Democrats are so naive
March 18, 2008 at 3:59 am | Posted in politics | Leave a commentTags: 2008 Presidential Race, Barack Obama, Bill Richardson, Gender, Hillary Clinton, John Edwards, John McCain, Race
After a brief break race and gender have once again become issues in the Democratic Presidential primary race.
This is no surprise to me but all over the place people are acting shocked. Democrats are so naïve. With Americans approval rating of Bush in the basement and many Republicans reluctant to vote for John McCain the White House was basically on a platter for the party. But as Randi Rhodes says only Democrats can snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.
Democrats were so caught up in the idea of making history that they failed to look at what I consider the most important factor…electability. Poll after poll showed the most electable Democratic candidate was John Edwards yet he was never able to finish higher than third after Iowa.
So many people I know said a variation of the following statement, “It would be so cool to have a woman president.” Or , “It would be so cool to have a black president.”
Call me square but all I thought was “Wouldn’t’ it be cool to have a democratic president. So we could actually get things done.”
I find it mildly amusing that while people said it would be cool to have an African-American President or a woman president there was never much of a push to elect this countries first Latino president. New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson was all but ignored.
Another thing I find amusing is that both Obama and Clinton have resorted to a scorched earth approach when it comes to pointing out the international diplomacy history of the other one. Once again one need only look at Bill Richardson to see real international experience.
But that doesn’t matter. Democrats wanted to make history. I just hope that the history that is ultimately made isn’t that John McCain becomes the oldest elected President in American History.
None of this means anything if the old white guy beat the woman or the black guy.
Why voting for President isn’t like hiring for a job.
March 2, 2008 at 7:56 pm | Posted in politics | Leave a commentTags: 2008 Presidential Election, Al Gore, Barack Obama, Bill Cinton, Bill Richardson, Experience, George H.W. Bush, George W. Bush, Hillary Clinton, Hurricane Katrina, Iraq, John F. Kennedy, John Kerry, Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan, Walter Mondale
I have been all over the place over the last year in terms of who I wanted to get the Democratic Nomination for President. I wanted Al Gore to run and get what was stolen from him eight years ago. I thought Bill Richardson being Latino and from the swing state of New Mexico was a good person to go with. I thought John Edwards with his populist message and being from the south was most likely to win against a Republican.
But of course by the time I voted on February 5th in the Democratic Primary I had to choose between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama (and Mike Gravel but who are we kidding with that one). While I acknowledge that Hillary has done a lot of good things I in her life I couldn’t bring myself to cast a vote for her. Knowing what I know about how she’s voted in the Senate, her corporate ties, the way her campaign has been run. I had to go with Barack Obama.
On Thursday night I saw Hillary on Nightlight. My heart softened for her. Despite the fact I am now fully supporting Obama I do feel sorry for her at time.
She made an interesting argument that was repeated by a friend of mine yesterday. You should look at voting for President as hiring somebody for a job. My friend said you wouldn’t hire somebody at Taco Bell just because he was charming, you would hire the person with the most experience.
Sadly, we all know that is not true. How often do more experienced people in their forties and thirties loose out to young up and comers in their late twenties and thirties because the younger people are most hungry. And voting in a primary isn’t choosing a person to do the job. It’s choosing the person who will be one of the final two people for the job. Why would you choose somebody to be a finalist when you don’t believe the hiring committee (in this case the American public) would pick that person for the position? Would you hire the person with the most experience even though they have made major mistakes in their past positions? Would you hire the person with the most experience even though it is very possible that the people who worked with her in the past will spend every night and day trying to get her fired once she is hired? No.
Another thing I don’t like about the whole experience argument is that it isn’t true. Wasn’t Nixon more experienced than Kennedy in 1960? What would this country be without a Kennedy Presidency? Isn’t that the argument that was used to promote Reagan over Mondale in 1984? If Mondale had won this country could have stopped the bleeding in the mid 1980’s instead of having to wait until the 90’s, plus there would have been a female vise president. Isn’t that the argument George H.W. Bush gave in 1992 against Bill Clinton? All the progress that Clinton made for this country would have never been if the American public had rehired the person with more experience in 1992. And speaking of rehiring somebody with more experience….George W. Bush had more experience than John Kerry in 2004. But do you want to tell the thousands of Americans and tens of thousands of Iraqi’s who have died since 2004 that it’s good that the American public went with the more experienced candidate. Do you want to tell Katrina victims that they were left like animals in the Superdome but at least we had the more experienced guy for Another four years. 
I didn’t think so. Come on Ohio and Texas vote Obama and end this thing.
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