[DEBATE] : Gary Younge's excellent take on Obama

[mfleshman at aol.com]

Many of the things said about Obama were also said of Bill Clinton in 
1992. He too was anointed the flag bearer of youth and vitality, 
promising (in endless detail compared to Obama's surpassing vagueness) 
a break with the past and realigning the factions within the Democratic 
Party. He was later even dubbed the first "Black president" by no less 
than Toni Morrison. Obama is indeed making history with his campaign 
but we've heard the hype before.

In 1996 Clinton crushed his Republican opponent Bob Dole with an 
awesome 8 million more popular votes and a vast majority in the 
electoral college.  What happened to those votes 4 years later? Yes the 
Republicans stole Florida''s electoral college votes -- but the theft 
was only made possible by Gore's razor thin majority in the popular 
vote. The Democrats are pleased to blame Ralph Nader for their loss, 
but nader in no way explains what happened to the 7.5 million vote 
majority the Democrats squandered between 1996 and 2000.

Obama may be able to bring in youth and other marginalized 
constituencies, can he keep them with business as ususal politics, 
which is all he really offers.  By splitting the Democratic Party along 
its racial fault line it is the Clinton duo that may end up permanently 
realigning things, and not for the better.



-----Original Message-----
From: Doug Henwood <dhenwood at panix.com>
To: debate: SA discussion list  <debate at debate.kabissa.org>
Sent: Tue, 10 Jun 2008 3:15 pm
Subject: Re: [DEBATE] : Gary Younge's excellent take on Obama


On Jun 10, 2008, at 3:05 PM, Sean Jacobs quoted Gary Younge:

> The Brazilian president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva,

What an odd comparison for Obama. Lula came out of a socialist party,
and was presumably a socialist himself. Obama comes out of the
Democratic Party, and has an agenda that's a hybrid of hedge fund and
elite nonprofit/NGO.

> Of the 10 blackest states, he won nine; of the 10 whitest, he won
> seven.

This is an interesting point. In the heavily black states, he got a
lot of votes from black people. In the heavily white states, he got
lots of votes from white people. What he couldn't do in mixed states
is get enough votes from white people to offset the lack of black
people. It's as if white people in very white states aren't as averse
to voting for a black guy as those in less white states.

Doug_______________________________________________
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