was Obama's only real connection to the black community.

Obama's father was African, not African-American, and he left Obama and his mother when Obama was very young. Then his mother married a man from Indonesia and they moved there. Obama returned to Hawaii when he was ten, but was raised by his white grandparents. There isn't a large AA community in Hawaii, and Obama went to n exclusive prep school where he and another mixed race student (black-asian) were essentially the only black students.

It wasn't until after he graduated from Columbia University and moved to Chicago in his mid-twenties that Obama was closely involved with an African-American community. This is also when he first started attending Trinity UCC.

Then he left for Harvard, and when he returned, he went to work for a law firm that represented a slum-lord (Rezko) and his only connection to the AA community was the church.

Now he cut that tie and avoids AA functions.
------------------------------------------------
Vote, n.

The instrument and symbol of a freeman's power to make a fool of himself and a wreck of his country. - Ambrose Bierce

his Philly speech was intended to stop all talk of race, and to distract from the far more toxic (anti-American) Wright stuff--Any and all open talk of race hurts him with white voters, which has always been his only concern.

You see it every day with him--he always talks about wanting to talk about issues --instead of what he dismisses and derides because it's hurting him politically --but he doesn't actually ever just dive in and talk about stuff.

All the Chicago powerbrokers/gateways/little bigshots (Wright, Ayers, Rezko, etc) he's been entwined with for decades were absolutely necessary back then for his success, and are absolutely toxic now--he knows it 100%.

"Any time that Hillary or one of her surrogates actually started to talk about racial issues, they were tarred and feathered as racists and the issue was taken off the table out of fear of being motivated to hurt the black candidate that is running as the white candidate."

Tarring them as racists also prevents them from making any outreach to the black community or speaking on racial issues. So not only does Obama not want to be associated with racial issues, but he wants to prevent anyone from talking about them at all.

It's obvious that some of the sharper cookies from the civil rights movement are on to this, which is why they haven't jumped on board for him - despite the threats. But too many people just don't seem to have picked up on it, so it's going right by them and instead they see Hillary as being divisive because Bill mentioned Jesse Jackson. (I'm especially offended by that - does Obama's campaign really think he's too good to be mentioned in the same sentence with a man who worked with Dr. King and was actually standing with him when he was shot?)

More liberal media at The Sideshow.

Jesse Jr did to Hillary when she cried in NH--

Obama wasn't outraged or angered over Katrina. He never called a press conference over Jena. He never was angered by the Sean Bell horror or awful verdict. He's never been outraged over the fact that more black men are in prison than in college. ...

Time to paint his bs fauxtrage and all-of-a-sudden anger and utter spin and flip-flops about Wright as the crock of shit it is.

thinks Obama is keeping his distance from them to win white votes.

I don't know if they really believe that (I'm not black) but if they do I think they will be in for an unpleasant surprise if he wins.

------------------------------------------------
Real ponies don't oink - Patrick McManus

it wasn't until he proved he could win whites that AA started coming around--and not until SC was coming up that they even started outreach of any sort.

He got major heat from many for utterly ignoring AA issues and voters and leaders for a long time in the beginning.

07-- "... While Obama was announcing in Springfield, PBS host Tavis Smiley was honchoing his annual State of the Black Union conference at Hampton University in Virginia. Coverage of the all-day event on C-Span was interrupted for the Obama announcement.

Smiley said that Obama had called him to apologize for missing the event. The Rev. Al Sharpton scolded Obama for making his announcement before a predominantly white crowd in Springfield, rather than at the forum. He added that he is looking for Obama to explain “what’s his embrace of our agenda.”

Cornel West, the Princeton University professor and black intellectual, said African Americans should ask Obama, “How deep is your love for the people” and “Where is your money coming from?”

..." -- http://www.inthesetimes.com/article/3066...

and right after Iowa-- "... Iowa was a tipping point. Like many black voters, he says, he was looking for proof that Obama could garner white support. Yet he wonders if the rest of the nation is as willing as Iowa to embrace the idea of a black president. ..." -- http://www.usatoday.com/news/politics/20...

are pissed that Obama isn't directing business their way. He spends millions on advertising and they are getting almost none of it.

------------------------------------------------
Real ponies don't oink - Patrick McManus

http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/... --- "... David Bositis of the Joint Center for Political Studies said Obama needs to avoid the candidate mold of a Jackson or Sharpton, whose appeal did not extend much beyond a core black audience.

