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Sunday, January 27th, 2008

vertvotertuesap.jpgOccasional contributor F. Landis gives us a heads up on the turnout numbers in South Carolina. He points out that, although it’s hard to compare directly because both the Republican and Democratic parties in the state have moved back and forth between caucus and primary systems, the “trends are mind-boggling”: MSNBC reported last night that African-American turnout at the polls this year doubled from 2004. Below are figures from the last couple election seasons. Also new: More Democrats than Republicans turned out in the 2008 South Carolina primaries, which is an entirely new phenomenon there, and reflects “buzz” about the general interest and enthusiasm across the nation and around the world generated by the Clinton-Obama contest.

Obama won another kind of victory today, pulling down a candid endorsement from JFK daughter Caroline Kennedy and a nodding endorsement from Caroline’s uncle, big-stick party leader, Clinton pal and excellent martini mixer Sen. Ted Kennedy, who has announced plans to endorse Obama sometime this week.

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South Carolina shouts

Saturday, January 26th, 2008

The Obama South Carolina victory was the first really decisive contest yet of the Democratic primary race. His victory speech seemed a powerful tour of his thinking over the past couple weeks, a combination finger wag and group hug. This kind of emotion-getting natural-born speechifying is something we as a nation have been sorely missing over the past eight years. Now that it’s over, Obama and Clinton together have to get back to Washington to do their jobs— ie, stand up with Sen Chris Dodd for an enormously important legislative action against the Administration’s unconstitutional eavesdropping bill and then sit for what will be another of the not-naturally-gifted President’s State of the Unions. (Cliff Notes version: “War, Government Lawlessness, Crippled Economy; Overall Not Good.”

Are Americans apathetic about politics? Not this year, baby. More than 520,000 votes were cast in Saturday’s South Carolina primary. The Associated Press reports that only 280,000 were cast in 2004.

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Hell no in South Carolina

Tuesday, January 22nd, 2008

Poor stiff ultra-white Mitt Romney did not say “who let the dogs out” at the beginning of this clip. Someone please say it’s a hoax. And let’s hope he didn’t really say that the infant at the end of the clip is wearing “bling bling.” No, god, he did not.

A final note from the Oh God No! file: Does the Billary team really think it will win votes by accusing Obama of being an (egad!) Reagan Lover? We have to ask: Can the country really elect someone president who either can not discern or is unwilling to admit the difference between (1) saying Reagan was a transformative politician and (2) praising the Reagan presidency and advocating for a return to Reaganomics? Isn’t that the kind of willfully dense president we already have in office?

Ooh gotcha. You said something that sounded positive about a Republican. Hell no. After sixteen years, does the country really need any more of that “experience”?

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