mississippi

Debate Analysis: You Mean Obama Won?

Monday, September 29th, 2008

The first debate is in the can and apparently, I got it all wrong.

The most compelling portion of the event came before it even began, when a haggard John McCain crawled back in front of the press, tail between legs, and said he would come out and play after all, his bluff called by the suddenly granite-infused Sen. Barack Obama.

But as I watched the debate itself, I kept having flashbacks to the final Bush/Kerry debate of 2004.  John Kerry, a very capable, if somewhat over-nuanced, debater was overwhelmed by an inexplicably articulate George W. Bush. G-Dub’s performance was an extended dead-ringer for Will Ferrell’s miraculous turn in  Old School’s quiz show finale featuring  James Carville.

Sen. John McCain also channeled a bit of Will Ferrell when speaking on the economy, avoiding any clumsy missteps while playing to America’s anger at the staggering “greed” and “corruption” in Washington and on Wall St. that led us to this precipice.

Obama, by comparison, seemed content to wallow in the details of his plan, sacrificing emotional appeal for gravity and intellectualism.

(more…)

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Voting and silliness continues

Wednesday, March 12th, 2008

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With wins in Wyoming this weekend and Mississippi last night, Obama made up all the delegates Hillary gained on him in Ohio and Rhode Island on March 4th. He is also set to add more delegates when the Texas caucus results are finalized.

According to Bloomburg News: “With the win in Mississippi, Obama has now won 29 contests compared with 15 for Clinton. In overall votes Obama has about 13.3 million to 12.6 million for Clinton, based on unofficial returns.”

AP exit polls suggest Obama won 90 percent of the black vote in Mississippi.

Meantime Geraldine Ferraro, former vice-presidential candidate and “unpaid Clinton fundraiser,” as I guess we’re referring to her now, is defending the statement she made to a newspaper in California Tuesday that “If Obama was a white man, he would not be in this position. And if he was a woman (of any color) he would not be in this position. He happens to be very lucky to be who he is. And the country is caught up in the concept.”

David Axelrod, Obama’s campaign manager, went after her hard, calling her remarks racist divisionary politics. Obama told the Today Show that it was another example of “slice and dice politics … which are about race and about gender and about this and that, and that’s what Americans are tired of because they recognize that when we divide ourselves in that way we can’t solve problems.”

Ferraro is standing by the comment but Hillary has begged off. Referencing the “She’s a monster” comments made by Obama adviser Samantha Power earlier in the week, Clinton said: “On both sides, some of our supporters have crossed the line and gotten personal. We have to keep this contest about the issues.”

Ferraro’s comments aren’t racist. They’re just stupid. They are meant to belittle Obama’s accomplishments. The idea that Obama is enjoying special privileges as a black man in this race is to miss the point entirely. The attention he has received because of his race is merely an acknowledgment of the daunting odds against a black man becoming president. For him even somehow to have surmounted the million obstacles, large and small, and make his way as a black man into the arena is one thing. To shine there as he has done is another, gaining support across demographics and leading the race for the nomination. Ferraro is no racist. She’s just another damn fool Democratic leader caught up in the destructive silliness that has taken over this primary race.

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Relief disaster

Friday, November 16th, 2007

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News shocker: most of the federal money sent to help folks in Mississippi has gone to relatively affluent residents and big business. According to the New York Times, the Bush Administration waived a rule mandating that 50 percent of all federal disaster relief grants go to low-income programs.

Mississippi officials told the Times that they do not discriminate by race or income in distributing aid to storm victims. In response, low income victims cried bullshit.

The state’s plan “moves business to the forefront and forgets about the people on the ground,” said Anthony Thompson, pastor at Tabernacle of Faith Ministries, whose spotless church (rebuilt by volunteers) is next to a moldering subsidized housing project that he says has not been touched since the storm.

In his mostly black neighborhood in west Gulfport, Mr. Thompson said, “I see a lot of people waiting on help. I see a lot of houses still damaged.”

Critics say that upper and upper-middle class residents are benefiting from the funding both directly and indirectly. Officials suggested that remaking the Gulfport shipping port, a project garnering substantial grant funding, for example, is essential to providing jobs in the area. But the Times reports that those jobs have never gone to low-income residents, a fact that’s not likely to change after the state has spent millions in earmarked low-income grant money on its reconstruction.

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