Obama, JFK, and Reagan vs. Bush, McCain

May 18, 2008

I can’t help but enjoy the fact that Barack Obama is successfully taking attacks from George W. Bush and John McCain, and turning them into a positive. He’s effectively taking GOP talking points, and throwing them back in their face.

Sen. Barack Obama went one step further today in his pushback against presumptive GOP presidential nominee Sen. John McCain and President Bush on appeasement, suggesting that both Republicans have a problem with presidents past who have engaged in direct diplomacy.

“If George Bush and John McCain have a problem with direct diplomacy, led by the president of the United States, then they can explain why they have a problem with John F. Kennedy because that’s what he did with [Soviet leader Nikita] Khrushchev, or Ronald Reagan, ’cause that’s what he did with [Soviet leader Mikhail] Gorbachev, or Richard Nixon ’cause that’s what they did with [Chinese leader Mao Tse-tung],” Obama said in Roseburg, Ore. “That’s exactly the kind of diplomacy we need to keep us safe.”

Obama called the dust-up “appealing,” after Bush said in Israel at the Knesset that it was a mistake to talk about diplomacy with “terrorists and radicals.”

I haven’t seen any polling on this, and I have no idea whether voters in general find the notion of diplomacy with unsavory international rivals appealing or not. But I think Obama has framed it exactly the right way — we’ve confronted dangerous enemies before, and open dialog has produced more results for our interests than closed minds.

I didn’t hear all of Obama’s remarks, but in case he didn’t mention it, I’d just add that we’ve already seen the results of the Bush/McCain approach. Did conditions improve with North Korea and Iran once we decided to stop talking to them?

In provides a context for the debate — Obama, Reagan, JFK, and success on one side; Bush, McCain, and failure on the other.

The McCain campaign responded:

“Offering the current Iranian regime an unconditional summit and the status of a super power akin to the Soviets, as Barack Obama has suggested, shows incredibly weak judgment and a dangerous lack of experience,” McCain campaign spokesman Tucker Bounds said.

My goodness, this sure is dumb. First, if McCain is troubled by the notion of equating Iran with the USSR, why hasn’t he said anything while prominent far-right Republicans have equated Iran with Nazi Germany for the last few years? Doesn’t that show “incredibly weak judgment”?

Second, Obama has not offered Iran an “unconditional summit.” That’s utterly absurd, patently dishonest, and the McCain campaign knows it. Obama has said for months that before any direct engagement with a country like Iran, there would have to be extensive diplomatic legwork completed first. Does any serious person think Obama, shortly after he’s inaugurated, is going to jump on a plane to Tehran or Pyongyang — without any advance work — just to see what happens? Does the McCain campaign really believe we’re foolish enough to buy such nonsense?

Obama is betting that voters, who may or may not be familiar with the details of five decades of diplomacy, will have an implicit understanding of the dynamics here — the United States is not afraid to sit at the table with rival nations. Kennedy wasn’t; Reagan wasn’t; Obama isn’t. Bush and McCain, meanwhile, harbor the notion that not talking to adversarial countries is punishment to them, and will somehow advance our interests.

I like our chances in this debate.

I like our chances in this debate.

You’re an optimist Steve. I am sure I am not the first to tell you that and I imagine others will do so in this very comment thread. I certainly hope you’re right on this but I suspect that many voters, particularly the voters that McCain is aiming at here, are not particularly familiar with the broader outlines of international diplomacy in a way that contextualizes Obama’s rhetoric properly. He is going to have to do some work to get a lot of people there and while I have no doubt that he has the “skillz” and the energy to do so, I think it would be a mistake to think of this as a “gimme.” If I ever had any doubt before, this primary season has certainly clarified the astonishing ignorance with which a whole lot of people, including many very smart people, approach political considerations.

  • The crux of this going to be Smarter vs. Tougher. We’ve seen what toughness without intelligence gets us, now let’s see what intelligence with toughness can do. That’s how Obama will win this debate.

    How many times did we have direct talks with Kruschev after he promised “We Will Bury You”?

    As Schrum said this morning (and I hate agreeing with him) this is the equivalent of arguing about the shape of the negotiating table and should be made to look like typical Republican pettiness.

  • ‘A man has to know his limitations’. Bush & McCain know they are to dumb to negotiate. They are paranoid sociopaths who shoot first and ask questions later. Any relationship, beyond the caveman level, involves trust, risk, and time to achieve fruition. The thugs take comfort in the fact that dead people can’t lie or bamboozle them. America has the strongest military on earth and they would have her act like the weakest punk on the cell block.

