As of this writing I have seeded, on Newsvine, 270 links, the exact number Obama needed in electoral votes to win this thing. Well, he far surpassed that, and I think this election is as much a referendum on George W Bush and the failed policies of his administration as anything else.
It's also, as many pundits have put it, a transformational election. Nobody, regardless of political affiliation, can deny that. America has just elected the first Black President in its history. For the first time ever we have someone other than an old white guy at the helm--and that, in and of itself, is pretty damn cool.
So while I may not agree with Senator Obama on many things, I'm still filled with pride that America has come as far as it has. I think Obama has a real chance to govern from the center, for all of America, and I hope and challenge him to do so, and to work with his opponents in the coming years to make this country as great as it can be.
Congratulations Obama. You deserve it.
And on a side note, good job McCain, too. You fought hard, and bowed out graciously. You will always be one of the most admirable public servants this country has ever been blessed with.
Western liberals, secularists and Atlanticists have an interest in minimising the possibility that there will ever be a Presidency of the ignorant and insular Sarah Palin.
John McCain has every right to be angry. He should have beaten George W. Bush in 2000. He lost to the money and smears of a lesser man, and then had to watch that man occupy the most historic presidency of modern times. Imagine McCain, a man who has spent his life thinking about war and honor and duty and sacrifice, observing Bush exhort us to shop after 9/11. What must he thought of that moment? How often must he have thought of what he would do with that moment?And I believe, quite strongly, that we had the wrong man in charge these last 8 years. Some will say it should have been Al Gore, but I firmly believe the man who should have led us through 9/11 and all the other trials we have faced is John McCain.
What McCain needs to do is junk the whole thing and start over. Shut down the rapid responses, end the frantic e-mails, bench the spinning surrogates, stop putting up new TV and Internet ads every minute. In fact, pull all the ads — they’re doing no good anyway. Use that money for televised town halls and half-hour addresses in prime time.
And let McCain go back to what he’s been good at in the past — running as a cheerful, open and accessible candidate. Palin should follow suit. The two of them are attractive and competent politicians. They’re happy warriors and good campaigners. Set them free.
Provide total media accessibility on their campaign planes and buses. Kick most of the aides off and send them out to swing states to work for the state coordinators on getting voters to the polls. Keep just a minimal staff to help organize the press conferences McCain and Palin should have at every stop and the TV interviews they should do at every location. Do town halls, do the Sunday TV shows, do talk radio — and invite Obama and Biden to join them in some of these venues, on the ground that more joint appearances might restore civility and substance to the contest.
Indeed. One can easily brush off the myriad stupid, uninformed college brats railing against Bush, but when you see a good number of very angry old white men with gunracks railing against Obama and his "black agenda" you start to worry. You should start to worry.
I agree about the media bias, but let's consider whether there may be some reason to tolerate more anger from the left than the right, especially if the lefties in question are young and the righties are old.
We're genetically programmed to weather the crying and tantrums of children. Teenagers sulk and shout, and we may grow impatient, but we understand the condition. We may well remember feeling the same way. Teenagers and young adults may annoy us, but we're not appalled. We think we can continue to speak calm reason and they will come around some day. But an angry older person sets off an alarm. Something is wrong here. Either there really is a problem or this person is unhinged. It gets our attention.
He did the right thing, needless to say, but I’m not sure how this squares with Palin telling people at fundraisers how many supporters are urging her to take the gloves off. It all goes back to this morning’s post: McCain wants to win the election but doesn’t seem to have the stomach to get truly nasty, so he compromises by bringing up Ayers but not pressing the issue too much. Gotta commit one way or another, champ. As it is, it’s a sad, strange situation to have one candidate forced to stick up for the other candidate in front of his own audience.He did do the right thing. I think McCain will lose, but going out honorably will ensure he's not remembered as the man who instilled hate in a campaign of such magnitude. Chris Buckley was right when he said McCain is the sort of man who should lead America, but that he's lost his way. Indeed, he has, but this moment proves that he is a man of substance, honor, and a true American patriot.Now that he’s defended Obama, I think it gives The One cover to call him out on it at the debate on Wednesday in the guise of, “John, I appreciate you trying to set the record straight on my behalf, but this climate you’ve created…” etc etc. In the meantime, here’s the only video I’ve been able to find thus far. Shuster aired the footage where the woman in the audience calls Obama an Arab a few minutes ago, and McCain really did almost yank the mike out of her hand before she could get going and make it worse. It’s not up on MSNBC’s website yet, but if I see it somewhere, I’ll update. Click the image to watch.
But then something weird happens: He acknowledges the "energy" people have been showing at rallies, and how glad he is that people are excited. But, he says, "I respect Sen. Obama and his accomplishments." People booed at the mention of his name. McCain, visibly angry, stopped them: "I want EVERYONE to be respectful, and lets make sure we are."
The very next questioner tried to push back on this request, noting that he needed to "tell the American the TRUTH about Barack Obama" -- a not very subtle way, I think, to ask John McCain to NOT tell the truth about Barack Obama. McCain told her there's a "difference between record and rhetoric, and I plan to talk about his record, respectfully... I don't mean that has to reduce your ferocity, I just mean it has to be respectful."
