US Election 2008

[Monkeys Fist 41317]

Told you I was thick

[ChezGiven 0]

Wll you've learnt nothing from the analysis then, most political commentators are putting the victory down to the huge investiments spent in tactical county battles in the key states. The sound-biters are talking credit-crunch/Palin. 48% of the country still voted Republican after the almighty mess they created and taking the hit for the financial collapse. 48%!

 

Obama had a huge task and if he had tried to appear anythign other than a centrist american politician he could have lost the election. This wasnt the same for Clinton whose political equity and ground-level constituency are completely different to Obama's.

 

What did this opportunity look like? What were the practical steps he could have taken to realise this?

 

 

As you know money makes the world go round, $600m to $300 was never going to be a fair fight.

 

He just had to not lose after Hilary.

 

 

 

How does that answer the question, they dont even address the same concepts? How does the difference between McCain's budget and Obama's reflect on his missed opportunity?

 

Obama raised that money through his powerful campaigning, he got that money in republican counties, where demoscrats never campaigned before. Clinton wouldnt have done that or needed to.

 

Obama had a harder job of becoming president than Clinton would have due to her appeal to the white working class (an enormous demographic). That is a ridiculous position? Only if you're stupid.

 

Stop deflecting the debate too, if you cant handle it, post in another thread.

 

Hilary would have had a harder job beating McCain, I think she'd have won but it would have been closer.

 

I don't even know what you're arguing about now, like I said Hilary was Obama's biggest issue, once he beat her he just had to not make any mistakes to beat McCain. His hard part was earlier in the year.

 

You can argue all you want that about that, and that Obama's 2:1 funding ratio over McCain made no difference, but it's a just a plain silly position form you.

 

I wasnt arguing that, perhaps if you slowed down with the trying too hard quippery you might read a post or two and reflect on the point. Obama's funds were measured at the end of the process, months after Clinton was out of the race, reflecting his campaigning (i.e fund-raising as this is obviously lost on you) in republican counties.

 

I'm saying he needed to raise that as thats what it took to win.

 

Fair enough though, got a clear opinion, you think it was easier for Obama than it would have been for Clinton. I disagree but thats not a problem.

 

I do think that the effort the Democratic strategists put into fund-raising (which essentially pays for people to go into areas to drum up support and things like the massive Florida campaign 4 weeks ago) shows that the best judges of that question thought it was a way from being in the bag right to the end.

 

I'll derive my opinion from the Democratic strategists.

 

If Obama beat Hilary how would it have been easier for Hilary to beat McCain? Hilary is a divisive figure in herself.

 

Obama beat Hilary on the funding stakes too didn't he? Although she raised a massive amount and the total amount spent this year has gone through the roof, $1.5b or something.

 

And I still don't understand why you think McCain was the front runner? He clearly wasn't. At best he had to run a perfect campaign with no mistakes and a couple of big hammer blows for a tight victory.

 

Hilary is white.

 

I never said he was a front-runner, i said america is the most socially conservative democracy on the planet.

 

There, answered yours, where are the answers to my questions (bolded above)?

[Kevin Carr's Gloves 3707]

Hilary Clinton would never have won the presidential election due to the Whitewater & travelgate scandals which are still not fully resolved.

[manc-mag 1]

Fop comes out of this election campaign looking like a right dick!

[ChezGiven 0]

Hilary Clinton would never have won the presidential election due to the Whitewater & travelgate scandals which are still not fully resolved.

 

Was she linked to 60's terrorists groups too?

[Guest alex]

Also, if it had been Clinton v McCain and the Republicans wanted to do a dirty tricks campaign they'd have been opening a can of worms with the latter's links to Contras and Palin's somewhat dodgy religious views and her expenses irregularities so it's not like either side would be 'whiter than white'

Edited November 6, 2008 by alex

[manc-mag 1]

Also, if it had been Clinton v McCain and the Republicans wanted to do a dirty tricks campaign they'd have been opening a can of worms with the latter's links to Contras and Palin's somewhat dodgy religious views and her expenses irregularities so it's not like either side would be 'whiter than white'

 

Pun intended I hope.