  • “Does the McCain campaign really believe we’re foolish enough to buy such nonsense?”

    they might not believe it, but they’re sure as hell hoping enough people are!

  • TAMPA The vice president and general manager of WTVT Fox 13 was arrested Friday night on charges of lewd and lascivious behavior and exposure of sexual organs, jail records show.

    Robert Linger, 49, of Lutz, was released from Orient Road Jail at 5:36 a.m. after posting $750 bail, records show

    Linger was arrested at 11:15 p.m. as part of an undercover operation that Tampa police were conducting at Fantasyland, an adult business at 4715 N. Lois Ave., according to a criminal report affidavit.

    Five other men also were arrested on similar charges, records show.

    The affidavit states that Linger and the other men formed a circle around the undercover officers and began masturbating. Linger also was seen masturbating while sitting on a couch, the affidavit states.
    ==============================================================

    Facing it, gang, THIS is what we are up against

  • little bear, I fail to understand what it is that we are up against. Who are we, and what is it?

  • Considering the high school mentality of the Bush/McCain policy of “I’m not talking to you” is right along the lines of the average intelligence of the American voter, Obama may have to explain it in a context that the idiot Americanus can understand.
    War with Iran=Even higher oil prices. Shouldn’t we try to find a peaceful solution that won’t hurt the working American?

  • Schrum was good on Meet the Press. What’ s depressing in this debate is that simply talking to ones adversaries is even considered appeasement. The press needs to grill Bush on what he means by appeasement, and why he thinks it’s appropriate to toss this allegations out in front of the Israeli Knesset. The focus should be on Bush, since he made the allegation.

  • Brent,

    your skepticism is understandable, but what Obama is doing is taking this topic and spoon-feeding it in a way that is very understandable to low-info voters – “what Reagan did to the USSR, I’m willing to do with Iran. AND what Reagan did to the USSR, Bush & McCain refuse to try to do with Iran, even though it worked.” Considering so many people stil revere Reagan as a god on earth, it’s not a bad way to phrase the argument.

  • RE: Shmuclebee’s comment – “That was Barack Obama, he just tripped off a chair, he’s getting ready to speak. Somebody aimed a gun at him and he dove for the floor.”

    Several things jump out at you as you watch the video. First, how did he pop that out so fast? It was like he was waiting to say it. No pause, no hesitation. Did he put someone up to making the noise just so he could say this?

    http://www.pensitoreview.com/2008/05/16/did-huckabee-have-someone-set-up-obama-remark/

  • slappy magoo, perhaps, but I hope obama is careful not to run behind the corpse of ronnie too much.

    Have to be careful when watering down your message to stooooooopid people because you really don’t know how they will “understand” what you have tried to say.

  • I didn’t hear all of Obama’s remarks, but in case he didn’t mention it, I’d just add that we’ve already seen the results of the Bush/McCain approach. Did conditions improve with North Korea and Iran once we decided to stop talking to them?

    He did. He pointed out that things got worse in Iran and NK when we didn’t talk to them, and the only progress recently has come from talking to NK.

    “Obama called the dust-up ‘appealing,’” Appealing?

    Appalling?

  • The following quotes of John McCain’s concern me.  Maybe even more than McCain’s 5X mistake about ‘Shiite Al Qaeda’ within one month, even though repeatedly corrected.

    “And I believe that the success will be fairly easy” and “There’s no doubt in my mind that… we will be welcomed as liberators.” [3/24/03]

    “I think we could go in with much smaller numbers than we had to do in the past… I don’t believe it’s going to be nearly the size and scope that it was in 1991.” [9/15/02]

    “There’s not a history of clashes that are violent between Sunnis and Shias. So I think they can probably get along.” [4/23/03]

    “Overall, I think a year from now, we will have made a fair amount of progress if we stay the course.” [12/8/05 (Exactly one year before violence in Iraq peaked)]

    “By January 2013, America has welcomed home most of the servicemen and -women who have sacrificed terribly so that America might be secure in her freedom.” [05/115/08]

    John McCain has repeatedly shown a disconnect between what he’d like to believe and facts on the ground.

