Obama's Iowa Acceptance Speech: I am watching history unfold!
 

:eek:

Is it really and truly possible? Can this actually happen? God keep him safe.

??

The man is not white.

I actually was not referring to his race at all. I just meant can our nation actually elect someone who will make me proud to say I'm an American again? Someone who addresses the actual problems of the people of our country and restores the respect of our nation to the world?

We all know what happened last time the country dared to dream, and I hope that we have enough sense this time to ALL come together and make this a better country than how we found it instead of turning it into the shame of humankind it is quickly becoming.

I wouldn't get carried away after the results of one caucus (which isn't even a real primary like most states have).

In 1988, Jesse Jackson was the Democratic front runner, and he actually won 11 primaries, gathering some 7 million votes in the process. He ended up losing the nomination to Michael Dukakis.

Why is everyone focusing on race?

I draw closer comparisons to Obama and Bobby Kennedy than Obama and Jesse Jackson.

I think he was just pointing out a case where the front runner fell. Didn't Bill Clinton tank in Iowa? I agree it's too early to crown Obama but if you wanna crown him, crown his ass. It's a big win for him though. Should be interesting heading into New Hampshire. I'd like to see him take down Hillary.

I think a Hillary nomination would do exactly the opposite of Barack and divide our country instead of unite it. I for one would under no circumstances vote for her.

True, Kennedy had a grand total of four years as a U.S. senator, while Obama has a grand total of three years in that capacity. Jackson has no experience as an elected official.

It's nice to see a non-cynical response to a political speech, but other than Ron Paul (and maybe even him), this is what the true nature of all politicians is:

I agree. I would never vote for her either. And I would never vote for the following people still in the Presidential race: Clinton, Edwards, Obama, Kucinich, Richardson, Romney, Huckabee, Giuliani, Thompson, Hunter, McCain. But I think if Obama gets the Democratic nomination, he will easily beat the Republican nominee. People showed up to vote Democrat 2-1 over Republicans tonight. We may see a similar trend throughout the country as President Bush has left the Republican Party in shambles.

I need to clarify my last post: That is the nature of politicians at the highest levels. They might start out with good intentions, but in order to get any real power, they pretty much have to sell their souls.

It's like Senator Paine in "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington", except he ended up having a soul at the very end.

I agree with that Schmidty. Power corrupts, no question. But Obama seems like someone who will be very open and honest with the people. Transparency promotes honesty and doing the right thing. Not to say he can't whip off his mask once he gets into office and declare himself Dubya junior either, but he genuinely seems to me like an intelligent person who cares and wants to make things better.

"I'd never vote for Clinton, but I won't vote for any of the other major (or some of the minor) candidates either"

I guess we know what you'll be doing come election day. Enjoy your night at home

SI

Jesse Jackson was certainly not the Democratic frontrunner. He didn't get anything in Iowa and was 4th place in New Hampshire. He took a brief lead after beating Dukakis in Michigan, but even then he had no real hope of winning the nomination. His anti-semitic comments were always going to doom him, and they destroyed Jerry Brown in the 1992 NY primary when he picked Jackson as his running mate.

Agreed. I'm a Republican by nature but I'm not one that's locked into voting for all Republican candidates. There is no one candidate that would lock me more into a Republican vote than Hillary as a candidate.

I'm not sure that Obama is the most 'qualified' candidate, but I'm not sure that's necessarily a bad thing. I think a president who isn't so locked into the political establishment along with (hopefully) a good dose of common sense could be a good thing. I do think that Obama has a much better chance of being the final candidate than Huckaby (sp?) does. I don't think he has a chance in hell (religious pun intended) of being the Republican candidate.

When a politician in a leadership position is not locked into the establishment, the establishment will end up running things behind the scenes.

Which is equally as annoying as a person who doesn't enjoy the dirty side of politics. I certainly can't disagree.

Counter-Point: LBJ

:D

He's clearly a Biden man. :)

No. Biden dropped out of the race last night. And so did Chris Dodd.

Who cares what Iowa thinks at their cock-off. It's Iowa.

You can always write them in. :)

I don't like Biden or Dodd though.

Well who are you holding out for? Larry Bird isn't walking through that door, Kevin McHale isn't walking through that door...

He didn't mention Ron Paul, so he must be one of those wackos. :)

Sorry but


HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA


Okay let the intelligent political discussion continue.

i hope Barak gets the Dem nomination. i despise Hillary and hate that ambulance chasing lawyer.

It was a helluva speech. One of the best I've seen in awhile.

Sorry, just had to point out that Iowa has more registered Democrats than Republicans to begin with. In addition, turnout on the Republican side (estimated at 115,000) was higher than it was in 2000 (around 88,000).

I'm not saying that Republicans won't have a tough time of it this year, but I wouldn't base your opinion on the statistic you cited.

One more point... from what I understand, total turnout last night was about 9% of those eligible (for both parties). There may be millions of Americans who feel like mrsimperless, but there are millions more who tuned in to watch ER or Kansas/VT.

