My Vice-President advice for Obama

Being a blogger prone to grandiosity (is there any other kind?) I'm assuming that Barack Obama is checking out the Internet at the moment, looking for some last minute advice on his vice-president selection.

Glad to oblige.

I'm a big Obama supporter. I must be, because I get almost-daily emails from the campaign thanking me for my contributions and asking for more.

Until recently I felt really good about Obama's chances in the general election. Now, not so much. McCain has been skillfully portraying him as an out-of-touch celebrity snob who doesn't want to drill for more oil and wouldn't mind losing in Iraq, while Obama's response to these attacks has been ineffectual.

Over at FiveThirtyEight, a great poll analysis site, the electoral college projection has been getting tighter. Now it's at 288 for Obama and 250 for McCain. Too close for comfort.

So here's the deal, Barack. You've got to hit a home run with your V-P choice. It can't be safe, like Bayh or Biden. It has to grab the country's attention. A big chunk of voters has to scream Oh yeah! when they hear the news.

Not Oh my…

This is why you've got to grit your teeth, do something unexpected, and pick Hillary Clinton. Now, I know you don't want to. And hardly anyone expects you to. That's why Clinton would be a great choice.

Her supporter's expectations are minimal. They're happy she's going to get a floor vote at the convention and will be a speaker. To have her picked as V.P. would be ecstatic for them. A whole lot of energy, enthusiasm, and money would flow into your campaign.

Clinton could be one of the attack dogs that you badly need right now. You're continuing to play the nice guy who will bring the county together while McCain brands you as the Anti-Christ.

Clinton has the balls (or rather, the ovaries) to bare her teeth and do some chomping. And she'd help you with the working class heartland types you've had trouble reaching. They like a candidate with some rough edges. You're too smooth for them. Clinton isn't.

If you don't pick her, then you've got to go with someone equally dramatic. Aim for the fences. No laying down a bunt and hoping that will lead to a win in November.

Comments

[j]

HRC is the best VP pick by far. She had 18 million supporters who are going to feel very snubbed if she isn't chosen. "Obama doesn't need your votes" is not a message he should be sending.

[condor]

Hillary and Bill are demonstrating the ease with which Barack Obama can be pushed around. With no real leverage over Obama, they have managed to secure prime time speeches for themselves on Tuesday and Wednesday night at the convention and to get Hillary’s name placed in nomination. They have won all of their demands for convention scheduling. In the name of party unity, Obama has given away the store. After the nominations, there will be a roll call vote. This further assures that the convention will be a continuation of the primaries and that Obama will be a guest at his own convention.

This begs the basic question: Is Barack Obama strong enough to be president?

Are we prepared to trust a new candidate with almost no experience and no claim to economic expertise in the middle of one of the most threatening economic situations we have ever faced?

Add to this backdrop Obama’s pledge to raise taxes and you have a combustible situation that could frighten American voters en masse. When, amid relative prosperity, Obama said he would restore fairness by raising taxes on the rich, it was well-received, particularly in the Democratic primary.

Raising the top bracket to 40 percent seemed a no-brainer. Applying the Social Security tax to more earned income, not just to the first $100,000, seemed like elemental fairness and a good way to save the pension system. Restoring the capital gains tax to 28 percent appeared to comport with the notion that those whose income derives from investment should pay a tax closer to that paid on earned income (despite the argument that it is after-tax money that they invested in the first place).

But now, with massive capital outflows crippling the public and private sectors, doubling the tax on capital seems like a very, very bad idea. And a sharp increase in taxes on the entrepreneurial class seems like a risky proposition.

And, besides, when a candidate starts raising taxes, who knows where he will stop once he is in office?

McCain can put economist after economist on the air to prophesy depression if Obama’s plan for taxes is enacted. And the public will not be reassured by the Democrat’s claims that his tax hikes are only on the rich.

It almost doesn’t matter that McCain is not an economist and avows ignorance of what Thomas Carlyle called the “dismal science.” We know McCain. We know he will surround himself with some pretty capable people. And, above all, we know that he won’t raise taxes.