    While I respect Mr. McCain’s service and what he went through as a POW, I have grave concerns about his actions upon his return. He, with the advantage of having an admiral for a father, was not prosecuted as other returning POW for collaborating with the enemy. Later, Mr. McCain headed the effort the shut down all investigation into remaining POW/MIA in order to open up trade with Vietnam. His father-in-law immediately opened up a multi-billion dollar beer industry there.

    http://www.aiipowmia.com/sea/schanberg_mccain.html

    I also have concerns about his mental fitness as well, specially since he will not release his old medical records even though the term PSTD was not in use as an official diagnosis when he first returned. The one time he did release these records to a journalist, much was blacked out. He later released them in 1999 to a physician who wrote him a clean bill of health without the benefit of a personal examination but rather on whatever records he was provided.

    “Among U.S. servicemen taken captive during the Korean War, as many as nine out of 10 survivors may suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and other mental disorders more than 35 years after their release, psychologist Patricia B. Sutker of the New Orleans Veterans Administration Medical Center and her colleagues report in the January AMERICAN JOURNAL OF PSYCHIATRY.”

    ‘Post-traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD, can result from wartime trauma such as suffering wounds or witnessing others being hurt. Symptoms include irritability or outbursts of anger, sleep difficulties, trouble concentrating, extreme vigilance and an exaggerated startle response.’

    http://www.reuters.com/article/featuredCrisis/idUSN17282413

    I do not say any of this lightly as I have worked with vets for over thirty years to help them get their benefits for PTSD. My father served in the Army for 33 yrs as as CWO4. All three of my brothers also served, two in Vietnam.

    But I have even more concerns about his current voting record towards our young veterans of today. His lack of support for their medical care is appalling.

    http://www.veteransforcommonsense.org/articleid/9559

    On a final note, it is worth reading what Col. Hackworth, the most respected officer to ever serve in Vietnam had to say about John McCain:

    http://www.vietnamveteransagainstjohnmccain.com/cin_hacker_2.htm

    “David H. Hackworth died in June 2005, he was a much-decorated and highly unconventional former career Army officer who became a combat legend in Vietnam. Col. Hackworth received 78 combat awards — including a Distinguished Service Cross, a Silver Star, a Bronze Star and eight Purple Hearts — during his 25-year military career which spanned the Korean and Vietnam wars..”

  • ” Does the McCain campaign really believe we’re foolish enough to buy such nonsense?”

    As several posters before me have commented on the above question, “Yes”. You’re talking about more than 59,000,000 people who voted for George W Bush in 2004.

    I wish we could take away the voting rights of all those 59,000,000 (some close relatives and friends of mine) for at least one Presidential election cycle, maybe even two, to get back to where we should be.

  • There’s another frame that Sen. Obama should add to this no-qutie-debate:

    Why is John McCain afraid to sit at a table opposite America’s enemies?

    We need to always chip away at the societal meme that “Republicans = burly men” and “Democrats = effete pansies”. Since BushCo and now McCain have made all of their decisions from a position of fear, it should be easy.

    Americans love a tough guy. They also love an optimist. Make McCain look weak and you won’t have to make him look old… it’ll take care of itself.

  • Much ado about nothing. The only people buying this crap from Bush/McCain are the ones already in their corner and won’t budge no matter what brilliant light you shine on them. I see comments by those who, regardless of polls to the contrary, keep holding onto the idea that “people” are taking McCain and Bush seriously as if Americans really believe (especially after the past 7yrs) that Bush and McCain know what the hell they are talking about, as if Americans are too slow to see an empty negative attack attempt by these pukes. Just like the Washington Post op-ed by Miss Dorothy Parker about Edwards and Obama being cute little girls, these pathetic character smears are doing more to cement democratic victories and turn people against republicans and conservatives than anything the dems could have imagined. They are down to “I know you are but what am I” tasteless chatter which has lost its effectiveness with the public.

    The paranoia of even thinking that someone might consider these guys still credible on foreign policy is ludicrous. After all, isn’t that why there is such a huge primary turn out? Because people are so sick of the Bush/McCain regime? The victories will be overwhelming so let these Bozos continue showing their collective asses on the world stage. It only activates while enraging their opposition.

  • Part of the myth…Republicans…draft dodgers…AWOL…think their tough.. cowardly bullies
    Democrats…Volunteers…medal holders…educated and smooth…are tough, don’t have to play at it. But these are images…the truth is personal to each individual.

    Tough should not equate to stupid or a yahoo mentality that would loudly beat their chests while walking into an ambush like “hot shot” McCain.

    Only a few more months till freedom from Bush, senate obstructionism and a politicized DoJ.
    Time to bring honor back to the presidency.

