USA Presidential Politics - 2008

[Just Lucky]

Originally Posted by Jacko

I hope I have not been seen as divisive within the Democratic Party,...I have long felt we had at least 5 candidates in the Democratic Primary with the potential to be much better than that which we have lived with for the past 8 years...the two remaining are the best of that bunch IMHO....

Frankly I felt quite out of place making that comment. I understand getting emotionally wrapped up in politics. Most folks here have seen that from me over and over again. I just usually vent my spleen on the other party or folks in my own party I feel are to close to them.

I just worry we Democrats will snatch defeat out of the jaws of victory yet again. There's a long campaign ahead and ,if recent history is repeated, it will likely be quite a dirty campaign against the Democratic nominee.

[roni]

I have a fearless prediction to make. Unless Hillary starts winning elections in the next period of time, she will not be the nominee

[ryberg]

And yet, RCP shows a jump of 30 in her superdelegates just today, entirely erasing the gain of 30 Obama spent the last several days picking up:



Ponderous. Superdelegates going precisely against the very clear trend of the popular votes over these past few days.

Steve

[Sol]

Here is some more news on Solis Doyle.

'SUPER' LATINO SLAMS CLINTON




By MAGGIE HABERMAN




February 12, 2008 -- A prominent member of the national Democratic Party has circulated a sharp e-mail saying the removal of Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton campaign manager Patti Solis Doyle was disloyal to Hispanics and should give "pause" to superdelegates and voters.
The e-mail from, Steven Ybarra, a California superdelegate who heads the voting-rights committee of the DNC Hispanic Caucus, was sent to fellow caucus members in the hours after word broke that Solis Doyle - the most prominent Latina in Clinton's campaign - would be replaced by another close Clinton loyalist, Maggie Williams, who is black.
The e-mail noted that Clinton, who is looking to Latino voters for a boost in the Texas and Ohio primaries on March 4, scored heavily with Hispanics in her California win.
"Apparently, loyalty is not a two-way street," he wrote. "Latino superdelegates like myself . . . will have cause to pause."
Ybarra told The Post yesterday that the loss of Solis Doyle, a child of Mexican immigrants, just weeks before the Texas primary, where 36 percent of the population is Hispanic, was "dumb as a stump."
Contacted for comment, the typically press-shy Solis Doyle told The Post that Ybarra was writing on "false information," and confirmed she's staying on as an adviser.
Team Clinton insisted that the decision to switch from Solis Doyle to Williams, revealed on Sunday afternoon, was amiable.

[Sol]

Otro artículo:

New York Hispanic leaders concerned if Clinton campaign manager was replaced over losses

Associated Press
Feb. 12, 2008 02:46 PM
ALBANY, N.Y. - Two New York Hispanic leaders said they would be upset if Hillary Rodham Clinton's Hispanic campaign manager was replaced because of primary losses they believe should be blamed on former President Bill Clinton and others.

Patti Solis Doyle, whose parents were Mexican immigrants, stepped down as Clinton's campaign manager this weekend as Clinton was losing five Democratic contests to Illinois Sen. Barack Obama. Clinton has said Doyle's decision was a personal response to a grueling campaign, not about job performance. She added that Solis Doyle would remain a senior adviser and that her campaign needed to add more staff.

In a letter to Clinton dated Monday and obtained by the Associated Press, State Sen. Ruben Diaz Jr. and Assemblyman Jose Peralta, both New York City Democrats, wrote that they are inclined to believe the explanation, but it will be very troubling to many if somehow we later find that she left her post under pressure because of the recent primary losses your campaign suffered."


The lawmakers credited Solis Doyle with helping build Hispanic support for Clinton and wrote that they hoped she was not "the one to take the blame and resign from her post instead of others involved with your campaign, including former President Clinton, who have caused serious problems and embarrassing situations for your campaign."

Bill Clinton was criticized when he suggested Obama's victory in South Carolina was a racial one, like the Rev. Jesse Jackson's there in 1988. Obama won with an overwhelming share of the South Carolina Black vote. After the criticism of that and other remarks he made about Obama, the former president said he would stick to promoting his wife, rather than defending her.

Clinton has received solid majorities from Hispanic voters. They helped her win California and she is counting on them again in Texas' March 4 primary.

"She might be playing with fire with the Hispanic community," Diaz told the Associated Press on Tuesday. "I just wanted them to know that we are not innocent, to believe that the person resigned on her own. No one resigns when things are going good." Diaz has not endorsed a candidate for president.

Solis Doyle responded: "This my decision, my choice, my timing."

