You're baiting me, aren't you? And I say again: no Gaum thread? You're nothing but a racist Mexican running dog.
1: Mexicans are Guamanian, Ari.
Isn't this just a variation on the fact that the Democratic party has been pretty much assuming that they automatically get black voters' votes since circa 1936? I would not be at all surprised to hear that (white, mainstream) Democratic party strategists are looking at these sorts of numbers and saying, "Eh, they'll all vote Dem in November regardless."
Which is, let's be clear, a really stupid assumption.
It would've been interesting if there were also graphs of their popularity among members of their own race. Does Hillary's race-baiting gain her more support than she loses among the guilty liberals, for example?
The problem is not whom the majority of black voters will choose in November, but what percentage will be motivated to vote. Given the hard times black voters have always gotten at the polls, it's no wonder it's a low-turnout demographic, but, if the primary turnouts are even the tiniest predictor, those turnout demographics can shift. This election is going to be fun to watch, I think, because HRC's campaign keeps pointing to statistics that aren't really useful in the current situation. Obama is changing the game in a way that HRC isn't.
Guam for Obama! Now it's really over. Right?
Guam for Obama!
—by a seven vote landslide.
What's the movie where a family protects Jeffrey Hunter on Guam from the Japanese?
7: Oh no, Ari, now it's just beginning. You see, Obama may have won Guam, but he didn't just need to win Guam - he needed to win Guam big. That narrow margin is going to cost him. In fact, I think years from now we'll be able to trace Obama's defeat at the nomination/loss in the general election/impeachment and/or incredibly/mildly disappointing two-term presidency to this failure, here, at this moment.
I suppose working-class whites don't count
Here's another comment from the same thread
I agree, tho, that Obama has probably actually gained support from white Phd's on the coasts. Obamomentum!
And then here's Giordano on the demographics within "white voters". Contains statements about women voters I could never make about black voters.
Hell, it seems to be the Obama supporters who are always & constantly bringing up race. I wonder what effect that has had over the last six months. Oh.
Weeding thru that comment section was about as much politics as I can stand for a while.
6:
Votes Obama 50.1 Clinton 49.9
Delegates Obama 14 Clinton 7
The story of the primaries.
Needless to say, if Clinton had won Guam by seven votes, it would have been a game-changing transformational victory that would have proven once again Obama's lack of electability and shown just why the supers need to sign on with Clinton as soon as possible - and why those who won't are just destroying the party.
Are you prepared to rule without a true mandate from Guam? Surely not, Mr. Obama. Surely not.
11: Those are half-delegates, Bob.
Those are half-delegates, Bob.
And there are only eight pledged half-delegates being awarded, meaning that it's probably 2-2. I'm not sure what Bob's numbers represent.
15:Obama appears to have won 14 of 21 districts
Represents reading too fast
I am pretty sure we have been over this before. Whether blacks turn out or working class white women stay home is probably not going to help or hurt in Alabama, but is significant in Wisconsin, Ohio, Michigan.
I don't watch TV, and I don't care what they say on Scarborough. The superdelegates will be approached by professionals with much more detailed numbers and analysis, state-level and below.
I ain't predicting who is gonna stay home, or who can win, or who needs to do what to patch up a weakness in fucking West Milwaukee. You better believe both campaigns do that.
But this kind of spin posing as science is bullshit.
But this kind of spin posing as science is bullshit.
As opposed to your ravings, which are purest truth.
On that note, I have to head off to my weekly meeting of the secret global Gen Y conspiracy. Tonight we're planning to swear eternal whirly-eyed fealty to Obama, relax with a screening of Logan's Run, secretly privatize Social Security and hunt middle-class boomer retirees for sport.
hunt middle-class boomer retirees for sport.
Hardly sport. Most of them you could hunt with a shovel.
hunt middle-class boomer retirees for sport.
Hardly sport. Most of them you could hunt with a shovel.
The most languorous game.
They combine it with a wheelchair race. Gen Y is nothing if not disability-friendly.
Also, not to quibble with statistics that comfort me, but has Al Giordano been right about anything during the campaign? He's been more bullish on Obama than Zogby most of the time, no?
25: Actually, Giordano and this whole post considered harmful. All just stupid electability porn for the feeble minded and those who lack self-discipline.
Thesis: the ratio of incidents of whirlyeyed Obama fandom to people complaining about whirlyeyed Obama fans is about 1:10.
27 is the truest thing ever. And the disparity keeps growing as time passes. I'm not even sure when the last incident of whirlyeyed enthusiasm for Obama too place. Perhaps such things are now extinct.
