OC to surrender “Most Republican” Crown

Posted: November 12, 2008

By MARTIN WISCKOL
The Orange County Register
Friday, November 7

The county Republican Party and its legion of volunteers seemed to have pulled out all the stops to get GOP voters here to cast ballots. But when county GOP Chairman Scott Baugh said he was “disappointed” by the presidential outcome in the county, he spoke for much of his party here.

As of Friday’s tally – with about 250,000 ballots left to count – Barack Obama was closer to winning Orange County than any Democratic presidential nominee since Franklin Delano Roosevelt won here in 1936.

Sure, Obama’s tally is nearly 4 percentage points shy of John McCain’s, but that’s a strong showing for a Democrat here. In 2004, George W. Bush won the county by 222,593 votes. As of Friday, McCain was ahead by 33,911. Obama won all four cities in the county where Democrats outnumber Republicans, and won six of the 30 GOP cities. He also won in Rep. John Campbell’s predominantly Republican 48th Congressional District.

That 2004 margin of victory for Bush was the most, in raw votes, of any county in the nation. It prompted Baugh and the local party to dub themselves “America’s Most Republican County,” a claim prominently featured at the top of the party’s Web site.

We’ll see how long it stays there. Maricopa County, Ariz., which came in second to Orange County in 2004, was showing McCain ahead by 143,831 votes as of Friday.

Obama Republicans

Baugh said his volunteers contacted most of the 714,000 Republican voters in the county, either by phone or by knocking on their doors. Or both, since he says nearly a million contacts were made in all, when you counted repeated urgings for voters to send in their mail ballots.

GOP registration among county voters has slipped about 3 percent in the past five years, thanks in part to an unpopular president – and in part because Baugh redirected much of the voter-registration energy to a mail-voter drive. The logic was that new registrants don’t necessarily end up voting, but Republican mail voters are more likely to cast ballots than those who can only vote in the polling place.

That effort showed some success. Of the ballots received by the county by last Monday, 52 percent were from Republicans and 32 percent were from Democrats, well outpacing Republicans’ 12-percentage point advantage in voter registration.

Total turnout looks like it will be slightly higher than in 2004. The big problem wasn’t turnout, according to Baugh. It was Republicans who ended up voting for Obama. Baugh said the local party’s job is to get Republican voters to cast ballots – and it’s the national campaign’s job to sell the voters on who they should cast those ballots for.

“I saw pre-election polling where 17 percent of the Republicans in Newport Beach were voting for Barack Obama,” Baugh said. “If they’re turning out to vote, but are voting for Barack, there’s really nothing more we can do. We don’t control the message.

“On a national level, voters wanted to punish George Bush and other Republicans,” he said. “George Bush and John McCain were the faces attached to our economic condition.”

Contact the writer: 714-285-2867 or

Congratulations Democrats

Posted: November 10, 2008

The Democratic Party of Orange County offers congratulations to President-Elect Barack Obama, Vice President-Elect Joe Biden, and to the Democratic Congressional Candidates who emerged victorious on November 4th.  Thanks to their efforts, the Democratic Party not only won back the White House, but significantly increased its majorities in both houses of Congress. 

We also extend our thanks to all of the candidates in Orange County who did such a wonderful job in representing the Democratic Party.  Each of them, whether victorious or not, brought class and honor to the Party.  Those of us in the party office thoroughly enjoyed working with each candidate.  We also congratulate the following candidates, endorsed by the Democratic Party of Orange County, who were elected on November 4th:

United States Representative 47th District: Congresswoman Loretta Sanchez.
Member of the State Assembly 56th District: Assemblyman Tony Mendoza.
Member of the State Assembly 69th District: Assemblyman Jose Solorio.
Anaheim City Council: Lorri Galloway.
Costa Mesa City Council: Katrina Foley.
Fullerton City Council: Sharon Quirk.
Huntington Beach City Council: Keith Bohr.
Irvine Mayor: Sukhee Kang.
Irvine City Council: Beth Krom and Larry Agran.
Laguna Beach City Council: Jane Egly and Verna Rollinger.
La Habra City Council: Rose Espinoza.
Santa Ana City Council, Ward 1: Vincent Sarmiento.
Santa Ana City Council, Ward 5: Claudia Alvarez.
Tustin City Council: Deborah Gavello.
Westminster City Council: Penny Loomer.
Judge of the Superior Court Office No. 12: Debra Carrillo.
North Orange County Community College District - Trustee Area 4: Molly McClanahan.
Coast Community College District - Trustee Area 2: Jerry Patterson.
Coast Community College District - Trustee Area 3: Lorraine Prinsky.
Rancho Santiago Community College District - Trustee Area 1: Brian Conley and Mark McLoughlin.
Garden Grove Unified School District: Kim-Oanh Nguyen Lam.
Santa Ana Unified School District: Valerie Amezcua.
Anaheim City School District: Susan Preus.
Westminster School District: Sergio Contreras.

Barack Obama’s Victory Speech

Posted: November 10, 2008

Barack Obama’s Victory speech was delivered on Election Night, November 4th, before a crowd estimated at over 250,000 in Grants Park, Chicago, IL.  The text of his speech is below.

PRESIDENT-ELECT BARACK OBAMA: If there is anyone out there who still doubts that America is a place where all things are possible; who still wonders if the dream of our founders is alive in our time; who still questions the power of our democracy, tonight is your answer.

Its the answer told by lines that stretched around schools and churches in numbers this nation has never seen; by people who waited three hours and four hours, many for the very first time in their lives, because they believed that this time must be different; that their voice could be that difference.

Its the answer spoken by young and old, rich and poor, Democrat and Republican, black, white, Latino, Asian, Native American, gay, straight, disabled and not disabled - Americans who sent a message to the world that we have never been a collection of Red States and Blue States: we are, and always will be, the United States of America.

Its the answer that led those who have been told for so long by so many to be cynical, and fearful, and doubtful of what we can achieve to put their hands on the arc of history and bend it once more toward the hope of a better day.

Its been a long time coming, but tonight, because of what we did on this day, in this election, at this defining moment, change has come to America.

I just received a very gracious call from Senator McCain. He fought long and hard in this campaign, and hes fought even longer and harder for the country he loves. He has endured sacrifices for America that most of us cannot begin to imagine, and we are better off for the service rendered by this brave and selfless leader. I congratulate him and Governor Palin for all they have achieved, and I look forward to working with them to renew this nations promise in the months ahead.

I want to thank my partner in this journey, a man who campaigned from his heart and spoke for the men and women he grew up with on the streets of Scranton and rode with on that train home to Delaware, the Vice President-elect of the United States, Joe Biden.

I would not be standing here tonight without the unyielding support of my best friend for the last sixteen years, the rock of our family and the love of my life, our nations next First Lady, Michelle Obama. Sasha and Malia, I love you both so much, and you have earned the new puppy thats coming with us to the White House. And while shes no longer with us, I know my grandmother is watching, along with the family that made me who I am. I miss them tonight, and know that my debt to them is beyond measure.

To my campaign manager David Plouffe, my chief strategist David Axelrod, and the best campaign team ever assembled in the history of politics - you made this happen, and I am forever grateful for what youve sacrificed to get it done.

But above all, I will never forget who this victory truly belongs to - it belongs to you.

I was never the likeliest candidate for this office. We didnt start with much money or many endorsements. Our campaign was not hatched in the halls of Washington - it began in the backyards of Des Moines and the living rooms of Concord and the front porches of Charleston.

It was built by working men and women who dug into what little savings they had to give five dollars and ten dollars and twenty dollars to this cause. It grew strength from the young people who rejected the myth of their generations apathy; who left their homes and their families for jobs that offered little pay and less sleep; from the not-so-young people who braved the bitter cold and scorching heat to knock on the doors of perfect strangers; from the millions of Americans who volunteered, and organized, and proved that more than two centuries later, a government of the people, by the people and for the people has not perished from this Earth. This is your victory.

I know you didnt do this just to win an election and I know you didnt do it for me. You did it because you understand the enormity of the task that lies ahead. For even as we celebrate tonight, we know the challenges that tomorrow will bring are the greatest of our lifetime - two wars, a planet in peril, the worst financial crisis in a century. Even as we stand here tonight, we know there are brave Americans waking up in the deserts of Iraq and the mountains of Afghanistan to risk their lives for us. There are mothers and fathers who will lie awake after their children fall asleep and wonder how theyll make the mortgage, or pay their doctors bills, or save enough for college. There is new energy to harness and new jobs to be created; new schools to build and threats to meet and alliances to repair.

The road ahead will be long. Our climb will be steep. We may not get there in one year or even one term, but America - I have never been more hopeful than I am tonight that we will get there. I promise you - we as a people will get there.

There will be setbacks and false starts. There are many who wont agree with every decision or policy I make as President, and we know that government cant solve every problem. But I will always be honest with you about the challenges we face. I will listen to you, especially when we disagree. And above all, I will ask you join in the work of remaking this nation the only way its been done in America for two-hundred and twenty-one years - block by block, brick by brick, calloused hand by calloused hand.

What began twenty-one months ago in the depths of winter must not end on this autumn night. This victory alone is not the change we seek - it is only the chance for us to make that change. And that cannot happen if we go back to the way things were. It cannot happen without you.

So let us summon a new spirit of patriotism; of service and responsibility where each of us resolves to pitch in and work harder and look after not only ourselves, but each other. Let us remember that if this financial crisis taught us anything, its that we cannot have a thriving Wall Street while Main Street suffers - in this country, we rise or fall as one nation; as one people.