  • Just 48 hours after jumping on the Bush appeasement bandwagon, John McCain is probably regretting his leap. First, it was revealed that the tough-talking Republican presidential nominee was for negotiating with the Hamas government in the Palestinian territories before he was against it. Then Americans learned that in 2003, Mr. Straight Talk favored engagement with the terror-sponsoring state of Syria. Now in his accusations against Democrat Barack Obama, John McCain conveniently forgot Ronald Reagan’s dealings with Tehran during the Iran-Contra scandal. Given his defense the Reagan administration at the time, McCain’s selective amnesia comes as no surprise.

    For the details, see:
    “McCain Defended Reagan, North During Iran-Contra Scandal.”

  • I enjoy the irony of Bobzim quoting Khrushchev while discussing Obama’s campaign against a Bush sycophant who looks just like a Nikita mini-me. And I’ll agree with Brent that this will not be a “gimme” campaign. It could be—and Obama could easily throw McPhony under the bus—but this time around, it needs to be about more than just that.

    It needs to be about throwing the whole blasted bus at these GOPer scum, and shoving them through the side of a mountain with it. It needs to be about putting America back on its course, and doing away with the Bush course altogether.

  • The column you are talking about joey is by Kathleen Parker not Dorothy. Its obviously a minor correction but I respect Dorthy Parker enough that I just couldn’t quite let it stand.

    As to the rest of your point, I don’t think the polling data and more importantly, the voting results suggest what you think they do. While things are certainly trending in the Democratic direction, McCain is still winning with most people on the question of National security credibility. The increased primary turnout bodes well but it would be a huge mistake to think of it as determinative. Increased enthusiasm within the base has not always resulted in victory in the GE as I would hope Democrats have learned pretty definitively by now.

    I think we will win this and, more than that, I think we will win it easily. But I think we will not win it if we go into it thinking we have already won the argument with the American people. I am certainly well aware of what a doofus McCain is but by every available metric we have, he is quite well respected by the majority of the American people and even by a good percentage of Democrats. All I ask is that we don’t underestimate the appeal that these clowns and their ridiculous tough guy arguments still have with the American electorate. I don’t think thats paranoia. I think it common sense.

  • I realize that Obama’s supporters have been emphasizing his intelligence (which I fully credit) partly in order to counter negative stereotypes, but in general, we live in an anti-intellectual culture which does not value smarts, even in a president. It goes way back (see Hofstadter’s “Anti-Intellectualism in America”) at a cultural and a personal level. That is partly why Bush was given 2 terms.

    I believe Obama is caught between a rock and a hard place on the matter of trying to educate voters and establish his own competence. People tend to equate intelligence and especially intellectualism (the two are not the same) with weakness. Further, talking is something women do and men don’t especially like (they claim), especially in the demographic groups that Obama has not won. I do not see how Obama can convince the general public that he can be strong against our enemies while insisting that we are going to talk things over with countries that think terrorism IS diplomacy. I believe in and fully favor talking, myself, but I think that is how this will play overall. Those who are themselves intelligent and/or who already agree with Obama may be nodding their heads along with him, but that isn’t where most unclaimed voters are these days.

    I said all this a long time ago but it is worth repeating now that the campaign has come around to an actual Obama-McCain exchange.

  • I think that McCain spokesperson makes a very important point: Iran is no Soviet Union.

    Of course, that begs the question why we’re painting them as the greatest biggest evilest threat that America has ever ever EVER faced.

    It might also be worthwhile reminding people that Iran spends, what, less than 5 billion on defense annually, versus our obscene, bloated & out-of-control 650 (or more!) billion.

  • 24. Mary said: I realize that Obama’s supporters have been emphasizing his intelligence (which I fully credit) partly in order to counter negative stereotypes, but in general, we live in an anti-intellectual culture which does not value smarts, even in a president. It goes way back (see Hofstadter’s “Anti-Intellectualism in America”) at a cultural and a personal level. That is partly why Bush was given 2 terms.

    You’re right, but imo that anti-intellectualism has to change if this country is going to arrest it’s current slide into irrelevance on the international stage. I personally don’t have a whole lot of hope for us as a country right now. I’m not sure that anti-intellectualism can be changed, there are too many people on the right who benefit from stoking resentments, but at least Obama is trying.

  • Incredible – mary seems to be advocating that we discard the majority opinion and find someone stooooooooopid, cuz, like that’s what America wants.