"I was really, really proud to be the first Hispanic woman to run a presidential campaign and particularly proud of the way Hispanics turned out and they turned out for Hillary," Solis Doyle added, "There was no pressure and while I'm sad not to have the role, I am so happy to be able to be home more with my kids."

[Sol]

This is on the Mexican American Political Association website:

30/Jan/2008 :: SI SE PUEDE WITH OBAMA

SI SE PUEDE WITH OBAMA


In various previous bulletins we have pointed out numerous contradictions and challenges facing us during this presidential campaign. The aspirations for political change that conforms to the myriad social needs of Latinos, the working majorities of the U.S., and all people of color are huge. Fair and humane immigration reform, an end to the war in Iraq and Afghanistan and the return of U.S. troops to their loved ones, universal and affordable healthcare, fair versus “free” trade policies and an end to the export of millions of jobs, immediate relief to working families devastated by the subprime housing crisis, equitable and progressive tax rates, a reduction of the budget deficit not on the backs of working people, a restoration and protection of privacy rights and an end to government spying and surveillance on its citizens and residents, protected right to organize a union and negotiate a collective bargaining unit, an end to the era of dependency on fossil fuels, the inviolability of women’s right to choice and immediate access to health services – these and many more issues are moving millions of people into motion in search of relevant change in our country.

The real question before us is whether any of the current presidential candidates measures up to our expectations and aspirations for change within the context of a constrained political system dominated by two main political parties – Republican and Democratic, its various minor parties, but an ever growing and robust independent segment of the electorate?

The Mexican American Political Association (MAPA), the oldest political-civic organization of Mexican Americans and Latinos in the U.S., answers the question in the affirmative with some reservations. The task before us is enormous and we refuse to invest everything on one woman or man aspiring to assume the highest political office in the land, and expect that this will create the change we desire. This is only one element of the political equation. The majority of the responsibility for change is ours – our collective responsibility to create sweeping social movement and impose our political will as the majority producers of society. We do this by participating in political elections, mobilizations of masses of people, social protests, lobbying, sit-ins, petitions, recall of elected officials when necessary, and the use of many other tactics.

No political candidate is perfect, but which candidate comes closest to our ideal and speaks to our issues and interests, exudes confidence, demonstrates a track-record for integrity and speaking truth to power, and voting in favor of working peoples interests?

Our first choice was Congressman Dennis Kucinich. We firmly believe that his platform is our platform, and that his progressive trajectory as an elected official speaks for itself. However, for many reasons citizen Kucinich retired from the presidential primary race to pursue a re-election bid for his current seat. MAPA stood on principle to support the candidate who thoroughly stands for peace, fair trade, humane immigration reform, universal healthcare access, women’s choice, worker’s rights, and while his candidacy may have represented an impossible long-shot – we resolved that elections in and of themselves do not constitute the main measure of political change, and that our fight is a strategic one premised on deep-rooted organization of political conscious Latino workers and families in alliance with affinity constituencies.

However, something nasty in the national campaigns reared its head over the past two weeks, which motivated us to consider another endorsement for a presidential candidate of the Democratic Party primary elections. We have observed with utter disgust the use of racially divisive and polarizing tactics employed by the Clintons, both Hillary and Bill, against Senator Barack Obama, not the first presidential candidate of African American origin. This is something that we would have expected from Republican candidates, but instead it surfaced from the bowels of the center-right institutional currents of the Democratic Party. The tactics are absolutely deplorable and clearly demonstrate what the Clintons think of all people of color.

In other words, when they speak and refer to Senator Barack Obama in the racially disparaging manner in which they have, they are really referring to all of us people of color – African Americans, Latinos, Asian Pacific Islanders, and Native Americans. Perhaps worst yet, they think little of white members of the electorate wrongly believing that such tactics would move white voters away from Senator Obama - the scary specter of a black candidate with little experience and questionable credibility assuming the reins of power. The repeated claim by the Clintons’ paid pollster, Sergio Bendixen that Latinos won’t vote for a black man is one more example of the polarizing self-fulfilling prophecy injected into the campaign of late. Certainly they will deny such a charge, but then again, they are not people of color and have not been the victims of their own invective.

MAPA has historically supported candidates it believed were competent to represent the corresponding electorate irrespective of their national origin, race, gender or age. The content of their character is what mattered most to us.

The leadership and membership of MAPA have resolved to endorse Senator Barack Obama as the presidential candidate for the Democratic Party, who also just happens to be African American.

