Politics

Commentary (and rants) on national and local politics.

Read more about the article Like Hope, But Different

Like Hope, But Different

[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3gwqEneBKUs]

(Warning: Put down any hot beverages you may be drinking before pressing play.)

On a more serious note, via The Atlantic‘s excellent Andrew Sullivan, comes Kaboom: A Soldier’s War Journal and a post, “Wisdom from the Homefront“, about some of the mail soliders in Iraq receive from American schoolchildren:

…my favorite portion of the miscellaneous stack of our mail room are the letters written to soldiers by American schoolchildren. Most of them offer the same commonplace banalities sent our way from the greater American public – thank you for what you do, please return home safely, we’ll pray for you. Empty words from an empty people; they want to show that they care, but this experience is so unlike anything in their realm of understanding only trodden clichés can fill their vacuum of confusion. I’m not bitter – yet – I’m just commenting on reality.

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Read more about the article Latino politics follow-up

Latino politics follow-up

There’s been some interesting comments so far in Friday’s “When politics gets personal for Latinos” post, including the one point the media often overlooks, that Latinos are not some monolothic entity that can be stereotyped in one particular way. Today, I came across a couple more interesting nuggets, one that digs a little deeper into Clinton and Obama’s support within the Latino community to-date, and another that breaks down Texas’ upcoming complicated not-really-a-primary contest on March 4th that Clinton’s effectively betting the house on.

NOTE: Check out the original post, too, as I added a couple of new references, including one that looks at the potential scenario of the Democratic nomination coming down to the final contest in Puerto Rico on June 7th!

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Read more about the article A relevant look at Health Care from a new mother

A relevant look at Health Care from a new mother

Politicians love citing individual stories on the campaign trail to illustrate their ability to connect with the average voter and reinforce the superiority of their positions on any given subject. These stories are often moving, if rarely informative, but it’s always more interesting to me to hear the background on how someone came to the decision to support a particular candidate.

A friend of mine who lives in Texas — an intelligent, married white woman under 40 who recently had her first child — posted privately in her journal yesterday about how she ultimately determined her preferred candidate based on her own research (imagine that!) of their positions on health care and I asked her permission to repost it (with personal details removed) because it’s as clear, unbiased and relevant an explanation of the differences between Clinton and Obama’s health care proposals as I’ve come across so far.

I’ve made up my mind about my democratic candidate, and it’s based on health care.

And my choice is Barack Obama.  Here is why.

My #1 issue this year is universal health care.  It’s a personal issue for me.  It was a terrifying experience for me to be pregnant and slightly above the income level Medicaid.  Since I was unemployed during [my daughter’s] birth and most of my pregnancy, I had to have health insurance.  And the only thing available to me was to continue my employer’s plan through COBRA, which was difficult to apply when I moved from PA to TX, and whose premiums were incredibly expensive.  Now, with [my daughter] to cover, I’m spending $600 a month to cover both of us monthly.  And that’s before co-pays, deductibles, and lab fees.  I’ve had to pay this with no income of my own–my daughter and I wouldn’t have insurance unless my mom hadn’t graciously paid the vast majority of my COBRA premiums.  I’m usually on the phone at least once a week with my insurance carrier getting bills adjusted, and I’m convinced the the system is utterly broken.  I loathe going to the doctor because I know it means I’m going to have to spend a couple hours on the phone with the insurance company in two months to get the visit paid for.  [My husband], who is working full-time as a contractor right now, has not had health insurance for about a year and remains uninsured.

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Read more about the article When politics gets personal for Latinos

When politics gets personal for Latinos

In reality, politics are without question a very personal matter but, partly due to the media’s focus on the horserace aspect of elections and partly due to the candidates often allowing themselves to be defined by labels (or at the least, trying to marginalize their opponents with them), most political debate occurs from a safe, impersonal distance. It’s what I think made John Edwards such an intriguing but ultimately flawed candidate this time around as he was undeniably the most passionate of the bunch but was significantly hampered by the combination of his problematic track record as a Senator and the inherent discordance of a filthy rich trial lawyer attempting to present himself as a champion of the downtrodden, no matter how sincere he seemed to be about his chosen cause.

As Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama continue to battle it out for the Democratic nomination that was not-too-long ago assumed to be going to be handed to her on February 5th, the admittedly minimal daylight between them on the actual issues are (hopefully) going to get a bit more scrutiny from voters and the media alike, and it’s going to be the most personal issues that will sway voters one way or the other.