Let us resist the temptation to fall back on the same partisanship and pettiness and immaturity that has poisoned our politics for so long. Let us remember that it was a man from this state who first carried the banner of the Republican Party to the White House - a party founded on the values of self-reliance, individual liberty, and national unity. Those are values we all share, and while the Democratic Party has won a great victory tonight, we do so with a measure of humility and determination to heal the divides that have held back our progress. As Lincoln said to a nation far more divided than ours, We are not enemies, but friends…though passion may have strained it must not break our bonds of affection. And to those Americans whose support I have yet to earn - I may not have won your vote, but I hear your voices, I need your help, and I will be your President too.

And to all those watching tonight from beyond our shores, from parliaments and palaces to those who are huddled around radios in the forgotten corners of our world - our stories are singular, but our destiny is shared, and a new dawn of American leadership is at hand. To those who would tear this world down - we will defeat you. To those who seek peace and security - we support you. And to all those who have wondered if Americas beacon still burns as bright - tonight we proved once more that the true strength of our nation comes not from our the might of our arms or the scale of our wealth, but from the enduring power of our ideals: democracy, liberty, opportunity, and unyielding hope.

For that is the true genius of America - that America can change. Our union can be perfected. And what we have already achieved gives us hope for what we can and must achieve tomorrow.

This election had many firsts and many stories that will be told for generations. But one thats on my mind tonight is about a woman who cast her ballot in Atlanta. Shes a lot like the millions of others who stood in line to make their voice heard in this election except for one thing - Ann Nixon Cooper is 106 years old.

She was born just a generation past slavery; a time when there were no cars on the road or planes in the sky; when someone like her couldnt vote for two reasons - because she was a woman and because of the color of her skin.

And tonight, I think about all that shes seen throughout her century in America - the heartache and the hope; the struggle and the progress; the times we were told that we cant, and the people who pressed on with that American creed: Yes we can.

At a time when womens voices were silenced and their hopes dismissed, she lived to see them stand up and speak out and reach for the ballot. Yes we can.

When there was despair in the dust bowl and depression across the land, she saw a nation conquer fear itself with a New Deal, new jobs and a new sense of common purpose. Yes we can.

When the bombs fell on our harbor and tyranny threatened the world, she was there to witness a generation rise to greatness and a democracy was saved. Yes we can.

She was there for the buses in Montgomery, the hoses in Birmingham, a bridge in Selma, and a preacher from Atlanta who told a people that We Shall Overcome. Yes we can.

A man touched down on the moon, a wall came down in Berlin, a world was connected by our own science and imagination. And this year, in this election, she touched her finger to a screen, and cast her vote, because after 106 years in America, through the best of times and the darkest of hours, she knows how America can change. Yes we can.

America, we have come so far. We have seen so much. But there is so much more to do. So tonight, let us ask ourselves - if our children should live to see the next century; if my daughters should be so lucky to live as long as Ann Nixon Cooper, what change will they see? What progress will we have made?

This is our chance to answer that call. This is our moment. This is our time - to put our people back to work and open doors of opportunity for our kids; to restore prosperity and promote the cause of peace; to reclaim the American Dream and reaffirm that fundamental truth - that out of many, we are one; that while we breathe, we hope, and where we are met with cynicism, and doubt, and those who tell us that we cant, we will respond with that timeless creed that sums up the spirit of a people:

Yes We Can. Thank you, God bless you, and may God Bless the United States of America.

Barack Obama Acceptance Speech

Posted: September 01, 2008

On Thursday, August 28th, Barack Obama delivered his historic acceptance speech before a crowd of more than 80,000 at Invesco Field in Denver Colorado.  You can replay the speech by clicking here.

Hillary Clinton’s Denver Speech

Posted: August 27, 2008

**Text of Hillary Rodham Clinton’s August 26 speech at the Denver Democrativ Convention**

I am honored to be here tonight. A proud mother. A proud Democrat. A proud American. And a proud supporter of Barack Obama.

My friends, it is time to take back the country we love.

Whether you voted for me, or voted for Barack, the time is now to unite as a single party with a single purpose. We are on the same team, and none of us can sit on the sidelines.

This is a fight for the future. And it’s a fight we must win together.

I haven’t spent the past 35 years in the trenches advocating for children, campaigning for universal health care, helping parents balance work and family and fighting for women’s rights here at home and around the world to see another Republican in the White House squander our promise of a country that really fulfills the hopes of our people.

And you haven’t worked so hard over the last 18 months, or endured the last eight years, to suffer through more failed leadership.

No way. No how. No McCain.

Barack Obama is my candidate. And he must be our president.

Tonight, I ask you to remember what a presidential election is really about. When the polls have closed and the ads are finally off the air, it comes down to you—the American people and your lives and your children’s futures.

For me, it’s been a privilege to meet you in your homes, your workplaces, and your communities. Your stories reminded me that, everyday, America’s greatness is bound up in the lives of the American people—your hard work, your devotion to duty, your love for your children and your determination to keep going, often in the face of enormous obstacles.

You taught me so much and you made me laugh and yes, you even made me cry. You allowed me to become part of your lives. And you became part of mine.

I will always remember the single mom who had adopted two kids with autism. She didn’t have any health insurance and she discovered she had cancer. But she greeted me with her bald head painted with my name on it and asked me to fight for health care for her and her children.

I will always remember the young man in a Marine Corps t-shirt who waited months for medical care, and he said to me: “Take care of my buddies. A lot of them are still over there. And then will you please help take care of me?”

I will always remember the young boy who told me his mom worked for the minimum wage, that her employer had cut her hours. He said he just didn’t know what his family was going to do.

I will always be grateful to everyone from all 50 states, Puerto Rico and the territories, who joined our campaign on behalf of all those people left out and left behind by the Bush administration.

To my supporters, to my champions—my sisterhood of the traveling pantsuits - from the bottom of my heart: Thank you.

Thank you, because you never gave in, and you never gave up. And together we made history.

And along the way, America lost two great Democratic champions who would have been here with us tonight. One of our finest young leaders, Arkansas Democratic Chair, Bill Gwatney, who believed with all his heart that America and the South should be Democratic from top to bottom.

And Congresswoman Stephanie Tubbs Jones, a dear friend to many of us, a loving mother and courageous leader who never gave up her quest to make America fairer and smarter, stronger and better. Steadfast in her beliefs, a fighter of uncommon grace, she was an inspiration to me and to us all.

Our heart goes out to Stephanie’s son, Mervyn, Jr, and Bill’s wife, Rebecca, who traveled to Denver to join us this family of Democrats.

You know, Bill Gwatney and Stephanie Tubbs-Jones knew that after eight years of George Bush, people are hurting at home, and our standing has eroded around the world.

We have a lot of work ahead of us. Jobs lost, houses gone, falling wages, rising prices. The Supreme Court in a right-wing headlock and our government in partisan gridlock. The biggest deficit in our nation’s history. Money borrowed from the Chinese to buy oil from the Saudis. Putin and Georgia, Iraq and Iran.

I ran for president to renew the promise of America. To rebuild the middle class and sustain the American dream, to provide opportunity to those who are willing work hard and have that work rewarded so they could save for college, a home and retirement, afford the gas and groceries and have a little left over each month.

To promote a clean energy economy that will create millions of green-collar jobs.

To create a health care system that is universal, high-quality and affordable so that every single parent knows their children will be taken care of.

We want to create a world-class education system and make college affordable again.

To fight for an America that is defined by deep and meaningful equality - from civil rights to labor rights, from women’s rights to gay rights, from ending discrimination to promoting unionization, to providing help for the most important job there is: Caring for our families and to help every child live up to his or her God-given potential.

To make America once again a nation of immigrants and a nation of laws.

To restore fiscal sanity to Washington and make our government an instrument of the public good, not of private plunder.

To restore America’s standing in the world, to end the war in Iraq, bring our troops home with honor, care for our veterans and give them the services they have earned.

We will work for an America again that will join with our allies in confronting our shared challenges, from poverty and genocide to terrorism and global warming.

Most of all, I ran to stand up for all those who have been invisible to their government for eight long years.

Those are the reasons I ran for president. And those are the reasons I support Barack Obama for president.

I want you to ask yourselves: Were you in this campaign just for me? Or were you in it for that young Marine and others like him? Were you in it for that mom struggling with cancer while raising her kids? Were you in it for that young boy and his mom surviving on the minimum wage? Were you in it for all the people in this country who feel invisible?

We need leaders once again who can tap into that special blend of American confidence and optimism that has enabled generations before us to meet our toughest challenges. Leaders who can help us show ourselves and the world that with our ingenuity, creativity and innovative spirit, there are no limits to what is possible in America.

Now, this won’t be easy. Progress never is. But it will be impossible if we don’t fight to put a Democrat back into the White House.

We need to elect Barack Obama because we need a president who understands that America can’t compete in a global economy by padding the pockets of energy speculators while ignoring the workers whose jobs have been shipped overseas.

We need a president who understands we can’t solve the problems of global warming by giving windfall profits to the oil companies while ignoring opportunities to invest in the new technologies that will build a green economy.

We need a president who understands that the genius of America has always depended on the strength and vitality of the middle class.

Barack Obama began his career fighting for workers displaced by the global economy. He built his campaign on a fundamental belief that change in this country must start from the ground up, not the top down. And he knows that government must be about “We the people” not “We the favored few.”

And when Barack Obama is in the White House, he’ll revitalize our economy, defend the working people of America, and meet the global challenges of our times.

Democrats know how to do this. As I recall, we did it before with President Clinton and the Democrats. And if we do our part, we’ll do it again with President Obama and the Democrats.

Just think of what America will be as we transform our energy economy, create those millions of jobs, build a strong base for economic growth and shared prosperity, get middle-class families the tax relief they deserve.

And I cannot wait to watch Barack Obama sign into law a health care plan that covers every single American.

And we know that President Obama will end the war in Iraq responsibly, bring our troops home and begin to repair our alliances around the world.

And Barack will have with him a terrific partner in Michelle Obama. Anyone who saw Michelle’s speech last night knows she will be a great first lady for America.