We also observe with great pride growing numbers of young white voters enthusiastically embracing the message of Senator Obama, black voters turning out in greater percentages than previous elections exuding pride and hope, Latino culinary union members who see themselves in the candidacy of the young senator, and women who deposit their faith in the intelligence and oratorical imagery displayed by candidate Barack Obama. All of this bodes well for the future of America – seeing beyond race – capable of assimilating the message of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

Senator Obama is the only remaining candidate who has declared in favor of issuing driver’s licenses to immigrants (much before the current campaign) and the right of immigrant youth to higher education through the Dream Act, pursuing humane immigration reform his first year in office, returning all U.S. combat troops from Iraq, (one of the few federal legislators who originally opposed the war publicly), and pursuing universal healthcare reform (albeit retaining a role for private insurance companies) – these are a few of his down-payment commitments to the electorate he seeks to convince that now is the time to carve the change required due to the current maladies plaguing the country. It is our obligation to move this campaign and candidacy still closer to the wishes and pressing needs of the majorities.

Si Se Puede con Obama, Yes We Can with Obama, is the recurring chant that we now will also raise to oppose those candidates who live in the past, seek dynasty, angle to divide and polarize us, or propose continued neo-liberal directions for the nation-state.

Si Se Puede with Obama, and with and by and for the people.


Nativo V. Lopez
National President

[ryberg]

When it rains, it pours, apparently...

[ryberg]

This is a very handy-dandy list of superdelegate totals broken down by states, and if you click on the little expando + buttons for a state, you can see by name the particular superdelegates involved for either candidate or still uncommitted. Much easier to work with than the other list at the other link I posted previously (though they say right here that their info relies on that link).

To give you a taste and simultaneously show an interesting breakdown:



FWIW. Could be interesting to monitor over the next few weeks...

Steve

[Sol]

Some Latinos are calling Clinton's campaign strategies: "No sé puede."

Oh...in an interview, Clinton indicated that states like Idaho, ND "don't matter." Apparently, us'n Democrats won't make much of a difference at the polls in November and these states are red anyway."
Wow...that's two. Solis Doyle is out and she doesn't think my state is important. Hmmm...what she doesn't know is that it is not only Democrats that are supporting Obama. I had better give her a call tomorrow and let her know.

[ryberg]

Originally Posted by Sol

Some Latinos are calling Clinton's campaign strategies: "No sé puede."

I'm sorry but that's very funny. That strikes me somehow as consistent with a lot of Latino humor. I don't know why...

That other part... well...



Did you see this? Maybe not a true definite sign of anything, but still, suggestive of a different direction, perhaps...

Tuesday, Obama even beat Clinton among Latino voters, a group that has heavily favored Clinton in most past primaries.

In Virginia and Maryland, Latinos went for Obama over Clinton by 6 points, though their support was not decisive in either contest -- only 5 percent of Democratic primary voters in Virginia and 4 percent in Maryland were Latino.

The only demographic Clinton won was white women, who broke for her over Obama by 10 points in Virginia and 13 points in Maryland . . . [source]

Steve

[Just Lucky]

Originally Posted by Sol

Some Latinos are calling Clinton's campaign strategies: "No sé puede."

Oh...in an interview, Clinton indicated that states like Idaho, ND "don't matter." Apparently, us'n Democrats won't make much of a difference at the polls in November and these states are red anyway."
Wow...that's two. Solis Doyle is out and she doesn't think my state is important. Hmmm...what she doesn't know is that it is not only Democrats that are supporting Obama. I had better give her a call tomorrow and let her know.

I think you should ring her on her cell.

I've got to say the endorsement from the MAPA website is awesome political writing! Do you by chance know who the author is? Very stirring.

[ryberg]

Originally Posted by Just Lucky

I think you should ring her on her cell.

Oh, man... I believe you're the funniest man on Playa.Info.

I mean excepting Stogey when he gets a good one off, you know, but that goes without saying.

What is it that gets into you, or what is it that you get into, at night?

Steve

[Just Lucky]

Originally Posted by ryberg

Oh, man... I believe you're the funniest man on Playa.Info.

I mean excepting Stogey when he gets a good one off, you know, but that goes without saying.

What is it that gets into you, or what is it that you get into, at night?

Steve

Ahh gee thanks!

I found out the author of the MAPA endorsement. It is Nativo V Lopez. Did his writing grab anyone else?

[ryberg]

The numbers and the delegates and the states' respective sizes and populations aside, this starts to get kind of hard to argue against (especially if you take the Electoral College apologist's view that the President should have broad appeal in many different states and regions even at the expense of some of the popular vote):



Steve

[ryberg]

It looks rather different from the final Electoral College map of the 2004 election (Bush 296, Kerry 242):



Steve