    When people see how stoooooooopid mclame really is (one clip above), Obama will win by a landslide.

    But I am curious – is mary setting us up so that she can proclaim that clinton is the candidate favored by the stoooooooopid?

  • Shalimar @ #26: You’re wasting your time. Mary is just a troll who claims to be a Clinton supporter. Either she can’t see past the end of her nose, or she’s a GOP supporter who is pretending (poorly) to be a dem. Either way, she really isn’t interested in a rational discussion on the issues; she’s only interested in tearing down Obama and goading the rest of us into replying.

  • No one ever didn’t get elected because they underestimated the intelligence of the American electorate. I agree the country has to change if it’s going to survive with some semblance of democratic institutions, but when presidents/candidates sell themselves as “someone you can have a beer with”/throw back a few shots with/bowl with then we’re a long way from defeating anti-intellectualism.

    If Obama keeps up this line of attack he’s taken against Bush/McSame I think it will resonate, and the Rethugs will let it die by not responding. Obama has to go on the attack. Of course the MSM will still make him look like an elite pansy.

  • little bear at 6, 7, 9,13, 14, 27, 28, 30, 31

    Get a hold on yourself, man. You’re out of control and really pissing me and a lot of other people off. This is no way to win friends or influence people.

  • beep52 – sounds like a personal problem. Do you get help from a professional. Has anyone suggested that you suffer from “EGO MANIA” and the delusions that anyone else should really give a damn what you think?

    get a grip, man – don’t be like mary or pencil dick

  • The GOP have latched on to the “without preconditions” phrase (although “stinking corpse” is fast becoming a favorite), and a suitable counter argument needs to be made. My understanding of the phrase is that it was an attempt to distinguish Hon. Sen. Obama’s position favoring negotiation from President* Bush’s (and now, presumably Hon. Sen. McCain’s) that we’ll talk anyplace, anytime… as long as the other party agrees beforehand to all out demands. This, to be plain, is the antithesis of negotiation. It is in effect saying that we’re in favor of negotiations as long as we don’t have to negotiate.

  • CB, that’s a little unfair.
    We haven’t really TRIED proper diplomatic isolationism yet,

    China, Japan and god knows who else have been talking with North Korea all along so it’s not Bush’s fault that he’s trying to create a vacuum and other world powers aren’t cooperative.

    Similarly, Cuba would have fallen long ago if all these other countries would just follow our lead.

    Is it so unreasonable that every nation on the planet follow our advice and be friends only with nations and leaders we approve of?

    If only every other country would be just like us…..

  • little bear @ 6, 7, 9,13, 14, 27, 28, 30, 31 and now 34:

    Thanks, you just proved my point.

  • Honestly beep, little bear is as much a troll as mary, we just happen to agree with him on a lot of things. I stopped trying to convince him to tone down the rhetoric months ago.

    As for the issue at hand, take a look at this Gallup poll from November. The reality is that most Americans favor diplomacy, believe that the US should abide by the Geneva Conventions, and are generally supportive of more US involvement in the UN (other issues that the GOP is extremely out of touch on).

    I have to say, I’m extremely confident that the Dems will win in November if these are the issues that the GOP wants to push. If, however, they continue to capitalize on the ignorance of the general public with race-baiting, secret muslim hoaxes, and the other stupid shit we’ve come to expect from them, my confidence starts to drop exponentially. I’m hopeful that the Democrats can use this election to highlight the neocon/nationalist hijacking of the Republicans’ foreign policy and undermine its influence. We’d be a better country for it.

  • troll that you happen to agree with….

    that’s a good laugh….

    whadda marooooooooooooon

  • I see this thread has unraveled, but I would like to add that the Iraq Study Group advocated Iranian diplomacy without preconditions in it’s report.

  • …and Berkeley, maybe you’re new to commenting on this site, but generally, most of us prefer reasoned arguments or humor to baseless hackery.

    Take a leaf out of Kevin James’s book and admit you have no idea what you’re talking about, or formulate a cogent argument.

  • Obama is pretty serious – challenging dur chimpfurher to a debate:

    Obama Says Bush Policies Strengthened Iran, Hamas

    WATERTOWN, South Dakota (Reuters) – Democratic presidential front-runner Barack Obama said on Friday President George W. Bush’s “failed policies” had strengthened U.S. enemies like Iran and Hamas.

    Responding to Bush’s comment on Thursday that those who want to talk to Iran were like Nazi appeasers before the Second World War, Obama accused Bush of “exactly the kind of appalling attack that’s divided the country and that alienates us from the world.”

