Over the course of the last several months, I have seen many, "I would like to support Obama...but" comments around the threads here at DailyKos. As an Obama supporter I've tried to answer these comments as honestly and forthrightly as I could with the knowledge I have about the man and his positions.
I'm going to attempt to lay out here what I perceive to be the major issues that fellow Kossacks have with Barack Obama and see if I can inform some of the undecideds, lay to rest some criticisms, and maybe spark an intelligent debate in the comments.
While I'm basing most of this diary on facts as stated elsewhere, I may inject, from time to time, personal anecdotes that may help you, the reader, into my head a little about why I made the choice I did. These opinions interspersed with the facts are my own.
So without further adieu, pour yourself a drink, grab a snack, and follow me below the thin orange line. It might be a little long...
What follows is a list of major issues as they pop out at me in the comments and diaries of DailyKos. They're in no particular order of importance.
The Soaring Oratory - "He's all talk, but where's the beef?"
Short answer: His Website
Long answer: Folks, there's a reason why more Democrats don't win. It's not because of policy - in fact, issues-wise more Americans would be Democrats - it's because of rhetoric.
It really is true what Obama said (and I know I'm stirring up a hornets nest here, but so be it) about Republicans being the party of ideas. I'll give you a great example. In 2000, Sam Donaldson said this about Al Gore's convention speech:
"The Vice President was on speed tonight. He acted like a man who was late catching a plane. Someone must have told him you must not be slow and awkward and methodical. Boy, he was none of those things. But you know, in racing along, he stepped on some of his best lines. When he would introduce the Gutierrez family, you could hear 'em in the background starting to cheer, and he'd go, 'No, no, no,' and he'd go on. I mean, I think people watching at home...said, 'Wait a second, this guy is going too fast, I can't get it.'"
Al Gore was a great progressive candidate...but he wasn't an exceptional campaigner the way Obama or Edwards are. There were broad themes to his campaign, but he didn't give himself a chance to emphasize them. Al Gore was the king of "10 point plans" and "process" but he did not hit hard enough on the overarching vision of how that tied into the average American's life.
What did we hear instead? "Compassionate Conservatism" and "restore integrity to the White House." No policy, no process, but a broad, overarching idea that America could feel good about itself again. (I, personally, felt pretty good about myself anyway, and voted for Gore...but I know a lot of people voted for GWB because he had "integrity," not because of any specific policy proposal.) America got the warm fuzzies when it thought of a strong, "compassionate" leader in the White House again, even if the man was a neocon in disguise.
This is a big part of our problem, in my view. We have great plans. But we don't sell the idea, we sell the plan itself. And that bores Joe and Jane AverageVoter. Mr. and Mrs. AverageVoter don't care if you have a 10 point plan. They want to know that you have a plan, not necessarily what that plan is. They just want to feel good when they go into the voting booth.
Al Gore didn't lose the election. But he lost the narrative. In hindsight, half of the country is now looking back saying, "Why didn't we vote for the smart guy?" But they felt good going into the voting booth. That's what's important.
Here's where Obama comes in. He has that rhetorical gift. That "soaring oratory." Guys and girls, we need this. Not for us. Not for you and me...but for Joe and Jane AverageVoter.
We in the blogosphere live in a bubble. We are, more or less, policy wonks. "I want to know how you're going to get us out of the war, and I want to know now! Give me a point by point, blow by blow."
But Joe and Jane AverageVoter don't care about the plan. If they want us out of the war, it'll be enough that whatever candidate said they'd get us out.
We want to know how the next President is going to restore habeus corpus. Most voters don't know what that is. They just know (hopefully!) that they potentially lost some rights, and they would get them back under a Democrat.
Most voters have no idea, and don't care, frankly, about the FISA bill or Chris Dodd. They know somebody might be listening to their calls...but they don't care. Who's going to be listening to my Mom make an appointment to get her Explorer serviced? She. Doesn't. Care. Should she? Yes, but that's a different discussion entirely.
In my opinion, we need somebody who can sell our story to the voters - and make no mistake, it is a story. Standing in front of a 10,000 person crowd and going on and on about the process of the legislature won't get you too many more 10,000 person gatherings.
