Barack Obama snags the endorsement of La Opinion, LA's large circulation spanish newspaper. John McCain (or "Juan McCain", as Glenn Beck calls him) unsurprisingly gets the nod on the GOP side.
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¡Obama!
02 Feb 2008 09:51 am
Comments (37)
Yo Mama!!
Great youtube piece. I actually think that was his NH speech, which is the one that motivated people to donate to his campaign at its highest level in the month. It was an incredibly inspiring speech, perfect for a narrow loss. Yes We Can!
Here's a passage from the endorsement, using Google Translation:
We were also disappointed in Clinton's calculated opposition to driver's licenses for illegal immigrants, which contrasts with the forcefulness of Obama's arguments in favor of them. We know that this is very controversial, but there is only one correct position and is the Illinois senator's. Both senators support comprehensive immigration reform, but Obama is the only one who pledged to resubmit the bill during his first year in office.
That same commitment to the issue of immigration took Obama in a debate to condemn the malicious lies that are told about them, to explain the need for licenses and defend undocumented students with co-authorship of the DREAM Act in the Legislature. The senator has shown character, maintaining his message despite the antagonism in the political climate.
Awesome youtube video. Many thanks Anna!
With Barack, we get Character.
With Hillary, we get Calculation.
The choice is Clear.
Yes we Can.
It's good to see Obama get some credit for taking that position on drivers' licenses. It's not a popular stand in the country overall. In fact, I'm not sure how I feel about it myself.
But I do agree that the guy shows character. He's a politician, not a saint. But for a politician, he's relatively straight with you, and relatively willing to take unpopular stands -- and even those "relativelys" would be a 100% improvement on the last twenty-eight years of American politics.
Si se puede!
I have noticed from time to time that Clinton seems to have her eyes on the general election a lot more than Obama. That speaks to his genuineness, and her calculating nature. Still, it's not unambiguously a good thing for Democrats, even if it does help Obama secure the nomination in the end. People keep saying that nominating Hillary is "the only way we could conceivably lose the White House in this Democrat-favoring cycle." Well, another way we could lose would be to choose the most liberal possible Senator, load him up with all kinds of choice, easily swift-boatable quotes, and see what happens, especially as John McCain triangulates back to the center. We hear a lot of Obama supporters say they can't possibly vote for Hillary in the general. But don't be so shocked if significant numbers of purple state Reagan democrats can't force themselves to pull the lever for Barack, given a very centrist Republican alternative.
calling him "the most liberal possible senator" partly misses the point.
there's SOMETHING Obama is tapping into in people, that they are responding to--yes, he's probably more liberal than Clinton, yet more indepedents and republicans say they're willing to vote for him.
unless they're ALL lying, then how is he pulling this off if he's so unbearably liberal?
with Obama you get 2-for-1--a guy with pretty firm liberal values, yet is appealing to people outside the base.
I agree that it's a reasonable warning, Jasper. Though I like Obama, I agree that the electability question is an unknown. Really wish National Journal hadn't tagged him "most liberal in 2007." And yet, we keep getting these Republicans who like him -- from Eisenhower's granddaughter to the inimitable Andrew Sullivan.
And McCain really isn't *very* centrist. The same magazines that rate Obama liberal end up rating him rather conservative. He's in trouble with the Republican base for rhetorical reasons, as much as anything --because when he does do something heretical, he won't always do it quietly, but on the contrary, turns it into a moral stand. But in actual fact, he's plenty conservative, and it won't be hard to tie him both to Bush and to the Iraq war. I don't really think the American people want to be in Iraq for another hundred years.
If Obama gets it, I wonder how long before intense buyer's remorse sets in. The elite (Susan Eisenhower) Republicans who Obama appeals to are not at all representative of the working class white people that the Dems
have been hemorraghing since JFK's time, or of "Reagan Democrats" in general. Perhaps when these folks finally start paying attention to the election they'll be as tranfixed as you all with the preppie from paradise with the Muslim name (yes, I know, Barack's a Jeremiah Wright Christian, not a Muslim) but I wouldn't bet on it. BTW, I like Susan Eisenhower.
