Friday, August 29th, 2008

Donkey Kong: “We Heart Obama” (What Did You Expect?)

by Ted Asregadoo

Well, the big night arrived, and the three of us gathered together to experience this historic moment in America the only way we knew how:  via the warm glow of our computers.  Welcome to the recap of the big finish for the Democratic National Committee Convention.  Jon, Dw, and I are ready to take you where you’ve probably already gone since, you know, the Convention was last night.  Okay, on with it!

Dick Durbin Introducing Obama’s Biographical Video

Ted: Are you watching Dick Durbin?
Dw: Yup.  I’m giving him a pass. He’ll start Jenny Craig tomorrow.
Jon: I wish he’d get it over with.  I didn’t tune in for pasty-face.
Ted: Dick Durbin looks like a guy who could own a motel on Interstate 80 … near North Platte, Nebraska.

The Biographical Video Starts

Jon: This profile video is a bit lackluster for my taste.  All these videos have to be compared to Bill in ‘92, and that video of teenage Bill with Jack Kennedy.  This video is a bit generic — apart from the personal details, the themes could be plugged right into Hillary or Biden’s intro video.
Ted: I have to admit that my mind is wandering as I watch this.
Dw: True story. After Obama’s speech in 2004, I told people he was going to be the nominee in the next election cycle. They told me I was nuts.
Ted: I remember his speech, and I too saw a winner.  But I kept it to myself.
Dw: Wise move. I should learn to shut my mouth more often.

Obama’s Speech Starts

Ted: U2!  What is that “City of Blinding Lights?”
Dw: Yessiree. I like. Better choice than “Beautiful Day” for the umpteenth time.
Ted: Wow!  Tons of “Thank yous”
Jon: 31 “Thank yous”, by my count.
Dw: Tank ya, tank ya. A wunnaful, a wunnaful. You’re welcome. Get on with it.
Jon: Michelle stands out in a crowd of 75,000 in that dress.  Where’s Joan Rivers to praise it?
Ted: Joan’s trying to find her face — which has been stretched to the back of her head.
Jon: Gwen notes that Barack’s tie and Michelle and the girls’ dresses are all coordinated. Let’s see how that looks at the end of the speech…
Ted: Gwen is good at noticing these things.  I’m just kind of like “Uh, nice tie.”

Barack Thanks Hillary Clinton (With a Huge Applause Erupting)

Dw: Well, I guess a Hillary namecheck was inevitable.
Ted: Had to do that early for the “unity factor.”
Dw: Like a Hitchcock cameo … Get it out in front.
Jon: “We love America too much to let the next four years be like the last eight…Eight is enough!”
Ted: Did he just make an “Eight is Enough” reference?  I kind of liked that show…
Dw: Dick Van Patten gives a little cheer in his rumpus room.
Jon: Isn’t Dick Van Patten a solid Republican?
(Pause)
By the way, my 11-year-old son Jacob is in the room watching this speech.  It’s the first political moment he’s ever really paid attention to.  I’m very proud to have him in the room with me.
Ted: My 12-year old daughter is watching, too.  She just asked me “Is Barack going to be our next president?”  And my answer was: “I sure hope so.”
(Pause)
Man, his family looks great!
Dw: And his wife doesn’t look like a Fembot. That’s very important.
Ted: Yeah, imagine that:  A modern first lady who isn’t lobotomized.
Dw: But the downside is that we wouldn’t get a first lady who can shoot bullets out of her chest.
Ted: Or walk around in sexy underwear. I don’t think this country has had a first lady do that since Martha Washington.
Dw: Rrrrrow.
Jon: “I don’t know what kind of life John McCain thinks celebrities lead”…and with a flick of the tongue, Obama exposes the Republican Party in all its irrelevance.
Ted: Go get ‘em, Barack! Unlike John Kerry, Obama knows the stakes.
Dw: This is no “reporting for duty…” Thank God.

Energy Independence

Jon: BARACK EMBRACES THE 10-YEAR TIMETABLE!!!!  That’s MAJOR!!!!
And he actually comes out and says drilling is just a “stop-gap.”  Wow! Actual bravery in a nationally televised speech.  Suck on THAT, McCain!
Ted: Wind, solar, biofuels…I think I just had a Green orgasm.
Dw: He’s killing on every one of these topics.
Ted: And it’s not about drilling or “Shootin’ at some food, and up from the ground comes a bubblin’ crude.”
Jon: Well, Jed Clampett is pretty much all that’s left of the Republican base…
Ted: I always thought Jed was a Democrat.  Now, Jethro...that’s another story.
Jon: Well, Jed was open to new things, and he moved to Beverly…Hills, that is…Democrats…movie stars.
Ted: Good point.  Jethro just kind of lived off the wealth … kind of like George Bush.

