Cynthetiq

Either way, next US presidency will be historic, with either the first black president or the first woman vice-president. Either way it is groundbreaking territory for America.

I was hoping that the race was going to be a black man vs. a white woman. I originally wanted a couple of years ago that it should be Colin Powell vs. Hillary Clinton. I'm surprised that it actually came out to something like this, just not the parties that I had envisioned.

This is something that I think that will change the face of politics in the next 20 years. Kids today can again dream of one day possibly being president. To me this is why the country is great, because there is always hope, there is always potential for change. Growing up watching the Mondale-Ferraro democratic ticket of 1984, I have been waiting for something like this to happen again.

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Willravel

Honestly, I hope the annals of history mark the success or failure of policy first and the race/gender thing second. I don't care if my next president is an Eskimo transvestite; if policy is strong and successful, then great.

jorgelito

Well, technically, Obama would the SECOND black president. However, he has mentioned himself as the 1st Asian-American president if elected.

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Charlatan

I would be nice if that happened but let's face it... that's not how it's going to go down.

As for the original post, I hadn't thought of it that way but yes, it will be a new benchmark regardless of how the election goes. Voters will be paying close attention to see how they perform and it will certainly have an impact on future generations.

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Poppinjay

I would totally drill baby drill Sarah Palin.

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Baraka_Guru

Actually, the politically correct term would be Inuit transvestite....

And as far as I'm concerned, there is a difference between how this "historic" political figure will be remembered and what they actually do. Let's hope some good can come out of it despite what we remember or forget about it.

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Knowing that death is certain and that the time of death is uncertain, what's the most important thing?
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Humankind cannot bear very much reality.
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Psycho Dad

I've suspected that a good many people want to vote for Obama due to his election being of historical significance. And one has to to a degree suspect that this is why McCain chose Palin. I think that Clinton could have had a lot of votes for much the same reason. Although Palin certainly will not be the influence Clinton could have been.

Will is right though that the candidates chosen should be about their policies and abilities to handle issues. We are simply faced with another election where we must choose the lesser of two evils. We just try to find comfort in there finally being real opportunities for women and minorities.

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fresnelly

I've always said that I don't envy the next administration as it's facing some incredible challenges and won't be leaving unscathed.

1.)The pullout of Iraq
2.)Housing and Credit crunch
3.)High Oil prices
4.)Struggling Economy

Throw in a terrorist attack or natural disaster as icing on the cake and you'll be living through the most divisive term in the modern era, no matter who's in charge. It ain't gonna be pretty.

A few will blame the coming hardship on either Obama's heritage or Palin's gender but I think most will stick to good ol' partisan bias. We can only apply an objective historical significance to this election in, say 20 years or so.

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Willravel

I guess it's just the audacity of my hope...

Bill O'Rights

Which begs the question...how can you tell? Is there a difference in the length of parkas?

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Willravel

I think Inuit is the politically correct term for Alaskan Natives.

Bill O'Rights

I know that...

I meant...how can you tell if an Eskimo/Inuit is a transvestite?

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"I distrust those people who know so well what God wants them to do because I notice it always coincides with their own desires." - Susan B. Anthony

"Hedonism with rules isn't hedonism at all, it's the Republican party." - JumpinJesus

It is indisputable that true beauty lies within...but a nice rack sure doesn't hurt.

Yakk

There is a reasonably popular rumor that Eskimo means "eater of raw flesh". I've heard that this is just a rumor, but regardless, many don't like the term. In any case, Eskimo definitely is not the term that the people labeled called themselves historically, but rather an external label.

As it happens, in Alaska, there are two branches of northing natives -- Inuit and Yupik. I don't know of a term that encompasses both other than Eskimo.

...

Right now, Sarah Pallin wonderfully stole the news cycle from the Democratic party. And if elected, is quite reasonably likely to be the first woman US President -- McCain is quite old, and ~20% of VPs have served as president.

Obama's choice of VP is interesting, because he would be older than McCain I think -- and McCain would become the US's oldest elected president if he was elected. In essence, Biden is not a "next presidential nominee" option.

So Pallin is both reasonably likely to succeed during one of McCain's terms, and young enough to be the presumptive presidential republican candidate after an 8 year run.

So let's presume that McCain wins the election, then gets reelected in 4 years, then dies in office. In 2016 Pallin becomes the presumptive nominee for the Republican party. Clinton then ends up being ... well, about as old as Reagan was when elected president (or about 3 years yonger than McCain). That would be an interesting election. :-)

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Last edited by JHVH : 10-29-4004 BC at 09:00 PM. Reason: Time for a rest.

Baraka_Guru

Actually, the Alaskan Natives don't speak Inuit, they speak Inupiaq and Yupik. Inuit should be reserved for the Native peoples of Arctic Canada and parts of Greenland. However, Inuit is the commonly used term for all these regions, so I guess this whole thing is a misnomer.

I suppose we could just use Eskimo to avoid confusion, but not in that eurocentric "they eat raw meat" sense. To be safe, we should probably say, "Eskimoan transvestite."