Oh come on. Your'e telling me what it's like in my own state! That's a slap in the face. Iowa is a swing state. You talk like Democrats outnumber Republicans by the same 2-1 margin. It's more like 30,000. And there's a reason why the number of Democrats has increased in the past few years. The Republicans had more mainstream candidates and more viable contenders this year than in 2000. Who were the contenders, Bush and Forbes? McCain did terrible here in 2000. You had 5 people get over 10,000 votes for the Republicans this year. But the Democrats showed up in mass to vote for Obama and the other two. The Republican Party has lost its way and that's why it won't win in November.

61,000 Democrats caucused in 2000 compared to 86,000 Republicans. 120,000 Democrats caucused in 2004. Bush was the incumbent that year. 220,000 Democrats caucused in 2008 compared to 115,000 Republicans.

No, I'm telling you that Iowa isn't necessarily representative of the United States as a whole, and trying to extrapolate what is going to happen based on the turnout for the Iowa caucuses is kind of stupid. If you want to take that as a slap in the face, be my guest, but it's not meant to be.

I agree that it's not representative of the whole country. Never said that it was! We should see what the other state primaries turnout looks like. I just think we'll see a higher turnout for the Democrats and Iowa proves this theory right. The current neo-conservative administration has run the Republican Party into the ground. People want a change and I predict we'll see that represented around the country.

I was genuinely shocked when change didn't happen in 2004. I do not understand how anyone in their right mind could have voted for George Bush at that time, but look what happened. I dare to hope this time around that people wake up and start to care about things.

Exactly. Iowa isn't even close to a bellweather state. It has gone to the Democrats every election since 1988 (correction: was Republican in 2004). The Iowa caucus is a great chance for the state to get a lot of publicity more than any actual presidential race indication

The state that actually has the greatest bellweather accuracy is Missouri. Missouri has failed to pick the eventual winner only once in the 1950s. Outside of that election, Missouri has predicted the eventual winner every election since 1900.

Meh. There was just some "Nobody believed we could do it!" ridiculousness along with some other bullshit.

At the same time, I think it's pretty stupid to completely disregard numbers from a swing state (won by Dems in 2000 and by GOP in 2004). That doesn't mean it's going to happen everywhere, but it's certainly not good news for the GOP that the Dems doubled their participation in a state they will likely need to retain the White House.

As a Republican who will cross the lines on occasion, I'm just as shocked by this kind of comment. I think you'll find lots of Republicans who would agree with your general point that Bush had some foreign policy difficulties that hurt his political image. But I feel the Democratic Party had more to do with Dubya's win than anything Bush did. They presented me with Kerry as an alternative. There were a lot of Republicans who would have been interested in crossing party lines, but they're not going to do it for a candidate like Kerry. Had the Democrats presented an Obama-like candidate in 2004, we wouldn't be having this discussion as there would have been sufficient Republican and Independent voters that would have switched sides, resulting in a Democratic president rather than another 4 years of Dubya.

I'm happy to switch sides, but I'll only do it to vote FOR a candidate, not to vote AGAINST a candidate.

dude...who the fuck would you vote for?

and don't tell me nobody

I'd disagree with that completely. Sure, it wasn't a policy speech, but it shouldn't have been -- it's a victory speech. And one that, for me, actually inspired some crazy ray of hope that this country could, if it wanted to, stop the divisive bullshit of the past twenty years and maybe even try to live up to the aspirations that have become just jaded talking points.

But that's just me.

Once again, it is not a swing state. It has been regarded as a state for the Dems for the past 20 years. If it doesn't go to the Dems, that would be an upset, as it was in the last election.

Right, but that's creative math Cam - Alabama still has more registered Dems than Reps, but that doesn't mean its a Dem state. - registrations take a long time and many people don't switch. I'd bet dollars to donuts that a whole bunch of Southerns are still "registered Democrats", despite not having voted for a Dem presidential candidate since Carter. Iowa is a swing state, and the turnout is a sign of enthusiasm.

Gore won Iowa by 0.31% in 2000
Bush won Iowa by 0.67% in 2004

It may have been a Democratic state in the 80s and 90s, but it certainly isn't anymore. Similarly, Democrats used to own West Virginia (even Dukakis won it), but it would be silly to say it's still a Democratic state.

That's a good point. And I don't see any democrat putting together an electoral college to get them to 270. I'd be interested in hearing opposing viewpoints.

There's a higher turnout for the Dems, and my guess it will continue to be so, because Hilary is just that polarizing of a person. People either despise her with the fire of a thousand hells, or wish to kneel before here and worship her Clintonian goodness. Thusly bringing a whole buttload people out of their holes to vote.

My guess is no.

I can't tell what's going to happen. I couldn't tell what was going to happen in 2004. I thought Kerry would win, but I'm not sure if that's because Bush still wasn't as roundly despised as I thought, or because I lived in a massively liberal area.

I guess how I feel at this point is that Obama could appear to have a huge edge even up to Election Day, but I won't be surprised if a Republican nominee still wins. I think a lot of people underestimate the ability of conservatives (or, anyone politically minded) to rally around someone when that person is seemingly their only choice.

My response of saying he isn't white was because of your last line in your first post. "God keep him safe." It just seemed like an odd line to say about a politician to me, and I jumped to the conclusion you would be concerned about him being a leading candidate and not white.There is a ton of racism still left in this country so I could see someone worrying about him in that way.

My bad.

(I was a Biden man :( )

Time to go candidate shopping

SI