"A black candidate who's mainly advocating for civil rights these days is not going to go anywhere in a presidential election," Bositis said. "I think he (Obama) will get substantial support from blacks, but not all blacks. Some black voters are going to find him — what? Too white."

Obama was asked recently whether he might be "too white" to appeal to black voters.

"If you look at my black vote in my U.S. Senate race or my approval ratings back in Illinois, I feel pretty confident that once folks know who I am, then we will do just fine," he said.

And while many voters have warmed to Obama's themes of political reconciliation and national unity, analysts say the message may not resonate as clearly with black voters.

"Barack Obama might not be considered a black candidate for traditional black voters, given their history," said Ronald Walters, director of the African-American Leadership Institute at the University of Maryland. "Obama has talked about America wanting a new kind of leadership. What is he talking about? He hasn't defined that sufficiently." ..."

Is Obama avoidance of discussion of race issues a peculiar behavior of his dictated by his interpretation of the primary process or is it a more general approach he applies to many major issues?

It is possible to argue that his health care plan and his solution to the war in Iraq follow the line the approach to race does. His health care plan stakes a position between a universal approach and the none (GOP) approach. On the Iraq war, he doesn't advocate immediate withdrawal, but rather leaving behind large forces although smaller than the current ones.

The more he talks about change the more he advocates and stays the same.

When those subjects are raised, he starts talking about "hope, unity and changing the way Washington DC does business."

His most "controversial" stand is opposition to the gas-tax holiday.

Everything else is slightly to the left or right of Hillary, who is a left-leaning moderate.

------------------------------------------------
Real ponies don't oink - Patrick McManus

while he's weak and tepid overall--or just vague or "present"-- on all issues, this specific urban and minority-related and AA stuff is different--he's all along very specifically avoided it until he needed it, and older leaders, and even easy point-scoring things, while he's also had the intentional strategy of smearing his opposition as racist.

he hasn't used these issues the way he's used others, i don't think. it's been much more carefully timed and used as both avoidance and attack line, i see.

there's a good article on how Axelrod and the campaign talk about how they needed to do it from the beginning and how even staffers disagreed, etc --

here-- NYTimes 2/08 -- Seeking Unity, Obama Feels Pull of Racial Divide -- http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/12/us/pol...

"... Glimpses inside the Obama campaign show, though, that while the senator had hoped his colorblind style of politics would lift the country above historic racial tensions, from Day 1 his bid for the presidency has been pulled into the thick of them. While his speeches focus on unifying voters, his campaign has learned the hard way that courting a divided electorate requires reaching out group by group.

Instead of following a plotted course, Mr. Obama’s campaign has zigged and zagged, reacting to outside forces and internal differences between the predominantly white team of top advisers and the mostly black tier of aides.

The dynamic began the first day of Mr. Obama’s presidential bid, when white advisers encouraged him to withdraw an invitation to his pastor, whose Afro-centric sermons have been construed as antiwhite, to deliver the invocation at the official campaign kickoff. Then, when his candidacy was met by a wave of African-American suspicion, the senator’s black aides pulled in prominent black scholars, business leaders and elected officials as advisers.

Aides to Mr. Obama, who asked not to be identified because the campaign would not authorize them to speak to the press, said he stayed away from a civil rights demonstration and did not publicize visits to black churches when he was struggling to win over white voters in Iowa. Then, a month after Representative John Lewis of Georgia endorsed Mrs. Clinton, setting off concerns about black voters’ ambivalence toward Mr. Obama, the campaign deployed his wife, Michelle, whose upbringing on the South Side of Chicago was more familiar to many blacks than Mr. Obama’s biracial background. ...
Mr. Obama was so annoyed by the complaints, one aide recalled, that he asked staff members to invite more than 50 influential African-Americans, including some of his critics, to meet with him, hoping to win them over with the gale force of his charisma.

But his aides cautioned that such a large event would be sure to draw press attention. Instead, they suggested that Mr. Obama establish a smaller advisory council of prominent black figures. In a two-hour telephone call, he not only persuaded Dr. West to serve on the panel, but also convinced him that his rhetorical tightrope — reassuring whites without seeming to abandon blacks — was necessary. ...
Aides said it proved a pivotal moment in the campaign, with some staff members — mostly white — urging Mr. Obama to stay focused on Iowa, while others — most of them black — warning that he needed to court black voters and elected officials more actively.