[Guest alex]

Also, if it had been Clinton v McCain and the Republicans wanted to do a dirty tricks campaign they'd have been opening a can of worms with the latter's links to Contras and Palin's somewhat dodgy religious views and her expenses irregularities so it's not like either side would be 'whiter than white'

 

Pun intended I hope.

[Happy Face 29]

Hilary Clinton would never have won the presidential election due to the Whitewater & travelgate scandals which are still not fully resolved.

 

I disagree. Even John Kerry would have won this time if you ask me. The average winning margin for each of the states Obama won was 17%. That might have been lower for Clinton, but the basic result would still have been 'not Republican'.

[ChezGiven 0]

So was it harder for Obama to enter the Whitehouse than for other Democrats because he is black?

[Happy Face 29]

Fuel for Fops fire....

 

Dear Senator Obama:

 

In your nearly two-year presidential campaign, the words "hope and change," "change and hope" have been your trademark declarations. Yet there is an asymmetry between those objectives and your political character that succumbs to contrary centers of power that want not "hope and change" but the continuation of the power-entrenched status quo.

 

Far more than Senator McCain, you have received enormous, unprecedented contributions from corporate interests, Wall Street interests and, most interestingly, big corporate law firm attorneys. Never before has a Democratic nominee for President achieved this supremacy over his Republican counterpart. Why, apart from your unconditional vote for the $700 billion Wall Street bailout, are these large corporate interests investing so much in Senator Obama? Could it be that in your state Senate record, your U.S. Senate record and your presidential campaign record (favoring nuclear power, coal plants, offshore oil drilling, corporate subsidies including the 1872 Mining Act and avoiding any comprehensive program to crack down on the corporate crime wave and the bloated, wasteful military budget, for example) you have shown that you are their man?

 

To advance change and hope, the presidential persona requires character, courage, integrity-- not expediency, accommodation and short-range opportunism. Take, for example, your transformation from an articulate defender of Palestinian rights in Chicago before your run for the U.S. Senate to an acolyte, a dittoman for the hard-line AIPAC lobby, which bolsters the militaristic oppression, occupation, blockage, colonization and land-water seizures over the years of the Palestinian peoples and their shrunken territories in the West Bank and Gaza. Eric Alterman summarized numerous polls in a December 2007 issue of The Nation magazine showing that AIPAC policies are opposed by a majority of Jewish-Americans.

 

You know quite well that only when the U.S. Government supports the Israeli and Palestinian peace movements, that years ago worked out a detailed two-state solution (which is supported by a majority of Israelis and Palestinians), will there be a chance for a peaceful resolution of this 60-year plus conflict. Yet you align yourself with the hard-liners, so much so that in your infamous, demeaning speech to the AIPAC convention right after you gained the nomination of the Democratic Party, you supported an "undivided Jerusalem," and opposed negotiations with Hamas-- the elected government in Gaza. Once again, you ignored the will of the Israeli people who, in a March 1, 2008 poll by the respected newspaper Haaretz, showed that 64% of Israelis favored "direct negotiations with Hamas." Siding with the AIPAC hard-liners is what one of the many leading Palestinians advocating dialogue and peace with the Israeli people was describing when he wrote "Anti-semitism today is the persecution of Palestinian society by the Israeli state."

 

During your visit to Israel this summer, you scheduled a mere 45 minutes of your time for Palestinians with no news conference, and no visit to Palestinian refugee camps that would have focused the media on the brutalization of the Palestinians. Your trip supported the illegal, cruel blockade of Gaza in defiance of international law and the United Nations charter. You focused on southern Israeli casualties which during the past year have totaled one civilian casualty to every 400 Palestinian casualties on the Gaza side. Instead of a statesmanship that decried all violence and its replacement with acceptance of the Arab League's 2002 proposal to permit a viable Palestinian state within the 1967 borders in return for full economic and diplomatic relations between Arab countries and Israel, you played the role of a cheap politician, leaving the area and Palestinians with the feeling of much shock and little awe.