But back to the issue at hand, fresnelly has raised a good point. How can the candidates not cover these issues during the campaign? They are unavoidable disasters waiting to happen. Or are they already disasters?

I think this would be one reason why it might be possible to not put so much stock in the significance of a black or female (vice) president. Either way, there are some very heavy issues either one will have to deal with for four years or more.

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Knowing that death is certain and that the time of death is uncertain, what's the most important thing?
—Bhikkhuni Pema Chödrön

Humankind cannot bear very much reality.
—From "Burnt Norton," Four Quartets (1936), T. S. Eliot

roachboy

i keep thinking and writing that the idea for the right is to see if the issue can be run to ground or avoided, replaced with personality cult infotainment, with the result of pitting grassroots machine against grassroots machine in november.

and if that's true, it follows that it doesn't really matter how stupid the republican memes appear to the Outside because they are not for us. they are for the Faithful, and a very effeciently mobilized faithful they are, one that it would be stupid to underestimate.

what the obama campaign has to do is not allow this to happen.
so far, with the pain idiocy, advantage rightwingers.

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Charlatan

This is what I have been thinking as well.

It does beg the questions though... what of the independent/undecided vote? Once the "faithful" on either side are on board (and it's not clear that both sides have won over their faithful yet) it is these "swing" voters that will decide the election.

Who are these people and how are they being reached?

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jorgelito

Swing voter here.

I can tell you for me, it is up to the candidates to reach out and address things like issues, policy values etc. I paid attention to both the DNC and RNC (you can read about my summary in the DNC thread). I then evaluate whether or not the candidate has addressed my concerns and the credibility of that candidate. So both sides are still very relevant to me at the moment.

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sprocket

IMHO this is the sole reason Palin was picked. America has been sold on the idea that this election is going to be 'historic' come hell or high water. Previously the only ticket that could do it was the democratic ticket. Palin was obviously chosen for the historic novelty.

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blktour

being from alaska and seeing how fast Palin has come up in the ranks, shows she will do whatever to get to the top. I am a Ron Paul follower, and he did state that he thinks Palin won't really "pull McCain where he needs to be." and agree with WillRavel about this "historic" election. If no one has ever done a flip off a roof, and I am the first, will that make it any more special than the next guy? My father always taught me that there will always be "someone better." so first black or first woman, it really doesnt matter. history is everyday. In our eyes it is "historic" since that is the society that we live in.

I personally think that Palin is just picking up the woman "Hilary" voters that Obama can't get. McCain is another "Bush" and this will help get into ANWR here in the AK.

No one is talking about the issues. in her speech all I saw was that she was talking up McCain and taking "jabs" at Obama without saying his name.

Then people cheer when Obama states that "they have called him worse in a basketball game".

Anything to get a rise out of people. I won't vote for any of them, nor do I think it is a "historic" event.

loquitur

I understand why people would wnat to vote for Obama, and why they would not want to vote for McCain. But this meme that McCain is just another Bush is asinine. In background, experience, training, personality, instincts they are nothing alike. Nothing. Their makeups are totally different, and I venture to say that their methods of thinking are totally different (just an impression; I don't really know either man other than from the news). So oppose McCain if you like - there are plenty of good reasons - but the idea that he is just like Bush is silly. Agreeing on certain issues doesn't make people clones - just because I like civil rights doesn't mean I'm a clone of Al Sharpton.

Willravel

Loq, if it were 2005 I'd agree with you. He's either shifted his policies becuase he thinks that the Bush way will help him win or he's been invaded by the same parasitic alien that took over Bush.

McCain's Senate votes are in line with Bush Admninistration policy 95% of the time. That doesn't seem silly to me.

Derwood

I think it was only a matter of time before either a woman or a minority were voted into the Presidency/Vice Presidency. Which came first was a matter of who that person was. Jesse Jackson was the wrong black man. Geraldine Ferraro was the wrong woman.

This year, I believe Obama is the right man, but Palin isn't the right woman. It's too bad McCain didn't pick someone like Olympia Snowe as his running mate

ratbastid

I'm not all that interested in the historicity of it. I'm REAL interested in the potential for change.

loquitur

What does this mean? I posted that his background and temperament and pretty much everything about him is different from Bush, which means a different decisionmaking process and a different approach. He's about as different from Bush as can be, as a person. We don't elect a slate, we elect a person.

As for the 95% thing, you'd need to show me which issues you're talking about and how you got that number, because "the Bush Admin" does not have a vote in the Senate. Obviously the man is a Republican, so yes, he'll vote on the "right" side of issues more often than not. And as you know, this game can be played both ways. You can show that Obama voted some high percentage of time with some loony demagogue's positions, too, if you pick the right data to feed into the comparison.

I'm not an apologist for McCain at all, nor for Obama, I just think this partisan crap is silly and makes smart people behave like idiots, parrotting talking points for their "team." It's one of the reasons I hate election season.

I hate the racist crap some people spout about Obama, and I hate people who put up sites like this one: http://downspalin.blogspot.com. Politics can make people forget their humanity, and it depresses me to no end. (I have a special needs child, and I find crap like that pretty much unforgiveable.)

Sorry, Will, I'm not unloading on you, I'm just already fed up and it's only September.