Iraq

Dw: Foreign affairs! Foreign affairs!  This kills the “Hussein” nastiness. He’s hitting targets from both angles – head-on and subtle.
Jon: And YES!  We’re back to the 2004 speech!  The echo had to come in somewhere.  And to tie it to the troops is just brilliant–partly because I bet more troops will be voting Democratic this year than at any time in recent history.
Ted: God, if I were stuck in Iraq on my fourth tour of duty, I sure would. And for all you doubters out there who thought Obama has no vision, fuck you. Oh where are my manner, “Fuck you, please.”
Dw: Vision or substance. We got substance in bushel-barrels tonight.
Ted: I’m just waiting for the guys selling peanuts and pop in the stadium to start yelling “Yo, substance!  Get yer substance, here!”
Dw: YES.

The Big Finish

Jon: You’ll never hear John McCain talk about finding middle ground on abortion, guns, gays, etc.  His constituents wouldn’t have it.  Ain’t life grand in the world of absolutes–as long as you’re self-interested enough not to care about anyone else?
Ted: Which makes elections about “small things.”  That leads to a loss of hope and “settling” for what they’re shoveling.
Jon: Sorry, Barack, this election really is about you.  That’s why you’re standing there.  If it were about us, Hillary probably would be up there (in a smaller hall).
Dw: He’s breaking down the cult of personality, building context, and here it is:  the tie in.
Ted: How it all relates to the promises of the “I Have a Dream” speech.
Dw: Right!
Jon: Amazing, by the way, that we got 40 minutes into the speech before he mentioned MLK on this night.

The Speech is Over

Ted: That’s it? That’s the end of the speech?  I want more!
Dw: No, no, no. It’s perfect. This is the poli-sci speech I was clamoring for. I’m telling you, they took the playbook and knocked it ass over end. What I loved was that he didn’t rely on bumper stickers to hit it.
Jon: Barack Obama is magnificent.  I keep trying to find something to say about the end of that speech, but I’ve got nothing.  I’m pretty sure McCain won’t have fireworks at the end.
Ted: That was an amazing speech. It had substance, with passion, and vision.  And I gotta say … finally, a Democratic nominee with a spine.

“Final Thoughts”

Jon pretty much sounds the keynote on our views of Obama’s speech, so he gets the spotlight to close our coverage of the Democratic National Committee Convention. Take it away, Jon!

Jon: Tonight Obama swept away all the trivializing GOP attacks of the last month–not just by responding with a strength he hadn’t shown before, but with a massive substantive counterattack against McCain and with a heartfelt scolding:  These are serious times, far too serious for the silliness the Republicans have displayed this summer.  The Republicans’ eventual comeback Friday and this weekend, of course, likely will be more GOP silliness–perhaps even accusing him of paraphrasing Aaron Sorkin too closely at several points, exaggerating the points that we (and Brian Williams) have noted.

I honestly don’t know how the Republicans can follow this in St. Paul, but I’m more excited than I previously was to find out.  They’ve got so little time to build a coherent response to the series of indelible moments this week.  If all they’ve got in response is insults, mockery and belligerent muscle-flexing, it’s going to be the most disheartening, despicable GOP convention since 1992–with likely the same result in November.  The GOP must be reeling right now; the Obamas, the Bidens, the Clintons, and 75,000 folks in a magnificent political spectacle just knocked them to the floor.  Can they even get up off the mat?

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This entry was posted on Friday, August 29th, 2008 at 7:30 am and is filed under Current Events. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

  • Elaine
    Conservatives by and large can't deal with McCain because they consider him to be too liberal. Palin's inclusion on the ticket helps his standing with them a great deal. I'm old enough to remember some of Joe Biden's gaffes in real time, and was shocked at Obama's choosing him. I really was.
  • I was shocked by Biden too, but the reason I'm more shocked by Palin is that she embodies everything McCain was assailing Obama about on the campaign trail. So, here, he can adopt a "if you can't beat them, join them" stance which, and I hope this gets some real talktime, plays directly into how this former "maverick" would fall in so deeply with the will of the Bush administration.
  • Elaine
    I never jumped on board screaming about Obama's lack of experience, so I don't see me screaming about Palin's, either. I mean Nancy Freaking Pelosi is third in line right now -- she's not qualified, either. Meh. Sick of politics already.
  • On Sarah Palin: Are you kidding? After assaulting Obama month after month for a supposed lack of experience, McCain chooses a governor who's previous experience was at a super-local level, and before that (as she's proud to admit) the P.T.A.? I won't fault McCain for choosing a woman because the gender has nothing to do with it.