 

David Levy, a former Israeli peace negotiator, described your trip succinctly: "There was almost a willful display of indifference to the fact that there are two narratives here. This could serve him well as a candidate, but not as a President."

 

Palestinian American commentator, Ali Abunimah, noted that Obama did not utter a single criticism of Israel, "of its relentless settlement and wall construction, of the closures that make life unlivable for millions of Palestinians. ...Even the Bush administration recently criticized Israeli's use of cluster bombs against Lebanese civilians [see www.atfl.org for elaboration]. But Obama defended Israeli's assault on Lebanon as an exercise of its 'legitimate right to defend itself.'"

 

In numerous columns Gideon Levy, writing in Haaretz, strongly criticized the Israeli government's assault on civilians in Gaza, including attacks on "the heart of a crowded refugee camp... with horrible bloodshed" in early 2008.

 

Israeli writer and peace advocate-- Uri Avnery-- described Obama's appearance before AIPAC as one that "broke all records for obsequiousness and fawning, adding that Obama "is prepared to sacrifice the most basic American interests. After all, the US has a vital interest in achieving an Israeli-Palestinian peace that will allow it to find ways to the hearts of the Arab masses from Iraq to Morocco. Obama has harmed his image in the Muslim world and mortgaged his future-- if and when he is elected president.," he said, adding, "Of one thing I am certain: Obama's declarations at the AIPAC conference are very, very bad for peace. And what is bad for peace is bad for Israel, bad for the world and bad for the Palestinian people."

 

A further illustration of your deficiency of character is the way you turned your back on the Muslim-Americans in this country. You refused to send surrogates to speak to voters at their events. Having visited numerous churches and synagogues, you refused to visit a single Mosque in America. Even George W. Bush visited the Grand Mosque in Washington D.C. after 9/11 to express proper sentiments of tolerance before a frightened major religious group of innocents.

 

Although the New York Times published a major article on June 24, 2008 titled "Muslim Voters Detect a Snub from Obama" (by Andrea Elliott), citing examples of your aversion to these Americans who come from all walks of life, who serve in the armed forces and who work to live the American dream. Three days earlier the International Herald Tribune published an article by Roger Cohen titled "Why Obama Should Visit a Mosque." None of these comments and reports change your political bigotry against Muslim-Americans-- even though your father was a Muslim from Kenya.

 

Perhaps nothing illustrated your utter lack of political courage or even the mildest version of this trait than your surrendering to demands of the hard-liners to prohibit former president Jimmy Carter from speaking at the Democratic National Convention. This is a tradition for former presidents and one accorded in prime time to Bill Clinton this year.

 

Here was a President who negotiated peace between Israel and Egypt, but his recent book pressing the dominant Israeli superpower to avoid Apartheid of the Palestinians and make peace was all that it took to sideline him. Instead of an important address to the nation by Jimmy Carter on this critical international problem, he was relegated to a stroll across the stage to "tumultuous applause," following a showing of a film about the Carter Center's post-Katrina work. Shame on you, Barack Obama!

 

But then your shameful behavior has extended to many other areas of American life. (See the factual analysis by my running mate, Matt Gonzalez, on www.votenader.org). You have turned your back on the 100-million poor Americans composed of poor whites, African-Americans, and Latinos. You always mention helping the "middle class" but you omit, repeatedly, mention of the "poor" in America.

 

Should you be elected President, it must be more than an unprecedented upward career move following a brilliantly unprincipled campaign that spoke "change" yet demonstrated actual obeisance to the concentration power of the "corporate supremacists." It must be about shifting the power from the few to the many. It must be a White House presided over by a black man who does not turn his back on the downtrodden here and abroad but challenges the forces of greed, dictatorial control of labor, consumers and taxpayers, and the militarization of foreign policy. It must be a White House that is transforming of American politics-- opening it up to the public funding of elections (through voluntary approaches)-- and allowing smaller candidates to have a chance to be heard on debates and in the fullness of their now restricted civil liberties. Call it a competitive democracy.