And Americans are fortunate that Joe Biden will be at Barack Obama’s side. A strong leader, a good man who understands both the economic stresses here at home and the strategic challenges abroad. He is pragmatic, tough and he’s wise. And, of course, Joe will be supported by his wonderful wife, Jill.

They will be a great team for our country.

Now, John McCain is my colleague and my friend. He has served our country with honor and courage. But we don’t need four more years of the last eight years.

More economic stagnation ... and less affordable health care.

More high gas prices ... and less alternative energy.

More jobs getting shipped overseas ... and fewer jobs created here at home.

More skyrocketing debt and home foreclosures, and mounting bills that are crushing our middle-class families.

More war and less diplomacy.

More of a government where the privileged few come first, and everyone else comes last.

Well, John McCain says the economy is fundamentally sound. John McCain doesn’t think that 47 million people without health insurance is a crisis. John McCain wants to privatize Social Security. And in 2008, he still thinks it’s okay when women don’t earn equal pay for equal work.

Now, with an agenda like that, it makes sense that George Bush and John McCain will be together next week in the Twin Cities because these days they’re awfully hard to tell apart.

You know, America is still around after 232 years because we have risen to every challenge of every new time, changing to be faithful to our values of equal opportunity for all and the common good. And I know what that can mean for every man, woman, and child in America.

I’m a United States senator because in 1848, a group of courageous women and a few brave men gathered in Seneca Falls, New York, many traveling for days and nights, to participate in the first convention on women’s rights in our history.

And so dawned a struggle for the right to vote that would last 72 years, handed down by mother to daughter to granddaughter and a few sons and grandsons along the way.

These women and men looked into their daughters’ eyes and imagined a fairer and freer world and found the strength to fight. To rally and picket. To endure ridicule and harassment and brave violence and jail.

And after so many decades—88 years ago on this very day—the 19th Amendment, giving women the right to vote, became enshrined in our Constitution.

My mother was born before women could vote. My daughter got to vote for her mother for president. This is the story of America. Of women and men who defy the odds and never give up.

So how do we give this country back to them?

By following the example of a brave New Yorker, a woman who risked her life to bring slaves to freedom along the Underground Railroad.

And on that path to freedom, Harriett Tubman had one piece of advice: “If you hear the dogs, keep going. If you see the torches in the woods, keep going. If they’re shouting after you, keep going. Don’t ever stop. Keep going. If you want a taste of freedom, keep going.”

And even in the darkest moments, that is what Americans have done. We have found the faith to keep going.

I have seen it. I’ve seen it in our teachers and our firefighters, our police officers, our nurses, our small-business owners and our union workers. I’ve seen it in the men and women of our military.

In America, you always keep going. We’re Americans. We’re not big on quitting.

And remember, before we can keep going, we’ve got to get going by electing Barack Obama the next president of the United States.

We don’t have a moment to lose or a vote to spare. Nothing less than the fate of our nation and the future of our children hang in the balance.

I want you to think about your children and grandchildren come Election Day. Think about the choices your parents and grandparents made that had such a big impact on your life and on the life of our nation.

We’ve got to ensure that the choice we make in this election honors the sacrifices of all who came before us and will fill the lives of our children with possibility and hope.

That is our duty—To build that bright future, to teach our children that in America, there is no chasm too deep, no barrier too great, no ceiling too high for all who work hard, who keep going, have faith in God, in our country and in each other.

That is our mission, Democrats. Let’s elect Barack Obama and Joe Biden for that future worthy of our great country.

Thank you. God bless you, and Godspeed.

Last Call for Change We Can Believe In

Posted: August 25, 2008

**Published August 23, 2008 in the New York Times by Op-Ed Columnist Frank Rich**

AS the real campaign at last begins in Denver this week, this much is certain: It’s time for Barack Obama to dispatch “Change We Can Believe In” to a dignified death.

This isn’t because — OMG! — Obama’s narrow three- to four-percentage-point lead of recent weeks dropped to a statistically indistinguishable one- to three-point margin during his week of vacation. It’s because zero hour is here. As the presidential race finally gains the country’s full attention, the strategy that vanquished Hillary Clinton must be rebooted to take out John McCain.

“Change We Can Believe In” was brilliantly calculated for a Democratic familial brawl where every candidate was promising nearly identical change from George Bush. It branded Obama as the sole contender with the un-Beltway biography, credibility and political talent to link the promise of change to the nation’s onrushing generational turnover in all its cultural (and, yes, racial) manifestations. McCain should be a far easier mark than Clinton if Obama retools his act.

What we have learned this summer is this: McCain’s trigger-happy temperament and reactionary policies offer worse than no change. He is an unstable bridge back not just to Bush policies but to an increasingly distant 20th-century America that is still fighting Red China in Vietnam and the Soviet Union in the cold war. As the country tries to navigate the fast-moving changes of the 21st century, McCain would put America on hold.

What Obama also should have learned by now is that the press is not his friend. Of course, he gets more ink and airtime than McCain; he’s sexier news. But as George Mason University’s Center for Media and Public Affairs documented in its study of six weeks of TV news reports this summer, Obama’s coverage was 28 percent positive, 72 percent negative. (For McCain, the split was 43/57.) Even McCain’s most blatant confusions, memory lapses and outright lies still barely cause a ripple, whether he’s railing against a piece of pork he in fact voted for, as he did at the Saddleback Church pseudodebate last weekend, or falsifying crucial details of his marital history in his memoirs, as The Los Angeles Times uncovered in court records last month.

What should Obama do now? As premature panic floods through certain liberal precincts, there’s no shortage of advice: more meat to his economic plan, more passion in his stump delivery, less defensiveness in response to attacks and, as is now happening, sharper darts at a McCain lifestyle so extravagant that we are only beginning to learn where all the beer bullion is buried.

But Obama is never going to be a John Edwards-style populist barnburner. (Edwards wasn’t persuasive either, by the way.) Nor will wonkish laundry lists of policy details work any better for him than they did for Al Gore or Hillary Clinton. Obama has those details to spare, in any case, while McCain, who didn’t even include an education policy on his Web site during primary season, is still winging it. As David Leonhardt observes in his New York Times Magazine cover article on “Obamanomics” today, Obama’s real problem is not a lack of detail but his inability to sell policy with “an effective story.”

That story is there to be told, but it has to be a story that is more about America and the future and less about Obama and his past. After all these months, most Americans, for better or worse, know who Obama is. So much so that he seems to have fought off the relentless right-wing onslaught to demonize him as an elitist alien. Asked in last week’s New York Times/CBS News poll if each candidate shares their values, registered voters gave Obama and McCain an identical 63 percent. Asked if each candidate “cares about the needs and problems of people like yourself,” Obama beat McCain by 37 to 23 percent. Is the candidate “someone you can relate to”? Obama: 55 percent, McCain: 41. Even before McCain told Politico that he relies on the help to count up the houses he owns, he was the candidate seen as the out-of-step elitist.

So while Obama can continue to try to reassure resistant Clinton loyalists in Appalachia that he’s not a bogeyman from Madrassaland, he must also move on to the bigger picture for everyone else. He must rekindle the “fierce urgency of now” — but not, as he did in the primaries, merely to evoke uplifting echoes of the civil-rights struggle or the need for withdrawal from Iraq.

Most Americans, unlike the press, are not obsessed by race. (Those whites who are obsessed by race will not vote for Obama no matter what he or anyone else has to say about it.) And most Americans have turned their backs on the Iraq war, no matter how much McCain keeps bellowing about “victory.” The Bush White House is now poised to alight with the Iraqi government on a withdrawal timetable far closer to Obama’s 16 months than McCain’s vague promise of a 2013 endgame. As Gen. David Petraeus returns home, McCain increasingly resembles those mad Japanese soldiers who remained at war on remote Pacific islands years after Hiroshima.

Economic anxiety is the new terrorism. This is why the most relevant snapshot of voters’ concerns was not to be found at Saddleback Church but at the Olympics last Saturday. For all the political press’s hype, only some 5.5 million viewers tuned in to the Rev. Rick Warren’s show in Orange County, Calif. Roughly three-quarters of them were over 50 — in other words, the McCain base. By contrast, a diverse audience of 32 million Americans tuned in to Beijing that night to watch Michael Phelps win his eighth gold medal.

This was a rare feel-good moment for a depressed country. But the unsettling subtext of the Olympics has been as resonant for Americans as the Phelps triumph. You couldn’t watch NBC’s weeks of coverage without feeling bombarded by an ascendant China whose superior cache of gold medals and dazzling management of the Games became a proxy for its spectacular commercial and cultural prowess in the new century. Even before the Olympics began, a July CNN poll found that 70 percent of Americans fear China’s economic might — about as many as find America on the wrong track. Americans watching the Olympics could not escape the reality that China in particular and Asia in general will continue to outpace our country in growth while we remain mired in stagnancy and debt (much of it held by China).

How we dig out of this quagmire is the American story that Obama must tell. It is not a story of endless conflicts abroad but a potentially inspiring tale of serious economic, educational, energy and health-care mobilization at home. We don’t have the time or resources to go off on more quixotic military missions or to indulge in culture wars. (In China, they’re too busy exploiting scientific advances for competitive advantage to reopen settled debates about Darwin.) Americans must band together for change before the new century leaves us completely behind. The Obama campaign actually has plans, however imperfect or provisional, to set us on that path; the McCain campaign offers only disposable Band-Aids typified by the “drill now” mantra that even McCain says will only have a “psychological” effect on gas prices.

Even as it points to America’s future, the Obama campaign also has the duty to fill in its opponent’s past. McCain’s attacks on Obama have worked: in last week’s Los Angeles Times-Bloomberg poll, Obama’s favorable rating declined from 59 to 48 percent and his negative rating rose from 27 to 35. Yet McCain still has a lower positive rating (46 percent) and higher negative rating (38) than Obama. McCain is not nearly as popular among Americans, it turns out, as he is among his journalistic camp followers. Should voters actually get to know him, he has nowhere to go but down.

