 | Another Sheep Gets Herded Away From Edwards |
Break out the fiddles, folks. It’s time to play a mournful dirge for Blue Wind over at DailyKos:
I have been a strong supporter of Edwards for 2 reasons: His strong message against corporate greed and his excellent health care plan. I have been also very impressed by his evolution over the last few years to a real progressive candidate. Moreover, I have great admiration and respect for his wife Elizabeth. I wish there was a real chance for an Edwards administration. But there is not. The chances are essentially zero at this time. That has become painfully obvious over the last 2-3 weeks. And this has been now confirmed after today’s results in Nevada, where it seems that Edwards is getting approximately 5% of the vote.
So, I would like to thank senator Edwards and his wife Elizabeth for their great message and spirited campaign. They did make a great difference in American politics and I only wish they could win.
But I can not keep supporting them at this time. I want a candidate who supports change to win the primaries and the general election. And that is why I am switching my support to Barack Obama.
Oh, please. I don’t support John Edwards as a presidential candidate because I don’t trust him; when I see his body language and hear his voice my bullshit detector goes off. I don’t believe he is really committed to a progressive agenda, and without that there’s not really very much to recommend.
But.
If you really think that John Edwards is the best presidential candidate out there, if you really think that, then why would you allow yourself to be manipulated into voting for someone else? Look, people, there have been votes for three states with teeny-tiny populations and just a handful of delegates (I’m not counting Michigan, for which there are no committed delegates). There are thousands of delegates left to be committed through primary votes, people. Thousands! Are you going to let results in a puny state like Nevada (no offense, Nevadans, but there just aren’t many of you) sway you from what you think is the best choice?
What is it? Are you allowing yourself to be herded like a sheep because you think John Edwards doesn’t have enough money to continue? Is that it? Well, he hasn’t pulled out, number one, and number two, Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton have pretty much spent all their money too. They’re all broke, which is a great equalizing circumstance.
What else is it? Do you think a Clinton or Obama presidential nomination is inevitable? Remember when they said back in the fall the Clinton was inevitable? Remember when they said back in the fall of 2003 that it was time for Howard Dean to pick his running mate? Inevitable, inschmevitable. Remember when they said back in 1993 that a national health care plan was inevitable? Remember when they said way back in the first Bush presidency that there was no turning back the clock of Democracy in China? The only thing that makes something inevitable in politics is that it happens — and it hasn’t happened yet.
What else is it? Are you playing some predictive game where you bet that other people will start acting like sheep, making your vote inconsequential? Well, let me break it to you softly: taken alone, your vote is inconsequential. Votes only matter when people behave in intentional blocs. There’s a lot of assumption right now that Edwards supporters are going to start defecting. Then again, there was a lot of assumption that Barack Obama would win New Hampshire in a blowout.
It boils to this: are you going to let yourself be outguessed and used by the likes of blow-hard, blow-dried Voice-of-God news anchors with names like Wolf Blitzer and Stone Phillips? You know, the ones who assumed that Saddam Hussein had nuclear weapons? Are you going to let yourself vote for someone who you think is a worse choice to lead this country because some blogger named Blue Wind is wringing her or his hands?
Well get a grip, Flossie. Take a deep breath, clear your mind and do a little thinking. Breathe. Stop panicking. Stop bleating like a sheep. Think. And if someone approaches you with a shepherd’s crook and tries to beat you into line, remember that you are not a sheep. You have opposable thumbs. So grab that crook and wield it like a great, smashing thing of …
… oh, crap, there goes my metaphor. Well, you get the point. Think for yourself, and speak up for what and who you believe, and who knows what might happen. Give up your hopes and you’ll only be certain you’ve lost.
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i’m still more in favor of Edwards than the other 2 front runners (because of what i heard during the debates, and i think he’s more “electable” than a woman or a black man with an Islamic last name - see you have to think about all the idiots out there and figure how the Republinazis will “swift-boat” ‘em into voting their way for racist, sexist reasons and negate it before it starts). i’d like to see him start moving up in the standings as we approach “super Tuesday” in February. If he hasn’t dropped out by April, when PA gets a crack at ‘em, i’d vote for him.