 

Your presidential campaign again and again has demonstrated cowardly stands. "Hope" some say springs eternal." But not when "reality" consumes it daily.

 

Sincerely,

Ralph Nader

 

Ralph articulates valid criticism better than Fop like.

 

Went on Fox News and questioned whether Obama would be an "Uncle Tom" too.

[Guest alex]

Interesting piece.

[NJS 4252]

The bit about constant referrals to the middle class echoes British politics - they know thats where elections are won and any talk of helping the poor angers that demographic.

 

I'm sure Fop will love the bit about him not visiting Mosques.

[ChezGiven 0]

Harsh words from him but then there are a few who have harsh words about him, in particular the people who work or contribute to Public Citizen, the organisation he founded;

 

In the aftermath of Nader's role in the 2000 presidential election, Public Citizen has disassocicated itself from its founder. Wrote Mother Jones, "For evidence of how rank-and-file liberals have turned against Nader, one need look no further than the empire he created. Public Citizen, the organization (Nader) founded in 1971, has a new fundraising problem—its founder. After the election, contributions dropped... When people inquire about Nader's relationship to the organization, Public Citizen sends out a letter that begins with a disclaimer: 'Although Ralph Nader was our founder, he has not held an official position in the organization since 1980 and does not serve on the board. Public Citizen—and the other groups that Mr. Nader founded–act independently.

[Happy Face 29]

Harsh words from him but then there are a few who have harsh words about him, in particular the people who work or contribute to Public Citizen, the organisation he founded;

 

In the aftermath of Nader's role in the 2000 presidential election, Public Citizen has disassocicated itself from its founder. Wrote Mother Jones, "For evidence of how rank-and-file liberals have turned against Nader, one need look no further than the empire he created. Public Citizen, the organization (Nader) founded in 1971, has a new fundraising problem—its founder. After the election, contributions dropped... When people inquire about Nader's relationship to the organization, Public Citizen sends out a letter that begins with a disclaimer: 'Although Ralph Nader was our founder, he has not held an official position in the organization since 1980 and does not serve on the board. Public Citizen—and the other groups that Mr. Nader founded–act independently.

 

Like Michael Moore, Nader might be a twat, but the squinty eyed stupid voiced goon appeals to my wooly liberal sensibility.

[spongebob toonpants 3845]

Also, if it had been Clinton v McCain and the Republicans wanted to do a dirty tricks campaign they'd have been opening a can of worms with the latter's links to Contras and Palin's somewhat dodgy religious views and her expenses irregularities so it's not like either side would be 'whiter than white'

 

 

Rolling Stone McCain article Long but interesting

[spongebob toonpants 3845]

Harsh words from him but then there are a few who have harsh words about him, in particular the people who work or contribute to Public Citizen, the organisation he founded;

 

In the aftermath of Nader's role in the 2000 presidential election, Public Citizen has disassocicated itself from its founder. Wrote Mother Jones, "For evidence of how rank-and-file liberals have turned against Nader, one need look no further than the empire he created. Public Citizen, the organization (Nader) founded in 1971, has a new fundraising problem—its founder. After the election, contributions dropped... When people inquire about Nader's relationship to the organization, Public Citizen sends out a letter that begins with a disclaimer: 'Although Ralph Nader was our founder, he has not held an official position in the organization since 1980 and does not serve on the board. Public Citizen—and the other groups that Mr. Nader founded–act independently.

 

Like Michael Moore, Nader might be a twat, but the squinty eyed stupid voiced goon appeals to my wooly liberal sensibility.