The argument against Obama’s “going negative” is that it undermines his message of “transcendent politics” and will make him look like an “angry black man.” But pacifistic politics is an oxymoron, and Obama is constitutionally incapable of coming off angrier than McCain. A few more fisticuffs from the former law professor (and many more from his running mate and other surrogates) can only help make him look less skinny (metaphorically if not literally). Obama should go after McCain’s supposedly biggest asset — experience — much as McCain went after Obama’s crowd-drawing celebrity.

It is, after all, not mere happenstance that so many conservative pundits — Rich Lowry, Peggy Noonan, Ramesh Ponnuru — have, to McCain’s irritation, proposed that he “patriotically” declare in advance that he will selflessly serve only a single term. Whatever their lofty stated reasons for promoting this stunt, their underlying message is clear: They recognize in their heart of hearts that the shelf life of McCain’s experience has already reached its expiration date.

Is a man who is just discovering the Internet qualified to lead a restoration of America’s economic and educational infrastructures? Is the leader of a virtually all-white political party America’s best salesman and moral avatar in the age of globalization? Does a bellicose Vietnam veteran who rushed to hitch his star to the self-immolating overreaches of Ahmad Chalabi, Pervez Musharraf and Mikheil Saakashvili have the judgment to keep America safe?

R.I.P., “Change We Can Believe In.” The fierce urgency of the 21st century demands Change Before It’s Too Late.

**A link to this article is available here**

How Obama Became Acting President

Posted: July 29, 2008

*Article written by Op-Ed columnist Frank Rich and published in the New York Times on July 27, 2008*

IT almost seems like a gag worthy of “Borat”: A smooth-talking rookie senator with an exotic name passes himself off as the incumbent American president to credulous foreigners. But to dismiss Barack Obama’s magical mystery tour through old Europe and two war zones as a media-made fairy tale would be to underestimate the ingenious politics of the moment. History was on the march well before Mr. Obama boarded his plane, and his trip was perfectly timed to reap the whirlwind.

He never would have been treated as a president-in-waiting by heads of state or network talking heads if all he offered were charisma, slick rhetoric and stunning visuals. What drew them instead was the raw power Mr. Obama has amassed: the power to start shaping events and the power to move markets, including TV ratings. (Even “Access Hollywood” mustered a 20 percent audience jump by hosting the Obama family.) Power begets more power, absolutely.

The growing Obama clout derives not from national polls, where his lead is modest. Nor is it a gift from the press, which still gives free passes to its old bus mate John McCain. It was laughable to watch journalists stamp their feet last week to try to push Mr. Obama into saying he was “wrong” about the surge. More than five years and 4,100 American fatalities later, they’re still not demanding that Mr. McCain admit he was wrong when he assured us that our adventure in Iraq would be fast, produce little American “bloodletting” and “be paid for by the Iraqis.”

Never mind. This election remains about the present and the future, where Iraq’s $10 billion a month drain on American pocketbooks and military readiness is just one moving part in a matrix of national crises stretching from the gas pump to Pakistan. That’s the high-rolling political casino where Mr. Obama amassed the chips he cashed in last week. The “change” that he can at times wield like a glib marketing gimmick is increasingly becoming a substantive reality — sometimes through Mr. Obama’s instigation, sometimes by luck. Obama-branded change is snowballing, whether it’s change you happen to believe in or not.

Looking back now, we can see that the fortnight preceding the candidate’s flight to Kuwait was like a sequence in an old movie where wind blows away calendar pages to announce an epochal plot turn. First, on July 7, the Iraqi prime minister, Nuri al-Maliki, dissed Bush dogma by raising the prospect of a withdrawal timetable for our troops. Then, on July 15, Mr. McCain suddenly noticed that more Americans are dying in Afghanistan than Iraq and called for more American forces to be sent there. It was a long-overdue recognition of the obvious that he could no longer avoid: both Robert Gates, the defense secretary, and Adm. Mike Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, had already called for more American troops to battle the resurgent Taliban, echoing the policy proposed by Mr. Obama a year ago.

On July 17 we learned that President Bush, who had labeled direct talks with Iran “appeasement,” would send the No. 3 official in the State Department to multilateral nuclear talks with Iran. Lest anyone doubt that the White House had moved away from the rigid stand endorsed by Mr. McCain and toward Mr. Obama’s, a former Rumsfeld apparatchik weighed in on The Wall Street Journal’s op-ed page: “Now Bush Is Appeasing Iran.”

Within 24 hours, the White House did another U-turn, endorsing an Iraq withdrawal timetable as long as it was labeled a “general time horizon.” In a flash, as Mr. Obama touched down in Kuwait, Mr. Maliki approvingly cited the Democratic candidate by name while laying out a troop-withdrawal calendar of his own that, like Mr. Obama’s, would wind down in 2010. On Tuesday, the British prime minister, Gordon Brown, announced a major drawdown of his nation’s troops by early 2009.

But it’s not merely the foreign policy consensus that is shifting Obama-ward. The Texas oilman T. Boone Pickens has now joined another high-profile McCain supporter, Arnold Schwarzenegger, in knocking the McCain nostrum that America can drill its way out of its energy crisis. Mr. Pickens, who financed the Swift-boat campaign smearing John Kerry in 2004, was thought to be a sugar daddy for similar assaults against the Democrats this year. Instead, he is underwriting nonpartisan ads promoting wind power and speaks of how he would welcome Al Gore as energy czar if there’s an Obama administration.

The Obama stampede is forcing Mr. McCain to surrender on other domestic fronts. After the Democrat ran ads in 14 states berating chief executives who are “making more in 10 minutes” than many workers do in a year, a newly populist Mr. McCain began railing against “corporate greed” — much as he also followed Mr. Obama’s example and belatedly endorsed a homeowners’ bailout he had at first opposed. Given that Mr. McCain has already used a refitted, hand-me-down Obama campaign slogan (“A Leader You Can Believe In”), it can’t be long before he takes up fist bumps. They’ve become the rage among young (nonterrorist) American businessmen, according to USA Today.

“We have one president at a time,” Mr. Obama is careful to say. True, but the sitting president, a lame duck despised by voters and shunned by his own party’s candidates, now has all the gravitas of Mr. Cellophane in “Chicago.” The opening for a successor arrived prematurely, and the vacuum had been waiting to be filled. What was most striking about the Obama speech in Berlin was not anything he said so much as the alternative reality it fostered: many American children have never before seen huge crowds turn out abroad to wave American flags instead of burn them.

Mr. McCain could also have stepped into the leadership gap left by Mr. Bush’s de facto abdication. His inability to even make a stab at doing so is troubling. While drama-queen commentators on television last week were busy building up false suspense about the Obama trip — will he make a world-class gaffe? will he have too large an audience in Germany? — few focused on the alarms that Mr. McCain’s behavior at home raise about his fitness to be president.

Once again the candidate was making factual errors about the only subject he cares about, imagining an Iraq-Pakistan border and garbling the chronology of the Anbar Awakening. Once again he displayed a tantrum-prone temperament ill-suited to a high-pressure 21st-century presidency. His grim-faced crusade to brand his opponent as a traitor who wants to “lose a war” isn’t even a competent impersonation of Joe McCarthy. Mr. McCain comes off instead like the ineffectual Mr. Wilson, the retired neighbor perpetually busting a gasket at the antics of pesky little Dennis the Menace.

The week’s most revealing incident occurred on Wednesday when the new, supposedly improved McCain campaign management finalized its grand plan to counter Mr. Obama’s Berlin speech with a “Mission Accomplished”-like helicopter landing on an oil rig off Louisiana’s coast. The announcement was posted on politico.com even as any American with a television could see that Hurricane Dolly was imminent. Needless to say, this bit of theater was almost immediately “postponed” but not before raising the question of whether a McCain administration would be just as hapless in anticipating the next Katrina as the Bush-Brownie storm watch.

When not plotting such stunts, the McCain campaign whines about its lack of press attention like a lover jilted for a younger guy. The McCain camp should be careful what it wishes for. As its relentless goading of Mr. Obama to visit Iraq only ratcheted up anticipation for the Democrat’s triumphant trip, so its insistent demand for joint town-hall meetings with Mr. Obama and for more televised chronicling of Mr. McCain’s wanderings could be self-inflicted disasters in the making.

Mr. McCain may be most comfortable at town-hall meetings before largely friendly crowds, but his performance under pressure at this year’s G.O.P. primary debates was erratic. His sound-bite-deep knowledge of the country’s No. 1 issue, the economy, is a Gerald Ford train wreck waiting to happen in any matchup with Mr. Obama that requires focused, time-limited answers rather than rambling.

During Mr. McCain’s last two tours of the Middle East — conducted without the invasive scrutiny of network anchors — the only news he generated was his confusion of Sunni with Shia and his embarrassing stroll through a “safe” Baghdad market with helicopter cover. He should thank his stars that few TV viewers saw that he was even less at home when walking through a chaotic Pennsylvania supermarket last week. He inveighed against the price of milk while reading from a note card and felt the pain of a shopper planted by the local Republican Party.

The election remains Mr. Obama’s to lose, and he could lose it, whether through unexpected events, his own vanity or a vice-presidential misfire. But what we’ve learned this month is that America, our allies and most likely the next Congress are moving toward Mr. Obama’s post-Iraq vision of the future, whether he reaches the White House or not. That’s some small comfort as we contemplate the strange alternative offered by the Republicans: a candidate so oblivious to our nation’s big challenges ahead that he is doubling down in his campaign against both Mr. Maliki and Mr. Obama to be elected commander in chief of the surge.
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Article available here.