Two issues of particular interest to Latinos are immigration reform and U.S. relations with Cuba and Latin America, the latter of which is greatly affected by a combination of the first two. Like Health Care, there’s not a huge disparity between them on the surface, but there are distinct differences in both their approach and tone that stand out for me.

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Read more about the article Obama’s Executive Credentials (and Clinton’s apparent lack thereof…)

Obama’s Executive Credentials (and Clinton’s apparent lack thereof…)

UPDATE: Holy shit! Obama has raised over $4m $5m SINCE LAST NIGHT!!!! BarackObama.com is currently down as their servers are overwhelmed so chances are he’s going to blow past $5m $6m by the morning. That’s a movement!

I said recently that Politico’s Ben Smith had become my favorite political blogger, and while still technically true from an informational perspective (check out this post on the question of whether the Clintons are self-financing their campaign), The Atlantic’s Andrew Sullivan has consistently impressed with me his level-headed insight on various aspects of this roller coaster campaign. Today he offers a compelling assessment of Obama and the “executive experience” question:

He asked me to judge his executive skills by observing how he was managing a campaign.

By that standard, who isn’t impressed? A first term senator – a black urban liberal – raised more money, and continues to raise much more money, than Senator Clinton. More to the point, the money he has raised has not come from the well-connected fat-cats who do things like donate to the Clinton library. His base is much wider, broader and internet-based than hers. It has many more small donors.

Now look at the strategy he laid out last year, as he explained it to me and others. Iowa was the key. If he didn’t win Iowa, it was over. But if he could win Iowa, he would prove the principle that a black man could transcend the racial issue, helping in New Hampshire, and then also helping him peel off what was then majority black support for the Clintons in South Carolina. Then his strategy was meticulous organization – and you saw that in Iowa, as well as yesterday’s caucus states. Everything he told me has been followed through. And the attention to detail – from the Alaska caucus to the Nevada cooks – has been striking.

He goes on to look at how Obama’s handled “the psychological and emotional challenges of this campaign” and declares: “In the middle of this very hot zone, he exhibit a coolness and steeliness that is a mark of presidential timber.”

The entire post is good reading and one to bookmark for knee-jerk Clinton supporters who like to offer the maddeningly vague and misleading “35 years of experience” talking point by way of explaining their choice.

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Continue ReadingObama’s Executive Credentials (and Clinton’s apparent lack thereof…)
Read more about the article Super Tuesday: The Aftermath

Super Tuesday: The Aftermath

I packed it in at 1am this morning, right after they called a tightly contested Missouri for Obama, and woke up to find that New Mexico still hadn’t picked a winner as he and Clinton are separated by just over 100 votes with four precincts and over 16,000 provisional ballots left to tally. When all is said and done, these two states mirrored the overall results of Super Duper Tuesday as Obama and Clinton effectively split the delegate count right down the middle, and if you believe the old saw “tie goes to the runner”, you could reasonably argue that Obama won the night overall and gets to move forward with his momentum relatively unchecked while Clinton’s campaign — which, prior to Iowa, often said the nomination would be decided on Feb. 5th — is starting to show some cracks in its foundation.

A couple of things came clear based on last night’s results:

  1. Obama has the black vote locked down but has now proven he can win anywhere, including predominantly white/red states.
  2. Clinton’s strongest support continues to be from those over 60 years old and Hispanics, the latter to a slightly lesser degree outside of California where they represent an atypically large percentage of the electorate.

Every other demographic, including women, is completely up for grabs at this point and each side can point to a couple of states that demonstrates their strength with a particular group, though even there, Obama can present a more compelling case for the coalition he’s building vs. Clinton’s more traditionally Democratic foundation which will likely show up in November for either of them.

ETA: MSNBC has some interesting analysis of the last night’s demographic breakdown.

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Read more about the article My Take on New York

My Take on New York

Check out my New York installment of "50 Ways of Looking at a Primary" over at the November 3rd Club: Today, millions (hopefully) of New Yorkers head to the polls to cast their votes in the Democratic and Republican primaries, each side offering only two legitimate candidates as a handful of states have once again prematurely winnowed the field. For Democrats, New York is a closed primary, meaning only registered Democrats can vote today, and in an odd and annoying twist that offers just one example of why our state legislature is considered one of the most inept and corrupt in…

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