Maybe, Scott. But Obama can have a pretty broad appeal: he's been winning churchgoers in the primaries. I think he has at least as good a chance of winning those Reagan Democrats back as Hillary. She may be doing well with the Dem. working class because of name recognition, but that name recognition isn't going to help her at all with people who voted Republican in the 90s.
I must be tired. I originally read that as iObama and thought he had gotten the endorsement of Steve Jobs or something.
Scott, you might want to look at the geographic breakdown in Nevada. While Clinton won Las Vegas, Obama had rather strong rural support. Someone over at Sullivan's blog noted that Blue States are basically urban-majority or plurality states and Red States are rural majority or plurality states. If Obama can simultaneously tap into the rural vote in the West and Midwest, the black vote in the South and Midwest (as well as the youth vote everywhere), we could have our biggest win in a while. This is a bit of a big if, but I think he's got a better chance to do this decisively than any other Democrat we've run in decades.
I think it is also an interesting time, perhaps a ripe time, to run a woman or a minority in America. Yes, we still have bigotry in this country. However, we are at a point in our history where the majority of the people in this country know that racism is wrong. Nobody wants to be seen as racist. Supporting Obama has become "what all of the cool kids are doing" in a way that I haven't seen in this country. Nobody under 40 or 50 wants to be the lame guy supporting the old white guy.
Hillary ahead in polls of Feb 5 states -- polls taken after Edwards dropped out. (If polls can be trusted in this election!)
http://www.dailykos .com/story/ 2008/2/2/ 104419/2030/ 244/448255
Anna -- Thanks for the video link. That was awesome.
Lisa -- I think anyone would have to give HRC the edge on Super Tuesday. She has enormous name recognition. That said, the polls are all over the place. There is no question Obama is gaining and impressively.
Totally unscientific survey. My crazy right-wing brother (don't ask me how it happened; mom and dad were liberal Dems, like me) says he'll vote for Obama over McCain. Doesn't know what he'll do if it's Hillary v. McCain. While this is a small sample -- uhm, smallest possible sample -- it seems to confirm a lot of anecdoctal evidence that's out there: the Big O divides the GOP, while reining in some votes from them.
I'm kind of a sucker, but I love that youtube video. Thanks much for posting it.
My $.02 is that Hillary has pretty much reached her ceiling in who will vote for her. Everybody knows who she is. Whereas Obama seems kind of viral, as if every person he connects with is really 1.5 people, because that person's enthusiasm is going to infect someone else. With the Republicans beaten and dispirited, some of them will look away from their nominee, but they won't look to Hillary.
If you look at the head to head matchup polls, Clinton v. McCain and Obama v. McCain, Clinton and Obama are neck and neck. In the latest round, McCain wins by 1.7% over Clinton and 1.1% over Obama. You could say that at this particular snapshot in time, they are statistically equally likely to be able to beat the Republicans.
But we're nine months away from the election. The choice seems pretty clear to me.
(Huh, ~18 comments into a post containing Spanish words, and yet no linkwhoring from the Whackobot. Someone call tech support; his ISP must be down or something...)
This La Opinion endorsement could be a very big boost for Obama's Latino support in CA, reinforcing the Kennedy endorsement. It could reduce the Hillary spread quite a bit.
Since most Latino voters tend to be working-class, they usually don't focus much on politics the way affluent bloggers do. For this reason, they tend to make up their minds during the last week or two of an election campaign, meaning that the endorsement hits in a very timely fashion.
Also, I haven't seen any data, but I'd suspect that Latinos are relatively unlikely to have already voted-by-mail as a very large fraction of the CA electorate does.
On the other hand, I'd bet that part of Obama's endorsement came from his support for giving drivers licenses to illegals, which is about as lethal a political position as you can take in America today. It's unfortunate for him that he had almost no prominent Latino supporters, or they would have never let him do it in a million years.
while the driver's license thing is a deal-breaker to a lot of people(in terms of not supporting Obama because of it), if he goes up against McCain, its not like he has a huge argument, either--both of them are way to the left of the Republican base on immigration, so Obama's position may not cut as deeply as it would if he went up against Romney.
while the driver's license thing is a deal-breaker to a lot of people(in terms of not supporting Obama because of it), if he goes up against McCain, its not like McCain has a huge argument, either--both of them are way to the left of the Republican base on immigration, so Obama's position may not cut as deeply as it would if he went up against Romney.
