2008 Primaries Thread

oh man we would get a real nice debate on the merits of war in iraq w/a mccain/powell ticket

Powell's gonna be on Late Edition on CNN tomorrow

i agree with just about everything gabbneb said in his longer post upthread speculating what will happen with the dem race.

and of course, this is key to determining who it'll likely be:

the thing is, I sorta suspect that Hillary has the upper hand given natural advantages in the big March and April states. the question is whether the momentum and coverage of the next four weeks of Obama winning and Hillary losing will be enough to get him to or beyond parity when we get to OH and maybe PA.

honestly tho, if obama 7 or 8 or 9 of these february contests, wouldn't that catapult him towards winning in march as well?

so we've obviously seen the new clinton campaign strategy for aftr super tuesday, which is an attempt to recast her as the upstart candidate. all of campaigns press-directed activities have been attempts to shore up this storyline -- the loan, the fundraising plea, the call for more debates, the 'press-hates-hillary' shuster affair. but keep in mind -- it takes money and time to come up with new talking points and strategies and requires organization to spread the new narrative -- you can bet a large part of these new-found funds are being used to focus-group new campaign slogans and shit like that... and clinton does need to raise a lot more funds and will be holding more traditional fundraising events, rather than just rallies.

so obama has an advantage here -- i really hope that the obama campaign can take the opportunity to talk more policy and actually set forth proposals for programs and legislation -- the plan for 80% reduction in emissions he set out in seattle is a good example, and delivered to the correct geographic crowd. if he can continue the strong grassroots support and season his events with a few more policy specifics, it will counter the narrative that the obama campaign is self-referential / a cult of personality / all generalities & no specifics.

so obama has an advantage here -- i really hope that the obama campaign can take the opportunity to talk more policy

Don’t worry, he won’t. Senator Obama will get hammered by both Senator Clinton and McCain if he even comes close to making policy the focus of his campaign, the campaign is well aware of this fact.

it will counter the narrative that the obama campaign is self-referential / a cult of personality / all generalities & no specifics.

You can’t change what he, or his campaign is. Frankly, if you’d like to see him win you should be praying he doesn’t attempt to change the narrative.

dude, you're really obnoxious.

Since on many levels Obama and Clinton "policies" are indistinguishable, and Obama's the more fiery speaker, HRC better buy some rosary beads.

Also, the only people that care about policy are the 10% of the population that's strongly involved in politics, so the more turnout increases, the less policy matters. 30% turnout = at least 2/3 of voters are making their decision based on personality or associative cues.

Worth reading -- reports on caucusing in Nebraska. TONS of people showing up for Democratic voting, overwhelming expectations. Some bits:

1:52 p.m.

The decision to have only one caucus site in all of Sarpy County appears to have been a bad one.

Reports are coming in that the caucus site in Papillion is overhwhelmed.

Thousands have turned up, when organized expected only several hundred.

They are still registering.

Traffic is backed up on Highway 370.

"All of Sarpy County is at this school and they've run out of registration forms," said Cindy Perich, of Papillion.

She had taken today off to caucus on behalf of Barack Obama. But, she left. It was too chaotic.

"It's totally unorganized. I'm totally disappointed with the (Nebraska) Democratic Party," said Perich.

* * *

11:42 a.m.

It doesn't look good for Clinton at Monroe Middle School.

The line to the Clinton box is empty. The line to vote for Obama is about a half block long.

Mr. Goodman, has the possibility that Obama is smarter than Hillary ever occurred to you?

i hope obama's momentum can help him out in texas and ohio

Mr. Goodman, has the possibility that Obama is smarter than Hillary ever occurred to you?

Of course it has. Look, I vote on three issues. The future of two of these determine my future employment as I plan to work within their area of policy and as a part of the next administration. It is in my best interest to support the candidate who I think will not only best serve the country, but serve myself (and my beliefs) as well.

While I have the utmost respect for the three leading candidates, I believe Senator Clinton is the candidate who best fits my ideology and interests.

you are out of a job if clinton looses?