 

 

twat imo

 

[Tom 14000]

Just picked this up from 365

 

[Happy Face 29]

Harsh words from him but then there are a few who have harsh words about him, in particular the people who work or contribute to Public Citizen, the organisation he founded;

 

In the aftermath of Nader's role in the 2000 presidential election, Public Citizen has disassocicated itself from its founder. Wrote Mother Jones, "For evidence of how rank-and-file liberals have turned against Nader, one need look no further than the empire he created. Public Citizen, the organization (Nader) founded in 1971, has a new fundraising problem—its founder. After the election, contributions dropped... When people inquire about Nader's relationship to the organization, Public Citizen sends out a letter that begins with a disclaimer: 'Although Ralph Nader was our founder, he has not held an official position in the organization since 1980 and does not serve on the board. Public Citizen—and the other groups that Mr. Nader founded–act independently.

 

Like Michael Moore, Nader might be a twat, but the squinty eyed stupid voiced goon appeals to my wooly liberal sensibility.

 

 

twat imo

 

 

Legend man, he's just repeating what Harry Belafonte asked of Colin Powell and Condoleeza Rice.

[Ken 119]

Also, if it had been Clinton v McCain and the Republicans wanted to do a dirty tricks campaign they'd have been opening a can of worms with the latter's links to Contras and Palin's somewhat dodgy religious views and her expenses irregularities so it's not like either side would be 'whiter than white'

There's a lot of dirt that will be dug up on her apparently in the next week or so. FOX News have already begun. Among other things, she couldn't name the countries in NAFTA, and, thought Africa was a country as opposed to a continent and South Africa was just the southern part of the country of Africa.

She was warned by her advisers not to do an interview with Katie Curic on CBS, but didn't heed those warnings and she ended up looking like a fool. She blamed her advisers for being asked the wrong questions - questions on topics she had no idea about. Apparently the last three to four weeks of the campaign she really lost it. She went mental.

 

Looks like she's the blame.

[Meenzer 15111]

Everything's coming up mavericky.

 

Like I said umpteen pages ago, I still feel a bit sorry for McCain - a decent enough man (by politician standards, anyway) who was tempted into biting the Repug apple for the sake of one last shot at the big time, only to find that it was full of worms. Freaky worms that were several times bigger than him.

 

This analogy is awful. Sorry.

[Ken 119]

So was it harder for Obama to enter the Whitehouse than for other Democrats because he is black?

No, nothing to do with race imo. The Republican party self-imploded no thanks to the radical ideology of the neo-conservative movement who have been running the show the last 8 years. They lost the vote of the minorities (eg latinos) and the younger generation who were were sick to death of the borrow-and spend policies that funded things like war. The Wall St crash came at the most perfect time too for the Democrats. If the Republicans don't want to sink further into obscurity, they will have to move toward the center. It''ll take more than one term for them to recover from the Bush Administration's blunders.

 

I agree that John Kerry, Hillary Clinton or Al Gore could have won this election. But that isn't taking away anything from Barack Obama. His ability to inspire ensured that people, who otherwise wouldn't have bothered to vote would be willing to wait 5 hours in a line to vote for him. This is something the others wouldn't have been able to do. He has made himself out to be the man of the people and for the people. He is the breath of fresh air that America and the world desperately needs.

Edited November 7, 2008 by Ken

[Meenzer 15111]

The Wall St crash came at the most perfect time too for the Democrats.

Undoubtedly. At least in terms of winning the election - in hindsight, they might end up wishing they'd lost it and condemned the Republicans to having to deal with the fallout, because it's only going to get uglier. The Dems could have triumphed in 2012 and become unbeatable for a generation. But them's the breaks, I guess.

[Ken 119]

The Wall St crash came at the most perfect time too for the Democrats.

Undoubtedly. At least in terms of winning the election - in hindsight, they might end up wishing they'd lost it and condemned the Republicans to having to deal with the fallout, because it's only going to get uglier. The Dems could have triumphed in 2012 and become unbeatable for a generation. But them's the breaks, I guess.