“My Plan for Iraq” by Barack Obama

Posted: July 15, 2008

The following Op-Ed was published in the New York Times on July 14, 2008.

CHICAGO — The call by Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki for a timetable for the removal of American troops from Iraq presents an enormous opportunity. We should seize this moment to begin the phased redeployment of combat troops that I have long advocated, and that is needed for long-term success in Iraq and the security interests of the United States.

The differences on Iraq in this campaign are deep. Unlike Senator John McCain, I opposed the war in Iraq before it began, and would end it as president. I believed it was a grave mistake to allow ourselves to be distracted from the fight against Al Qaeda and the Taliban by invading a country that posed no imminent threat and had nothing to do with the 9/11 attacks. Since then, more than 4,000 Americans have died and we have spent nearly $1 trillion. Our military is overstretched. Nearly every threat we face — from Afghanistan to Al Qaeda to Iran — has grown.

In the 18 months since President Bush announced the surge, our troops have performed heroically in bringing down the level of violence. New tactics have protected the Iraqi population, and the Sunni tribes have rejected Al Qaeda — greatly weakening its effectiveness.

But the same factors that led me to oppose the surge still hold true. The strain on our military has grown, the situation in Afghanistan has deteriorated and we’ve spent nearly $200 billion more in Iraq than we had budgeted. Iraq’s leaders have failed to invest tens of billions of dollars in oil revenues in rebuilding their own country, and they have not reached the political accommodation that was the stated purpose of the surge.

The good news is that Iraq’s leaders want to take responsibility for their country by negotiating a timetable for the removal of American troops. Meanwhile, Lt. Gen. James Dubik, the American officer in charge of training Iraq’s security forces, estimates that the Iraqi Army and police will be ready to assume responsibility for security in 2009.

Only by redeploying our troops can we press the Iraqis to reach comprehensive political accommodation and achieve a successful transition to Iraqis’ taking responsibility for the security and stability of their country. Instead of seizing the moment and encouraging Iraqis to step up, the Bush administration and Senator McCain are refusing to embrace this transition — despite their previous commitments to respect the will of Iraq’s sovereign government. They call any timetable for the removal of American troops “surrender,” even though we would be turning Iraq over to a sovereign Iraqi government.

But this is not a strategy for success — it is a strategy for staying that runs contrary to the will of the Iraqi people, the American people and the security interests of the United States. That is why, on my first day in office, I would give the military a new mission: ending this war.

As I’ve said many times, we must be as careful getting out of Iraq as we were careless getting in. We can safely redeploy our combat brigades at a pace that would remove them in 16 months. That would be the summer of 2010 — two years from now, and more than seven years after the war began. After this redeployment, a residual force in Iraq would perform limited missions: going after any remnants of Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, protecting American service members and, so long as the Iraqis make political progress, training Iraqi security forces. That would not be a precipitous withdrawal.

In carrying out this strategy, we would inevitably need to make tactical adjustments. As I have often said, I would consult with commanders on the ground and the Iraqi government to ensure that our troops were redeployed safely, and our interests protected. We would move them from secure areas first and volatile areas later. We would pursue a diplomatic offensive with every nation in the region on behalf of Iraq’s stability, and commit $2 billion to a new international effort to support Iraq’s refugees.

Ending the war is essential to meeting our broader strategic goals, starting in Afghanistan and Pakistan, where the Taliban is resurgent and Al Qaeda has a safe haven. Iraq is not the central front in the war on terrorism, and it never has been. As Adm. Mike Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, recently pointed out, we won’t have sufficient resources to finish the job in Afghanistan until we reduce our commitment to Iraq.

As president, I would pursue a new strategy, and begin by providing at least two additional combat brigades to support our effort in Afghanistan. We need more troops, more helicopters, better intelligence-gathering and more nonmilitary assistance to accomplish the mission there. I would not hold our military, our resources and our foreign policy hostage to a misguided desire to maintain permanent bases in Iraq.

In this campaign, there are honest differences over Iraq, and we should discuss them with the thoroughness they deserve. Unlike Senator McCain, I would make it absolutely clear that we seek no presence in Iraq similar to our permanent bases in South Korea, and would redeploy our troops out of Iraq and focus on the broader security challenges that we face. But for far too long, those responsible for the greatest strategic blunder in the recent history of American foreign policy have ignored useful debate in favor of making false charges about flip-flops and surrender.

It’s not going to work this time. It’s time to end this war.

Barack Obama, a United States senator from Illinois, is the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee.

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A link to the article is available here. 

Obama Mines a Republican Stronghold

Posted: July 14, 2008

By Dan Morain, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
July 14, 2008

On the Balboa Bay Club’s wall of its most famous guests, there are photos of Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush, Gerald Ford and, of course, the Duke.

There are no Democratic politicians. Securely tucked behind the Orange Curtain, Newport Beach is Republican-held territory.  But Barack Obama may be hoping to change that.

On Sunday, the Democratic Illinois senator brought his campaign to the center of Republican power and did what he has done better than any other presidential candidate—raise money.

Obama would leave with $1.2 million, an organizer estimated. With this infusion, he may exceed the amount GOP candidate John McCain has raised in Orange County.

“It is the hot ticket in town,” said Santa Ana lawyer Wylie A. Aitken, one of the state’s leading Democratic fundraisers.

Aitken, who represents plaintiffs who sue corporations, was on the host committee for Sunday’s event, as were lawyers Frank Barbaro, chairman of the Orange County Democratic Party; and Leigh Steinberg, who represents sports figures.

Obama has drawn attention for his success with donors who contribute in amounts less than $200. Through May, he had raised $136 million of his $287-million total that way. But small donors were not his target Sunday.

About 40 contributors gave the legal maximum of $28,500 each to the national Democratic Party. They and 225 others each gave the maximum $2,300 allowed to Obama.

Donors included a few dozen Iranian Americans, who chipped in at least $200,000, Obama’s aides said.

Jerry Howard, 63, is a Republican who has never voted for a Democrat. Nor had he ever given money to Democrats—until he wrote a $28,500 check to the Democratic National Committee. That gained him the privilege of meeting Obama at the VIP reception, on a patio overlooking the harbor where yachts the size of small houses are moored. Obama donor and pharmaceutical company founder Milan Panic had his 125-foot yacht tied up a few dozen feet away.

Howard, a retired owner of a hotel design company, said, “I was shocked they were going to have a fundraiser in Orange County, the heart of Republican country.” It’s not that Howard dislikes McCain. But he said he was “astonished” at the state of the economy, and places much of the blame on Republicans. He is not certain he will vote for Obama. But encouraged by his wife, Deborah, he is leaning that way.

“At least he is something different,” Howard said.

Obama has vastly out-raised McCain in California, $37 million to $12.5 million through the end of May. But McCain had bested Obama in Orange County, $2 million to Obama’s $1.3 million. With Sunday’s event, however, Obama may have caught up.

“We thought it was symbolic,” said Barbaro, explaining why the event was held at the Balboa, long a favorite haunt of John Wayne and other Republican icons. “If you’re going to take it to them, take it to them where they live.”

Few experts expect Obama to carry Orange County. Republicans maintain a significant voter registration advantage, 46% to 31%.

But Obama’s visit made political sense. The Balboa resort is a union facility, which appeals to Democrats. And the Democratic population in the county is large. There are twice as many Democrats as in San Francisco—488,703 to 240,358, at last count—and the number has gone up more than 36,000 since 2004.

Barbaro and others are counting on Obama to draw Republicans like Geoffrey Lyon. Lyon, 50, lives in Huntington Beach and supports the Iraq war. But he also gave Obama $2,300 this year.

“It is a historic candidacy, and I didn’t want be on the wrong side of it,” Lyon said in a recent interview.

A labor lawyer who represents employees in discrimination cases, Lyon said he thought an Obama presidency would be “good for America.” He said he believed it would be more difficult for radical Muslims to “teach people to hateAmerica when we visibly live up to our principles. The racial divide—it is time to end.”

Obama met privately Sunday for about 15 minutes with Iranian Americans. People who attended said he spoke of his desire to use diplomacy while standing up to rogue nations.

“He came across as young and full of energy,” said Santa Ana lawyer Houman Fakhimi, a Democrat who attended.

Obama visited Orange County once before in the campaign. This was his first visit since he locked up the nomination. Aitken had supported fellow trial lawyer John Edwards. His wife, Bette Aitken, had backed Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton.

“Now there is one choice. It is time to come together,” said Aitken, who tapped friends and associates to raise “well over $100,000” for Sunday’s event.

On this trip, Obama was met by actor Louis Gossett Jr., Lakers point guard Jordan Farmar, Arianna Huffington of the Huffington Post and an old school chum, Greg McGrath.

“He was a funny guy with a big smile. We called him Barry,” McGrath said.

He said it never dawned on him that Obama might one day run for president. But the Dana Point businessman readily wrote out a $2,300 check.

“It is time for a change,” McGrath said. “Republicans—what can I say—have messed it up.”

The America We Love, by Senator Barack Obama

Posted: June 30, 2008

June 30, 2008
Independence, Missouri

On a spring morning in April of 1775, a simple band of colonists - farmers and merchants, blacksmiths and printers, men and boys - left their homes and families in Lexington and Concord to take up arms against the tyranny of an Empire. The odds against them were long and the risks enormous - for even if they survived the battle, any ultimate failure would bring charges of treason, and death by hanging.

And yet they took that chance. They did so not on behalf of a particular tribe or lineage, but on behalf of a larger idea. The idea of liberty. The idea of God-given, inalienable rights. And with the first shot of that fateful day - a shot heard round the world - the American Revolution, and America’s experiment with democracy, began.