And then later, again, someone dangled a great big piece of low-hanging fruit in front of McCain: "I'm scared to bring up my child in a world where Barack Obama is president."
McCain replies, "Well, I don't want him to be president, either. I wouldn't be running if I did. But," and he pauses for emphasis, "you don't have to be scared to have him be President of the United States." A round of boos.
John McCain has changed. He said, famously, apropos the Republican debacle post-1994, “We came to Washington to change it, and Washington changed us.” This campaign has changed John McCain. It has made him inauthentic. A once-first class temperament has become irascible and snarly; his positions change, and lack coherence; he makes unrealistic promises, such as balancing the federal budget “by the end of my first term.” Who, really, believes that? Then there was the self-dramatizing and feckless suspension of his campaign over the financial crisis. His ninth-inning attack ads are mean-spirited and pointless. And finally, not to belabor it, there was the Palin nomination. What on earth can he have been thinking?All this is genuinely saddening, and for the country is perhaps even tragic, for America ought, really, to be governed by men like John McCain—who have spent their entire lives in its service, even willing to give the last full measure of their devotion to it. If he goes out losing ugly, it will be beyond tragic, graffiti on a marble bust.....
.....Obama has in him—I think, despite his sometimes airy-fairy “We are the people we have been waiting for” silly rhetoric—the potential to be a good, perhaps even great leader. He is, it seems clear enough, what the historical moment seems to be calling for.So, I wish him all the best. We are all in this together. Necessity is the mother of bipartisanship. And so, for the first time in my life, I’ll be pulling the Democratic lever in November. As the saying goes, God save the United States of America.
He views true conservatism as classical libertarian conservative, where economic control of a citizen's daily life by the government is very limited. However, this style of conservatism differs from classic libertarianism in that some governmental control or regulation is acceptable in order to preserve a functional society as it currently exists. Stances on social or cultural issues, under this style of conservatism, resemble the stances of classical libertarianism or modern U.S. liberalism. While stances on foreign policy are more hawkish than classic libertarianism, this style of conservatism differs from current neo-conservatism and arguably more closely resemble U.S. liberalism from the early 1930s up until the late 1960s. In the foreign policy sphere, Sullivan's foreign policy views have become somewhat less hawkish following the difficulties of the Iraq War.And at this point, I'm in almost complete agreement with Sullivan on Obama, McCain, Palin, etc. Conservatives may howl at this, but at this point I think Obama would be a better choice for the country than McCain/Palin. It's just time, yes, for a change. It's time to re-evaluate what it means to be conservative, American, part of a global world. It's time.
Today’s conservatism is lost. It is so lost it doesn’t actually know if it lost at sea, lost in space, or lost in a desert. It lacks moral courage, a philosophical core, and intellectual certitude. McCain’s defeat will help change all of that because his defeat will lead to a debate within conservatism unlike anything in several decades.Peter Suderman writes:
Obama, as always, appeared sophistacted, urbane: He held the mic in that delicate, refined way of final-level American Idol contestants, and constantly seemed to be holding an imaginary pen in the air and trying to visualize it. He will solve America’s energy crisis with telekinesis.McCain, on the other hand, came off as less the high-toned maverick and more the self-satisfied frat-boy goof: He started several of his answers with an Igor-via-Beavis-and-Butthead chuckle: heh-heh, heh-heh. Sorry dude: not funny.
One thing that’s clear from this debate is how little there is to John McCain and his campaign.
Conor Friedersdorf writes:
One striking thing is what didn’t happen. After days of staring into television cameras telling America that Obama is a closet terrorist sympathizer, Senator McCain blinked when they were face to face. How will Americans who watched those speeches and ads — and then watched this debate — react? My guess is that they’ll find the Illinois Senator a pretty regular, level headed guy, whatever they think of him on the issues. Talk about lowering expectations before the debate! The McCain campaign prepared the nation for a new Che Guevara. What we got is a candidate who Aaron Sorken might’ve written onto The West Wing.
James Poulos writes:
A crippled economy and a stalwart opposition gives a transformational president little to work with. But, paradoxically, perhaps that’s the greatest hedge against overactive presidencies from either Obama or McCain. It’s easy to think we’re headed for more sweeping change in government, given what’s wracked the world private sector. But the weight of bureaucracy and the inertia of government means we’re largely locked in. Ironically, it may be the case that Obama will not be truly transformational enough, and McCain will be too apt to precipitous, impulsive change.
There was always going to be a point of revolt and panic for a core group of Americans who believe that Obama simply cannot be president - because he's black or liberal or young or relatively new. This is that point. As the polls suggest a strong victory, the Hannity-Limbaugh-Steyn-O'Reilly base are going into shock and extreme rage. McCain and Palin have decided to stoke this rage, to foment it, to encourage paranoid notions that somehow Obama is a "secret" terrorist or Islamist or foreigner. These are base emotions in both sense of the word.
But they are also very very dangerous. This is a moment of maximal physical danger for the young Democratic nominee. And McCain is playing with fire. If he really wants to put country first, he will attack Obama on his policies - not on these inflammatory, personal, creepy grounds. This is getting close to the atmosphere stoked by the Israeli far right before the assassination of Rabin.
For God's sake, McCain, stop it. For once in this campaign, put your country first. [emphasis added]
