To start things off, I voted for Obama. In an ideal world, I would say Obama and Clinton would make a great team. Clinton has the testicular fortifications to get things done as a Vice and Obama has the voice and face that can move and inspire the masses as a President.
So you can see that I am not opposed to Clinton on the whole. Unfortunately, her campaigning is starting to hit a raw nerve for me. Campaigning can be a dirty business and Hilary, as a motivated individual, is doing her best to put herself ahead of all others. But this means that she is targeting Obama's campaign with lies and scandalous accusations that are just plain not true. The Republicans have been wasting away day and night, no doubt, trying to figure out how they are supposed to win a race against a man where making certain accusations from the view of an egocentrist party would show them for the racist, under-handed, evangelistic, pigs that they truly are. They know they can win against Hilary, because th Republicans have no problem slandering a woman and accusing her of god-knows-what (it will probably tie into some nasty personal life problem with Bill, whom they are still angry with for recieving some under-the-desk love). The GOP has started looking to Hilary's mudslinging techniques for how to take Obama out of the picture, should they come against him. This is the scariest part of this campaign.
One of the accusations is that he would swear into office on he Qu'ran. Alright, it seems that this far all presidents have been faithful to some form of Christianity, meaning they swore in on the Bible. But are the ultra right-wing conservatives that threatened by someone whose beliefs are not the same as their own? Islam is actually not all that different from Christianity, boys and girls; they both have one God, a book of holy text and certain ways, holidays and places for worshipping, even their core ideals and beliefs are ultimately the same. Why then is the GOP so threatened?
If Barak Obama does not survive the election we will have lost a very special chance to widen our own horizons about what a President is.
(As a test to the nastiness of American lawmakers, we have been mispronouncing the name Hussein for years. It is actually pronounced hoh-sayn, meaning 'one who is good or handsome' whereas hoo-sayn is the title of a lowly job such as a fisherman or farmer. This mispronunciation was first propogated in the presidency of Bush Sr.)
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I agree with your statement about the similarities between the religions, but Obama isn't Muslim. I think that's an important distinction to make, since, unfortunately, many people refuse to vote for a Muslim.
http://www.progressiveu.org/blog/ediblewoman
I know completely what you mean. We may actually get along better with the Middle East if we had a Musulman for president.
Super delegates anyone?
+mspin
The whole concept of super delegates is like super villains and it is ridiculous. They are axe-swinging idiots, especially since they are given more power during elections.
This is a group of powerful Dems. As close as this campaign is, they will have the final vote. It seems that everyone is up in arms about this superdelegate notion that theirs may be the votes that change the winning candidate. The Dems know this. None have any sworn vote as of yet. From what I've heard a lot of them say, they will change their vote if necessary to follow how the people vote.
-Sonja :)
There has been, to my knowledge, only one Congressperson to swear on the Qu'ran. The fact that people are believing it was Obama makes me scared for this country: "One black man did swear on the Qu'ran, and there was a rumor that Obama is Muslim, so that must have been him." How does that thought process work?
I find it funny that most people are claiming that we need a Dem President, but Clinton still insists on damaging her own Democrat opponent. Nice Democrat unity. Even McCain denounced the words of a speaker that was introducing him that was slandering his Democratic opponents. Clinton is the only one playing dirty, and I don't like it.
From http://www.pbs.org/now/shows/401/political-smears.html
Timeline of a Smear
2006: The first chain e-mail circulated on the Internet contending that Obama is Muslim. (Politifact and other fact-checking websites have been unable to pinpoint the exact date)
Jan. 17, 2007: A discredited news story from InsightMag.com, "Hillary's team has questions about Obama's Muslim background," reported that Obama had attended a madrassa, an Islamic religious school, as a child.
Jan. 19, 2007: Fox News' Fox & Friend First and Fox & Friends highlighted the report from InsightMag in its coverage without discrediting it. The weblog Think Progress noted that Fox even took caller comments about the allegations.
Jan. 20, 2007: New York Post article titled 'Osama' Mud Flies at Obama quoted Clinton spokesman Howard Wolfson saying, "We have no connection to this story."
The week of Jan. 20, 2007: CNN, ABC-TV and the Associated Press sent reporters to the school Obama attended and reported that it was not a religious school but a public school.
Jan. 23, 2007: Washington Post article by media columnist Howard Kurtz, "Headmaster Disputes Claim That Obama Attended Islamic School", reported that the school Obama attended was not a religious school but a public school.
MEDIA MATTERS: Media Matters for America
Jan 28, 2007: Washington Post editorial, "Sticks, Stones and Mr. Obama; Misleading aspersions about the senator's background only make the perpetrators look bad", criticized the Insight Magazine article.
March, 15, 2007: A Snopes.com website article titled "The Enemy Within" dispelled the claim that Obama is a "radical, ideological Muslim."
Sept. 16, 2007: A photo of Obama that would later be used as the basis for another negative rumor was taken in Indianola, Iowa, at the Harkin Steak Fry, an annual political event hosted by Sen. Tom Harkin. The caption on the Time photo read, "Respect: Senator Barack Obama, Governor Bill Richardson, Senator Hillary Clinton and Ruth Harkin stand during the national anthem."
Oct. 2007: The first chain e-mail accompanying some version of an e-mailed photo circulated on the Internet questioning Obama's patriotism based on its contention that Obama refused to put his hand over his heart during the Pledge of Allegiance. One of the e-mails read: "He refused to not only put his hand on his heart during the pledge of allegiance, but refused to say the pledge ... how in the hell can a man like this expect to be our next Commander-in-Chief?"
Oct. 27, 2007: Snopes could not find any information substantiating the claim that Obama refused to put his hand over his heart during the Pledge of Allegiance. However, they did say that the following claim, "Photograph shows Barack Obama without his hand over his heart while the U.S. national anthem is being played," is true.
Nov. 9, 2007: The St. Petersburg Times publishes an article "E-mail assailing Obama's patriotism misses mark" pointing to the original Time photograph as evidence that the e-mail rumor makes a false claim. The article also discusses the new phenomenon of chain e-mails "ricocheting" around Internet.
Nov. 11, 2007: A video from ABC News confirmed that the photo was taken during the singing of "The Star-Spangled Banner."
Nov. 29, 2007: The Washington Post publishes an article, "Foes Use Obama's Muslim Ties to Fuel Rumors About Him", by political reporter Perry Bacon Jr. exploring the rumors that Obama was Muslim. The article did not explicitly dispel those rumors.
Dec. 9, 2007: In response to "ferocious" criticism from readers and others, Washington Post ombudsman Deborah Howell addresses Bacon's story in a column titled Refuting, or Feeding, the Rumor Mill. She writes: "My problems with the story...were that Obama's connections to Islam are slender at best; that the rumors were old; and that convincing evidence of their falsity wasn't included in the story."
Dec. 13, 2007: Despite being debunked by mainstream news organizations, the claim that Obama didn't place his hand over his heart during the Pledge of Allegiance is repeated on Bill O' Reilly's show. In response to a caller who says she's disturbed by Obama's alleged action, O'Reilly doesn't correct her and, according to MediaMatters.org, replies: "I think that Obama needs to answer some questions about his point of view, not only on the USA, but on a lot of things."
Damage Lasts Longer Than Rumors Themselves
-Sonja :)