Obama on policy

Presidential candidate Barrack Obama promises at Flint appearance to help auto industry refashion itself [8]

*****
GOOD MORNING FLINT!
9/9/09 By Terry Bankert
http://goodmorningflint.blogspot.com/
Longer article with citations
http://www.flinttalk.com/viewforum.php?f=2

* * * * * REFLECTIONS:

The next President of the United States appeared in Flint MI USA 9/08/08.The next Democratic administration is committed to re-industrialization of American and specifically re-birth of the automobile industry.What Obama demonstrated is ability to advocate positive policies for change. But he cannot help us if he does not win. To win the Palin bump must be addressed. The Democrats will defeat the republican by the strength of policy argument. Our chant to McCain/Palin should be WHERE’S THE BEEF.In Flint, Obama said" that he -- not McCain -- has consistently advocated changes in tax policy, education, the war in Iraq and the U.S. auto industry that will create jobs and help average families who are struggling.""You can't just make stuff up. You can't just reinvent yourself," he said of McCain. "The American people aren't stupid. What they're looking for is someone who has consistently called for change."Polls have shown that voters consistently rate the economy as the top issue facing the nation this election season. Obama/Biden are talking economics, health care, good alternative fuel, national security, and correcting the chaos Bush has caused our national economy and international image. McCain/Palin are talking religious conversion and 4 more years of Bush policies. Its time for a change.[trb]
* * * * *

He cannot help if he does not win.To win the Palin factor must address. Here Obama by talking economics, auto industry. McCain/Pailin will be defeated by the strenght of the democratic arguments on policy.[trb]

AMERICA TO SELECT A VP THAT COULD BECOME PRESIDENT

Eight weeks from Tuesday, Americans choose a president and a vice president. That deputy job matters. Eight times in U.S. history, vice presidents have replaced presidents who died.[6] Gerald Ford stepped up when Richard Nixon resigned. If Bill Clinton hadn't barely escaped conviction by the Senate after he was impeached by the House, Al Gore would have been the 10th veep thrust into the top job on short notice.[6]

WHO THEN ARE THESE CANDIDATES

In Flint, Obama said that he -- not McCain -- has consistently advocated changes in tax policy, education, the war in Iraq and the U.S. auto industry that will create jobs and help average families who are struggling.[6]

"You can't just make stuff up. You can't just reinvent yourself," he said of McCain. "The American people aren't stupid. What they're looking for is someone who has consistently called for change."[6]

Polls have shown that voters consistently rate the economy as the top issue facing the nation this election season.[6]

Obama noted in Flint that the national unemployment rate soared to 6.1 percent last month, the highest jobless mark in five years, even as McCain pronounced the nation's economy fundamentally sound. He added that Michigan's rate is at 8.5 percent and unemployment in Flint is over 12 percent. [7]

"If John McCain thinks the economy is fundamentally sound, he needs to come to Flint," Obama said at a gathering of about 300 at Mott Community College. [7]

"You don't have to tell people in Michigan the economy is not in good shape. But you do need to tell John McCain." [7]

Obama touched on Flint's high unemployment and housing crisis, all the while criticizing McCain's recent claims that the Republican ticket is for change."Government can't be for change when you brag about supporting George Bush," said Obama.[8]

The latest statewide polls have shown Obama leading in Michigan and Genesee County by a small percentage, with 23 percent of voters in the area still undecided and Obama underperforming amongst union workers.[8]

THERE IS NOT JUST ONE AMERICA, THERE IS NOT ONE CORRECT POINT OF VIEW

Palin, with her meat loaf and rifles, reminds us that there are two hopelessly incompatible Americas[1]

McCain through palin is exploiting our division.

With the most recent decision which could impact our great nation; John McCain has once again demonstrated his poor judgment, lack of concern for the American people and his contempt for women's issues. By secretly selecting a running mate whom he had only met once, who was not fully vetted, and who lacks the years of experience governing, which was an issue in his campaign, shows it was designed to appease the evangelical base of the Republican party and to attract disaffected Hillary Clinton women voters.[5]


SOME HAVE A RIGHT TO MAKE PALIN THEIR POSTER GIRL

A Photo shopped picture of Sarah Palin has been doing the rounds for the past few days; it shows her in a stars and stripes bikini toting a rifle - patriotism, hunting and cheesecake all combined in one image.[1]