“Nobody put race explicitly on the table,” one aide said. “But there was certainly the feeling among some of the black staff that some of the white staff did not care enough about winning black votes.” ...

By mid-January, Mr. Obama had so much support among black voters in South Carolina that he worried that his rivals would try to marginalize his campaign as a black-only phenomenon — a concern that later proved well-founded when former President Bill Clinton compared Mr. Obama’s campaign to Mr. Jackson’s. ..."

Their "plotted course" was, of course, impossible.

I don't think the Clintons tried to marginalize Obama as the "black" candidate. I think his race card strategy is what did that. The more he plays the race card, the more white votes he loses.

Some people don't like being called racists.

------------------------------------------------
Real ponies don't oink - Patrick McManus

his Philly speech was intended to stop all talk of race, and to distract from the far more toxic (anti-American) Wright stuff—

What Anti-American stuff? The sad fact is that opposition to Obama is a carrier for all sorts of right wing ideology including the theory that criticism of the US and US society from the progressive point of view, particularly by a black person, is just not allowed.

the NYT thing spins and ignores stuff, but it's clear they had a very intentional strategy all along and it was impossible--they were ready with the racist cries even tho it's not in the article--it all along has been part of the calculations.

They knew before day 1 that that he would lose white votes if he was ever seen as the black candidate, and have always acted accordingly--until it became too impossible to pretend otherwise--they were getting really bad press and states w/large black pops were coming up, so they had to make it something the opponents were responsible for, instead of his own outreach and hard and needed work to get those votes.

They had an impossible task, and knew it. What might work locally or in one state is not feasible nationally. From pushing the Bradley Effect in NH as why he lost, to the explicit tying of racial stuff like Katrina to Hillary's tears, it was clear and openly done.

for throwing Rev. Wright under the bus. After all, you just said you don't think there is anything wrong with what Rev. Wright said, right?

I guess you won't be voting for Obama.

------------------------------------------------
Real ponies don't oink - Patrick McManus

and it's not allowed from Black clergy--only white rightwing ones can get away with it, and only if they blame the usual suspects--us gays, or feminists, or liberals or secular society, etc.

these are facts--sad but true. not dealing with them or refusing to admit them is beyond dumb, esp for politicians.

And Obama's own actions show he knew it.

"God Damn America" is never ever allowed--even little kids know that.

this is about Obama, and that he thought he could get away with all this stuff---and by his continual lies, evasions, distractions, and wholly political actions and non-actions at managing the inevitable that he knew was coming.

From race to class to Wright, Rezko, Ayers, to his focus on red states and caucuses, etc --to his own decision not to run on issues but on biography and branding, etc --this has always been about him alone, and about his choices and decisions on how he thought he could get to the White House. He can't--they were inherently too fragile and contradictory to withstand the real world and the real media environment, and the real opposition, etc...

everybody knows that thanks to decades of conservative propaganda.

But it wasn't until this year I found out I was a racist too.

------------------------------------------------
Real ponies don't oink - Patrick McManus

Avedon...

It’s obvious that some of the sharper cookies from the civil rights movement are on to this, which is why they haven’t jumped on board for him - despite the threats. But too many people just don’t seem to have picked up on it, so it’s going right by them and instead they see Hillary as being divisive because Bill mentioned Jesse Jackson. (I’m especially offended by that - does Obama’s campaign really think he’s too good to be mentioned in the same sentence with a man who worked with Dr. King and was actually standing with him when he was shot?)

These sharper cookie blacks to which you refer are absolutely frightened to speak up because their communities are unhinged. The only safe course is to support Obama or STFU...there are no other options.

Of course Jesse Jackson knows the score. His son...well Jr. sees a reward on the horizon if his guy gets there.

know that God Damn America is absolute poison that needs to be avoided and distracted from at all costs no matter what--an impossible task if there's video and you have 20 years history with him and he brought you to faith-- which you've made a giant deal of in the campaign (partly to counter the other absolutely toxic stuff--the ongoing Muslim smears, btw).

you notice that every single time he's on tv he has flags behind him lately? it's no accident--it's just further damage control.

All along, the anti-American stuff is the only poisonous Wright fallout--it's not race at all. Race is what Obama tried to avoid, but it's not what really kills him--we look at him and know he's black.