You could look at it that way - or you could look at it like Obama will get the longest honeymoon period of any President in recent history because of the economy and Wall St crash. He will have his critics from the very beginning like FOX News, but most publications and media outlets will go easy on him, or at least I think they could, because there are no quick fixes to the issues facing Obama and his new administration.

[Fop 1]

Wll you've learnt nothing from the analysis then, most political commentators are putting the victory down to the huge investiments spent in tactical county battles in the key states. The sound-biters are talking credit-crunch/Palin. 48% of the country still voted Republican after the almighty mess they created and taking the hit for the financial collapse. 48%!

 

Obama had a huge task and if he had tried to appear anythign other than a centrist american politician he could have lost the election. This wasnt the same for Clinton whose political equity and ground-level constituency are completely different to Obama's.

 

What did this opportunity look like? What were the practical steps he could have taken to realise this?

 

 

As you know money makes the world go round, $600m to $300 was never going to be a fair fight.

 

He just had to not lose after Hilary.

 

 

 

How does that answer the question, they dont even address the same concepts? How does the difference between McCain's budget and Obama's reflect on his missed opportunity?

 

Obama raised that money through his powerful campaigning, he got that money in republican counties, where demoscrats never campaigned before. Clinton wouldnt have done that or needed to.

 

Obama had a harder job of becoming president than Clinton would have due to her appeal to the white working class (an enormous demographic). That is a ridiculous position? Only if you're stupid.

 

Stop deflecting the debate too, if you cant handle it, post in another thread.

 

Hilary would have had a harder job beating McCain, I think she'd have won but it would have been closer.

 

I don't even know what you're arguing about now, like I said Hilary was Obama's biggest issue, once he beat her he just had to not make any mistakes to beat McCain. His hard part was earlier in the year.

 

You can argue all you want that about that, and that Obama's 2:1 funding ratio over McCain made no difference, but it's a just a plain silly position form you.

 

I wasnt arguing that, perhaps if you slowed down with the trying too hard quippery you might read a post or two and reflect on the point. Obama's funds were measured at the end of the process, months after Clinton was out of the race, reflecting his campaigning (i.e fund-raising as this is obviously lost on you) in republican counties.

 

I'm saying he needed to raise that as thats what it took to win.

 

Fair enough though, got a clear opinion, you think it was easier for Obama than it would have been for Clinton. I disagree but thats not a problem.

 

I do think that the effort the Democratic strategists put into fund-raising (which essentially pays for people to go into areas to drum up support and things like the massive Florida campaign 4 weeks ago) shows that the best judges of that question thought it was a way from being in the bag right to the end.

 

I'll derive my opinion from the Democratic strategists.

 

If Obama beat Hilary how would it have been easier for Hilary to beat McCain? Hilary is a divisive figure in herself.

 

Obama beat Hilary on the funding stakes too didn't he? Although she raised a massive amount and the total amount spent this year has gone through the roof, $1.5b or something.

 

And I still don't understand why you think McCain was the front runner? He clearly wasn't. At best he had to run a perfect campaign with no mistakes and a couple of big hammer blows for a tight victory.

 

Hilary is white.

 

I never said he was a front-runner, i said america is the most socially conservative democracy on the planet.

 

There, answered yours, where are the answers to my questions (bolded above)?

 

And Hilary was his biggest obstacle, so we agree now that you've come around to my point of view.

 

Fop comes out of this election campaign looking like a right dick!

You keep trying, even though you never get anywhere, there's that fighting spirit!

 

 

Hilary Clinton would never have won the presidential election due to the Whitewater & travelgate scandals which are still not fully resolved.

 

I disagree. Even John Kerry would have won this time if you ask me. The average winning margin for each of the states Obama won was 17%. That might have been lower for Clinton, but the basic result would still have been 'not Republican'.

 

Yup, anyone but Bush would have won, but for Obama his biggest threat was Hilary, never McCain.

 

Fuel for Fops fire....