Two minutes of Googling reveals that the rifle has been identified by gun nuts in Republican chatrooms as a Crossman pump pellet gun. Soft porn for rednecks. Expect to see it pinned to the wall in every gas station in Texas and tacked to the dashboard of every long-haul truck. But this cartoon-like depiction of her smothers what we need to understand about why Palin appeals to American voters and why American elections have been so deadlocked for the past decade, as if there were two Americas, doomed to lived on the same landmass under the same government, like hopelessly incompatible spouses.[1]

PALIN DOES HAVE HER CRITICS

While most praise her bold, tough approach, they also point out her lack of follow-through and seeming disinterest in the details of governing, and her inability to work with those who disagree, the Los Angeles Times reports. [2]

Others note that Palin's governing style is to stifle dissent and criticism rather than hear all sides of an issue[2]

Democrats Barrack Obama and Joe Biden went after rising GOP star Sarah Palin Monday, casting the vice presidential nominee as a flip-flopper with "extreme" views.[3]

In fact, Palin at first supported the bridge, numerous records show. As recently as July, she told reporters she pulled her support only after the bridge became a symbol of pork-barrel spending and she saw "the writing on the wall," a video Monday showed.[3]

Earlier, Biden ramped up his rhetoric against Palin, saying the Alaska governor would soon have to defend her "fairly extreme" positions.

Asked to elaborate, aides to Biden later cited Palin's past statements expressing doubt that manmade pollution contributed to global warming as well as her opposition to stem-cell research and abortion, even in cases of rape.[3]

The Democratic duo got an assist from former primary rival Hillary Clinton, who stumped through Florida for Obama.[3]

Clinton argued that returning Republicans to the White House "is like asking the iceberg to save the Titanic." With News Wire Services[3]

BUT WHO IS OR WHAT IS PALIN?

Dan Hardy, a 60-year-old business owner from West Bloomfield, thinks Palin's appeal is fleeting. Once she submits to interviews, he said, people will realize "how shallow she is." [7]

PALIN HAS CHANGED THE POLITICAL PICTURE, WHAT WILL IT DO TO THE DEBATE.

Governing a state with fewer people than San Francisco, and just two years ago a small-town mayor, Palin has already sucked the air from both parties' nominees and has scrambled the debate between feminists and cultural conservatives.[3]

But Palin owes Americans much more opportunity to scrutinize her—and many more answers to questions: How did a mayor who secured congressional earmarks for her community convert to McCain's belief that earmarking is irresponsible? What positions does she hold on Iraq, Afghanistan, national security and the U.S.-led war against global terrorism? What are her thoughts on economic policy—and do they square with her record as governor? [6]These aren't trick questions. And we're not here to shill for "those reporters and commentators" Palin mocked in her speech to the Republican National Convention. On a personal level, sure, she has a right to be miffed: The disdain of PBS' Gwen Ifill and some other TV journalists after Palin's speech was visible to millions. But the issue here isn't anybody's personal peeve. It's about giving all Americans time to absorb and approve, or disapprove, of a candidate's record in office and her stance on key issues.[6]

SO..WE ARE MORE THAN ONE AMERICA

It's true. One America is the envy of the world-filled with intellectual and artistic achievement, culture, and filled with thoughtful, intelligent people. The other US loves guns, believes God controls everything, and have little or no culture. (There is also a third America, which is the poor black/Latino America that is so disenfranchised it doesn't, or can't, vote.)[freemtspeech comment at 1]

WE SAY WE RESPECT PLURALISM...BUT WE REALLY DO NOT,.ITS OUR WAY OR THE HIGHWAY

A new novel, American Wife by Curtis Sittenfeld, published in the US this week, tells a fictionalised and thinly veiled story of Laura Bush, from small-town girl in the 1950s midwest to school librarian to Republican bride to President's wife. What you learn from the novel is that, like it or not, the American heartland is not so much a political ideology but an actual place with people living in it. Small-town Americans have values and a lot of those values are good ones: neighbourliness, family life, a knowledge of the land and what grows in it. The other America they see on TV seems without ethics - crime, violence, drug addiction, pornography and prostitution - and they don't want any part of it.[1]

ULTRA RELIGIOUS NON HISPANIC WHITE REPUBLICANS OR FOR SHORT WHITEBRED REPUBLICANS

So clear is the divide between big-city and small-town America that one American friend said to me: "These whitebread Republicans are like children - someone has to tell them what to do and what to think, they're incapable of independent ideas." [1]

ULTRA RELIGIOUS RIGHT

All countries have different socio economic groups. I do not know how widespread the ultra religious right is despite that fact the Republicans courted and won them.

