Obama's Concession Speech: Bashing Dems Again

What is it with this guy? Does he really feel this way about the Democratic Party? If so, why does he want to be its standard bearer?

Senator Barack Obama's Pennsylvania concession speech last night, delivered in (ahem) Indiana, contained some decidedly anti-Democratic Party sentiment...

"These Americans cast their ballot for the same reason you came here tonight; for the same reason that millions of Americans have gone door-to-door and given whatever small amount they can to this campaign; for the same reason that we began this journey just a few hundred miles from here on a cold February morning in Springfield – because we believe that the challenges we face are bigger than the smallness of our politics, and we know that this election is our chance to change it."

Since when have Democratic Party politics been small?

The Franklin Roosevelt Administration (The New Deal, WPA, TVA, SEC, Social Security, etc.)

The Lyndon Johnson Administration (The Great Society, Civil Rights, The Kerner Commission, Medicare, Medicaid, etc.)

The Carter Administration (Cleaning up after Nixon, established the Depts. of Energy and Education, The Camp David Accords, etc.)

The Clinton Administration (Family Medical Leave Act, Earned Income Tax Credit, the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, 22 million new jobs, etc.)

These are neither "small" ideas nor "small" politics.

"Because the truth is, the challenges we face are not just the fault of one man or one party."

Uh, yes they are. But for Republicans, their greed-bloated congressional cabal, and their cardboard cutout presidents, we'd be a damned sight better off, and Obama should know that.

"We can do what I did in Illinois, and in Washington, and bring both parties together to rein in their power so we can take our government back. It’s our choice."

Hm. So many problems with that statement, I don't even know where to begin.

Oh, yeah. "What I did in Illinois" is a good start.

But wait. What did Obama do in New York? He talked to community college students about the importance of recycling, instead of concentrating on the more important issues his PIRG colleagues emphasized.

Mr. Obama says he spent three months “trying to convince minority students at City College about the importance of recycling” — a description that surprised some former colleagues. They said that more “bread-and-butter issues” like mass transit, higher education, tuition and financial aid were more likely the emphasis at City College.

What did Obama do in Illinois? There's NO (Paper or electronic) RECORD of his legislative doings or meetings, and NO ONE is stepping up to provide any information on the state senator's (cough) singular accomplishments (cough). We do have his record of voting present on multiple occasions, instead of taking a principled Democratic Party stand on the issues.

What did Obama do in Washington? He certainly didn't convince any BushCo Republicans to reach across the aisle and work with Democrats, so why is he saying he did? Obama has spent 2 out of 3 years in the US Senate as a newbie, voting present 39.9% of the time and the last year and a half running for president (while criticizing John Edwards' senate record). Even after being given a plum assignment as chair of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations' Subcommittee on Europe, HE DIDN'T CONVENE A SINGLE MEETING. Aren't we at war?

Hm. Maybe not holding hearings or hosting meetings is Obama's way --along with his history of voting present-- of reaching across the aisle. If so, that's disturbing.

"Or this time, we can build on the movement we’ve started in this campaign – a movement that’s united Democrats, Independents, and Republicans; a movement of young and old, rich and poor; white, black, Hispanic, Asian, and Native American. Because one thing I know from traveling to forty-six states this campaign season is that we’re not as divided as our politics suggests."

If you believe that Democrats, Republicans, and Independents all have the same hopes and dreams for America, you haven't been paying attention. Democrats want everyone to benefit from government; Republicans want 30% to benefit; and Independents want whatever they can get from either side.

And 2008 is the year that "young and old, rich and poor; white, black, Hispanic, Asian, and Native American" voters had no intention of voting Republican whatsoever.

We're not as divided as our politics suggest?

Then why is Obama wasting his time and several tons of money trying to convince voters to tick off his name on a ballot?

"Because in my two decades of public service to this country, I have seen time and time again that real change doesn’t begin in the halls of Washington, but on the streets of America."

2 decades of service? Let's see: He was one of a zillion community organizers in Chicago, where he registered people to vote and shook a lot of Dem Party hands; he was one of 177 state senators, and the people in his district couldn't even get him to force his friend, Antonin Rezko, to do something about the squalor in the buildings they lived in. Oh, yeah. He joined a church, where he never heard his infamous minister say a negative word about anything. For 20 years.

As for Obama's Washington record, he's now spent as much time running for president as he's spent supposedly representing Illinois in the US Senate.

I also know that real change has never been easy, and it won’t be easy this time either. The status quo in Washington will fight harder than they ever have to divide us and distract us with ads and attacks from now until November.

Uh oh. Sounds like Obama knows something big is coming out, and he's trying to get ahead of it, doesn't it?

Something that will divide us and distract us?

For a candidate who lives and breathes "Yes, we can," Obama sure does sound like someone who prefers, "I am that I am."

Some concession speech. Why did I expect anything different from the Hope & Change candidate? This speech was almost exactly the same as his Springfield speech, delivered to launch his presidential bid in February, 2007:

What's stopped us from meeting these challenges is not the absence of sound policies and sensible plans. What's stopped us is the failure of leadership, the smallness of our politics — the ease with which we're distracted by the petty and trivial, our chronic avoidance of tough decisions, our preference for scoring cheap political points instead of rolling up our sleeves and building a working consensus to tackle the big problems of America.

--snip--

By ourselves, this change will not happen. Divided, we are bound to fail.

If you want a cut & paste president, Obama's your guy.

I'd prefer the actual Democrat in the race: Senator Clinton isn't all things to all people on the campaign trail; she's for all good things for all people. Period.

And that makes me proud to vote for her.



Best bar bet in the world: Delilah didn't do it.
Judges 16:19-- And she made him (Samson) sleep upon her knees; and she called for a man, and she caused him to shave off the seven locks of his head.