    Obama also challenged Bush and Republican presidential rival John McCain to a debate on foreign policy issues, a day after Bush caused outrage among Democrats with his remarks on appeasement before the Israeli parliament.

  • we just happen to agree with him on a lot of things

    to your discredit. he has no place here. anyone expressing agreement actually encourages him to continue. only when he understands he is impressing no one will he go find someplace with similar commenters. i continue to be surprised by the lifelines he is thrown here. an unmoderated board needs to be self-policing – i.e. the social mores have to be upheld by the participants. anyone not taking a firm stance against little bear’s behavior contributes to the slow but sure degredation of the signal-to-noise ratio until this blog is overrun by static. there are plenty (too many) political boards that are little but the little bear type of post, he should be encouraged to find one.

  • Obama should ask, “What are the Republicans afraid of? Democrats are not afraid. We are the United States of America.” That should do it.

  • beep: Seriously, stop wasting your time. He/She/It is just a troll pretending to be a Hillary hater. By replying like that, you’re giving him/her/it exactly what he/she/it wants. Just scroll past his/her/its posts and ignore them.

  • Berkeley is just another poster that does not understand logic or arguments or math – no shortage of them. Basically, like many others, proclaiming themselves to be right, infallable, and the final word because they said so.

    An awful lot of that in these threads.

  • Shade Tail – thanks for being the BLOG GOD today and proving my point above.

    I read these threads – you are not held up as an important person or leading opinion here.

  • Oh, and, by the way, as a recovering academic, I hope we won’t see “memes,” “frames,” “zeitgeist” and “cogent” ever in a single post. Oops. Oh, the irony . . .

  • Jim –

    left out paradigm. add that one and we can nearly set up a “random thesis title generator”

  • Obama drew a crowd of 75,000 people to hear him speak in Portland, OR. Republicans must be terrified of what looms ahead. Our long national nightmare of Bush is drawing to an end.

  • Pingback: www.buzzflash.net

  • I thought I remembered something like this from The Carpetbagger. turns out it was a little longer ago than I remembered (February) but I found it. everyone should probably re-read the whole thing, but here is most of it for those who don’t follow links:

    Digby had an item the other day discussing how out of hand her comments section has become. C&L and Atrios recently had posts talking about the same phenomenon. I’m afraid some of the same problems have emerged here, particularly over the last couple of weeks.

    . . . it’s only natural that passions would run high, and I enjoy spirited discourse as much as the next guy.

    But I don’t enjoy what we’ve seen lately. Disagreements have become bitter and ugly; arguments have turned personal; and nonsensical name-calling has come to rule the day. Some of my long-time regulars are thinking about giving up on the discussions altogether, and some already have. I find this more frustrating than I can say.

    . . . For a long while, the comments section was a good-size community — the threads were readable, commenters got to know one another, and arguments were heated but generally polite. As The Carpetbagger Report’s audience has grown, so too has the number of people who want to participate in the discussions. That’s a good thing. But too often, as the Obama/Clinton contest has intensified, all reason has gone right out the window. That’s not a good thing.

    I absolutely love (or at least, I used to) the insights commenters share, most of which I find informative, perceptive, and often hilarious. So, how are we going to get things back on track?

    . . .

    I suppose one of the easier solutions would be to simply ban the most annoying parties. I’ve already done some of that, but perhaps I should lower the standards and start banning more frequently. Another possibility is a firm “ignore the trolls” stance, though I know full well that’s easier said than done. I could also create a registration process, which might discourage indiscriminate trolling.

    I’m open to suggestion. I’ve believed for quite a while that we have some of the best commenters online, but the only way to maintain this high degree of quality is if we lower the temperature and get these discussions back on track.

    Do we really want to disappoint our gracious host again?

  • Mary said:
    I believe Obama is caught between a rock and a hard place on the matter of trying to educate voters and establish his own competence. People tend to equate intelligence and especially intellectualism (the two are not the same) with weakness.