Rob! - good point about a potential Obama - McCain matchup. Neither one is an immigration hardliner, which sort of nullifies any negatives from the issue. If McCain really is the frontrunner on the GOP side, doesn't that sort of show that a hardline position on immigration isn't quite the political slam-dunk it's assumed to be. I mean, not even the Republicans are going for the "deport 12 million people" scheme.
Just some more anecdotal evidence -- I ride the bus into work every morning down Cesar Chavez Avenue through East L.A. and Boyle Heights. Yesterday morning I noticed a couple of Hillary signs in store windows. But in the evening, coming home, there was a big bunch of young people standing on the corner of Cesar Chavez and Soto St. --- outside the King Taco where L.A. mayor Antonio Villaraigosa took Hillary to eat --- enthusiastically waving Obama signs. It may be a generational divide more than anything else.
One of the things that really worries me about Obama is that he thinks he's knows what's coming from the Republican attack machine, but (unlike Hillary) he doesn't have a clue. Please, please heck out this piece, particularly the second half, from The American Conservative (Pat Buchanan's magazine).http://www.amconmag.com/2008/2008_01_28/article.html I think his idealistic supporters are in for a big shock if he's the nominee.
One of the things that really worries me about Obama is that he thinks he's knows what's coming from the Republican attack machine, but (unlike Hillary) he doesn't have a clue. Please, please check out this piece, particularly the second half, from The American Conservative (Pat Buchanan's magazine).http://www.amconmag.com/2008/2008_01_28/article.html I think his idealistic supporters are in for a big shock if he's the nominee.
rob:
No, I think you're missing the dynamics of a McCain-Obama race...
Basically, 2% or whatever of the electorate---the fervent anti-immigrationists---hate McCain and will never vote for him, so they'll go instead for Ron Paul or whomever. But the vast majority of the Republican base doesn't even know or remember that McCain is an immigrationist heretic, and probably won't find out during the course of a campaign against an even bigger pro-immigrationist. After all, the Democrats can't run millions of dollars of ads blasting McCain as pro-immigration, can they?
On the other hand, the Republicans *will* spend tens of millions of dollars making sure everyone in America knows that a vote for Obama is a vote to give drivers licenses to all the illegal immigrants. And the polling shows it's totally lethal even in NY, maybe the most pro-immigrant large state.
This is exactly what happens when you're a candidate will NO political campaign experience AND also NO knowledge of immigration/Latino issues nor prominent Latino supporters.
People keep saying he has no campaign experience or that he has no idea what he's in for or what the Republicans will throw at him, but, um... if he manages to beat the Clintons, I think that's demonstrative of campaign skill and an implicit acknowledgment that maybe he's not totally clueless about this and is prepared to continue the campaign against the Republicans.
It's not like McCain and his surrogates are necessarily better candidates or campaigners than the Clintons, unless you're viewing elections through a rock-paper-scissors mindset (Clintons beat Republicans, Republicans beat Obama, Obama beats Clintons) which would be sort of a wacky way of evaluating possible outcomes.
I don't know Sheldon. When someone starts talking up Shelby Steele, I just find that it's not worth reading more, so I just have a hard time taking anything they know seriously. The only people who know him are quasi-fascist activists and his major intellectual detractors, so we're talking like 4% of the population at best. And really, the idea that a black man in America has no idea how to handle disgusting racism is a bit naive.
Immigration is one of those issues that seem bigger than they are. The number of people concerned over immigration is about the same in some polls as the number of people concerned over global warming, but very few people vote on that issue. The numbers also often combine the people who are anti-illegal immigrant and the people who are pro-amnesty as "concerned about illegal immigration." The people who are concerned about immigration in the reactionary, racist way are 1) the people who never vote Democratic anyway 2) listen to right-wing radio (the major force pushing the anti-immigration meme onto the MSM) and thus know McCain is heterodox on the issue and 3) have been pushing non-Cuban Latino voters back into the Democratic camp after starting to trend towards the Republicans with Bush's outreach attempts.
