My parents and I got a chance to listen to portions of speeches by Clinton, Obama, McCain, and Huckabee tonight.
Clinton: Certainly not a bad speaker, but trying far too hard to smile all the time. A lot of “I”‘s and usual promises.
Obama: Pushed the usual promises in better wrapping, actually said he’d have a tough time achieving his goals. As good an orator as advertised. Too much “hope” talk.
McCain: Was obviously reading his speech, and was completely laughable.
Huckabee: At least he didn’t use cue cards, but he was mainly talking about how he wasn’t mathematically eliminated. Not a good sign.
Oh, yeah, Obama and McCain swept the primaries tonight.
Prediction: Obama will be the next president. I’m confident enough to wager small amounts of money on it. This means that he will defeat Clinton, then McCain.
1. Why Obama will defeat Clinton
- The Clinton campaign expected to have the nomination wrapped up by Super Tuesday so spent a lot of money quickly. Hillary will be at a relative disadvantage in money the rest of the way.
- People tend to like Obama the person, and not everyone knows him. As more time goes on, more people will find out about him, increasing his strength.
- Clinton now seems to be relying on March 4, when Texas and Ohio go to vote. While she won’t be embarrassed, Obama’s momentum in carrying many smaller states will give him enough votes in these larger states to maintain an advantage. (Something like how Giuliani’s Florida strategy was a failure.)
- While Clinton currently has a large advantage in superdelegates, it’s hard to see her increasing her percentage of this group. Obama will steal some.
- Obama’s younger, a better orator, and is more likable. Yes, this stuff counts.
2. Why Obama will defeat McCain
- People like image. Reading from cue cards in an obvious manner just isn’t going to cut it.
- Conservatives are sabotaging McCain and will suppress the turnout he needs to win. Liberals have no such beefs with Obama.
- Bush gave his stamp-of-approval for the poor guy.
- Just being Republican will lose some votes this time around.
- McCain will be painted as “old Washington”, which will hurt more than Obama being portrayed as too inexperienced.
You always impress me with your mind. I wish I could think as linearly as you. Usually my thoughts are like a jug of spilt milk; I’m just lucky not to slip in it.
I actually think Hillary will win. She may not be as likable, but I’m under the impression that she’s the brand name to Obama’s generic. Or, maybe it’s because I’ve only seen a biased cross section of media coverage.
i don’t do politics, but here is my 1.5 cents worth…
it’s all bull. the media acts like we only have these poor choices, and so most of the lemmings who vote think they only have obama or mcain to choose from. if the media would also give fair time to independents, libertarians, etc, people would see they have another choice, they don’t have to choose dem or repub. we have more than two parties, yet we only act like we have to, and we have to choose the lesser of two evils. that is so wrong, it bothers me.
ok, done, won’t hear about it from me again.
I agree with most every point Donnie makes–so why am I commenting? Well, statistically I’d bet on Obama too, but I figure there are a lot of unknowns out there, things that could come up between now and November; if there was some kind of terrorist incident, for example, and Obama didn’t call for some serious ass-kicking McCain might profit a lot from it. In the normal course of events BHO will take it, as he’s the vessel that a lot of people pour all their hopes into and bask in having them reflected back.
Obama is scary. We have yet to learn where his loyalties lie.
Thanks for breaking it down, D, for us apathetics who can’t even vote anyway and prefer to get all their news updates from a website named after McDonald’s “eggs”. And has a mascot composed of stick body, arms, and legs and egg face.
I’ve been putting a spreadsheet together on teh issues for each of hte candidates… except for Huckleberry Finn… because a man who clamims to have eaten squirrels cooked in a popcorn poppper in college doesn’t really sit well with me… I’d ratehr hear about Clinton’s Bong his in college.
Problem with most “sheeple” is they don’t want to take teh time to read through each of the candidate’s issues and how they stand. Instead, they will be contnent to listen to the soudn bites of the stump speeches or worse… will listen to the pundit’s regurgitation of said sound bbites from stump speeches.
I agree, i think Obama’s momentum will steam roll Hilary. people are more inclined to read about his facts… and the propaganda machine known as mainstream media… will realize the rating boost the more they report about Obama.
