The Barack Obama pre-post-modern
View From Another Campus
Kai Stinchcombe: The Stanford Daily (Stanford)
Issue date: 11/2/07 Section: Viewpoint
Hillary Clinton is not the inevitable, unstoppable candidate some make her out to be. She is pulling away from the others in polls and her fundraising numbers are better than ever, but two months is an eternity in politics and Barack Obama still has a colossal amount of money. Anyone who thinks 60 days of news coverage and $30 million can't produce a 10-point swing in the polls at this stage has simply not paid attention to a presidential race before. Bill Clinton, perhaps, put it best in 1992: "Though I was running dead last in the [New Hampshire] polls in mid-November, I liked my chances."
Obama still has a decent shot, but the campaign has work to do and they know it. Looking at the polling data - and blogger and political analyst Chris Bowers just published a great article on this - the demographic that hasn't yet committed to Hillary Clinton is the Democratic "creative class": urban, liberal, well-educated, middle or upper-middle class professionals and knowledge workers. In other words, people like me. It's true: I haven't decided who I am going to vote for when I go to the polls in three months.
One thing that won't win my vote is the strategy the Obama campaign just announced - sharpening the differences they see between them and Hillary Clinton, which is politics-speak for attacking her positions and record. I have seen 15 years of cash register magazine covers about Hillary Clinton giving birth to two-headed bats, murdering her staffers and having lesbian affairs with other celebrities. More money has been spent demonizing her than any other living person. In spite of all the mudslinging, I still have enormous respect for her, and nothing Barack Obama or anyone else says will change my mind. That new tactic won't work - I've already heard it all. So how can Team Obama win my vote?
What I'm looking for is leadership. I want a candidate whose ideas excite me, who I believe can have a transformational impact. I want someone who talks about the environment like Al Gore, about poverty like John Edwards, about civil liberties like Chris Dodd, about healthcare, frankly, like Michael Moore or Dennis Kucinich. And so do the supporters of John Edwards, Al Gore, Chris Dodd, Joe Biden and Dennis Kucinich - these are real voters up for grabs. If Obama got the John Edwards people and the Al Gore holdouts he would be neck-and-neck with Clinton.
Obama still has a decent shot, but the campaign has work to do and they know it. Looking at the polling data - and blogger and political analyst Chris Bowers just published a great article on this - the demographic that hasn't yet committed to Hillary Clinton is the Democratic "creative class": urban, liberal, well-educated, middle or upper-middle class professionals and knowledge workers. In other words, people like me. It's true: I haven't decided who I am going to vote for when I go to the polls in three months.
One thing that won't win my vote is the strategy the Obama campaign just announced - sharpening the differences they see between them and Hillary Clinton, which is politics-speak for attacking her positions and record. I have seen 15 years of cash register magazine covers about Hillary Clinton giving birth to two-headed bats, murdering her staffers and having lesbian affairs with other celebrities. More money has been spent demonizing her than any other living person. In spite of all the mudslinging, I still have enormous respect for her, and nothing Barack Obama or anyone else says will change my mind. That new tactic won't work - I've already heard it all. So how can Team Obama win my vote?
What I'm looking for is leadership. I want a candidate whose ideas excite me, who I believe can have a transformational impact. I want someone who talks about the environment like Al Gore, about poverty like John Edwards, about civil liberties like Chris Dodd, about healthcare, frankly, like Michael Moore or Dennis Kucinich. And so do the supporters of John Edwards, Al Gore, Chris Dodd, Joe Biden and Dennis Kucinich - these are real voters up for grabs. If Obama got the John Edwards people and the Al Gore holdouts he would be neck-and-neck with Clinton.
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