We need the soaring oratory, the lofty rhetoric, to get our "ideas" across. Let people get the warm fuzzies about a Democrat for a change. Let people feel good. Let them get (dare I say?) FIRED UP! Let them get emotionally engaged, because that's when we really get the buy-in.
Let us policy wonks worry about the specifics. Let us do the research we need to flesh out our support for a candidate based on their positions.
Let Joe and Jane AverageVoter get wrapped up in the rhetoric. It is, right or wrong, the only way they're going to get involved.
Hillary Clinton shows flashes of it. If you've seen the "Invisible" commercials she ran in Iowa, you'd see it.
John Edwards has it in jumps and starts. Remember "it's time for Democrats to show a little backbone?" Great stuff.
But Barack Obama has the ability to connect to most average voters in the way that Hillary Clinton doesn't, John Edwards doesn't always, and none of the Republicans do.
But think about this, in the frame of an average voter:
If we can change a room, we can change a city. If we can change a city, we can change a state. If we can change a state, we can change the country, and if we can change the country we can change the world!
Do you know how powerful that is? You want to know why so many young people are involved for the first time? It's speeches like this that grab them. And that's a good thing!
Make no mistake, my friends, we must have that personal and emotional connection to the voting public to win.
He'll Govern from the Center
I'm going to steal a chunk of this from a diary I wrote a while ago entitled "Barack Obama's Centrism - Fact or Fiction?"
Illinois SB0702 - Ethics Reform was the Illinois Ethics Reform bill that is often cited as Obama's first (and much-needed) foray into ethics reform.
I'll let you read the entire bill at the link above if you wish, but a short summary from me follows:
This bill, among other things, provides:
- Establishes an Ethics Board to oversee the processes laid out in the bill
- Ethics training for all employees
- Bars state employees and relatives from lobbying for 1 year and from accepting contracts worth over $25,000
- Provides limits on gifts and gratuities state employees may accept
- Adds whistleblower protections
Voting results [PDF]: 32 Yea, 16 Nay, 2 Present. No Republican voted for this bill, 2 voted present. Doesn't seem very "bi-partisan, Republican pandering" to me. It certainly seems like most Republicans would object to nearly every provision I've outlined.
The Honest Leadership and Open Government Act of 2007 is another biggie. The link I've provided is to AdamB's excellent diary on this bill.
The big highlight for me:
The FEC will be drafting new regulations requiring campaign committees to report bundled contributions from lobbyists and their political committees that total at least $15,000 during any six-month period.
Would you like to know why sites like Opensecrets.org can categorize all the big money the campaigns are getting? Why you can see that "Barack Obama takes more money than any other from [X] group?" This bill is the reason.
There's a lot more. There's a ton of language in the Act with regards to lowering dollar amounts for certain gifts and contributions.
There were 96 Yeas, 2 Nays, and 2 no votes. Again, this bill doesn't seem very "Centrist" or "Republican" to me. These are all things they've fought against in the past.
These are just 2 of the many, many bills in Barack's progressive agenda. Let me quote from my previous diary again:
If you go to THOMAS, the search engine for legislation, and select Barack Obama, you'll see that he's introduced much more legislation that's important to us
There's S.115, which "suspend[s] royalty relief, to repeal certain provisions of the Energy Policy Act of 2005, and to amend the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 to repeal certain tax incentives for the oil and gas industry," and S.117 which "amend[s] titles 10 and 38, United States Code, to improve benefits and services for members of the Armed Forces, veterans of the Global War on Terrorism, and other veterans, to require reports on the effects of the Global War on Terrorism," also S.133 - "A bill to promote the national security and stability of the economy of the United States by reducing the dependence of the United States on oil through the use of alternative fuels and new technology," and S.433 - "A bill to prohibit deceptive practices in Federal elections," S.674 -A bill to require accountability and enhanced congressional oversight for personnel performing private security functions under Federal contracts," and the list goes on and on and on. Illegal immigration, auto fuel mileage standards, veteran care, mortgage fraud prevention...it's all there.
I could go on, but I think you get the idea.