 

Dear Senator Obama:

 

In your nearly two-year presidential campaign, the words "hope and change," "change and hope" have been your trademark declarations. Yet there is an asymmetry between those objectives and your political character that succumbs to contrary centers of power that want not "hope and change" but the continuation of the power-entrenched status quo.

 

Far more than Senator McCain, you have received enormous, unprecedented contributions from corporate interests, Wall Street interests and, most interestingly, big corporate law firm attorneys. Never before has a Democratic nominee for President achieved this supremacy over his Republican counterpart. Why, apart from your unconditional vote for the $700 billion Wall Street bailout, are these large corporate interests investing so much in Senator Obama? Could it be that in your state Senate record, your U.S. Senate record and your presidential campaign record (favoring nuclear power, coal plants, offshore oil drilling, corporate subsidies including the 1872 Mining Act and avoiding any comprehensive program to crack down on the corporate crime wave and the bloated, wasteful military budget, for example) you have shown that you are their man?

 

To advance change and hope, the presidential persona requires character, courage, integrity-- not expediency, accommodation and short-range opportunism. Take, for example, your transformation from an articulate defender of Palestinian rights in Chicago before your run for the U.S. Senate to an acolyte, a dittoman for the hard-line AIPAC lobby, which bolsters the militaristic oppression, occupation, blockage, colonization and land-water seizures over the years of the Palestinian peoples and their shrunken territories in the West Bank and Gaza. Eric Alterman summarized numerous polls in a December 2007 issue of The Nation magazine showing that AIPAC policies are opposed by a majority of Jewish-Americans.

 

You know quite well that only when the U.S. Government supports the Israeli and Palestinian peace movements, that years ago worked out a detailed two-state solution (which is supported by a majority of Israelis and Palestinians), will there be a chance for a peaceful resolution of this 60-year plus conflict. Yet you align yourself with the hard-liners, so much so that in your infamous, demeaning speech to the AIPAC convention right after you gained the nomination of the Democratic Party, you supported an "undivided Jerusalem," and opposed negotiations with Hamas-- the elected government in Gaza. Once again, you ignored the will of the Israeli people who, in a March 1, 2008 poll by the respected newspaper Haaretz, showed that 64% of Israelis favored "direct negotiations with Hamas." Siding with the AIPAC hard-liners is what one of the many leading Palestinians advocating dialogue and peace with the Israeli people was describing when he wrote "Anti-semitism today is the persecution of Palestinian society by the Israeli state."

 

During your visit to Israel this summer, you scheduled a mere 45 minutes of your time for Palestinians with no news conference, and no visit to Palestinian refugee camps that would have focused the media on the brutalization of the Palestinians. Your trip supported the illegal, cruel blockade of Gaza in defiance of international law and the United Nations charter. You focused on southern Israeli casualties which during the past year have totaled one civilian casualty to every 400 Palestinian casualties on the Gaza side. Instead of a statesmanship that decried all violence and its replacement with acceptance of the Arab League's 2002 proposal to permit a viable Palestinian state within the 1967 borders in return for full economic and diplomatic relations between Arab countries and Israel, you played the role of a cheap politician, leaving the area and Palestinians with the feeling of much shock and little awe.

 

David Levy, a former Israeli peace negotiator, described your trip succinctly: "There was almost a willful display of indifference to the fact that there are two narratives here. This could serve him well as a candidate, but not as a President."

 

Palestinian American commentator, Ali Abunimah, noted that Obama did not utter a single criticism of Israel, "of its relentless settlement and wall construction, of the closures that make life unlivable for millions of Palestinians. ...Even the Bush administration recently criticized Israeli's use of cluster bombs against Lebanese civilians [see www.atfl.org for elaboration]. But Obama defended Israeli's assault on Lebanon as an exercise of its 'legitimate right to defend itself.'"

 

In numerous columns Gideon Levy, writing in Haaretz, strongly criticized the Israeli government's assault on civilians in Gaza, including attacks on "the heart of a crowded refugee camp... with horrible bloodshed" in early 2008.