    The United States desperately needs it’s political leaders to change the way issues are talked about (I’d say we need a “new paradigm”, but buzzwords are a symptom of the problem). The country has a number of problems that can only be solved by razing institutions down to their foundations and rebuilding from scratch. We need a completely new way of thinking about:

    — Our economic structure — supply-side economics needs to end up on the scrap heap of history alongside the gold standard.
    — The misguided “war on terrorism” — as satisfying as it is to some people for us to kill bunches of brown-skinned people, we can’t defeat terrorists — their own people have to reject terrorism.
    — Education — schools are failing our kids.
    — Heath Care — there many shocking statistics but one that stands out is that the U.S ranks 32nd, behind Cyprus and Cuba in infant mortality.
    — Energy — our 21st century energy needs cannot be satisfied by 19th century technology.
    — Campaign finance — no problem can be solved if politicians are more afraid of losing campaign contributers than they are about alienating voters.

    Republicans have allowed voters to think that there are simplistic and painless solutions to these immense problems. Any Democrat running for office has to contend with that, and has to contend with a corporate-controlled media that is wedded to the status quo and to the “conventional wisdom” that they, themselves create. I ended up supporting Barack Obama because I came to believe he has the oratorical skills to speak intelligently against conventional thinking in a way that could connect with people.

    There are a lot of intelligent Democrats. John Kerry was, if anything, too smart for his own good. His speeches sounded like he was reading from Gibblon’s The Rise and Fall of the Roman Empire — with sentences that ran for half a page and paragraphs that ran for two and a half pages. Hillary Clinton is also very intelligent, but she and the rest of the DLC have consistently shown a tendency to move toward the middle. Unfortunately, incremental changes are not going to solve our problems.

    A lot of what needs to be done will not be discussed before the election. The problems can only be successfully addressed by using the power of the presidential bully pulpit. If real problems and real solutions are discussed seriously during the campaign, the full power of the Republican smear machine with the assistance of the support of the corporate-controlled media will distort the debate and destroy hope for another decade.

    I’m making a leap of faith in believing Obama will address these issues after he’s elected. But for better or worse, he’s the only person in the game who can.

  • Oh, and, by the way, as a recovering academic, I hope we won’t see “memes,” “frames,” “zeitgeist” and “cogent” ever in a single post. Oops. Oh, the irony . . .

    I’ll see you and raise you “schadenfreude,” “dolschtosslegende” and “optics.”

  • Obama is drawing record numbers to see him – estimates of at least 75,000 today are not exagerations – take a look at this crowd.

    They can’t steal 2008 if he can draw this type of support and get this type of crowd out in the streets.

    Its time for change.

  • Alright, another post, and I’ll try really hard not to use any of the aforementioned “intellectual” words. For the record, I think that was the only time (#43) I’ve ever used the c-word in posting.

    I’m totally with SteveT on the need to change the buzzword-heavy language of politics, but it’s certainly no small task. The neocon right has been extremely effective in saturating the political debate with the idea that “strength” and diplomacy go together like peanut butter and pickles. It’s extremely frustrating to see the label of a “strong leader” be almost necessarily tied to a politician’s willingness to use military force as a tool, the primary tool, of one’s foreign policy. The example that comes most readily to mind is Hillary Clinton’s campaign pushing the rhetoric on Iran, trying to somehow show that she’d be a stronger commander in chief.

    The strong/weak military/diplomacy language hasn’t helped the Dems in the past, and so far I think Obama’s done an excellent job in trying to address this perception. He’s very serious about changing the way the US thinks about foreign policy, and that’s what really drew me to him at the start of his campaign. That’s essentially what this latest McCain/Bush/Obama debate is about, and I couldn’t be more encouraged by it’s progression.

    I only wanted to add this to SteveT’s list of things we need to change the language on, as it’s something to think about when you’re having a conversation about this current foreign policy debate.

    ps- it was really hard to write the preceding post without using the word “frame.”

  • So much for the lies about white people not supporting him – look at the faces in the crowd. They can’t all be college educated and there can’t be enough latte for them all in that town.

    So more lies about Obama smashed, right mary?

  • NB – trying to impress with your verbiage? What a waste of the alphabet – so many keystrokes and so little to say.

  • For what it is worth. Obama is making an impression on lifelong republicans.
    This afternoon I met a lady who has been a Republican all her life; she asked me whether I became a US citizen. Once I answered her that I’ve been a citizen since ’95, she asked me whether I’d be voting for Obama? She told me that she is still registered as a Republican and probably will not change her registration. However, she did tell me that when filling out her ballot (living in Oregon and our primary being this coming Tuesday) she actually wrote in Mitt Romney’s name in protest of McCain and Bush.

    She intends to vote for Obama in the general election.

    Sure this is anecdotal news, but certainly encouraging.