Those men of Lexington and Concord were among our first patriots. And at the beginning of a week when we celebrate the birth of our nation, I think it is fitting to pause for a moment and reflect on the meaning of patriotism - theirs, and ours. We do so in part because we are in the midst of war - more than one and a half million of our finest young men and women have now fought in Iraq and Afghanistan; over 60,000 have been wounded, and over 4,600 have been laid to rest. The costs of war have been great, and the debate surrounding our mission in Iraq has been fierce. It is natural, in light of such sacrifice by so many, to think more deeply about the commitments that bind us to our nation, and to each other.

We reflect on these questions as well because we are in the midst of a presidential election, perhaps the most consequential in generations; a contest that will determine the course of this nation for years, perhaps decades, to come. Not only is it a debate about big issues - health care, jobs, energy, education, and retirement security - but it is also a debate about values. How do we keep ourselves safe and secure while preserving our liberties? How do we restore trust in a government that seems increasingly removed from its people and dominated by special interests? How do we ensure that in an increasingly global economy, the winners maintain allegiance to the less fortunate? And how do we resolve our differences at a time of increasing diversity?

Finally, it is worth considering the meaning of patriotism because the question of who is - or is not - a patriot all too often poisons our political debates, in ways that divide us rather than bringing us together. I have come to know this from my own experience on the campaign trail. Throughout my life, I have always taken my deep and abiding love for this country as a given. It was how I was raised; it is what propelled me into public service; it is why I am running for President. And yet, at certain times over the last sixteen months, I have found, for the first time, my patriotism challenged - at times as a result of my own carelessness, more often as a result of the desire by some to score political points and raise fears about who I am and what I stand for.

So let me say at this at outset of my remarks. I will never question the patriotism of others in this campaign. And I will not stand idly by when I hear others question mine.

My concerns here aren’t simply personal, however. After all, throughout our history, men and women of far greater stature and significance than me have had their patriotism questioned in the midst of momentous debates. Thomas Jefferson was accused by the Federalists of selling out to the French. The anti-Federalists were just as convinced that John Adams was in cahoots with the British and intent on restoring monarchal rule. Likewise, even our wisest Presidents have sought to justify questionable policies on the basis of patriotism. Adams’ Alien and Sedition Act, Lincoln’s suspension of habeas corpus, Roosevelt’s internment of Japanese Americans - all were defended as expressions of patriotism, and those who disagreed with their policies were sometimes labeled as unpatriotic.

In other words, the use of patriotism as a political sword or a political shield is as old as the Republic. Still, what is striking about today’s patriotism debate is the degree to which it remains rooted in the culture wars of the 1960s - in arguments that go back forty years or more. In the early years of the civil rights movement and opposition to the Vietnam War, defenders of the status quo often accused anybody who questioned the wisdom of government policies of being unpatriotic. Meanwhile, some of those in the so-called counter-culture of the Sixties reacted not merely by criticizing particular government policies, but by attacking the symbols, and in extreme cases, the very idea, of America itself - by burning flags; by blaming America for all that was wrong with the world; and perhaps most tragically, by failing to honor those veterans coming home from Vietnam, something that remains a national shame to this day.

Most Americans never bought into these simplistic world-views - these caricatures of left and right. Most Americans understood that dissent does not make one unpatriotic, and that there is nothing smart or sophisticated about a cynical disregard for America’s traditions and institutions. And yet the anger and turmoil of that period never entirely drained away. All too often our politics still seems trapped in these old, threadbare arguments - a fact most evident during our recent debates about the war in Iraq, when those who opposed administration policy were tagged by some as unpatriotic, and a general providing his best counsel on how to move forward in Iraq was accused of betrayal.

Given the enormous challenges that lie before us, we can no longer afford these sorts of divisions. None of us expect that arguments about patriotism will, or should, vanish entirely; after all, when we argue about patriotism, we are arguing about who we are as a country, and more importantly, who we should be. But surely we can agree that no party or political philosophy has a monopoly on patriotism. And surely we can arrive at a definition of patriotism that, however rough and imperfect, captures the best of America’s common spirit.

What would such a definition look like? For me, as for most Americans, patriotism starts as a gut instinct, a loyalty and love for country rooted in my earliest memories. I’m not just talking about the recitations of the Pledge of Allegiance or the Thanksgiving pageants at school or the fireworks on the Fourth of July, as wonderful as those things may be. Rather, I’m referring to the way the American ideal wove its way throughout the lessons my family taught me as a child.

One of my earliest memories is of sitting on my grandfather’s shoulders and watching the astronauts come to shore in Hawaii. I remember the cheers and small flags that people waved, and my grandfather explaining how we Americans could do anything we set our minds to do. That’s my idea of America.

I remember listening to my grandmother telling stories about her work on a bomber assembly-line during World War II. I remember my grandfather handing me his dog-tags from his time in Patton’s Army, and understanding that his defense of this country marked one of his greatest sources of pride. That’s my idea of America.

I remember, when living for four years in Indonesia as a child, listening to my mother reading me the first lines of the Declaration of Independence - “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal. That they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” I remember her explaining how this declaration applied to every American, black and white and brown alike; how those words, and words of the United States Constitution, protected us from the injustices that we witnessed other people suffering during those years abroad. That’s my idea of America.

As I got older, that gut instinct - that America is the greatest country on earth - would survive my growing awareness of our nation’s imperfections: it’s ongoing racial strife; the perversion of our political system laid bare during the Watergate hearings; the wrenching poverty of the Mississippi Delta and the hills of Appalachia. Not only because, in my mind, the joys of American life and culture, its vitality, its variety and its freedom, always outweighed its imperfections, but because I learned that what makes America great has never been its perfection but the belief that it can be made better. I came to understand that our revolution was waged for the sake of that belief - that we could be governed by laws, not men; that we could be equal in the eyes of those laws; that we could be free to say what we want and assemble with whomever we want and worship as we please; that we could have the right to pursue our individual dreams but the obligation to help our fellow citizens pursue theirs.

For a young man of mixed race, without firm anchor in any particular community, without even a father’s steadying hand, it is this essential American idea - that we are not constrained by the accident of birth but can make of our lives what we will - that has defined my life, just as it has defined the life of so many other Americans.

That is why, for me, patriotism is always more than just loyalty to a place on a map or a certain kind of people. Instead, it is also loyalty to America’s ideals - ideals for which anyone can sacrifice, or defend, or give their last full measure of devotion. I believe it is this loyalty that allows a country teeming with different races and ethnicities, religions and customs, to come together as one. It is the application of these ideals that separate us from Zimbabwe, where the opposition party and their supporters have been silently hunted, tortured or killed; or Burma, where tens of thousands continue to struggle for basic food and shelter in the wake of a monstrous storm because a military junta fears opening up the country to outsiders; or Iraq, where despite the heroic efforts of our military, and the courage of many ordinary Iraqis, even limited cooperation between various factions remains far too elusive.

I believe those who attack America’s flaws without acknowledging the singular greatness of our ideals, and their proven capacity to inspire a better world, do not truly understand America.

Of course, precisely because America isn’t perfect, precisely because our ideals constantly demand more from us, patriotism can never be defined as loyalty to any particular leader or government or policy. As Mark Twain, that greatest of American satirists and proud son of Missouri, once wrote, “Patriotism is supporting your country all the time, and your government when it deserves it.” We may hope that our leaders and our government stand up for our ideals, and there are many times in our history when that’s occurred. But when our laws, our leaders or our government are out of alignment with our ideals, then the dissent of ordinary Americans may prove to be one of the truest expression of patriotism.

The young preacher from Georgia, Martin Luther King, Jr., who led a movement to help America confront our tragic history of racial injustice and live up to the meaning of our creed - he was a patriot. The young soldier who first spoke about the prisoner abuse at Abu Ghraib - he is a patriot. Recognizing a wrong being committed in this country’s name; insisting that we deliver on the promise of our Constitution - these are the acts of patriots, men and women who are defending that which is best in America. And we should never forget that - especially when we disagree with them; especially when they make us uncomfortable with their words.

Beyond a loyalty to America’s ideals, beyond a willingness to dissent on behalf of those ideals, I also believe that patriotism must, if it is to mean anything, involve the willingness to sacrifice - to give up something we value on behalf of a larger cause. For those who have fought under the flag of this nation - for the young veterans I meet when I visit Walter Reed; for those like John McCain who have endured physical torment in service to our country - no further proof of such sacrifice is necessary. And let me also add that no one should ever devalue that service, especially for the sake of a political campaign, and that goes for supporters on both sides.

We must always express our profound gratitude for the service of our men and women in uniform. Period. Indeed, one of the good things to emerge from the current conflict in Iraq has been the widespread recognition that whether you support this war or oppose it, the sacrifice of our troops is always worthy of honor.

For the rest of us - for those of us not in uniform or without loved ones in the military - the call to sacrifice for the country’s greater good remains an imperative of citizenship. Sadly, in recent years, in the midst of war on two fronts, this call to service never came. After 9/11, we were asked to shop. The wealthiest among us saw their tax obligations decline, even as the costs of war continued to mount. Rather than work together to reduce our dependence on foreign oil, and thereby lessen our vulnerability to a volatile region, our energy policy remained unchanged, and our oil dependence only grew.

In spite of this absence of leadership from Washington, I have seen a new generation of Americans begin to take up the call. I meet them everywhere I go, young people involved in the project of American renewal; not only those who have signed up to fight for our country in distant lands, but those who are fighting for a better America here at home, by teaching in underserved schools, or caring for the sick in understaffed hospitals, or promoting more sustainable energy policies in their local communities.

I believe one of the tasks of the next Administration is to ensure that this movement towards service grows and sustains itself in the years to come. We should expand AmeriCorps and grow the Peace Corps. We should encourage national service by making it part of the requirement for a new college assistance program, even as we strengthen the benefits for those whose sense of duty has already led them to serve in our military.