28: Oh year fur sure
We get a post and links that again say tat while Clinton supporters will vote for Obama in the fall, Obama supporters might not vote for Clinton in the general, even if that means the election of John Mccain. And that this is somehow very good news. But not whirly-eyed.
Anyone who doesn't exult at this analysis or enjoy the fact of Obammer intimidation, threats, and party disloyalty is a psycho meanie.
I can't believe I get another post telling that I might have to endure 4-8 more years of a Republican adminstration, with war, deficits, horrible health & environmental, troglodyte judges etc nightmare etc...
...because some Clinton campaign staffers said mean things about Barry(??)...
...and I am the irrational one?
17 is great.
Feel Oguama's momentum. Hillary's making a strong play for my affection with that gas tax suspension, but I'm resisting.
I'll troll tangentially to topic.
LA Special Election ...Cilizza at WaPo, Publiu at ObsWi has more.
I have wondered since Petey was using "coattails" as an argument for Edwards how much net gain for progressive policies there was in the addition of new conservative Democrats to Congress. Part of the argument I used against Petey was a that a large Democratic but conservative majority would be more able to pass legislation not to my progressive liking than a slim impotent Republican majority.
I also suspect there are arguments above my pay grade about the advantage of being the marginal, swing Senator or congressperson, in a marginally more vulnerable seat, offering the possibility of even further DINO gains down the line.
Adding ten more Ben Nelsons or Joe Liebermans would be an improvement over having Republicans in those seats, but I am not sure how much of an improvement it would be.
(PS:If you are wondering what I am doing up, scowling, at 3-4 AM:I have Norwegian Roof Rats in my room. Now there is an embarrassing admission.)
29: fascistcultfascistcult lah-dee-da-dee-dah, lather, rinse, repeat, repeat, repeat, repeat
Slim Republican majorities have proven quite vitile over the last few years, Bob.
Coattails: I just saw a speculation that Edwards hasn't endorsed because whoever it is he wants to endorse feels he'll be adrag rather than a boost. I liked and still like Edwards but that shoots Petey's coattails argument all to hell.
The best pro-Obama argument, for me, is the number of successful swing and border-state politicians who have endorsed him. Clinton beats him in her best areas, but large chunks are Obama country.
"Virile". Or "vital", if you wish.
This is precisely my point about the Wright thing; the losses among hypothetical white people who were sufficiently unscared to consider voting for Obama but are now scared off, must be netted-off against the losses among black people pissed off by Clinton pushing "Obama: Black or Negro? Experts Differ" stories.
I suspect the first group is not very large; a large majority of those who are susceptible to "Scary Black Guy" stories are obviously not going to vote for Obama under any circumstances - they are racists, and they are probably Republicans anyway - so their scaredness isn't really a problem. What are they going to do; vote McCain twice?
However, I suspect the set of black voters who aren't sufficiently committed to teh cause to vote Democratic come what may, and are therefore susceptible to staying at home come election day if Hillary keeps antagonising them, is quite a bit bigger.
Reagan's popularity has been exaggerated. It's the same people who rehabilitated Nixon. Reagan was intensely loved by those who loved him, and while they're influential in the media, at the end of his term they weren't a majority.
Eh. November's a long way off. If Clinton gets the nomination and Obama does the usual thing and endorses her, she might just be right that she can afford pissing off black voters.
This should have been a headline. Obama has officially lost the latte-sipping crowd. He prefers orange juice to coffee. Also, note the obvious demonstration of solidarity with OJ Simpson (aka "the juice"). He should repudiate this other black man before he loses more votes.
This certainly doesn't make it sound good for Obama among working-class whites. People just need a hook to hang their latent racism/classism on, and now they've got it.
40:They made up 43 percent of all voters in the 2004 presidential contest ...MSNBC
Maybe we can win without them. Voter registration drives at Starbucks and Ivy League Campuses will provide the winning margins, with coattails!!
40: Again, November's a long way off. What matters two weeks after the Pennsylvania primary might not matter post-convention.
The man wanted orange juice once, for God only knows what reasons (maybe he'd already had a gallon of coffee and his stomach hurt, who knows?), and it's become a trope. Jesus Christ.
Obama has claimed to prefer tea to coffee. Elitist!
At diners, one cannot request orange juice. I know this because I am down with the gente, or making stuff up. How can I get me one of these pundit jobs? I'm great at making stuff up.
