Let Obama Be Obama

Primetime Politics ^ | March 6, 2008 | Victor Davis Hanson

[Nony]

Liberal Democrats from the North haven’t had much success in recent presidential elections — not Hubert Humphrey, not George McGovern, not Walter Mondale, not Mike Dukakis, and not John Kerry. Democratic southerners — Lyndon Johnson, Jimmy Carter, and Bill Clinton — have done quite a bit better.

Sen. Barack Obama, of Illinois, knows this history. So why does he think he can be the first Northern liberal Democratic president since John F. Kennedy edged out Richard Nixon almost a half-century ago?

First, there is no incumbent president or vice president running for the first time in over 50 years. Add a controversial war, an unpopular incumbent, and a shaky economy, and you’ve got a wide-open race full of voters rethinking things as never before.

Second, as the first African-American candidate to seriously contend for either party’s nomination, Obama offers Americans a sort of collective redemption at home and admiration abroad.

[IMissPresidentReagan]

Seems like a lot of shady happenings occur in West Virgina. I wonder who is currently ahead in WV?

[driftless2]

Let Obama be Obama and also let Michelle Obama be Michelle Obama. I can just see her press conference after her hubby wins the nomination. “Now we can finally challenge that racist, cracker John McCain. And this is still a horrible, mean, racist country. Thank you very much, and please vote for my husband.”

[driftless2]

"working class"

Yes, we live in the New Great Depression. I've seen the bread and soup lines outside my office window full of emaciated, ill-clad people, and it's just awful.

Sorry, for the sarcasm, but middle-class Americans and many "poor" Americans for that matter have it better than well-off people in many first world countries.

[driftless2]

"being raped economically"

You can't be serious.

[paleorite]

—Sorry, for the sarcasm, but middle-class Americans and many “poor” Americans for that matter have it better than well-off people in many first world countries—

Yeah, and we’re not wearing animal skins and hunting mammoths like our ancestors did either (sorry for the sarcasm). Seriously have you not seen the following:

1. College costs
2. Inexplicable rise in food prices
3. Rapacious speculation in energy prices (what are YOU paying for a gallon of gasoline)
4. Offsourcing of good-paying jobs, such jobs are replaced by jobs and McD’s and Wally World.

I could go on, but I think I’ve made my point.

[Nonstatist]

Is the middle and working class being raped economically or is it not?

Raped? Compared to what? Western Europe? Eastern Europe? Madagascar? You got to be kidding me. You havent the slightest idea of what "rape" is if you have to present the "question" like that..And you say Hansen is out of touch...

The "answer" is not more govt control of the "means of production" , as you control junkies might think. The answer is more free markets, less regulations, less red tape, etc. There are free market ideas out there (ie Cato, Heritage proposals,etc) to problems like "health care" if you care to look at them , which it doesent look like you could be bothered with.

[neverdem]

bump & a ping

[tom h]

"Actually, he lost the popular vote by over 100,000,"

Not to prolong this, but Nixon actually won the popular vote totals, also.

It's a little known fact that some of the votes in the South (specifically Alabana )were not specifically for Kennedy but for an unidentified Democrat. The news media routinely put them in Kennedy's column but the story is more complicated than that. See the Wall Street Journal article, linked below. Nixon actually won the popular vote.

http://www.opinionjournal.com/diary/?id=110004320

[Content Provider]

The purpose of the VP quite literally is to establish a line of succession - the VP has no job other than to be the President’s successor. This makes the position ideal for the purpose of a President of one party establishing another member of his party as the natural next elected President. A VP simply has no other job than to study up on what it takes to be the President. You could not craft a better position to groom one’s party’s next candidate.

[baa39]

‘...as the first African-American candidate to seriously contend for either party’s nomination, Obama offers Americans a sort of collective redemption at home...’

Hey, this warrants the old parenthetical “barf alert”!

This need for “collective redemption” from slavery is getting really old. The Emancipation Proclamation was over 140 years ago; I never owned slaves, nor did any of my ancestors. Many of our ancestors DIED freeing the slaves. Get over it already.

[Nonstatist]

It's a little known fact that some of the votes in the South (specifically Alabana )were not specifically for Kennedy but for an unidentified Democrat

Very interesting. I checked , and in other states like Mississippi and Louisiana the votes for unpledged electors is actually tabulated and not credited to either Nixon or Kennedy...In Georgia, however, the only choices on the ballot were Kennedy and Nixon and Kennedy won by a landslide.

I think its obvious that the deep South mistrusted Kennedy but couldnt get themselves to vote for Nixon. Just about every state Kennedy won was by a small margin except for his home state and one or two others. Nixon did well in the midwest and far west , but barely squeaked by in his home state of California.

That election was clearly muddled as well, and I guess Nixon didnt have the stomach for a fight, afterwards. I must say, looking back, I can't see how he lost that election. I'm guessing the (slight) recession of 1960 made all the difference.. Too bad.

[supremedoctrine]

Tell me paleorite, is your computer STILL located in the basement of the DNC?

[paleorite]

No, but maybe VDH’s is. Last I heard he’s still a registered Democrat.