 

Israeli writer and peace advocate-- Uri Avnery-- described Obama's appearance before AIPAC as one that "broke all records for obsequiousness and fawning, adding that Obama "is prepared to sacrifice the most basic American interests. After all, the US has a vital interest in achieving an Israeli-Palestinian peace that will allow it to find ways to the hearts of the Arab masses from Iraq to Morocco. Obama has harmed his image in the Muslim world and mortgaged his future-- if and when he is elected president.," he said, adding, "Of one thing I am certain: Obama's declarations at the AIPAC conference are very, very bad for peace. And what is bad for peace is bad for Israel, bad for the world and bad for the Palestinian people."

 

A further illustration of your deficiency of character is the way you turned your back on the Muslim-Americans in this country. You refused to send surrogates to speak to voters at their events. Having visited numerous churches and synagogues, you refused to visit a single Mosque in America. Even George W. Bush visited the Grand Mosque in Washington D.C. after 9/11 to express proper sentiments of tolerance before a frightened major religious group of innocents.

 

Although the New York Times published a major article on June 24, 2008 titled "Muslim Voters Detect a Snub from Obama" (by Andrea Elliott), citing examples of your aversion to these Americans who come from all walks of life, who serve in the armed forces and who work to live the American dream. Three days earlier the International Herald Tribune published an article by Roger Cohen titled "Why Obama Should Visit a Mosque." None of these comments and reports change your political bigotry against Muslim-Americans-- even though your father was a Muslim from Kenya.

 

Perhaps nothing illustrated your utter lack of political courage or even the mildest version of this trait than your surrendering to demands of the hard-liners to prohibit former president Jimmy Carter from speaking at the Democratic National Convention. This is a tradition for former presidents and one accorded in prime time to Bill Clinton this year.

 

Here was a President who negotiated peace between Israel and Egypt, but his recent book pressing the dominant Israeli superpower to avoid Apartheid of the Palestinians and make peace was all that it took to sideline him. Instead of an important address to the nation by Jimmy Carter on this critical international problem, he was relegated to a stroll across the stage to "tumultuous applause," following a showing of a film about the Carter Center's post-Katrina work. Shame on you, Barack Obama!

 

But then your shameful behavior has extended to many other areas of American life. (See the factual analysis by my running mate, Matt Gonzalez, on www.votenader.org). You have turned your back on the 100-million poor Americans composed of poor whites, African-Americans, and Latinos. You always mention helping the "middle class" but you omit, repeatedly, mention of the "poor" in America.

 

Should you be elected President, it must be more than an unprecedented upward career move following a brilliantly unprincipled campaign that spoke "change" yet demonstrated actual obeisance to the concentration power of the "corporate supremacists." It must be about shifting the power from the few to the many. It must be a White House presided over by a black man who does not turn his back on the downtrodden here and abroad but challenges the forces of greed, dictatorial control of labor, consumers and taxpayers, and the militarization of foreign policy. It must be a White House that is transforming of American politics-- opening it up to the public funding of elections (through voluntary approaches)-- and allowing smaller candidates to have a chance to be heard on debates and in the fullness of their now restricted civil liberties. Call it a competitive democracy.

 

Your presidential campaign again and again has demonstrated cowardly stands. "Hope" some say springs eternal." But not when "reality" consumes it daily.

 

Sincerely,

Ralph Nader

 

Ralph articulates valid criticism better than Fop like.

 

Went on Fox News and questioned whether Obama would be an "Uncle Tom" too.

I wrote that.

 

Interesting piece.

Only because you thought I didn't write it.

 

The bit about constant referrals to the middle class echoes British politics - they know thats where elections are won and any talk of helping the poor angers that demographic.

 

I'm sure Fop will love the bit about him not visiting Mosques.

 

He was playing a tricky game.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It's funny how this thread dies if I'm not here to argue with though.