25 - Giordano's night before primary predictions have normally been pretty spot on. I think he predicted virtually every Super Tuesday state correctly, and fairly close to the actual percentages. He also called all the later February primaries more or less right, and got Ohio, Rhode Island, and Vermont fairly close. He screwed up Texas fairly significantly. He then over-corrected a bit, making a too conservative prediction for Mississippi and an initially very negative prediction for Pennsylvania. After Pennsylvania tightened, he then made a somewhat too optimistic prediction there - a five point Clinton win instead of a ten point one, leading to a somewhat narrowed delegate win (I think he picked Obama to win the three Philly suburban districts, as well)
His general tone is pretty bullish on Obama, but in terms of actual specific predictions, he's been pretty solid - not perfect, but not egregious. Texas was the only big blunder.
The thing that's scary, though, is that the leftosphere repeats these sorts of stories in mocking terms, and the pundits feel justified in referring to these stories as shorthands for whatever narrative is compacted into them.
The perfect case for this was John Edwards's haircut. Everybody knew this was bullshit---okay, everyone but the most feverish right-wing bloggers. Leftie bloggers like Atrios made fun of the idea of the trope, saying shit like "300 people died in Iraq today, but John Edwards got a haircut, so there." The pundits kept throwing that little aside into their descriptions of the Edwards campaign---because they felt that it was relevant, that it had become part of the story---and then, ta-da!, it was part of the story.
It's a tricky phenomenon to combat, though: how to discredit these waves of trivia without amplifying them? I mean, I personally think that a Philly cheesesteak with Swiss cheese sounds fine, dammit; Michael Moore is fat, and it would be stupid to deny it; Al Gore certainly does travel a lot and his beard probably wasn't very flattering; and the Edwards mansion was not what I would have chosen to buy if I had that kind of money. But so fucking what?
personally think that a Philly cheesesteak with Swiss cheese sounds fine, dammit;
Cheesesteaks are best with swiss cheese. I just confirmed this recently. Now you know.
Cheesesteaks as a genre are pretty gross, but the absolute worst way to make one would have to be with Cheezwhiz.
Do they even let you vote in America with that kind of attitude?
here's hilzoy on the gas tax controversy. Study both the McCain & Clinton quotes she includes
and here is pgl of angry bear riffing off a Bill Polley price on tax incidence. The comments went over my head with shifting demand curves and such, or at least it wasn't settled to my satisfaction. But I liked this one:
Jeez, the liberals are going apoplectic over a 3 month gas tax holiday. As buff would say "Bat-shit insane." Is it the widespread support?...sammy
I guess hilzoy & the econblogs would say it's the principle of the thing. Exactly right.
Present company excepted because the "whirly-eyed" offends, politics in practice is not a rational choice experiment. It is always a gut-level emotional appeal. To make the necessary connection with the constituency, of course you have to pay lip-service to policy prescriptions, but at some point you have to go deliberately unrational or extrarational or batshit crazy. You might do this with a rhetoric of hope and change or a stupid anti-intelektual populist appeal but you have to committ to your supporters in a way that will alienate those on the fence.
Obama understands this and has done it well, but he cannot deliver a message that will excite all possible constituencies. No one can. He & Clinton chose their coalitions, and are now stuck with them. Remains to be seen who can win what.
I just got my address-change confirmation, switching my district from West Harlem/Morningside Heights to Bedford-Stuyvesant!
47: Right, because the trouble is that it is a mug's game for the Dems, the deck is stacked. For instance the real story of the whole Cheez Whiz thing included a total lie and BS from Bush that for some reason never got picked up. From CJR:
It all started yesterday, when CNN, Fox and The New York Times were content to transcribe and transmit President Bush's comment about preferring his Philadelphia cheesesteaks "Whiz with," thereby handing the Bush camp what it was after -- a revisitation in the national press of a year-old John Kerry "faux pas" (ordering his Philly cheesesteak with Swiss). [...] Kathleen E. Carey of The [Delaware County, Pa.] Daily Times went beyond mere stenography and did a little leg work on the issue, [...] And the intrepid Carey came up with her own expose. She reported that Bush actually "prefers his steak absent of the usual Cheez Whiz and provolone, accompanied only by cheese of the American variety," information that she obtained from her own Deep Throat, one Caeser Barnabei, the owner of the well-known cheesesteak shop, Jim's Place. Barnabei, who has fed the Bush camp on previous swings through Pennsylvania and provided "70 to 80 hoagies" for the Bush campaign yesterday, confided to Carey that "the Jim's Special is altered to whet the 'W' appetite."
