In the last several days Obama has promised money in th pocket to the middle class. He, Reagan as well, knows that the poor don't vote, so why care about them?

Courtesy of Paul Krugman

Obama likened Clinton’s health care mandate proposal to eliminating homelessness by requiring everyone buy a house.

I seem to recall a lot of huffing and puffing from Obama about what a positive, transformative campaign he was going to run.

not a progressive but he's just plain evil? What with the right-wing rhetoric, the blatant cynicism, lack of empathy and all? Just what will he do with all those glassy-eyed masses under his sway? Obama and his "movement" scare me.

the job interview answer you're always supposed to use: "I just can't stop thinking about work and how to do my job better."

But yeah, in this case he comes off sounding a little jerky.

... is whether we take him at his word that he represents African-American interests.

Because we take his word when he says he was born in Hawaii; that the majority of his formative years spent in other countries does not matter; that his borrowed rhetoric concerning social justice is permitted because black leaders have given up in having an American-born and raised person of their ethnic background run for president (Colin Powell probably was their last chance, for anyone alive during the Civil Rights Movement); and that his deliberate slurs, dismissals and outright lies about the need for social justice now are OK, because we need someone who can be just racist and classist enough to earn the respect of the majority of the voting public.

Needless to say, I don't take him at his word about a goddamn thing. And it would have been super easy for me to have done so, if there were anything about him that suggested a good faith effort to do the right thing. I mean hell, I've voted for Dinkins when he was the next in line, just because we knew back in the 90s that any Republican hungry enough for the mayoralty was one sheet short of joining the KKK. I've voted for more flawed candidates than I can count, because their mistakes did not seem intentional, triangulating or malicious. That means I've never voted for Sharpton, but for him it was nice that he was outed as a bitch for the FBI; I mean, it's nice to know.

Obama hasn't proven to me that he's a truly compassionate American, let alone a trustworthy political candidate. Any bozo can be a community activist, if he sees the op as his version of the Peace Corps, something to suffer through until mummy and daddy pay for his step up to the next phase. Sure, they say he lived poor, but he lived graduate school poor, and he expected to get paid, some day, if he did the right things at the right time.

Lastly, if you want me to trust a man, show me his money men and his advisors. As far as I can see, his team's a thousand-mile of bad road.

I'm not voting today; I can't. It's a caucus, and my man's no longer on the ballot. But if in these few months we don't do a steamcleaning on what we expect both Obama and Clinton to do for us, we'll be massively unable to influence them when we need them.

too -- http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/02/05...

"Sen. Barack Obama portrayed his primary opponent Sen. Hillary Clinton as a hyper-cautious poll-driven candidate -- a criticism that Clinton critics are often lob.

"If you choose change, you will have a nominee who doesn't just tell people what they want to hear," Obama said.

But a look at campaign finance filings reveals that it is Obama not Clinton who has spent more on polling and surveying."

thanks, amberglow, for the link. The OFB's capacity for rationalization never ceases to amaze me. Here's my favorite wide-eyed response to the polling piece:

Okay, this is a potentially misleading article.
This article assumes that the reason he is doing the polling is to find out what 'positions' he should take. There are a million other reasons for polling and different states are concerned about different things - it doesn't mean he changes his positions based on polls, but it could influence what he chooses to talk about (like Yucca Mountain in Nevada vs. the War in Iowa).

How is it wrong to want to understand what is important to people?

The difference between Obama & Hillary is as far as I can tell, generally (although admittedly not always) Obama tends to stick with his postitions. I can't always say the same for Hillary.

Like I said upthread, I sure hope He uses his power (over these people) for good. Because if He's got evil in mind, we're fucked.