Saturday, August 2, 2008

The DNC Follows ‘The New Paradigm In Politics’ Off A Cliff

Original Link: http://noquarterusa.net/blog/2008/08/01/the-dnc-follows-%e2%80%98the-new-paradigm-in-politics%e2%80%99-off-a-cliff/

By Ani

In her MSNBC interview with McCain campaign manager Rick Davis last night, the ever-biased Andrea Mitchell called Obama ‘a new paradigm in politics.’

Oh, really? Is that why he is desperate and playing the race card once again, this time on Senator McCain? He must be wondering why he got no bounce from his Barackapalooza World Tour, or why the American public as a whole is not bamboozled enough to vote for him.

Not surprisingly, Senator McCain’s campaign seems to have found solid footing painting Obama quite accurately as a ‘celebrity candidate.’

Davis mentioned that since Obama was too busy to visit the troops, but had time for several workouts a day and made special diet demands, it would be hard to characterize him as anything but a ‘celebrity.’ When Andrea went after him for this ‘triviality,’ Davis pointed out that it is the media that sees fit to make public domain all the minutae of what this candidate was doing — and that when the press would cover it, he would be happy to come back and discuss more substantive issues. Ouch.

How ridiculously distressing, to say the least, that the DNC did not see this coming. Did they have dollar signs clouding their eyes? Was it Clinton Derangement Syndrome? Were they so caught up in their fear of an actual leader with her own clear vision that they would instead trumpet an empty suit, a shape-shifting charlatan, so that the old guard of the DNC could set the agenda and whisper in this neophyte’s ear?

Doesn’t quite sound like the new way of doing business in Washington that Obama is advertising. And little did they realize that his outsized ego will, like Bush Jr., be rather hard to control once Obama is able to, as he said, “put his feet up on the desk.”

It is becoming more likely that Democrats will face a loss in November, thanks to the likes of Dean, Pelosi and Brazile. You know, see no evil, hear no evil, and well, I could say speak no evil – but Donna lives to speak evil – her favorite phrase is ‘stop the hate.’

She should talk.

If it is any comfort to any of you Hillary fans out there, I am relatively certain (call me psychic) that Dean will have to resign after the crushing loss Obama will experience and that Brazile likewise will lose what credibility she might have had left. Her idiotic idea to make the Democratic Party a completely urban group and throw rural voters under the bus smacks of as much reverse racism and class-ism as anything I have ever seen.

Pelosi with her approval rating around what – 14% – let’s just say she may not be long for the Speaker job either.

The piper will be paid.

I am a New Yorker born and raised, now a “left coaster.” I am loath to admit that as a lifelong Democrat, I have had ‘elitist’ moments myself, however unintentionally. It is easy to get caught in your own liberal beliefs and be obtuse about rural voters or Middle America and not understand that their experiences, upbringing, religious faith and environment may make their concerns appear different to my more secular upbringing. I have more than once heard them referred to as “the fly-over people.” Shame on us all.

I apologize for my short-sightedness. This election cycle, making so many GOTV phone calls to so many parts of the country, and corresponding with those of like mind from different states has given me a new perspective. I am reminded that people need to be treated with equal dignity, not only legally and morally – but politically.

We are all in this together. This red state/blue state crap has to stop. We do have more in common than we think and need to reach out to find that ground.

The person who taught me that was Senator Hillary Clinton. She rejected no one, though she was rejected. She insulted no one, though she was daily crucified and insulted by a biased, misogynist media. She fought like a lion and she did it, not as a vanity project, but because she actually has coherent, progressive and sensible plans to move our country forward. P.S. – She actually gives a damn about the American people. All of them.

Obviously, voters of all social strata and location – 18,000,000 of them – got her message and liked what they heard, with excellent reason. She reached out for every single vote, whether she knew she would receive a cool reception or a standing ovation.

I attended one such evening, a fund raiser, where she must have received 20 such ovations from a huge, sold out auditorium. For two hours, she warmly, specifically, and eloquently answered random questions voters had submitted – that were picked out of a bowl on the stage. She found common ground. The ovations were not out of adulation, but appreciation for and understanding of the issues. I was impressed with every voter in that house. And they were more impressed with her.

The DNC has instead willfully chosen to give us the prancing prince, with behavior more reminiscent of Bush Jr.’s woefully premature “Mission Accomplished” than anything new and refreshing on the horizon. Playing the race card and flip-flopping on most of his campaign promises. What new paradigm is that, Andrea?

Rick Davis gave another nice slap down to Andrea Mitchell when he basically said Obama did not go to Germany to win votes and talk about campaign issues, he came to be adored and lauded by 200,000 fans. Davis rightly pointed out that Obama drew first blood on attack ads and also made Andrea eat her words in classifying McCain as ‘bitter.’ Hmmm. Bitter. Where have we heard that word before?

Well, do we really think Hillary would be having the DNC sweating a tie in the polls at this point in time? She’d be out there every day, building her coalition further, not using her gender as a weapon but asking that she be judged on the merits.

Now that’s a new paradigm in politics.

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