The future of two of these determine my future employment as I plan to work within their area of policy and as a part of the next administration

At least you're selfless.

you are out of a job if clinton looses?

http://www.medgadget.com/archives/img/12423511gp1.jpg

From: Lil' Boosie

Date: Feb 9, 2008 9:48 AM
Subject: VOTE FOR A CHANGE
Body: Normally I dont even get involved in all the politics... but make sure you go vote for BARACK TODAY...

You want to see change in the world... make sure you go vote.

lxy reports that washington's caucus today is "already really annoying"

Huckabee takes Kansas

LIVE REPORT FROM MACKRO MACKRO VIA PHONE:

--

"From Queen Anne Hill, 'pro-Hillary'/Gary Locke district:

Obama -- 90%
Clinton -- 10%
GOP -- a vast and empty silence

Now off to the Kimya Dawson instore at Easy Street.

Rock. (Pretty surprising even for me!)"

i wish more ron paul fans wouldn't vote

-- J.D., Sunday, 30 December 2007 10:28 (9 hours ago) Link

Sorry. We're coming out in droves on super tuesday. Get ready.

-- If Assholes Could Fly This Place Would Be An Airport, Sunday, December 30, 2007 2:51 PM (Sunday, December 30, 2007 2:51 PM) Bookmark Link

x-post -- He adds his estimates aren't official, but just judging by the raising of hands. Also adds it was a total madhouse, people asked to leave if preferences had already been recorded -- scene outside "like a natural disaster had happened and everyone was waiting in line for supplies"

at least he broke 5% in NY, xp

is QA supposed to be pro-Hillary because richies live there?

My wife drove by the Republican caucus site in our crappy Kansas town this morning as the caucus was ending, and said every person she saw was age 65 or older (I guess the three Ron Paul voters were still inside moping).

I'm surprised Huckabee won so big here---there's a lot of military here, and I thought they'd be very pro-McCain.

x-post -- Ask the man when he gets back to this thread.

Not one of Huckabee's better photos:

http://media.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/photo/homepage/hp2-9-08a.jpg

Now off to the Kimya Dawson instore at Easy Street.

lol

Was he chewing on a baby with those incisors?

(xpost)

i am hoping huckabee can make a run and conservative infighting will continue.

i saw ann coulter on cspan at the cpac thing and she said she would have voted for giuliani because he would pick judges that would be against miranda rights

i'm still in shock that ann coulter's a deadhead.

I'm not!

lol at lowercase "deadhead"

it is kind of baffling to me that coulter/rush/etc thought mitt a "true conservative"

i guess they were enamored by his wealth/biz background?

haircut.

I'm surprised Huckabee won so big here---there's a lot of military here, and I thought they'd be very pro-McCain.

I kind of feel like Huckabee's good-guy born again persona goes over pretty well in KS, b/c it's probably how a lot of people view themselves. There might be a lot of military in some places, but there are tons of registered Republicans all over the state to kind of balance them out.

greenwood elementary (sea, US) initial tally:

obama 55
hillary 9
undecided 6

when do the results start coming in? i thought i had read nebraska's caucuses were over at like 5 est?

link passed along to me:

http://community.livejournal.com/seattle/5045218.html

Wow. That's fucked up.
---
http://wa-democrats.com/

http://wa-democrats.org/

The second goes to the WA state Democrats website. The first one? The WA state GOP site.

oh boy:

http://www.politico.com/blogs/bensmith/0208/Now_on_MSNBC.html#comments

looks like she's pimped out her leverage.

i saw ann coulter on cspan at the cpac thing and she said she would have voted for giuliani because he would pick judges that would be against miranda rights

-- artdamages, Saturday, February 9, 2008 9:50 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Link

for a second there i was pro-coulter; my brain read that as 'miranda july'

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cMHLI7ypeLQ

Crappy vid of Obama with a megaphone addressing the 3K+ supporters who got stuck out in the cold outside the Key Arena yesterday.

they had one of those specials for McCain a few days ago

Well, just back from caucusing. My precinct had 35 people show up, of whom 28 went for Obama and 7 for Clinton, with 5 delegates going to the former and 1 to the latter, which looked like it was more or less the story for all the Everett precincts. Hopefully that result is replicated all over WA.

Looking at Jergins' post, maybe so.

some people in the comments section say this was planned to be paired with a mccain headliners & legends ep?