We must remember, though, that true patriotism cannot be forced or legislated with a mere set of government programs. Instead, it must reside in the hearts of our people, and cultivated in the heart of our culture, and nurtured in the hearts of our children.

As we begin our fourth century as a nation, it is easy to take the extraordinary nature of America for granted. But it is our responsibility as Americans and as parents to instill that history in our children, both at home and at school. The loss of quality civic education from so many of our classrooms has left too many young Americans without the most basic knowledge of who our forefathers are, or what they did, or the significance of the founding documents that bear their names. Too many children are ignorant of the sheer effort, the risks and sacrifices made by previous generations, to ensure that this country survived war and depression; through the great struggles for civil, and social, and worker’s rights.

It is up to us, then, to teach them. It is up to us to teach them that even though we have faced great challenges and made our share of mistakes, we have always been able to come together and make this nation stronger, and more prosperous, and more united, and more just. It is up to us to teach them that America has been a force for good in the world, and that other nations and other people have looked to us as the last, best hope of Earth. It is up to us to teach them that it is good to give back to one’s community; that it is honorable to serve in the military; that it is vital to participate in our democracy and make our voices heard.

And it is up to us to teach our children a lesson that those of us in politics too often forget: that patriotism involves not only defending this country against external threat, but also working constantly to make America a better place for future generations.

When we pile up mountains of debt for the next generation to absorb, or put off changes to our energy policies, knowing full well the potential consequences of inaction, we are placing our short-term interests ahead of the nation’s long-term well-being. When we fail to educate effectively millions of our children so that they might compete in a global economy, or we fail to invest in the basic scientific research that has driven innovation in this country, we risk leaving behind an America that has fallen in the ranks of the world. Just as patriotism involves each of us making a commitment to this nation that extends beyond our own immediate self-interest, so must that commitment extends beyond our own time here on earth.

Our greatest leaders have always understood this. They’ve defined patriotism with an eye toward posterity. George Washington is rightly revered for his leadership of the Continental Army, but one of his greatest acts of patriotism was his insistence on stepping down after two terms, thereby setting a pattern for those that would follow, reminding future presidents that this is a government of and by and for the people.

Abraham Lincoln did not simply win a war or hold the Union together. In his unwillingness to demonize those against whom he fought; in his refusal to succumb to either the hatred or self-righteousness that war can unleash; in his ultimate insistence that in the aftermath of war the nation would no longer remain half slave and half free; and his trust in the better angels of our nature - he displayed the wisdom and courage that sets a standard for patriotism.

And it was the most famous son of Independence, Harry S Truman, who sat in the White House during his final days in office and said in his Farewell Address: “When Franklin Roosevelt died, I felt there must be a million men better qualified than I, to take up the Presidential task...But through all of it, through all the years I have worked here in this room, I have been well aware than I did not really work alone - that you were working with me. No President could ever hope to lead our country, or to sustain the burdens of this office, save the people helped with their support.”

In the end, it may be this quality that best describes patriotism in my mind - not just a love of America in the abstract, but a very particular love for, and faith in, the American people. That is why our heart swells with pride at the sight of our flag; why we shed a tear as the lonely notes of Taps sound. For we know that the greatness of this country - its victories in war, its enormous wealth, its scientific and cultural achievements - all result from the energy and imagination of the American people; their toil, drive, struggle, restlessness, humor and quiet heroism.

That is the liberty we defend - the liberty of each of us to pursue our own dreams. That is the equality we seek - not an equality of results, but the chance of every single one of us to make it if we try. That is the community we strive to build - one in which we trust in this sometimes messy democracy of ours, one in which we continue to insist that there is nothing we cannot do when we put our mind to it, one in which we see ourselves as part of a larger story, our own fates wrapped up in the fates of those who share allegiance to America’s happy and singular creed.

Thank you, God Bless you, and may God Bless the United States of America.

Barack Obama is a Democratic Senator from Illinois and a candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination.

Obama’s profound impact on the future

Posted: June 26, 2008

The following article appeared in The State on June 26.

By WARREN BOLTON - Associate Editor
Many have opined about what Sen. Barack Obama’s phenomenal win in the Democratic presidential primary and his possible ascension to the presidency mean to this nation.

Just the elementary historical facts are powerful enough: There has never been a black president. An African-American had never come close to winning a major-party nomination. None had been part of a majority-party ticket.

What does Sen. Obama’s nomination say about race and race relations in America? What does it say about opportunity for people of color? Those are the kinds of questions many a pundit has tried to put into perspective.

Of course, most importantly, Sen. Obama’s ascension says a lot about, well, Sen. Obama. It says his powerful gift of oratory and his message of change connected. His ability to build and manage an extraordinary campaign network and to raise funds is superior. His idealism that America can unite beyond race and politics and age worked.

As I’ve considered Sen. Obama’s accomplishment, I’ve determined the most profound impact he’s had — not considering the possibility of him becoming president and proving to be one of our better ones — is on our future more than our present or our history.

I didn’t grasp that until I took my 2-year-old to the doctor last week and he took a vision exam. It was through young Alexander’s eyes that I saw how important this moment in time could be.

The nurse administering the exam pointed to different shapes and images on a chart, asking Alexander to identify each. One of the recurring images was that of a flag. It wasn’t an American flag, but a flag just the same.

To a 2-year-old, a flag is a flag, right? Alexander is most familiar with the U.S. flag. When the nurse pointed to the flag, he answered confidently.

“Barack Obama,” he said, pronouncing it as best as a 2-year-old could.

“What did you say?” she asked.

“Barack Obama.”

As she went through the chart, she once again came to the flag.

“Barack Obama.”

“Do you know what he’s saying?” I asked her.

“No.”

“He’s saying Barack Obama.” Why? Because he was making an association. Most times when he’s seen Sen. Obama on TV, the Democratic nominee has been standing in front of the U.S. flag.

Whether Sen. Obama wins the presidency or not, he has had an untold effect on the future and psyche of America.

My son will live a lifetime in which he knows an African-American can ascend to the highest levels in this country. He won’t think it odd for a black man to seek to lead a nation. He as well as many white, Asian, Hispanic and other children, whether they like the candidate or not, won’t think it odd or a novelty to see a black man standing in front of the American flag — the ultimate display of patriotism, despite misguided and mean-spirited efforts to paint Sen. Obama as being otherwise — articulating his concerns and love for his country.

Because of Barack Obama, many of our children won’t grow up with as many of the psychological bruises those before them might have endured.

I grew up being told that I could one day be president. But much of what I saw and heard suggested otherwise. I saw and experienced the discrimination. Blacks only secured the right to vote in my lifetime. I saw many black kids in school being steered away from advanced courses and training that would have prepared them to shoot for higher goals.

Not only does Sen. Obama’s feat help shape a 2-year-old’s thoughts about himself and the world around him, but it affects so many others, from high-schoolers to college students to older folks.

Think of the many people, particularly older citizens, who had determined they would never live to see a black president. Scarcely 200 years since the end of the evil slave trade, there’s a good chance it could happen.

I’ll never forget the e-mail I got from one of my sisters who was excited about Sen. Obama’s chances: “He has more going for him than any other black person who has ever tried for the presidency. I never thought this would happen in my life time, but now I see the possibility.”

Possibility. Hope. Change.

People sell those notions short. But they’re powerful. The fact is, people of all races and backgrounds see different possibilities and hope in Sen. Obama. They see the hope for a unified America that actually attempts to address issues such as health care. It’s not so much that Sen. Obama can solve them alone — what president can? — but they believe he can inspire Americans to rise up and help bring about change.

An Obama win doesn’t mean we’ve arrived in terms of race relations and equality. But it would send a signal that we can arrive.

Even Congressman James Clyburn, who once said he would never live to see a black governor in South Carolina, was moved by the possibility. He told ETV’s “The Big Picture” that he was overcome with emotion watching Barack Obama become the first black major-party presidential nominee. He said he left a public event and went home to watch Sen. Obama’s victory speech alone “because what I was feeling was indescribable, and I was afraid that I would not be able to control my emotions .”

Congressman Clyburn controlled himself — that time. If Sen. Obama succeeds in November, Congressman Clyburn may not be able to control his emotions.

He’ll have lots of company.

California Voters Get It

Posted: June 25, 2008

The latest Rasmussen poll released on June 25th shows that Democratic Presidential Candidate Barack Obama has opened a sizeable lead over rival John McCain in the Golden State.  The polling conducted on Monday evening showed Obama leading McCain 58% to 30%.  The margin is double what the same poll showed a month ago when Obama led 52% to 38%.

Hillary Clinton won the California Democratic Primary, but there is no evidence of disenchanted Clinton supporters moving to the McCain camp.  Among registered Democrats in the state, the poll showed Obama leading McCain 84% to 6%.  Obama also showed a 23% lead among independent voters.

Obama holds 12-point lead nationally over McCain, Times/Bloomberg poll finds

Posted: June 24, 2008

The following article appeared in the Los Angeles Times on June 24.

Buoyed by enthusiasm among Democrats and public concern over the economy, Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) has captured a sizable lead over Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) at the opening of the general election campaign for president, the Los Angeles Times/Bloomberg Poll has found.

In a two-man race between the major party candidates, registered voters chose Obama over McCain by 49% to 37% in the national poll conducted last weekend.

On a four-man ballot including independent candidate Ralph Nader and Libertarian Bob Barr, voters chose Obama over McCain by an even larger margin, 48% to 33%.

Obama’s advantage, bigger in this poll than in most other national surveys, appears to stem in large part from his positions on domestic issues. Both Democrats and independent voters say Obama would do a better job than McCain at handling the nation’s economic problems, the public’s top concern.

In contrast, many voters give McCain credit as the more experienced candidate and the one best equipped to protect the nation against terrorism—but they rank those concerns below their worries about the economy.