Yakk

He's got Rove telling him what to do.

He's explicitly decided to follow the pro-war, anti-choice, pro-death, pro-regressive policies of Bush. He picked a running mate that is strongly anti-choice for anyone outside her family, but says that her daughter's decision to have a baby is her choice, who bans books, takes money from people known to bribe politicians (in Alaska, as part of her run for LG), who was proud to have gotten the 'bridge to nowhere' money -- until it got uncoupled from the bridge, then decided she was against it. The very person who helped fund her earlier run for state-wide office ended up being right at the center of the scandal that took down the previous governor, which is why she's governor of Alaska. He dumped his hospitalized and injured wife of many years for a younger, prettier, millionaire hieress, demonstrating his character. He's been involved in dirty political money scandals. He's currently reciting the talking points of the religious right in exchange for their political support, in direct contradiction to what he was saying a mere 2 years ago, and hasn't (to my knowledge) explaind his change of heart. And if elected, he's the oldest individual _ever_ to be elected President -- older even than Reagan.

And he's running on a platform of change -- sure, they have had more control over the executive and legislative branches than the Democrats for the last 8 years (examine how many votes a Republican backed bill needs to poach from the Democrats, vs the other way around -- the Presidential veto power means that the Republicans have more power in the congress/house to pass laws than the Democrats do), they claim that voting for them again will bring a breath of fresh air to Washington.

In the last 2 years, what major policy issues did McCain oppose Bush on?

The Bush Administration has 2 votes in the Senate. First, Cheney gets to break ties (which rarely happen, due to the rules of the Senate). Second, the Bush Administration gets to decide if the bill is vetoed or not.

As it takes 60/100 to get a Bill out of the Senate with Bush's approval, and 66 or 67 (not certain)/100 to get it out without Bush's approval, that places Bush's personal power in the Senate at 6 to 7 Senators.

Bush votes for a proposed bill whenever Bush signs it without sending it back. Bush votes against a proposed bill whenever he sends it back. It is generally known if Bush is in favor, or against, a given bill before it makes it through the Senate/House.

And if the decision making process is different, but the results on major issues are the same... then it really don't matter that much.


...

Pallin is explicitly a sop to the right-wing base of the Republican party. She is evidence that McCain is going to depend on, and give influence to the same power sources that Bush did. Or, possibly, lie about it until he's elected, and hope that he doesn't die while he's president.

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Last edited by JHVH : 10-29-4004 BC at 09:00 PM. Reason: Time for a rest.

Willravel

We vote for the decisions a candidate is going to make. While McCain is clearly his own man, I suppose, as of maybe 2006 he became a different person than he was in the previous decade. He went from a relative centrist to a neo-conservative with his votes and his rhetoric. The McCain of 2004 would have run a completely different campaign from the McCain of 2008.
This was a study done by and then on the Congressional Quarterly's assessment of McCain's voting record. The positions of President Bush are well documented and can be verified with a look back in his public speaking and decisions in office, and those positions are in line with McCain's Senate voting record for 2007. The best (least biased) information about the 95% figure can be found at FactCheck.org.

Don't worry about it. A lot of people (myself included) end up getting frustrated by at least one aspect of the presidential election circus. Some time between the shot heard around the world and now, the presidential campaign became mostly a joke, and it's frustrating for those that know how important and wonderful an election can really be. I mean, we've all seen the West Wing. No one saw Swing Vote, though.

I think that McCain's proposed policies are absolutely insane. That's why I won't support him. It has nothing to do with his father-in-law's mob ties, the fact that he crashed like 4 planes before being captured, or the fact that he's a raging sexist. Those aren't important. He intends to continue the war in Iraq until some theoretical, unattainable victory. He intends to increase tax cuts for the rich. He supports torture (not with his words, but with his votes). He is not against using nuclear weapons on Iran. His temper has effected his Senate service. He was involved with the Keating Five. There are myriad reasons for me not to vote for him, and they're all directly related to policy, proposed policy, and his behavior that would effect his service in the office.

Tully Mars

I think it's nice the country seems more willing to accept women and minorities in high level positions. Not that long ago this would have been unheard of-

I'm a little younger then some on here and a lot older then others. But I remember when my dad had an absolute fit when my mom wanted to go somewhere in *gasps* pants. I also remember starting school and her wanting to get a job. "Women don't work, are you crazy? What will the neighbors say?" And while I'm from a northern state I remember watching the civil rights movements on the news. I also remember the first time I saw a black person, I was at least 8 and we'd traveled from Salem, Or to Portland, Or. That really wasn't that long ago.

Things change, sometimes change is good.

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new man

For me, it's not just historic about the races and the genders. I would never vote for Jesse Jackson or Al Sharpton. But I like what Obama has to say. I will not vote for McCain or Palin because she holds different positions from me.

One other thing, many people said they voted for bush in the beginning because he "was a guy you could share a beer with at a barbecue, a regular guy". Palin claims she is "just a regular hockey mom". I do not want a regular joe in the office. I want a leader. Regular joes have regular little minds with small problems and small solutions. I want the big brain that sees the big picture.