Were these calmer times, with less of a threat from abroad and less economic danger, we might indulge our penchant for change and elect a neophyte in the hope that he will offer something different. We might be more easily captivated by his charisma. But, in these times, we may want to stay with the safer candidate.

[Rain]

People hear what they want to hear with all these candidates. I see the YouTubes that show McCain garbling one answer after another on important things like Iran while the other side looks at Obama saying he'd been to 57 states instead of 47 and plays it over and over while they chortle that a guy with a that much education doesn't know how many states we have.

To me for people like condor (and there are a lot of them), the election isn't about watching to see what is going to happen, reading each candidate's comments and issue stand, but just waiting for their chance to vote. Their decision was made a long time ago when they backed Bush's policies and whether they don't like Bush now or not, they think McCain will get them right this time.

I am just waiting to vote for Obama and will whoever he picks for veep. I just hope he picks someone who can help him govern wisely if he wins in November. It should not just be about winning though but also what they do once they win.

This country is in a mess and that doesn't take partisanship to see. Just look at the situation with Russia, the economic competition with the countries coming into power, the global climate concerns, using up of resources that are growing more and more costly, our debt that so many Republicans think can be fixed by voodoo or faith-based something or other; and on and on. Unless something catastrophic happens (as some are predicting Cheney will make sure it does if it looks like Obama could win) the election will be very close.

There are so many don't even pay attention but will vote anyway based on one soundbite in the first week of November. Then the ones who are informed but get all their news from the fair and balanced people...
People who actually listen and think about what both sides are saying are rare.

Personally, I have concern that Obama cannot win based on even so many democrats saying they won't vote for a black; and of the ones who don't admit that, a lot just look for an excuse to not vote for him like a flag pin or goofing up how many states we have in one off the cuff comment.

Even with all of that, Obama has to pick someone who can give him the best advice and really cares about this country as he does. If that's Hillary, I say go for it; but he has to choose for the best of the nation. Hopefully McCain with all his bloopers and selling out will do the same thing. I doubt it with McCain though and that's back to the beginning of this. Americans see the world through two different sets of glasses and what one sees, the other is clueless about. How anybody can support McCain amazes me as obviously it amazes others that anybody supports Obama. If McCain gets in, I don't know how this country will survive 4 more years of Bush policies but then with McCain changing his positions on everything but abortion (which he'd make a crime for the women as well as the doctors if he got his way), who knows what he'd do once in-- other than probably start WWIII with Russia, of course. If anybody thought the terrorist criminal bunch was WWIII, Russia is waiting to teach them differently.

[Condor]

Last week raised important questions about whether Barack Obama is strong enough to be president. On the domestic political front, he showed incredible weakness in dealing with the Clintons, while on foreign and defense questions, he betrayed a lack of strength and resolve in standing up to Russia’s invasion of Georgia.
This two-dimensional portrait of weakness underscores fears that Obama might, indeed, be a latter-day Jimmy Carter.

Consider first the domestic and political. Bill and Hillary Clinton have no leverage over Obama. Hillary can’t win the nomination. She doesn’t control any committees. If she or her supporters tried to disrupt the convention or demonstrate outside, she would pay a huge price among the party faithful. If Obama lost - after Hillary made a fuss at the convention - they would blame her for all eternity (just like Democrats blame Ted Kennedy for Carter’s defeat).

But, without having any leverage or a decent hand to play, the Clintons bluffed Obama into amazing concessions. Hillary will speak on Tuesday night in prime time. Chelsea will introduce her. She will get to play a film extolling her virtues produced by Harry Bloodworth Thomason. Bill will speak on Wednesday night. Hillary’s name will be placed into nomination. She will get to have nominating and seconding speeches on her behalf. And, on Thursday night, the last night of the convention, the roll call will show how narrowly Obama prevailed.