Comment by Tom — 1/20/2008 @ 4:44 pm
Some things bother me about Edwards:
His basic campaign is to single out individuals with sad stories and make them examples..of? That’s all very nice if you want to be a boy scout and prove you have enough compassion to help little old ladies across the street, but does he have any clue about policy? That’s what presidents do.
He has said he will have no lobbyists in his administration, then he backed off and qualified the statement. It seems to me this isn’t very practical, and is a broad promise that will be very hard to keep. Still he has some basic message about moneyed influence, it’s just not coming across in a believable way or an understandable soundbite or a workable policy.
He says he will remove all troops from Iraq and not even leave a base. We still have troops in the Balkans–does he disagree with this? Seems to me that this is a nitty gritty detail and he is zooming in on picky details without having thought about them or bothering to explain the reason behind them or the Big Picture. The biggest thing about his Iraq statements is not that it makes sense, but that he says it distinguishes his policy from the other candidates. So what. Does he understand how to formulate broad policies?
Other than I don’t see leadership capability of a presidential caliber, I really do like Edwards a lot. In spite of the class war terminology, and the constant my-daddy-worked-in-a-mill soundbite, he does understand what is happening to the economy, and I think this election will boil down to “it’s the economy, stupid”–again.
Comment by Iroquois — 1/20/2008 @ 6:14 pm
Oh, i see, so by the model we have to compare Edwards with - Bush - he doesn’t measure up, according to you, as presidential material.
Talk about ignoring details, just look what the government’s done over the past 7 years! The entire Bush legacy is crumbling before our eyes with the economy melting down, the dollar becoming scrip, and the vaunted “tax plan” (reducing taxes while waging an unbelievably expensive war, with little to show for it no less) now resulting in the need for a bogus “stimulus package” (which is much like pouring water from the deep end of the pool into the shallow end to raise the level, according to some analysts; but worse is the printing of money with nothing to back it up). i think Edwards could do better than that, and i’ll vote for him because i don’t see Hillary or Barak passing the muster of the gender and race biased idiots who vote in this country based on hatefilled sound-bites, outright lies and swift-boated “truth.” Meanwhile, look what the Rethuglicans have to offer . . .
Comment by Tom — 1/21/2008 @ 7:31 am
I didn’t compare Edwards with Bush, I compared him with boy scouts–and quite favorably too.
But I forgot to mention the most important qualification for president: a white penis.
But I think instead of “the gender and race based idiots will vote for Edwards because he is a white male”, you mean to say “I will vote for Edwards because he is a white male”.
Baaa.
Comment by Iroquois — 1/21/2008 @ 1:13 pm
Why do you think it’s called the “WHITE House”?
i’ll vote for him if he’s still in the running, which looks less likely with each state primary.
If the choice is between Barak and Hillary, i’ll go with Obama, and hope the Republicans don’t tar and feather him with attack ads and racist comments. If a Republican wins this presidential election it’s all over for the U.S. as far as the former middle class goes. But, either way, it’s just running out the clock before the environment makes life on earth near impossible for humans (give it another 100 years or so at best).
Comment by Tom — 1/22/2008 @ 8:35 am
So if you have to settle for a candidate with one out of two in the White Penis Qualification category, you’re going for the penis.
I don’t agree that Democrats should choose a candidate based on trying to predict how much the Republicans might decide to attack them. Maybe the strongest candidates would also draw the strongest (and stupidest) attacks. The weak candidates–people like Huckabee–the other party would be saying ‘yes, yes, do nominate that idiot. If that’s the best you can do, we aren’t going to have to make any attacks at all because they will make themselves look stupid without any help from us’.
Comment by Iroquois — 1/22/2008 @ 9:26 pm
I agree with Iroquois. Choosing a Democrat that Republicans won’t attack much is pretty much like letting the Republicans choose the Democratic presidential nominee for us.
Comment by Fruktata — 1/22/2008 @ 9:47 pm
The strategery of nominating John Kerry because he was a realistic candidate who was electable and who the Republicans couldn’t attack sure didn’t work.
Comment by Jim — 1/23/2008 @ 9:52 am