  • Not only all this, but the facts are that the “appeasers” back in 1938-41 were the Republicans. The Senator Bush quoted was Senator Borah of Idaho, an isolationist who wrote the Neutrality Act that required Britain and France to pay cash-and-carry when they were trying to rearm in the face of the Nazi threat. The Republicans were the main sponsors of the pro-Nazi “America First” movement, and advocated as late as 1941 recognizing Hitler’s conquests in Europe.

    Not to mention that the President’s grandfather, Preston Bush, was the ultimate American appeaser: financier of the rise of Hitler in the 1920s, who took advantage of that in the 1930s to invest in German companies with Nazi support, who refused to remove his investments, and only avoided an indictment for TREASON under the Trading With The Enemy Act in 1942 by getting himself elected to the Senate.

    After the war, it was Republican companies like General Motors who entered claims against the United States for the destruction of their German subsidiaries during the war, companies actively engaged in supporting the Nazi war effort.

    Remind me again which party is the party of Treason and Appeasement????

  • Why are you equating Ronald Reagan with Jack Kennedy and Barack Obama. Oh, that’s right — all three used overblown rhetoric to characterize the country’s adversaries.

    You won’t certainly won’t score any political points with me regarding President Kennedy. He ordered my father, who was chief advisor to the Vietnamese Marine Battalion in late 1963, to assist the ARVN forces in the overthrow of President Diem. My father himself lost his own life three months later in a Viet Cong terror strike on an American movie theatre in downtown Saigon. I hold Kennedy in large part responsible for laying the solid foundation for the government’s shameful legacy of misconduct and mismanagement of the Vietnam War.

  • Tom – its even worse than that – the bush clan did the dirty work for the economic interest that created hitler and the nazis:

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h8AdSHKywEU

    Long tradition of treason in that family – but remember, they were just acting in the behalf of others – just like dur chimpfurher is carrying out an agenda that is not of his creation.

  • Want an example of appeasemen?The Obama campaign paying off Hillary Clinton’s self inflicted ,extravagant campaign debt,which is a direct result of a poorly planned,and fiscally irresponsible bid for a coronation. That’s what I would called appeasing and providing “unjustifiable” concessions to an unjust foe,which,IMHO, Clinton certainly has irrevocably proven to be.

  • On another note,i have not seen this discussed elsewhere,but does anyone KNOW who wrote the Bush appeasement address tto the Knesset? Has anyone considered that this address was given a day or two BEFORE Bush went to Saudi Arabia ,with his hat in his hand,asking for more oil for the Saudis.Could not the appeaser remark been “forplay” to mollify the Saudis in addition to the Israelis?

  • Why are you equating Ronald Reagan with Jack Kennedy and Barack Obama. Oh, that’s right — all three used overblown rhetoric to characterize the country’s adversaries.

    Obama uses “overblown rhetoric to characterize the country’s adversaries”? As opposed to, say, the Bush administration or Hillary Clinton with her saber-rattling threats of “obliterating” 70 million people? LOL.

  • re: Oveblown rhetoric= “smoking gun will be a mushroom cloud”,referring to NON existent WMD in Iraq?And while were talking about appeasement,isn’t that exactly what we are doing with Mexico by not enforcing boder controls-What About Ramos and Compean- U.S.Border control agents sent to prison for DOING THEIR JOBS?

  • neighborhood watch at #45 argues that little bear should be thrown out into the Greater Darkness:

    “i continue to be surprised by the lifelines he is thrown here. an unmoderated board needs to be self-policing – i.e. the social mores have to be upheld by the participants. anyone not taking a firm stance against little bear’s behavior contributes to the slow but sure degredation of the signal-to-noise ratio until this blog is overrun by static. there are plenty (too many) political boards that are little but the little bear type of post, he should be encouraged to find one.”

    While I would agree that little bear was pretty much all noise/no substance when he first arrived here, that isn’t true anymore – not to say that the noise component has completely subsided, but it’s not as relentless as before – and frequently it gets stirred up by these absolutist shut up reactions. Rather than advocating for permanent exile or terminal silencing ask yourself – What would Obama do?

    Little Bear – you could stand to ask yourself that question once in awhile as well. Just sayin’…

  • heck back in the late 50’s richard nixon actually got Nikita Khrushchev to drink a pepsi with him. appeasement? and of course, imagine how much better the cuban missle crisis would have worked out if we hadn’t been talking to the soviets.

  • that was a great respons from obama. thats the same thing i thought what about khrushchev.

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