And for the Edwards' haircut, just incredible to see someone mocked by hundreds of people who get collectively thousands of dollars spent every year on their appearance because it is one of the key determinants of success in their profession is appearance.
Do they even let you vote in America with that kind of attitude?
Gawd knows they shouldn't. Cheesesteak is the food of the gods. I'm pretty sure that was in that one awful Gaiman book that I read.
And that Cilizza article mentioned in 32 is complete fucking Repub leaning horseshit narrative as well>
Republicans will counter that both Jenkins and Jim Oberweis, the dairy magnate who carried their flag in the Illinois special election, were poor candidates whose losses should not be interpreted as a sign of anything other than that bad candidates often are defeated.
The tie breaker in this argument will come in ten days time when voters in Mississippi's 1st district head to the polls in another special election ...
Yes, so if the Dems only capture 2 out of 3 seats in high 50s to low 60s Repub districts it's a draw. And how about a little consideration of why the Repubs cannot field decent candidates in "solid" districts, might that be a sign of anything?
I went looking for relevant quotes outa Schmitt or Arendt, but forget it.
Politics begins when you say "Us vs Them" I have always said there had to be them(s) somewhere under the Obamapony. Well now we are starting to see Obama's "them". This is dynamic etc but I am really not sure you can bring your enemies back into the fold without alienating some part of your base.
Yes, it is kinda funny to see HRC running against "pointy-headed DC technocrats" and maybe disgusting to the procedural liberal crowd, but it is a message she had to send to her base, just as Obama had to denounce the divisive angry Rev Wright to keep the latte-sippers onboard.
Bob, has Clinton done a single thing since Super Tuesday that makes her look better, rather than worse? How much success has she been having with her cynical campaigning? She needs 60% of all remaining delegates to just barely win, and if she breaks even with Obama on Tuesday I think she'll need 65%. And according to McCaskill, a lot of the ourstanding supers are leaning Obama.
As far as negatives go, either a black or a female candidate would have them. Hillary had 45% negatives from the start. (One of the weird things is that McCain has enormous negatives among the Republicans. None of the big Republicn bloc leaders will ditch him, in the end, but a lot of their rank and file might).
As far as I can tell her only plus is her medicare plan.
Cheesesteaks as a genre are pretty gross, but the absolute worst way to make one would have to be with Cheezwhiz.
Not to try to make this into one of those 'gross foods I totally love because I'm down with the gente' things, but Cheezwhiz all mixing in with the steak juices... yum.
As far as I can tell her only plus is her medicare plan.
Are you referring to the public option of her health care plan? Because that's not a plus. It's largely undefined in her proposals, but she's described in on several occasions as "bare-bones." This is not, as several self-proclaimed liberal health care experts seemed to think, her version of Edwards's "back door to single payer." It's a whittled-down public option for those who can't afford anything else, and it doesn't sound like it's designed to compete with private health care.
Shorter me: Boo hoo hoo! I'm gobsmacked and stupefied that my preferred candidates are being differentially disadvantaged by disingenuous media narratives incorporating indigenous local cuisines that only serve to hornswoggle and bamboozle the electorate into forming negative impressions of progressive candidates.
Solution: Whine harder! Use bigger words!
Bob, has Clinton done a single thing since Super Tuesday
She is forcing Obama to adjust his message, to talk to parts of the Democratic coalition Obama would have preferred to ignore. I am hoping this will in turn marginally affect policy next year.
If Edwards had been able to stick around he would have helped in the same way.
She is forcing Obama to adjust his message, to talk to parts of the Democratic coalition Obama would have preferred to ignore
Like what, the racist vote?
Bob, your issue with Obama has been clear for a while now: more than any pretense to politics or ideology, you're a generational tribalist, and are dead convinced that any candidate who gets a large following of younger-than-you voters must therefore be out to destroy you and your generational cohort. Once that switch had flipped in your tiny brain, you clung to any bit of fact or fantasy - including some incredibly bigoted shit - to try to justify your conversion to Clintonism.
Provolone is the only acceptable cheese for cheesesteaks, imo.
After six years in Philly, I've still been unable to convince myself to try a cheesesteak with whiz, which makes me faintly nauseous.
Also - Cheesesteaks are only good in the Philly area. Cheesesteaks elsewhere (and many in Philly) are disgusting, for the most part. (I'm sure there are a few exceptions)
I get cheesesteaks with AMERICAN cheese. If the server doesn't chant USA USA USA while making them, I leave it on the counter and walk out.
62:Bullshit, stras, I am not so simple.