>>After all, the Democrats can't run millions of dollars of ads blasting McCain as pro-immigration, can they?
no, they can't, of course you're right about that.
but in a debate, if McCain slams Obama for the DL thing, he can bring up that McCain ain't that far away from that position.
as to what the Republican attack machine will say out Obama, 2 thoughts occur to me:
1)they will say ANYTHING, whether Obama is for it--whatever "it" is--or not
2)we're going to let the Republican attack machine start picking democratic candidates? they probably won't pick the best one. just a hunch.
you don't think they have miles of video tape of Bill saying "i did not have sex with that woman",l the Vince Foster rumors, all of that crap, ready to go? that they'll somehow go EASIER on Hillary?
and, as stated above, if Barack Obama can--in basically a year or two of national exposure--unseat the most famous woman on the planet, i'd say he's got his act together.
its like watching Jesus perform a miracle and then saying "nice miracle. can you do another before i'm fully convinced?"
Reality Man:
I assume you don't live in New York... Maybe you should ask one of your friends who *does* live there why the "drivers licence" issue cost Spitzer something like 30(!) points of support in just a few weeks.
rob:
Why do I strongly suspect that our friend "rob!" also has NO campaign experience...
>>Why do I strongly suspect that our friend "rob!" also has NO campaign experience...
no, i don't. i guess only people with campaign experience can have any opinion on this. after all, the campaign people Rudy hired were pros, and look at the fine job they did!
i thought i was responding to your point with respect even though i don't necessarily share it. thanks for revealing me to be the charlatan i guess i am!
The Scott McConnell article in American Conservative mentioned above seems to be a combination of suggested dirty tricks and wishful thinking. When the author notes that Obama would not appeal to isolationists and bigots, is that not a compliment to Obama? Since America is proud to be called a nation of immigrants, how can Obama be called un-American because of his name and background? Obama's perception of America as a melting-pot is much more American than the writer's version. Only an arch-racist-isolationist could claim that Obama's concern for not only Americans but others in distress around the world is wrong, or that a young person's searching for his roots is a failing. The writer is correct to point out, however, that unlike Hillary, Obama is as yet unknown to most November voters. Indeed, this is why by then he'll win in a landslide.
"I assume you don't live in New York... Maybe you should ask one of your friends who *does* live there why the "drivers licence" issue cost Spitzer something like 30(!) points of support in just a few weeks."
My sister lives in New York, along with a lot of friends. Spitzer was already flailing when the issue came up. The blood was already in the water and he wasn't doing a bang-up job on anything else either. There is also a difference between approval ratings once someone has already been elected (like Spitzer was with a pretty good margin) and getting elected. If Spitzer loses re-election, immigration will only compound his broader problems. Also, a single data point is not a trend. This is an issue that has been filled with hot air by right-wing radio. The hardcore supporters can get by on anger for a long time, but at some point the more casual conservative has to find something new to keep them angry. Also, considering that these very demographics know about McCain's record on immigration because of right-wing radio and only one person can win an election, this doesn't exactly cut in McCain's favor. Not only did her support the legislation, he sponsored the guest worker bill with Ted Kennedy. All Teddy has to do is mention this fact a bunch of times on TV (like how he has reluctantly praised the Governator on TV to keep the family happy) to play his elder statesman who can be friends with Republicans (Hatch most famously) and the message will get across. McCain will have to either blatantly flip-flop and look like a phony to the people who care about the issue or they will have to stay home or vote third party. Obama already beats, on the other hand, McCain on the two biggest issues: Iraq and the economy.
Obama has flip-flopped on: i) legalization of marijuana -- used to be for it, then changed his position once he started running for President; ii) normalization of relations with Cuba -- used to be for it, then he changed his position once he started running for President. These are just two of the issues he's going to get skewered on from the right. BTW, he also was one of the few Dems to actually advocate getting involved in the Terri Schiavi case -- weird. Still gets to me that he voted present all those times on abortion issues when he was from a very safe district -- he didn't have to, but choose to anyway. Also, FYI, one of the reasons the far-right hates McCain is that he's on record as saying that Hillary Clinton would make a good president (he also said that about Kerry). That'll make a good talking point in the general election!