Moreover, McCain suffers from a pronounced “enthusiasm gap,” especially among the conservatives who usually give Republican candidates a reliable base of support. Among voters who describe themselves as conservative, only 58% say they will vote for McCain; 15% say they will vote for Obama, 14% say they will vote for someone else, and 13% say they are undecided.

By contrast, 79% of voters who describe themselves as liberal say they plan to vote for Obama.

Even among voters who say they do plan to vote for McCain, more than half say they are “not enthusiastic” about their chosen candidate; only 45% say they are enthusiastic. By contrast, 81% of Obama voters say they are enthusiastic, and almost half call themselves “very enthusiastic,” a level of zeal that only 13% of McCain’s supporters display.

“McCain is not capturing the full extent of the conservative base the way President Bush did in 2000 and 2004,” said Susan Pinkus, director of the Times Poll. “Among conservatives, evangelicals and voters who identify themselves as part of the religious right, he is polling less than 60%.

“Meanwhile, Obama is doing well among a broad range of voters,” she said. “He’s running ahead among women, black voters and other minorities. He’s running roughly even among white voters and independents.”

Among white voters, Obama and McCain are dead even at 39% each, the poll found. Earlier this year, when Obama ran behind Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) among white voters in some primary elections, analysts questioned whether the African American senator could win white voters in the general election.

But the great majority of Clinton voters have transferred their allegiance to Obama, the poll found. Only 11% of Clinton voters have defected to McCain.

Nader, a consumer advocate who ran as the candidate of the Green Party in 2000 and as an independent in 2004, and Barr, a former Georgia congressman, both appear to siphon more votes from McCain than they do from Obama. When Nader and Barr are added to the ballot, they draw most of their support from voters who said they would otherwise vote for the Republican.

Obama’s strong showing also stems from a broader trend among voters of support for Democratic candidates and Democratic positions after almost eight years of an increasingly unpopular Republican administration.

In this national poll’s random sample of voters, 39% identified themselves as Democrats, 22% as Republicans, and 27% as independents. In a similar poll a year ago, 33% identified themselves as Democrats, 28% as Republicans, and 30% as independents.

The survey found public approval of President Bush’s job performance at a new low for the Times/Bloomberg Poll: only 23% approved of the job Bush is doing, and 73% disapproved.

A bare majority of 51% of voters said they have a “positive feeling” about the Democratic Party; only 29% said they have a positive feeling about the Republican Party.

“It’s a Democratic year,” Pinkus said. “This election is the Democrats’ to lose.”

The Times/Bloomberg Poll, conducted under Pinkus’ supervision, interviewed 1,115 registered voters across the nation June 19-23. The poll’s margin of sampling error is plus or minus three percentage points.

Obama Focuses On Energy

Posted: June 24, 2008

From NBC/NJ Athena Jones June 24, 2008

Barack Obama kept the focus on energy at an event with green technology workers at Springs Preserve—a site outside Las Vegas dedicated to sustainability—arguing he offered a different vision for America’s energy future than his Republican rival.

The presumptive Democratic nominee called oil a “a 19th century fossil fuel that is dirty, dwindling, and dangerously expensive” and said a renewable energy economy was not “some pie-in-the-sky, far-off future, it is now.” He said making progress toward energy independence and encouraging clean energy was one of the top three goals of an Obama administration—along with ending the war in Iraq and reforming the healthcare system.

“I have a very different vision of what this country can and should achieve on energy in the next four years—and in the next 10 years,” he said. “My entire energy plan will produce three times the oil savings that John McCain’s ever could—and what’s more, it will actually decrease our dependence on oil while his will only grow our addiction further.”

Obama’s discussion with a group of about 100 people here, roughly coincided with an event his McCain was holding on the environment in Santa Barbara, CA and the Illinois senator drew laughter at times as he sought to draw contrasts with his rival, criticizing the Republican’s record on clean, renewable energy and his current proposals. He slammed McCain again for proposing a gas tax holiday and for his opposition to the 2005 energy bill that increased investment in renewable energy, saying the Arizona senator had voted against biofuels, solar power, wind power—“some of the very same projects and businesses he’s highlighting in his campaign.” He seemed to mock McCain for saying yesterday that lifting the moratorium on offshore drilling would have a mainly “psychological impact.”

“A psychological impact. In case you were wondering, that’s Washington-speak for, “It polls well.” Obama said to laughter in the crowd. “The American people don’t need psychological relief or meaningless gimmicks to get politicians through the next election cycle, they need real relief that will help them fill up their tanks and put food on their table.  They need a long-term energy strategy that will reduce our dependence on foreign oil by investing in the renewable sources of energy that represent the future.  That’s what the American people need.”

Obama talked about his own plans to invest $150 billion over ten years to develop alternative energy sources and his plans to raise vehicle fuel standards and help car companies make the transition to more fuel efficient cars. He said McCain’s offer of a $300 million reward for the developer of a better car battery was too small-scale, suggesting it was another example of Washington’s failed approach to the issue.

“After all those years in Washington, John McCain still doesn’t get it,” he said. “I commend him for his desire to accelerate the search for a battery that can power the cars of the future.  I’ve been talking about this myself for the last few years.  But I don’t think that a $300 million prize is the way to go. When John F. Kennedy decided that we were going to put a man on the moon, he didn’t put a bounty out for some rocket scientist to win – he put the full resources of the United States government behind the project and called on the ingenuity and innovation of the American people, not just in the private sector but also in the public sector.”

Obama also said McCain’s proposal to build 45 new nuclear reactors did not make sense because he had no plan to store the was in any place other than at Nevada’s Yucca Mountain.

President William Jefferson Clinton Addresses the Nation’s Mayors on June 22

Posted: June 23, 2008

President Bill Clinton addressed the Annual Gathering of The U.S. Conference of Mayors on Sunday, June 22. President Clinton’s speech to the nation’s mayors reemphasized the importance of his global Energy Efficiency Building Retrofit Program, a project of the Clinton Climate Initiative (CCI) that President Clinton created in 2007. The Energy Efficiency Building Retrofit Program brings together four of the world’s largest energy service companies, five of the world’s largest banks, and sixteen of the world’s largest cities in a landmark program designed to reduce energy consumption in existing buildings. 

“Climate change is a global problem that requires local action,” said President Clinton. “The businesses, banks and cities partnering with my foundation are addressing the issue of global warming because it’s the right thing to do, but also because it’s good for their bottom line. They’re going to save money, make money, create jobs and have a tremendous collective impact on climate change all at once. I’m proud of them for showing leadership on the critical issue of climate change and I thank them for their commitment to this new initiative.”

For more information on the Energy Efficiency Building Retrofit Program, please visit the William J. Clinton Foundation.

The Case for Obama-Clark

Posted: June 19, 2008

The following “Viewpoint” is written by Denny Freidenrich.  His commentary can be found in the June 16 issue of the Orange County Business Journal.

Now that Barack Obama is the presumptive Democratic nominee for president, it is time to play the veepstakes game for real.

Eight years ago, I urged Al Gore to consider picking a woman to be his running mate.  Four years later, I asked John Kerry to do the same.  This time around, an Obama-Hillary Clinton ticket is being called the “dream team.”

For too many reasons to go into here, I am afraid this so-called “dream” might turn into a nightmare.  That is why I am going in a completely different direction in 2008.

Since April, the drum beat to name General Wesley Clark as Obama’s running mate has been getting louder by the day.  Not surprisingly, I agree.

That’s because Gen. Clark was my pick for president in 2004.  What I liked about him four years ago still resonates with me today.

First, as the former NATO supreme allied commander, Gen. Clark knows how to deal with America’s adversaries. When it comes to fighting international terrorism, few people in politics (or at the Pentagon) today have the military credentials the retired Army general has.  Are you listening John McCain?

Second, because he is from Arkansas, Gen. Clark will inspire blue-collar,lower income whites in West Virginia, Florida, Ohio and Pennsylvania, for example, to vote for Obama.  Key states, all, in the Democrats’ strategy to win back the White House this November.

And last, as a true-blue Clinton insider, Gen. Clark’s presence on the ticket will send an unmistakable message to millions of Democrats who, today, say they might not vote this fall.  In its simplest form, thismessage is one of party unity, another key element in the campaign to win the presidency.

Here’s how writer/TV commentator Lawrence O’Donnell framed the Clark issue last month:

“The silly season of TV talk about Obama-Clinton, Clinton-Obama tickets is almost over.  There was general agreement on Meet The Press recently that Obama will consider military experience in choosing a vice president.  James Carville foolishly suggested Anthony Zinni and other politically untested generals.  That will continue now that the conventional wisdom has settled on the military angle for VP.  But no former general, other than Wesley Clark, will make it onto the short list in the end.

“Yes, Clark was a bad campaigner in 2004.  So was every other Democrat who lost the nomination to John Kerry.  Clark has learned enough since then to survive a two-month, one-debate vice presidential campaign.”

Clark’s addition to the Democratic ticket means that Obama’s wildly popular campaign theme of “change” will not be compromised, nor will the senator’s views about U.S. involvement in the Middle East, Cuba, Europe or Asia.

America’s responsibilities in each of these regions of the world requires a delicate balance of military strength and political will.  Some people argue that these two strategies are mutually exclusive.  I don’t buy that.

Clark is the one person who can best help the Democratic Party and the country’s new president straddle this elusive divide.

Now that Barack Obama is the Democratic presidential nominee in waiting, I hope he quickly names Gen. Clark to be his running mate.  This ticket will be a dream for the Democrats and a nightmare for the Republicans.  It is time to start the veepstakes watch now.

----

Denny Freidenrich is the founder of First Strategies consulting in Laguna Beach.  He helped raise $125,000 for Sen. Obama when he visited OC last June.

Sirota Speaks to DPOC, Then Hits Bestseller List

Posted: June 12, 2008

The New York Times today announced that David Sirota’s new book, THE UPRISING, will