The question of his experience will be a big one against McCain at the general election. There will be some who can point to his stance on the issues. He will have to polish it to 1 minute or less sound bites. Kerry couldn’t do that in ’04.
fundamentally, I think this country is ready for change. ( don’t get me started)… This is what will actually tip the scale in Barak’s favor going against McCain. McCain can’t differentiate himself enough from this administration which will hurt him.
Even though Bush ( only 321 days left)is not too keen of McCain as he states his position for the Conservatives is not 100% in thier favor. If left with teh choice of Barak versus McCain though the Conservative demographic probably won’t be enough to tip the scale.
The Independents and the moderate Republicans ( called Obamicans I heard ).. will be the deciding vote. For that argument, the economy and the war will be the driveing factor.
Now, I will conclude this political slant with this concept. Bush could pull his October Surprise and wage war against Iran and constitutional claim he has to remain in office during the country’s time of duresss. To which the 321 days left would be indefinite.
🙁
BTW.. I kant tipe… sorry
BTW… if it were McCAin to win… I’d tolerate it since he’s talking about doing away with the Alternative Minimum Tax hitting 25 Million Middle class families.
But its bitter sweet since he also wants to maintain or increase the tax breaks for corporate america.
The Democrats, overall , have interesting Tax reforms that target large corproations and help the middle class. But they aren’t mentioning anything about the AMT … which I asked about…. no resposne.
What I don’t understand is why such a hue and cry about corporations not paying enough taxes. Where does their money come from anyway?
@Annie: I am flattered. In reality, I stole everyone else’s observations that made sense and condensed it into bullet points.
@chessloser: This country’s run on money. The Dems and GOP got it. Everyone else doesn’t. Yes, it is frustrating. I’m pretty set on voting neither large party this November. No one would even know Ron Paul’s name if he didn’t switch from Libertarian to Republican.
@Wahrheit: Ah, yes, the “you never know” factor. It’s such a powerful factor because…you never know. It’s also why I’d bet only small amounts of money on my prediction.
@Grandma: Now I’ve heard multiple people who are unsure whether Obama’s loyalty is to the United States! I never realized this. Could this drag him down?
@Sworn Enemy: Are you implying that my website doesn’t have the gravitas to compete with CNN?
I still think the United States and Canada should merge into one country. Then you could vote (you are Canadian citizen, yes?)
@Blunderprone: How long has it been since they changed the AMT? Decades? It IS archaic, and seems pretty obvious that it’s now hitting middle-class people it shouldn’t. I’ve no clue why they haven’t touched it.
Most people don’t really find out what the candidates stand for. The candidates all seem to have the same goals (in the portions of Obama and Hillary speeches I’ve seen, I was amazed that when you distilled out and summarized the content, there was no practical difference).
Now in 2004, John Kerry’s list of issues changed every two weeks, while Bush’s hadn’t changed since 1984. It was a little weird.
@Grandma: People see news like Exxon-Mobil making record profits while they are having a tough time. (Of course, there’s the flip side, such as GM having record losses but that doesn’t make people angry.)
About Obama’s loyalty – I don’t know if many are paying attention and the media isn’t bringing it up.
I’m not happy about those excess profits but Exxon is not the only corporation. Corporations provide jobs and when their expenses go up, so do prices.
Exxon’s excess profits? Who decided they were in excess? Exxon makes less profit as a percentage of invested capital than many other corporations. If I thought they were making excess profits I wouldn’t be complaining about it, I’d be buying their stock.
GM’s record losses get people angry… but it gets them angry against foreign car companies. It’s different.
Exxon’s profits are considered excess because they’re setting new records for amount of profit, compared to their previous years. All this really means is that they should have hosed everyone years ago… then by now it wouldn’t seem so bad. Although I wonder how record their profits are if you adjust for inflation.
@Grandma: Most people don’t think about it because he’s a senator. I haven’t heard convincing evidence to doubt his loyalty, but maybe you know something I don’t.
@Carson/Allen: We should be familiar with how media works by now. The inflation thing is a big one. Remember when we were hitting “records” in oil prices, but they weren’t accounting for inflation?
Right.
But still, the raw numbers scare the bejesus out of people.
For example, $1199 does sound very different than say
$1250.
Yes. That’s why they sell everything for $XX.99.