I just scanned the comments above, and it's great that so many are so hopeful. However, let me suggest learning from this: youtube.com/watch?v=9KSzu_lgaX8
There will be future questions for him and others, and they'll be better: youtube.com/watch?v=YRWRzZ_yPnk
As for the post, the publisher of LaOpinion is/was on the board of BankOfAmerica, a bank that's trying to profit from indirect illegal activity. And, in fact, you'll find plenty of links between those on the left who support illegal activity and those in the corporate world who do. Not that any of that matters to MattY, of course.
>>Still gets to me that he voted present all those times on abortion issues when he was from a very safe district -- he didn't have to, but choose to anyway.
ABC News' Teddy Davis Reports: When Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., voted "present," rather than "yes" or "no" on a handful of controversial abortion votes in the Illinois state senate, he did so with the explicit support of the president and CEO of Illinois Planned Parenthood Council.
"We at Planned Parenthood view those as leadership votes," Pam Sutherland, the president and CEO of the Illinois Planned Parenthood Council, told ABC News. "We worked with him specifically on his strategy. The Republicans were in control of the Illinois Senate at the time. They loved to hold votes on 'partial birth' and 'born alive'. They put these bills out all the time . . . because they wanted to pigeonhole Democrats."
Speaking to ABC News as Obama was preparing to join Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., and the wife of Sen. John Edwards, D-N.C., in addressing Planned Parenthood’s national conference in Washington, D.C., Sutherland said Obama approached her in the late 1990s and worked with her and others in crafting the strategy of voting "present." She remembers meeting with Obama outside of the Illinois Senate chambers on the Democratic side of the aisle. She and Obama finished their conversation in his office.
"He came to me and said: 'My members are being attacked. We need to figure out a way to protect members and to protect women,'" said Sutherland in recounting her conversation with Obama. "A 'present' vote was hard to pigeonhole which is exactly what Obama wanted."
The kind of hardball Clinton played against Obama (and I don't think she did much) is kid stuff compared to what the Republicans - and, worse, their Swiftboating allies - will throw at him. And he will be defined by them a lot sooner than he will be able to define himself to those who don't yet know him. The wind behind the Democrats this year may yet overcome the Rove-like machine, but anyone who thinks this will be a landslide is, in my opinion, dreaming.
Hillary accuses Obama of not being "vetted" and talks about how she's "still here" after all the scandels, etc. But Clinton campaign operatives have been digging into Obama's past with a fine tooth comb. (They even went to his kindergarten to try and dig up dirt on him !!!).
AND GUESS WHAT !!! They found virtually NOTHING bad about him. So, even the Clinton machine, with all it's connections and it's willingness to go to extreme (and probably illegal) lengths hasn't been able to successfully attack Obama.
What does this tell you?? It tells me that there ISN'T A LOT OF DIRT TO FIND OUT ABOUT OBAMA !!! It tells me he's led a good, ethical and productive life. PERIOD.
Contrast this with the Clintons. Scandel after scandel. Malfeasences galore. SLEEZE.... bimbos and trailer trash. IMPEACHMENT. Accusations of sexual assault and rape. Illegal commodity trading. Whitewater. Filegate. Travelgate. Pardongate. Renting out the Lincoln bedroom. Stealing White House property when leaving the White House. OH MY GOD, I could go on and on and on.
Comments closed February 16, 2008.
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Heads in the Sand
This is an awesome endorsement. The Editorial board did NOT like Hillary's immigration answer, and they said as much in the piece so I think that's what cinched it for Obama.
In other good news for the Barackster, everyone has to check out this amazing video that was released last night. It's sure to go viral (and already kinda has) and shows Baracks South Carolina speech made as a song. Features various celebrities. It's pretty awesome.
Youtube Link:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uHA_ZTvOgUM
Posted by Anna | February 2, 2008 10:04 AM