So Obama gave away Tuesday night, Wednesday night and part of Thursday night to the Clintons. It will really be their convention. A stronger candidate would’ve called their bluff and confined the Clintons to one night on which both Hillary and Bill spoke (he would have outshone her). He would have blocked a roll call by allowing a voice vote to nominate by acclimation. He would have stood up to the Clintons and recaptured his own convention.

If Obama can’t stand up to the Clintons, after they have been defeated, how can he measure up to a resurgent Putin who has just achieved a military victory? When the Georgia invasion first began, Obama appealed for “restraint” on both sides. He treated the aggressive lion and the victimized lamb even-handedly. His performance was reminiscent of the worst of appeasement at Munich, where another dictator got away with seizing another breakaway province of another small neighboring country, leading to World War II.

After two days, Obama corrected himself, spoke of Russian aggression and condemned it. But his initial willingness to see things from the other point of view and to buy the line that Georgia provoked the invasion by occupying a part of its own country betrayed a world view characterized by undue deference to aggressors.

We know so little about Obama. His experience is so thin that it’s hard to tell what kind of a president he’d be. While he nominally has been in the Senate for four years, he really only served the first two and consumed the rest of his tenure running for president and disregarding his Senate duties.
So we have no choice but to scrutinize his current transactions and statements for some clue as to who he is and what he’d do. In that context, his reaction to the first real-time foreign-policy crisis he faced as a nominee leaves his strength in doubt. So does his palsied response to the Clintons’ attempt to make Denver a Clinton convention.

Is Obama an over-intellectualizing Hamlet who is incapable of decisive, strong action? With Iran on the verge of acquiring nuclear weapons and Russia resurgent, there isn’t much room for on-the-job learning.

[Rain]

Condor, are you doing as much research on how bad McCain will be? If you are one of those who always votes for the lesser of evils, be sure you are not ignoring the greater evil in your attempt to paint Obama as a weak person. Look at McCain and look hard. Now me, I believe in Obama, I think he's what we need right now but if you disagree, just be sure you haven't ignored the worse qualities in McCain, the horrible damage he can expand that Bush has begun. I have written about McCain a lot in my blog pointing out a lot of these features. The information is out there. If all you want to do is keep looking at Obama for problems, you will vote for McCain and if enough do the same thing, in two years they will be bemoaning what they got and it'll be too late because we will be in more wars and the tax issue will be moot because taxes will have to raise so high to pay for them that nobody will be able to play voodoo economics.

[condor]

Of course McCain is flawed, but everybody knows that. He has a history. It's the assumption that Obama isn't flawed that I'm addressing. Believe in Obama, but shouldn't one know as much as possible about what one is believing in?

[Rain]

If someone sees Obama or any politician as some kind of Micheal the Archangel, then they have a hero worshiping problem. We can believe in the man and still not agree with all of his policies or even see him as perfect. But unless Hillary pulls off a coup at the convention, it will be McCain or Obama and if someone doesn't like either, they need to evaluate who would be worse. It's not like voting none of the above will get anybody anywhere.

[Condor]

Barack Obama selected Sen. Joe Biden of Delaware late Friday night to be his vice presidential running mate, according to a Democratic official.

Looking good for McCain/Lieberman.

[Alan]

Well, Obama picked the PR nightmare Biden. Biden is, I guess, the best choice, as Obama is lacking on the whole foreign affairs deal. I guess Obama will get the younger voters and Biden will be able to court the older voters. To be honest with you, this reminds me of a Kennedy-LBJ ticket -- Kennedy, young and charismatic, and Lyndon Johnson, older with lots of experience. And I figure you can compare Biden's verbal gaffes with the picture of LBJ holding his dogs by the ears. Similar PR gaffes, I figure. Pretty good choice, once you look at it again.

[mh]

well i don't nee to say much well don
for obama: He need to tell McCain tell American how are you going to help not just i know my friend i know how to do it, all time he repeat this sentence i know how to do it my friend, Pleas tell American what do you know.