I think the problem that a lot of netroots progressives have with Obama isn't the policies, it's the framing. There have been a lot of accusations of "Republican talking points" and "Centrist ideology." I'm going to reply to that one with a comment I made in a diary entitled "How can Obama make his approach work in DC?" a while back:
The feeling I get from Obama is that he likes to do things in increments. The kind of politics we've seen in the past 7 years with GWB where you get a majority and ram things through the legislature quite frankly pisses a lot of people off. That kind of leadership is very effective in the short term, but it creates a huge backlash in the long run.
Take ethics reform...there's been a lot of rhetoric flying around lately about "it's OK as long as they eat standing up." That's fine, and it's a relatively true criticism, but let's be realistic - have you ever tried to eat Steak Tartare standing up? So let's take the biggest chunk - the most expensive meals, the free private jets, the no-limit fundraisers, etc. - and throw those out the window first.
After a year or two, we can turn around and say, "Eh...you're doing OK without the sit-down dinners and planes, let's take away the bar food, too."
It becomes much easier to take off chunk after chunk until you have nothing left.
The same can be true, I think, of his health care plan. People criticize him for not having a mandate. I get the reason why people think mandates are important, and eventually I think we'll have one. But you and I know that any health care plan that includes a 100% mandate is going to be savaged by the Republicans, no matter how small their minority.
And nobody, not even Obama, has said how they're going to pay for this yet. Ending the war in Iraq will go a long way, but let's be realistic - you're not going to come up with the money for a UHC system simply by ending the war. And, if we want a balanced budget, that money has to come from somewhere else...or we raise taxes.
So Obama's incremental approach comes in handy here, too. He advocates lowering the cost of healthcare - negotiating with the drug companies and health plan providers - but just in case, the Federal government will be providing healthcare, too, and at a lower cost. They don't necessarily have to make a profit. They just have to break even.
If we bring the cost of health care down, at least so it's in line with inflation, then in a year or two we can say, "Hey, we've got the cost under control - let's implement a full UHC/single payer health system."
You pointed out something in your diary that I think is dead on. Obama tends to take divisive issues and reframe them so that they don't sound quite so offensive. OK, so we won't limit campaign contributions [a reference to ethics reform in Illinois]...but everybody will be able to see who gave to you. Is that OK? Good...they're public record now, so let the people decide what's good and bad.
He did the same thing at the Federal level. You want to know why everybody knew Hsu was a Clinton bundler? Obama's ethics reform. It was the same thing. We won't prevent you from bundling, but everybody's going to know who the bundlers are bundling for, how much they're giving, and who they work for.
Again on the so-called "Google for Government" bill. Don't want to limit earmarks? OK, that's fine. But we're going to make all government spending transparent - put it online so everybody and their dog can see it.
...
Something must be working...he worked with Tom Coburn to pass the Google for Government bill and with Richard Lugar to pass the Ethics Reform bill. As a freshman senator. In my personal opinion, this approach works if you have somebody that knows how to work it.
But he's not ANGRY enough!!! I want a fighter!
I get this argument. I really do. Being here in Iowa, I got the ability to see and hear many of the candidates first-hand before making my decision who to support.
And I'll tell you...when I heard John Edwards stand up on the stage and say, "You know what the problem is? Democrats just need to grow a little backbone!" I was right there with him. It made me proud of him as a candidate. I would love nothing more than John Edwards with a boot on the back of George Bush's head, pushing his face in the mud and screaming, "We're taking our country back, asshole!"
When I heard Hillary Clinton say, "to me, you are not invisible" I thought, "Yes. This is a politician that gets it."
But when I heard Barack Obama say, "We are not a collection of red states and blue states, we are the United States!" that gave me a new perspective.
As much as I want to see all Republicans thrown out with the trash, demonizing them won't work in the long term.
What we're seeing in the country right now is a whipsawing back and forth of the political spectrum. It's inevitable, to a certain degree.
But when we retake the true majority of the Congress and the Presidency, for us to ram through legislation without so much as a passing glance at the Republicans (even if it's only a courtesy) breeds resentment and anger. And that anger has big consequences.
What will we see in 4 or 8 years? If we give the Republicans an overt reason to be angry, we're going to give the Neocons all the ammunition they need to elect somebody 10 times worse than GWB. The harder we pull overtly to the left, the harder they pull to the right.