A SMALL FANATICAL SECT USED BY BIG MONEY TO DOMINATE AMERICA

I suspect they are really a small subset but a vocal one and one that has put itself on school and library boards, is active in state and local government and in the US Congress. As an American who was raised in NYC area and has lived in most of the regions, I think most people are moderately conservative, but not radical.[comment elsafromlndy at 1]

REPUBLICAN PARTY ..JUST A MOUTH PIECE FOR A RELIGIOUS SECT

I think the Republican party has become the mouthpiece of the religious right so this small group has amassed an inordinate amount of power. I always think Washington is more ultra conservative than my conservative midwest neighbors and friends.[comment elsafromlndy at 1]

JUST WHERE IS THE FREE SPEECH WE SAY IS SO IMPORTANT TO US

Because the Republican party is controlled by this faction, the US has been deprived of a responsible sober conservative voice. It is a pity because I feel the US is being destroyed by the lack of civil discourse due to the right wing's control of the Republican party.[comment elsafromlndy at 1]

LIBERALS

The conviction by the left that the right is stupid is one of the defining and least attractive characteristics of contemporary politics. Assuming that anyone who disagrees with you is too dim to get your point is not itself a particularly brainy way to win others over to the essential correctness of your views. But it is true that to small-town Republicans the world is not a complicated place, because they have seen so little of it. [1]

LIBERALS ARE AS FULL OF THEMSELVES AS THE ULTRA CONSERVATIVES ARE OF THEIR NARROW INTERPRETATION OF THE BIBLE...LETS BROADEN THE DISCUSSION

Liberals are the overly touchy-feely group that want to help everyone as the right wingers like to derisively point out, we do not discriminate based on IQ. Personally I do not think the right are a bunch of dimwits. I think the right seems like the party of the angry and fearful who like to define a clear enemy so they can unite behind a clearer goal. Standard Machiavellian strategy 101, and this strategy is getting old.[comment of photoelastic at 1]

THE HARD WORKING CONTRIBUTORS VS THE LAZY CONSUMERS

I asked a sophisticated and well-travelled Republican why he voted the way he did. He described growing up "dirt poor" in a small town in Northern California where joining the military was your sole ticket out; where the people in his family who depended on welfare stayed where they were and the ones who worked their fingers to the bone managed to make a better life for themselves. For him, joining the army led directly to an education. In fact, it led all the way to Princeton. But how, I asked him, baffled, could someone as intelligent as he is believe that George W Bush was anything but a cretin? [1]

WE CANNOT BREAK THIS COALITION BY CALLING THEM STUPID

Because, he explained, people in small towns don't like or trust intellectuals, particularly ones who appear to be sneering at them for their supposed stupidity. They admire a plain-speaking man; it's what they know and what they are used to. [1]

They always assumed Bush was a regular guy who could keep his thoughts concise. [1]

WHY NOT PICK ONE THING YOU BELIEVE IN AND STICK WITH IT?

I grew up in a state that has since become about as Red as any. There are plenty of people of conscience and intellect there. What distinguishes those states is a fairly slight preponderance of people who feel free to invent the world the way they want it to be -- or more likely, to embrace the world handed to them by some shamanistic personality -- and to simply disregard all contrary evidence. Sadly, they have been holding the balance of power on which the fate of the whole planet may depend. If that does not change this year, I'd start saying my prayers, wherever I lived.
[comments of druid at 1]

OUR MULTIPLE AMERICAS ONLY COLLIDE DURING ELECTIONS

So America is stuck. Two countries, mutually irreconcilable, who never meet each other and don't want to, either. Who distrust each other at best, despise each other at worst. And who have absolutely no understanding of the other. [1]

Reading Sittenfeld's thinly disguised account of Laura Bush and her upbringing, it was possible to see that the modest lives of her midwestern characters both had dignity and made sense. But I only have to meet them in a novel, which I can snap shut as soon as I've finished it. Were I an East Coast Democrat, which is the only kind of American I can ever imagine being, I would have no objection to small-town Republicans - to their church-going and their hunting rifles and their flag-decked porches and their meatloaf with gravy, and their lemon chiffon cake. I could admire their intimacy with the wide prairie and the vast sky. [1]