    HOWEVER, there are so many more qualified running mates to choose from, some of whom are female, and he overlooked them all to appeal to youth and gender. Obama's core base is NOT black America although the African-American degree in it is high. His core base is NOT the young because he's a young candidate, relatively speaking. His core base is a contingent of people who see American pain as whining and just want to shove a big sweet lollypop in that mouth to shut it up.

    Sarah Palin, had she real experience, could have been the groundbreaker McCain would hope for, but he's only using her as a lollypop, and that's why we're shunning the GOP.

    Then again, everything I just said was so damn obvious, I don't know why I had to repeat it!
  • McCain's core base is a contingent of people who see American pain as whining and just want to shove a big sweet lollypop in that mouth to shut it up.

    I should have been on top of that one.
  • 360sound
    Sarah Palin - the next Monica Goodling..
  • J
    I loved the speech...I was raised a Libertarian, with an unusually strong distrust for politicians. But this guy seems like the real deal. And not only real, I agree with him on most things. Awesome.
  • JonCummings
    Let's be clear about this: Sarah Palin isn't Hillary Clinton; at BEST, she's Gerry Ferraro. This selection has more than a slight whiff of desperation about it, and, if anything, it represents a profound disrespect for women among McCain and the Republicans.

    Do they honestly think they're going to peel away Hillary voters with a rabidly pro-life conservative? Do they think Independent women will re-assess what's important about this election simply because there's now a vagina involved?
  • I don't know what's more offensive - that McCain's using these generalities or that he thinks that's the only reason some followed Hillary. This SHOULD be called back on him just to crystallize how out of touch he is.
  • steve
    Jon, you may be right - I don't think the choice of a woman will pull too many female votes his way. Maybe some. But it's all moot. The nail is already in the coffin. Obama doesn't have a chance. Mark my words, bookmark my comments. I've said it here before and I will keep saying it - McCain will win easily, maybe by landslide. The democratic primaries in WV and Kentucky showed how many racists "working class" democrats are still out there who will NEVER vote for Obama. Most of these creeps said so openly in exit polls after voting for Hillary. And then there's the Bradley effect, which has been pretty much seen in every single political race involving an African American. Many folks who say they'll vote Obama will not, but won't say so in polls in case they may appear racist.

    McCain is leading Obama in early polls. Obama got no boost from choosing Biden. And the Bradley effect is in play for many of those who say they'll vote Obama.

    Game over.
  • It's called "wishful thinking," Steve. Maybe you're taking a poll of your friends, but it doesn't square with what Gallup has found:
    http://www.gallup.com/poll/109933/Gallup-Daily-...
  • steve
    Wrong Ted. First off, I'm voting for Obama, so put away your judgments. But no one has a response to the fact that Hillary KILLED him in WV & Kentucky (and others) after it was absolutely impossible for her to win. And in exit polls in those states, up to 20% of the Hillary voters said that they would - in NO way - vote for Obama. And that's just the ones who admitted it. They're racist. And the Bradley effect - which you didn't address either - will take that number down by much more.

    Look, I grew up in the ghettos of Baltimore. I'm white. I've seen racial strife all my life. I learned at a very young age how to get along with African Americans. I had to. I have many black friends and am blessed that I grew up in the ghetto because it taught me more than most suburbanites. But I know racism when I see it, and America is still very racist - both Republicans and Dems (and many black folks too).

    How will Obama get those "working class" Hillary Dems from WV and Kentucky and other states? I'd put more belief in your confidence of Obamas chances if you could give me a good answer to that. They said they'd NEVER vote for him!
  • Is there still overt racism in the U.S.? No doubt. Is the “Bradley Effect” something Obama should be concerned about? I’m not so sure. First off, the theory that in a biracial election, whites vote differently from how they say they will vote when polled is becoming less common nationwide. In 1982, those who told pollsters that they voted for Tom Bradley for Governor of California was pretty close to the prediction (these were exit polls). The problem was that absentee voters (who weren’t polled) voted for Deukmejian in larger numbers. Were these voters motivated solely by racial prejudice? It’s really tough to know with any reasonable certainty because, to my knowledge, no polls were conducted to measure how much of a factor the race of the candidate influenced the choices voters made. West Virginia and Kentucky have a total of 13 electoral votes, and if whites (who are vocal about their racism) won’t vote for Obama because he’s partly black (or in their minds, all black), then there’s no winning them over. But it doesn’t mean the election is lost by a “landslide” – as you suggest. Indeed, if you look at the trend since 2000, the racial or ethnic make up of a candidate is become less relevant in the minds of voters (somewhere around 3% of voters out there say they wouldn’t vote for a candidate because he or she was black). I’m not saying racism is gone (because clearly, it isn’t), but Obama’s popularity and viability as a presidential candidate appeals more to voters who don’t have racial hang-ups than those who do.