This doesn't in any way mean we can't get a progressive agenda passed. It just means that we shouldn't demonize the Republicans to do it. Ignore them? Sure...especially if we have a solid majority.
Am I pissed off? Am I angry at what the Republicans have let this country become? You're goddamned right I am! But I will not let that anger blind me to the consequences of what would happen if we stomp all over those that stand in our way.
But he'll get eaten up by the Republicans in the General! He's not electable!
There is one inalienable truth in politics, everyone, and that is that Republicans are going to attack Democrats with half-truths, distortions, and out-and-out lies.
One of Obama's advantages in this regard is that he believes in bottom-up politics. He didn't start out at the top and buy his way in. He worked from community organizer to state legislator to U.S. Senator. If Rezko is the only skeleton in his closet (and I think it's close to the only one) then they're not going to have much ammo.
I think the tack they'll take with Obama is much like the one they took with Kerry. Make his positives into negatives. Twist his words, demonize his race, and attempt to frame him as a "weak liberal" because of his position against the war.
I think the other candidates have much more to fear in this regard. Remember, with Republicans, the attacks don't have to be true.
Hillary is at an immense disadvantage. All of the attacks against her might be "old" and she's "fully vetted," but America won't care. Flash some of the scandals of the past on the TV screen, and America is going to start remembering why they weren't proud of the Presidency after 1998. I've said it before and I'll say it again: The Republicans won't campaign against Hillary - they won't have to. They'll campaign against Bill. Sad, but true.
John Edwards has problems, too. His positions are awesome, and I, for one, happen to believe he's completely sincere in what he says.
But the Republicans don't care. His centrist voting record in the Senate? Splashed all over the TV. His vote to authorize the Iraq war? Commercial. His railing against "corporations?" Twisted around.
The only issue I see with the "anti-corporate" rhetoric is that most Americans don't see corporations as inherently evil. There are always those "other" ones...the oil companies, the drug companies, the HMO's...those are evil. I'm not even sure some that work at these companies say they're inherently evil. But the "others" are. And framing the "others" without making people feel like you're demonizing them instead of their leadership.
All in all, we're going to have an uphill slog to the White House no matter the nominee or the condition of the electorate. I'm under no illusion that Barack Obama is going to have a free pass.
But he continues to fund the war!!!!
This is a personal issue for me. I have a brother-in-law that served 2 long terms in the disaster that is Iraq.
But there is one undeniable truth in this:
No matter how people choose to frame it, Barack Obama stood against the war from the beginning. It was not politically popular to do so in 2002 when the idea was extremely popular, but he did it anyway.
His position always has been, and continues to be that he would not abandon troops in the field now that they're in a war. It's really that simple.
I've argued this point with many people without getting personal, but many of those who advocate to "pull the funding" just don't understand what goes on in a war. War is a nightmare.
So my response to all the inevitable comments is this: Do you mean to tell me that I need to look my brother-in-law in the face and tell him the man I support for President should advocate to cut off funding? Do you mean to tell me that I should say that during his service to this country he did not deserve body armor, or an armored Humvee? Do you mean to tell me that he didn't deserve clean uniforms or the ability to call home? Do you mean to tell me that because we need to end this war (and make no mistake, we do!) that he and the other soldiers with him in Iraq don't deserve the full weight of this country behind him? Bullshit. B U L L S H I T!
Do I want this war over yesterday? You're damned right I do! Do I think we ever, ever should have gone there in the first place? Absolutely not. But to ask people like my brother-in-law who served our country honorably to wonder whether or not he's going to get the equipment to protect himself because we're having an academic discussion about cutting off war funding as a means to end the war? Sorry...I have a different view.
And so does Barack Obama.
Conclusion
I think I've covered enough for one night. If you've read this far, then thank you. You'll have my profound thanks.
If there's enough interest, I'll post a part II and talk about specifics that are brought up in the comments.
And now, on to the comments. Let's have a vigorous, intelligent debate about all our candidates.
Thank you for reading.
UPDATE:
If you're an Obama supporter, and you haven't had a chance to donate yet, or would like to donate now, please use Populista's link below to donate to his Netroots Obama fundraising drive.