ignore it.

    Makes me wonder since I wasn't alive during the Hitler era if the Jews didn't bring about their own fate because they don't seem to stand up for themselves and they keep voting for Democrats who basically hate them... very weird.

    13 posted on 05/11/2008 4:23:57 PM PDT by xtinct (I was the next door neighbor kid's imaginary friend.)
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    To: OKIEDOC
    The man is nothing more than a novice naivete nincompoop elitist racists but other than that he couldn't find his butt with 3 hands.

    He is a rookie on the national level and has made some rookie mistakes but I see no point in underestimating an enemy's talents and strengths.

    The idea that Obama is an "empty suit" is a dangerously misguided one. He has a head full of aggressive and destructive plans he wants to inflict on this nation, and has been deliberately vague about them as a smokescreen.

    Better from his point of view to get elected on Change while taking shots about being nonspecific, than to reveal an agenda which, if publicly known, would get him run out of town.

    14 posted on 05/11/2008 5:22:59 PM PDT by hinckley buzzard
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    To: xtinct

    I can’t really explain it, except that Roosevelt was a Democrat and the Jewish population credit him with saving them during WWII. The Jews in the universities are just as elitist as the rest of the university profs. They think that they are smarter and more modern than the general population, so they buy into the post modernist meta narrative that the US is a hegemonic despot that should be brought down to the level of the rest of the world and Israel right along with it.


    15 posted on 05/11/2008 5:40:59 PM PDT by Eva (CHANGE- the post modern euphemism for Marxist revolution.)
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    To: hinckley buzzard
    Your absolutely right and what you say is not counter to what I previously posted.

    Just because he is a novice, naivete nincompoop elitist racists doesn't mean he is not the most dangerous man of a main stream party to run for office in the last 100 years.

    I don't underestimate him or the folks who are leading this treacherous chameleon by the nose through the maze called politics.

    The Republican party has through ignorance and malaise underestimated it's opposition on many occasions and for that we conservatives are now in a huge growing minority with no real leadership in sight.

    A person willing to take the life of an unborn child would be willing to do just about anything no matter how unethical to gain power.

    I don't wish ill will against one of Gods creatures as is Obama but I would support just about any measure short of violence to stop him from tearing this country apart.

    I don't think John McCaniac has the stomach of the opposition Democrats for doing what is necessary to make sure this guy never makes it to POTUS.

    Just the lowly opinion of a red state wannabe

    16 posted on 05/11/2008 6:42:05 PM PDT by OKIEDOC (Kalifornia, a red state wannabe. I don't take Ex Lax I just read the New York Times.)
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    To: OKIEDOC
    "A person willing to take the life of an unborn child would be willing to do just about anything no matter how unethical to gain power."

    ...and he is more extreme on abortion than any nominee in history.

    17 posted on 05/11/2008 7:17:35 PM PDT by cookcounty (Obama reach across the aisle? He's so far to the left, he'll need a roadmap to FIND the aisle.)
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    To: Oldexpat
    The more pictures that I see of this guy..the more that I think he is a little light in his lofers.

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

    18 posted on 05/11/2008 7:25:49 PM PDT by cynwoody
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    To: Free ThinkerNY

    What accomplishments does he EVEN have?

    He won’t make the first hurdle!


    19 posted on 05/11/2008 7:27:28 PM PDT by Salvation (†With God all things are possible.†)
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    To: cookcounty

    My neighbor is a bigtime Hispanic Catholic and did not know he was for abortion.

    She knows now and is supporting McCaniac.


    20 posted on 05/11/2008 7:33:53 PM PDT by OKIEDOC (Kalifornia, a red state wannabe. I don't take Ex Lax I just read the New York Times.)
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    To: Free ThinkerNY; All

    The key question about an Obama presidency, in my opinion, is can you imagine Obama (or Clinton) as a war-time Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces, which is what he will be? I certainly can’t. That’s why I am planning to vote for McCain.


    21 posted on 05/11/2008 7:42:33 PM PDT by Amendment10
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    To: Free ThinkerNY; All
    As a side note about Obama, as much as people "love" to pay federal taxes, many people probably "donating" more money to the federal government than they give to charity, I'm surprised that we don't hear more of the following pertaining to Obama and constitutionally unauthorized federal spending.

    This post (<-click), while addressing taxes, helps to explain why "constitutional experts" like Senator Obama are actually in contempt of the Constitution that they have sworn to defend, foolishly following in the footsteps of FDR's dirty federal spending politics. In fact, the article referenced below shows that Obama is the #1 federal spending proposer in the Senate for '08; Clinton is #2.

    Obama, a big-shot federal spender
    The people need to reconnect with the Founder's division of federal and state government powers. The people then need to wise up to the major problem that the federal government is not operating within the restraints of the federal Constitution, particularly where constitutionally unauthorized federal spending is concerned.

    The bottom line is that the people need to send big-shot federal spenders like Obama home as opposed to trying to send people like him to the Oval Office. The people need to get in the faces of the feds, demanding a stop to constitutionally unauthorized federal spending while appropriately lowering federal taxes.

    22 posted on 05/11/2008 7:56:04 PM PDT by Amendment10
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