[supremedoctrine]

#25—— there is plenty to lament in Nos. 1-4, and those are “bipartisan” failures neither to be remedied or even brought into focus by the likes of classic Lefty Obama.
Indeed, the ONLY purpoose this laundry list serves for someone like him, is a presentation that he thinks WILL GET HIM ELECTED.
For MOST of them, however, especially # 1, what I would suggest is a mass exodus from the aspirations toward the pricier reaches of “status” Higher Education. What we really need are more and different trade schools, so we’ll have an improved pool of professionals in ALL fields. NOT, ironically, A BUNCH OF UNDERACHIEVING YET GROSSLY OVERPAID
Nouveau Riche ROYALTY LIKE MICHELLE OBAMA WHO ARE STILL ,(AMAZINGLY) COMPLAINING ABOUT THE BURDENS OF HAVING TO REPAY STUDENT LOANS, OF ALL THINGS!!

[paleorite]

My kid is going to a good technical college and will have real trade when she graduates; not some English (or some such) degree from some snooty, overpriced liberal arts school that might get her a job selling shoes after 4 years (not that there’s anything wrong with that!).

I never actually said I was voting for Obama, I’m just saying that politicians who ignore these problems are really ignoring the elephant (no pun on the GOP here!) in the living room. Having lived through the economic horror show that was the 70s, no politician really did much to alleviate that mess either. We escaped for a while, now it’s like the bad dream of the 70s is back, and on steroids!

[bt_dooftlook]

1. College costs - the more they raise prices, the more people apply; if you were a college wouldn't you raise prices, too? And a new government program to make college "affordable" will only drive up the costs faster. In layman's terms, this is market distortion.

2. Why is this inexplicable? Food prices go up when the costs of inputs go up. Now, aside from transportation costs, which are in large measure driven by oil price increases, what else is driving this up? Ah, corn! That's right, it is used as feed for livestock and is the largest source of sweetener in the country. But your gov't decided it was more important to use it for ethanol (e.g. more market distortion) based on a charlatan's claims of "global warming".

3. Oil prices - when was the last time a new refinery was built in this country? Why aren't we drilling in ANWR or off Florida? Why aren't the local, state, and federal gov'ts reducing the obscene taxes placed on this critical resource all along the production chain? How fast is China industrializing, and how much oil are they soaking up to do so? All (except for the last) are market distortions.

4. Outsourcing - now why would a company choose to grow overseas? Well, labor costs might be lower, along with land and health care costs. Now, why are these costs so high here? Well, one common cost of doing business is legal expenses, and we have the highest in the world. Between Sarbanes-Oxley, ADA, civil rights, non-discrimination, etc., there is someone waiting to sue a company whatever they do. These lawsuits cost a lot of time and money; they and the regulations that support them are market distortions.

As others here have posted, the path to a solution lies in reduced government involvement in the economy, not more.

So...what point were you trying to make?

[paleorite]

—College costs - the more they raise prices, the more people apply; if you were a college wouldn’t you raise prices, too? —

If I were a greedy sumbitch who should be shot and fed to hogs, then, yes.

—And a new government program to make college “affordable” will only drive up the costs faster. In layman’s terms, this is market distortion.—

Prices have been rising much faster than inflation, and there have been no new “programs” in years. In layman’s terms, this is price-fixing, antitrust violation etc.

—Why is this inexplicable? Food prices go up when the costs of inputs go up. Now, aside from transportation costs, which are in large measure driven by oil price increases, what else is driving this up? Ah, corn! That’s right, it is used as feed for livestock and is the largest source of sweetener in the country. But your gov’t decided it was more important to use it for ethanol (e.g. more market distortion) based on a charlatan’s claims of “global warming”.—

Retail food prices have been rising far faster than cost of commodities. Oops.

—Oil prices - when was the last time a new refinery was built in this country? Why aren’t we drilling in ANWR or off Florida? Why aren’t the local, state, and federal gov’ts reducing the obscene taxes placed on this critical resource all along the production chain? How fast is China industrializing, and how much oil are they soaking up to do so? All (except for the last) are market distortions.—

The oil companies in the US have not been lobbying very hard to open up ANWR or the coasts either. Why would they want to introduce more oil into the market when that would only bring the price down? If you are selling diamonds, the last thing you want is somebody to open a new mine and flood the market. And those “obscene” taxes on gasoline are the lowest in the industrial world; they haven’t been raised in 15 years, and if they disappeared, our roads would be in even worse shape than they are now.

—Outsourcing - now why would a company choose to grow overseas? Well, labor costs might be lower, along with land and health care costs. Now, why are these costs so high here? Well, one common cost of doing business is legal expenses, and we have the highest in the world. Between Sarbanes-Oxley, ADA, civil rights, non-discrimination, etc., there is someone waiting to sue a company whatever they do. These lawsuits cost a lot of time and money; they and the regulations that support them are market distortions.—

Sure, if I could outsource to a bunch of medieval serfs, that would help my bottom line big time. Look, I respect the free market, but I don’t worship it like a golden calf. Some “conservatives” apparently do.