MCCAIN HOPED TO SELL HIS VP WITHOUT QUESTIONING TO SMALL TOWN AMERICA

McCain's decision to select a one-term governor in office less than two years, from one of the smallest states in the nation; a two-term mayor of a town with less than 6,500 residents; with no foreign policy experience; who has ties with the Alaskan Independence Party (who advocates secession from the United States); a hockey mom who opposes woman's right to choose; supports drilling for oil in ANWR; and is currently under investigation for abuse of power and lying; is a pathetic example of what poor judgment John McCain actually has.[5]

CAN SMALL TOWN VALUES RUN A COUNTRY...YES THEY CAN AND BUSH IS THE RESULT..BUT THEY GIVE THEM SELVES OVER TO BIG MONEY, BIG OIL AND BIG MILITARY.

The problem is that when they're running the whole country, they want to take away abortion rights, drill for oil in Alaska (a Palin policy), ignore climate change, and start unwinnable wars. With the small-town Republican mindset in charge, the rest of America and the rest of the world is forced to live by small-town values, which aren't much help when you're trying to decide what, if anything, can be done about Iranian nuclear ambitions or more humbly, workplace date rape. [1]

ONE MANS SAINT IS ANOTHER MANS BUMPKIN, THIS DOES NOT HELP THE DEBATE

Growing up dirt poor and living in a small town is no excuse for thinking like a bumpkin, I come from a working class family and live in small town I have no delusions about Jesuss, the end of the world or the age of it, guns, sex-ed or contraception.[comment karmapolice1 at 1]

STOP TAKING THE BIBLE SO SERIOUSLY, ITS OVER A THOUSAND YEARS OLD

How does this nonsense stop? Perhaps it can be as simple as getting people to stop taking the bible so seriously. Easier said than done, but it’s a cause worth fighting for. The way things are going with the Dems sucking up to Religion now it looks abysmal.[comment karmapolice1 at 1]

LIBERAL MUST SIMPLIFY POSITIONS FOCUS IDENTIFY A CLEAR ENEMY BUILD A BROADER COALITION AND STICK TOGETHER

This is, I'm afraid, hopelessly simplistic and uninformed. America is infinitely more complex than this. One of the reasons the Republicans keep winning is that the Democrats keep abandoning the Left in a hopeless attempt to win over this imaginary and homogeneous heartland.[comment attw at 1]

AFTER THIS ELECTION WILL AMERICA BE MORE DIVIDED?

Can America survive another photo-finish election which the Republicans win, or will it be out and out war between the red and the blue states? Perhaps only small-town America itself can prevent it, such as the dental nurse who asked how the mother of five kids, one with Down's syndrome, could hold down a full-time job, one step from running the United States[1]

Today, some Democratic women question whether Palin is putting career ahead of family.[3]
"You have women in particular looking at this situation with her daughter and saying, 'How could you put her through this, you knew she was pregnant, you accept this nomination and you know what's coming for her,' " said Debbie Walsh, director of the Center for American Women and Politics.[3]

The Obama campaign will have to limit itself strictly to issues, said Maria Elena Durazo, a Los Angeles labor leader working with the Obama campaign. "If anybody says she can't do her job because she has a 6-month-old child, I would say that's sexist," Durazo said. "What I think voters want to hear about is what have you done every single day to help the cause of women. ... I don't think there is any other credible way of dealing with her."[3]

Sarah Palin, bad mom. That might finish her.[1]

Posted here 9/7/08 by Terry Bankert
http://attorneybankert.com/

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[1]
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/sep/04/sarahpalin.johnmccain

[2]
http://www.newser.com/story/36881/palin-swings-hard-lacks-follow-through.html

[3]
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/09/03/MNIU12MMIH.DTL

[4]
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/2008/09/08/2008-09-08_barack_obama_joe_biden_bite_back_at_sara-2.html

[5]
http://www.newsleader.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080909/OPINION03/809090313

[6]
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/opinion/chi-0909edit1sep09,0,3791866.story

[7]
http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080909/NEWS15/809090358

[8]
http://www.mlive.com/flintjournal/


[TRB]
Comments of Terry Bankert to include unattributed cap headlines
http://attorneybankert.com/


SEE ALSO
http://www.mlive.com/flintjournal/index.ssf/2008/09/presidential_candidate_barack_1.html

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