Chicago Tribune today - 5/3/08 - What Led Obama to Wright's Church

Oddly enough, Obama once wondered if Wright was willing to be controversial enough. As a young community organizer, he wrote that he wasn't sure if a pastor trying to maintain unity within a church could take forceful stands on public matters.

"[If] men like Rev. Wright failed to take a stand," he wrote, "if churches like Trinity refused to engage with real power and risk genuine conflict, then what chance would there be of holding the larger community intact?"

As it turned out, Obama would be the one to value unity over conflict. He made that clear in the news conference in which he distanced himself from Wright.

"I have spent my entire adult life trying to bridge the gap between different kinds of people," he said. "That's who I am. That's what I believe."

Total sell out - from Obama's own words

surely a president has to be the president of all the people and not just the blacks or whichever race/ethnicity/religion/etc.

What is clear is that his constituency has always been muddy...he seems to get votes because he can talk the talk, play the game but he has shifted gears so completely that it's impossible to feel as though he is genuinely committed to anything other than being elected.

When he was running for the Senate in 2004, he was for single payer, universal health care. When he was in the IL Senate, he supported gas tax holidays. Heck 5 weeks ago, he couldn't disown his spiritual mentor.

substance-free candidacy...seems to have worked for a while at least. Doesn't seem like it can get him through November though

... that I thought you linked to, about a lot winking going on among Obama supporters. Am I right? It bears on Avedon's comment above.

[x] Any (D) in the general. [ ] Any mullah-sucking billionaire-teabagging torture-loving pus-encrusted spawn of Cthulhu, bless his (R) heart.

... that I thought you linked to, about a lot winking going on among Obama supporters. Am I right? It bears on Avedon's comment above.

[x] Any (D) in the general. [ ] Any mullah-sucking billionaire-teabagging torture-loving pus-encrusted spawn of Cthulhu, bless his (R) heart.

impossible from the start--he's premised his campaign and branding on stuff that's too easily proven false all along. Of course he's just a pol, but why base your campaign on not being one when you know it'll be proven false? Why not focus on issues so that you'll have a foundation to run on no matter what happens? Why focus on "changing the system" when you've never shown it at all? ...

And all Democrats overall--and especially Black Dems--don't get away with this kind of thing ever. Dubya and Reagan did--but there was no way Obama ever could.

over the patriotism or lack thereof of Wright's comments about G-d Damn America...most people aren't. For the most part, if you grew up 60 years ago, black, and in America, you understood that. Most whites over 50 understand the sentiments.

Look at the incarceration rates, the ugly distribution of people on death row, etc.

The issue with Wright isn't that he's crazy, arrogant, unpatriotic or anything related...in fact, he's a rather articulate statesman for the inequities of race and far more eloquent and likable than say Al Sharpton.

The problem is that Obama tied himself closely to him and when Wright's video clips starting appearing on the main stream media, Obama put himself center stage and proclaimed to put forth some major proposition on race and publicly embraced Wright just like his white grandmother.

Then he says/does nothing again and it's clear that his only concern with race relations is how it affects his candidacy and all other implications are summarily ignored.

Wright isn't the problem...Wright is the magnification lens that highlights the problems with Obama's candidacy.

And all Democrats overall—and especially Black Dems—don’t get away with this kind of thing ever. Dubya and Reagan did—but there was no way Obama ever could.

Totally agree...

international bio -- very unlike most Americans' lives in its locations and surroundings -- and the GOP's automatic using of patriotism against us, and even his name, etc--from the beginning Obama had this problem of coming off as not quite American and as something unknown--he isn't like ANY of us, black or white or mixed, and his whole campaign's message is different from the usual too, and even the path he's taking to the nomination is different...

how much difference counts to people? when is there a tipping point? and aren't people always looking for reassurance that politicians are at least a tiny bit like us, or will pretend to be so? What happens when the candidate tries to make his differences his strength?

and how easy or hard is it to connect any or all of these differences to the usual anti-American painting of all Dems?

Obama and Axelrod have never run a national campaign. Even at the state level it's fairly easy to be different things to different people. You don't have media following you and people recording your every word and action. But it's different when you're running for the top spot.

Somebody recently referred to it as being on a stage so large you couldn't hide.

------------------------------------------------
Real ponies don't oink - Patrick McManus

why are we attracted to others? Sometimes is the cultural similarities, sometimes it's that they are totally different and the difference intrigues us. Do the same rules apply for candidates?