For instance:energy policy. Read Matt Yglesias or Ezra Klein on gas taxes. Rebates to the poor? Yup.
Mass transit for urbans? You bet. Any consideration for suburban/exurban SUV middle-cohort commuters? Fuck em. Energy policies will also impact suburban/exurban RE values.
I don't necessarity object to Obama's coalition in itself. I am emotionally closer to the urban creatives and inner-city poor myself. I have all along just been saying that coalitions always exclude as well as include, and that coalitions have consequences for policy.
And what I get back is people calling me racist and trying to show me a the pony, i.e., that Obama is everything for everybody with whipped cream and a cherry on top.
bob is disproving my thesis in the opposite way. It's more like 1:100.
For instance:energy policy.
You're going to cite Clinton's superiority on energy policy? Jesus Christ! She's wholeheartedly thrown herself into a gas tax pander that will do nothing more than increase consumption of fossil fuels while lining the pockets of energy conglomerates. And all the while she's been pandering to the coal lobby in a desperate attempt to win primary votes.
I am not so simple.
Not only are you that simple, you're one of the simplest fucking people I've ever seen on the internet. Your motivations are utterly transparent to anyone but yourself and your talking points never change. Go ahead, tell me about the '68 convention again now, and about how real men crawl through sewers with knives in their teeth to overthrow the status quo by electing former Wal-Mart executives.
67:Ok, Cala, look at the post and the links. The subject is Obama's difficulty with whites, corrected at #40 by ogged to working-class whites, and Clinton's problems with blacks. Clinton is apparently doing real damage to Obama in that WCW demographic this week with her "gas-tax holiday", which shows the problem is not just racism. Now Obama has admitted he has a problem with working-class, female, and older white voters, and taking steps to improve.
But what do I get from Obama supporters on this thread? Nowhere even as much engagement on the substantive issue as I would get from Obama. Ad hominems, accusations of racism & tribalism, insults, jokes & clowning around.
I didn't write the post, and have been trying to address the content. I am the only one. I interpret the response I have gotten as an entirely irrational and emotional reaction to any substantative criticism of Obama. Yes, whirly-eyed.
You're going to cite Clinton's superiority on energy policy?
Does this have any relation at all to what I said in #66?
And as for this:
And what I get back is people calling me racist
When you repeatedly make the claim that Obama is secretly influenced by "Muslim third way economics," yes, people are going to call you racist. Because you're being a fucking racist.
71:You're going to cite Clinton's superiority on energy policy?
Fuck off, stras. If you going to repeatedly make shit up and attempt to attach to my name, you reveal yourself as the very lowest form of internet commenter, one that should get universally banned.
You are also not on topic.
...
Going back to #40
People just need a hook to hang their latent racism/classism ...ogged
Pennsylvania also illustrated the problems racial attitudes among less educated whites are causing Obama.In exit polls, one in five of the state's white voters who haven't completed college said race was an important factor in choosing a candidate, about double the number of white college graduates who said so. Eight in 10 of them voted for Clinton over Obama, and only about half said they would vote for Obama over McCain in November
The 2nd sentence of the 2nd paragraph seems to imply that the whites polled here are white Democrats, but it isn't completely clear.
In any case, the first sentence, para 2 amounts to:
non-college whites:20% race important factor
college whites: race important factor
Since I would guess that at least for some of those polled, race would be a reason to vote for Obama, that means that somewhere between 80-90 percent of non-college whites vote against Obama for reasons other race.
If you going to repeatedly make shit up and attempt to attach to my name
I interpreted the semi-literate sentence fragments you placed at the beginning of 66 as an argument for your candidate, rather than admission that she's terrible on energy and the environment but you just don't give a fuck. But I'll happily concede that you admit your candidate is shitty on the issues, but you've got a hard-on for a right-wing corporatist Clinton presidency anyway.
72:
If 20 percent of the uneducated voters in PA voted based on race and 80 percent of those voted for Clinton and they make up 43 percent of the total voters, that means 7 percent of the total number of voters in PA are uneducated racists voting for Clinton. That is not an insignificant number, it happens to be the margin of victory in PA (the 7% translates into a 14% margin, and she only had a 10% margin). So, Clinton actually does owe her victory to those forces. (This does not even include the educated racist voters, who add another 6-8 percent to the margin, depending on the assumptions you make about how many voted for Clinton)
Self-correction: Ignore the margin of victory parenthetical. I am insomnia-posting. If it is ~10 percent of the total, then that is already in margin terms. Sorry about that.