    Have a look at this article : http://pewresearch.org/pubs/408/can-you-trust-w...
  • steve
    And BTW my poll was here and it's a week old.

    http://www.reuters.com/article/topNews/idUSN192...

    But MSNBC qutoed one yesterday (can't remember pollster) on the Morning Joe show that had Mccain 48 Obama 46. They were astonished - as I was - at how Obama got basically no boost from announcing Biden. Usually candidates get a big boost when they announce VP.
  • JonCummings
    That Reuters poll is so far out of whack with every other poll that's been taken this entire season that you have to wonder what their party-ID split was. I'm guessing it was way off-kilter. Plus it was taken 1) in the middle of the Russia-Georgia and 2) when Obama was on vacation.

    I think McCain may have succeeded in blunting Obama's poll bounce with this morning's bizarre affair, but the best he's done for himself is confuse people. Palin is going to have to show a hell of a lot more substance than that to make her anything but a liability for McCain, once women wrap their heads around the idea of this small-town mayor leapfrogging dozens of substantive women leaders to a place on a national ticket.
  • steve
    Granted, most polls have Obama out front, but not by much. Jon, you still have no answer to my question of how Obama will get those Dems who I'm convinced are plain racist. This is serious. I want him to win - I'm an independent but I like his optimism. We need optimism. We need something new. But the results of the cagefight with Hillary are disturbing. Some folks say "well how can America be so racist - he beat Hillary". Yes, he beat a white WOMAN who is the single most polarizing figure in politics. I do not think he would have beaten a serious white male contender. And I think the working class Dem states are going to go heavy to Mccain, simply because too many of those folks won't vote for a black man. Hell, they admitted it.

    Jon - you're smart and write great political stuff. I'd really like to hear what you think about this and the Bradley effect. It worries me for his chances when he's barely up in the polls.
  • J
    After last night's speech, and this morning's pathetic attempts to pander to Clinton voters, if Obama does in fact lose, it will be for the reasons Steve mentions. My hope in WV et.al. is that just as many disgusted Republicans will stay home in those states as racist Democrats.
  • JonCummings
    Two points to answer Steve: First, Obama wouldn't win Ky. and W.Va. if he were lily-white, and likely neither would Hillary. Second, Ky. and W.Va. combined have 13 electoral votes; Virginia, which Obama won by 29 points and which likely as not will go to Obama in the fall, has that many electoral votes all by itself. Talk to me about states that are vital to the Democrats' prospects, and we can have a conversation about the impact of race.

    I don't know if the Bradley effect really pertains at this level of politics, though I imagine there are some people who say they're for Obama who will just stay home. We're so polarized as a nation that I doubt there are people telling pollsters they support Obama when they plan to vote for McCain--and enthusiasm is so low for McCain that enough of his polled supporters likely will stay home to offset any Bradley effect.

    Finally, what everyone fails to consider is, #1, the huge enthusiasm gap between Obama supporters and McCain supporters, and #2, the massive registration and get-out-the-vote drive being organized on Obama's behalf that McCain will have neither the funds nor the enthusiasm to match.

    I honestly believe that if 12 percent of the electorate is undecided, 11 percent are going to vote either for Obama or nobody/third party. Either way, I just don't see McCain picking the lock on the enormous, nationwide anti-Republican sentiment.
  • JonCummings
    That's ridiculous. You are exactly wrong. It's Obama who's going to win by a pretty large number. McCain has never led Obama in a single poll that I've seen--I don't know what you're looking at. The vast majority of undecideds in the polls are folks who are either going to vote for Obama or stay home. I've never seen McCain top 45 percent in a single poll, and I'm having trouble imagining that he ever will.
  • It's a typical corporate counter-programming move. The cigar-chompers in the Republican back room are looking at Obama/Biden and thinking "Hmm...Obama is young, black, and pissed off a lot of Hillary supporters. Biden. Well, he's OLD and, uh, old. Our guy is, uh, old, too. Damn. Hey! I've got it, why don't we ask Palin? She's young, FEMALE, she loves guns and hates abortionists. That'll totally appeal to Hillary supporters -- won't it?" And then a round of back-slapping and hearty handshaking ensues. Thumbs up, guys... thumbs up.
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