I think that we intrinsically distrust all politicians...we think/expect that they lie and will say anything to get elected. We expect that they will mistreat us, take our votes for granted and willingly vote for the lesser of evils at every juncture.

But I do recognize that with youth, there is less resistance, less cynicism and more enthusiasm for politicians...I was young once and believed in RFK/Eugene McCarthy/George McGovern and all of that youthful enthusiasm was beaten out of me.

Since we are talking specifics though, let's consider Obama. There are a few 'classes' of supporters and there seems to be different reasons for each.

* youth...the lack of critical thinking allows them to be satisfied with a substance-free campaign

* under 40...have heard the negative Clinton narratives but were too young to appreciate any of the middle/working class gains of the 90's

* professionals...have this notion that Obama represents progressive values more than Clinton. Who's to know the answer to this but my gut feeling from all I have seen thus far is that is a bad calculation.

So I think that for most of these people, race, background, cultural similarities isn't part of the calculation at all.

But then again, what the heck do I know...I do very poorly at picking women.

-- yup, and that itself is a giant GOP thing that calls up horrible Reagan/Dubya/Rove/etc associations in itself for me.

it's actually ironic (or something) that McCain is the opposition--the image of him is not at all connected to reality, and he gets away with it and is fully protected from things that prove it false--Obama won't ever get that treatment.

because the media was complicit...ABC (anyone but Clinton)

I wish Edwards had hung in there myself and apparently so does Joe Trippi

differences only can be brushed aside in politics if the candidates are still willing and seen as able to fulfill our baseline demands and are seen as knowable and defined quantities, i think.

And mistrust of politicians and knowing they're all full of it doesn't mean that we don't have rules and expectations--I certainly have tons of them for Democratic candidates (and Obama has fully violated most of them), and the GOP has them, and the media has them, and they're all very commonly believed in.

Because we don't know Obama, everything that conflicts with our expectations--and conflicts with his own messaging-- hurts him all the more, and he hasn't helped reassure us except on very few things (things that shouldn't even be operative in a Democratic primary, actually, and aren't as important as issues and baseline actions/beliefs-- which are all wholly partisan--which conflicts with his messaging too)

look at Romney--the money men liked him but GOP voters were absolutely unwilling to accept a slick Mormon.

means that we're less willing to take chances on "different" and unknown--which hurts Obama most, but also hurts Hillary.

And also--Gore would have overwhelmingly won if he had run as a continuation of the Clinton years instead of running away from him like he did--people like the proven and the familiar always in presidents.

Dubya's last name and the "old hands" around him made up for his failures and weaknesses (but not enough in the end as we saw--if he was George Smith, he never ever would have gotten as far).

The Clinton name and history and brand-- for good and bad--establishes Hillary as a known quantity regardless of her own accomplishments. We know or think we know what we'll get with her.

McCain's image as well--even tho it's all bs. We think we know what we'll get with him.

Obama?

to try a different path.

That is what Obama was advertised as, but he's not.

There is nothing new and different about his policy proposals. He talks about change, but he doeswn't propose any.

The whole premise of changing the way Washington works is faulty, because much of the current system flows from the Constitution and the separation of powers.

------------------------------------------------
Real ponies don't oink - Patrick McManus

i think most people batten down the hatches and reduce their willingness to try the new--to spend, to take chances, to take vacations, to seek out new experiences, to try new food brands or restaurants or this season's clothing or a new car, etc--when times are tough.

And most want practical and tangible solutions to visible problems precisely so that things will definitely get better---so that taking risks and trying what's new or different is then less of a real risk like it is now.

And the older you get the less likely risktaking is anyway --and most reliable voters are older rather than younger. And most Americans can't even begin to take risks when they can't pay their mortgage and food and gas are going up and jobs are scarce, etc--their basic needs are at risk now. You usually have to have a secure foundation and safety net--or the risk has to be very small and non-life-impacting--Presidents are very life-impacting.

did the voters in Idaho actually know Larry Craig? They thought they did.

did the voters in 2004 know Kerry? They thought they did.

Politics as is played in the US is ALWAYS the lesser of evils bound by the perception that we have gathered from whatever sources...their web site, blogs, the main stream media, their campaign sloganeering...

Heck back in 1992, WJC was the relative 'unknown' and I think that the economy and world events we find ourselves enmeshed in almost make it more likely for people to take a chance on someone different.

I think that if you take a look at where Deval Patrick is today, you can see the results of an Axelrod package that got elected with a substance-free candidacy...and what MA got was a substance-free governor and his approval ratings are in the toilet.

there was an interesting thing somewhere on how Obama assumes all needs are already met so voters are free to focus on wants and non-essentials.

i think most needs are less met than ever for the vast majority, as homes, jobs, food, gas--all very basic needs--fall away or lose value or get expensive.

the 'TO' subjective of the change is obviously very squishy and the notion that *HE* can reach across the aisle is simply stuff for the chronically stupid.

He is all about hope and promise which is a nice package. My ex-girlfriend used to talk about the need for 'faith and trust' while she neglected to mention a few details about her involvement in a criminal ponzi scheme.

We certainly got a glimpse of Obama's ability not to crumble under political pressure this week when he disowned Reverend Wright when he said he couldn't/wouldn't just 5 weeks earlier.

It's a plain as my face...that if there is a political cost, Obama definitely is about change you can believe in.

We all are concerned about the price of arugula...

18 cents a gallon rollback...pshaw...

What I don't get is why the latte group isn't freaking about his intentions to raise capital gains taxes to 28%?

Craig and Vitter and Foley --and all the GOP problemchildren-- still met basic voter demands in all the important ways--and had proven they could act in ways voters liked and approved of. They voted right, sponsored the right things, and followed the GOP partyline for years. Craig and Foley 's transgressions overruled those records--the party's use of "family values" doesn't allow non-straight stuff--and exposed their hypocrisy too blatantly. And both seats were safe so they could easily switch people and keep them GOP. The rules for new candidates are much harsher and more exact--Craig and Foley and Vitter and all the rest hid for years because they knew that and followed the rules to get in.

Obama has to follow rules to get in too, and the rules are far more demanding and restrictive when it's President.

Kerry was known, but didn't stop the redefining of him negatively--or fight effectively when it came as it was bound to. He was picked because it was wartime and he was known as a War Hero, and very safe and middle-of-the-road comfortable to voters--or so they thought.

(is it Maslow? he makes sense now more than ever)

When times are bad we vote for the challengers, i.e. "Change"

If it hadn't been for the Great Depression, there wouldn't have been a New Deal.

------------------------------------------------
Real ponies don't oink - Patrick McManus

Obama has to follow rules to get in too, and the rules are far more demanding and restrictive when it’s President.

So was one of these 'rules' that Obama had to 'disown' Wright so the main stream media would like him? Was that the quid pro quo?

What are these 'rules' for presidential candidates?

but which challengers, and for how much change and what kind of change? that's the point here too i think--structural systemic change or tangible practical change? Which are more or less possible? Which provide more immediate relief to immediate problems? Which are based in current reality most?

the rules are that you have to disown and trash all who hurt your image, messaging, and chances to get elected--you have to do it strong too and not half-heartedly, and you never ever define them as family or compare them to loved ones. And if you've done it publicly before --or demanded your opposition do it-- you have to be as clear and strong as you were then. 2 sets of rules read as hypocrisy and as bull.

and you have to keep your stories straight as well.

Wright damages Obama on tons of levels and in multiple real ways--for his own good --regardless of the media and GOP --Obama had to disown him.

Rootless: You must be very angry at Obama
Submitted by myiq2xu on Sat, 2008-05-03 17:59.

I guess you won’t be voting for Obama.

No. I find the continual parade of hurt feelings and grievances in this primary to be an astounding exhibition of failure to grow up. We have two centrist candidates, far to my right. They both try various tactics to improve their electoral standing. None of that makes me angry.

Reverend Wright is nothing to me.

is burning the thing down and starting over.

I think the tax code must be torn up and started over.

I think the health care system is irretrievably broken and must be redone as single payer (government run) because there is no other practical way. The world has proven that to be the case.

That is far more ambitious change than Obama can deliver.

If he were to be elected, the Republicans would challenge him right away but the Democrats would do worse.

Given the current political climate, I really believe that only Hillary is strong enough and capable enough to manipulate both sides of the aisle to actually sit down together to plot some changes. Obama talks about it but I have yet to see any evidence that he can substantive accomplish anything.

The whole premise of changing the way Washington works is faulty, because much of the current system flows from the Constitution and the separation of powers.

The entire premise of a DC system where money flows from lobbyists and is necessary for TV time is not contemplated in the constitution at all.

Link to 'Unity' diary on TalkLeft