Steven Warshawsky dresses down Obama supporters
We deal with them daily. They're the Obama supporters who either leave comments berating us, or those that contact us via e-mail. And yes, they have tossed the race card in our direction despite the fact that there's never been a racist post placed on this site by either Marcie or myself. We have constantly questioned Obama's qualifications, his experience, and whether or not his ideas would help or hurt this nation. Honestly, we believe his ideas would hurt this nation a great deal. (It won't be destroyed, but it will be weakened -- militarily, economically, and culturally -- significantly.
At RealClearPolitics, Steven Warshawsky takes his supporters to task to emphasize the same conclusion we have come to -- Barack Obama will not be elected president:
There is palpable anxiety, even despair, among many Republicans and conservatives over the possibility that Barack Obama will be elected president this November. This anxiety is being fueled by the mainstream media's fawning coverage of Obama's every word, while shamelessly downplaying John McCain's campaign; by public opinion polls that purport to show Obama "leading" the race over McCain; and by political commentators, on both sides of the aisle, who believe this is the Democrats' "election to lose," based on historical cycles, an uneven economy, high gas prices, continuing opposition to the Iraq War, and President Bush's dismal approval ratings.
I don't share this anxiety. For months now, I have been reassuring my right-leaning friends that Barack Obama will not be elected president. If I were a gambling man, I would buy lots of McCain stock on Intrade. Why am I so confident that John McCain is going to win the election? In short, because Barack Obama is not an acceptable choice to lead the country. Let me explain.
Obama is too young and inexperienced.
One of Obama's most striking characteristics is how "green" he is compared to previous presidential candidates. Obama was born on August 4, 1961. He just turned 47 years old. The average age of elected presidents since 1952 (the era of televised politics) is 56.
If elected president, Obama would be the fifth youngest president in U.S. history. The only younger presidents would be Teddy Roosevelt, John F. Kennedy, Bill Clinton, and Ulysses S. Grant, all of whom were much more accomplished than Obama. Grant, Roosevelt, and Kennedy were war heroes. (Not Clinton, notoriously.) Roosevelt and Clinton had served as state governors. Grant had been the general-in-chief of the Union Army during the Civil War. The least experienced of the four, Kennedy, had served twelve years in Congress, six in the House of Representatives and six in the Senate, and had been a serious candidate for vice-president in 1956.
What has Obama accomplished to date? In truth, not very much -- except to master the art of self-promotion. ...
Obama is too liberal.
The last Democratic presidential candidate who garnered more than 50% of the popular vote was Jimmy Carter in 1976 - and Carter received only 51% of the vote in a political environment marked by defeat in Vietnam, the Watergate scandal, an energy crisis, and stagflation. There has been only one other Democratic president in the past 40 years: Bill Clinton. Despite campaigning as "New Democrat," Clinton received only 43% of the popular vote in 1992 (his victory was due to the third-party candidacy of Ross Perot) and 49% of the popular vote in 1996. Significantly, the Democratic candidate's share of the popular vote has gone down the last two elections. Al Gore received 48.4% of the popular vote in 2000, and John Kerry received 48.3% in 2004.
The Democratic Party has a terrible track record at the presidential level since the 1960s because it consistently nominates far left presidential candidates who do not represent the values, interests, and aspirations of most Americans. See McGovern, Carter, Mondale, Dukakis, Kerry. Even Gore, who was considered a "moderate" Democratic (no longer), lost to the uninspiring George W. Bush in 2000.
Barack Obama is no exception. In his brief tenure in the U.S. Senate, Obama has compiled a consistently liberal voting record, and was named the Most Liberal Senator for 2007 by the National Journal. This distinction does not augur well for Obama. John Kerry was named the Most Liberal Senator for 2003 -- the year before he lost the 2004 presidential contest to Bush.
As a U.S. Senator, Obama has voted along Democratic Party lines 97 percent of the time, almost 10 percentage points higher than the average for Senate Democrats. So much for his "bipartisan" image. He opposed funding for the War on Terror that was not tied to a timetable for withdrawal from Iraq. He opposed strengthening the ability of the federal government to monitor terrorist communications. He voted in favor of providing habeas corpus rights to detainees at Guantanamo Bay. He supported the failed "comprehensive immigration reform" bills. He voted against the Federal Marriage Amendment. He opposed a bill that would have reduced the federal estate tax. He voted against the confirmations of John Roberts and Samuel Alito to the Supreme Court. ...
Obama is too race-conscious.
Finally, we come to the "hot button" issue in this election: Obama's black racial consciousness.
Contrary to what Obama and his supporters want the American people to believe, Obama is not a "post-racial" politician. As abundantly demonstrated in his two autobiographies, his 20-year membership in Rev. Jeremiah Wright's "unashamedly black" Trinity United Church of Christ, and his "intensely race-conscious approach" to politics as an Illinois state senator (see here), Obama is deeply committed to his "black" identity -- despite having a white mother and being raised for much of his childhood by his white grandparents. Furthermore, Obama built his political career on promoting the interests of the black urban community. Right or wrong, fair or unfair, Obama's black racial consciousness is going to have a negative effect on his campaign for president by undermining his appeal among white working- and middle-class voters.
Let's look at some numbers. According to the CNN exit poll, in the 2004 presidential election, the electorate was composed of 77% whites, 11% blacks, 8% Latinos, 2% Asian, and 2% other. They voted as follows: whites 58-41 for Bush; blacks 88-11 for Kerry; Latinos 53-44 for Kerry; Asians 56-44 for Kerry.
I see little reason to believe that the Latino or Asian votes will change substantially in 2008. Clearly, the black vote will shift even more strongly in favor of the Democratic candidate. However, the white voting population is seven times larger than the black voting population. Consequently, a shift in the black vote of seven percentage points is roughly equivalent to a shift in the white vote of one point. Even if Obama were to receive essentially all black votes, which is unlikely, a loss of less than two percentage points of the white vote would be enough to offset these gains.
So the key to the upcoming election is whether white voters will be more, less, or equally likely to vote for Obama as for Kerry. I believe the answer is less likely. ...
As I wrote last December, "[t]he pundits can talk until they are blue in the face about Obama's charisma and eloquence and cross-racial appeal. The fact of the matter is that Obama has no chance of being elected president in 2008." I am more convinced of this conclusion than ever.
We have been convinced that he is not ready for primetime. While he can deliver a prepared speech, or comments off a teleprompter better than most, he is hardly the "second coming of Reagan" when it comes to speaking. Reagan could speak off the cuff with the best of them, and it's clear to us that he simply can't do that. When he goes into the presidential debates, he will be in hot water with voters who will tire of hearing him stumble. It may not be a gaffe, or even a mistake, but the "ums" and "uhs" coupled with the stuttering will show the nation that this man does not think beyond himself.
Throw in the points that Mr. Warshawsky points out, and he has a very weak hand before the river is dealt. He is playing poker with the nation, and a lot of us know that he's bluffing. His pair of deuces can't beat McCain's three aces, but he's going to try to urge people to back his play. We don't think the electorate, once it begins paying attention to this race, are going to buy into the bull he's shoveling.
Come November Barack Obama isn't going to be pleased with the election results, and no doubt his surrogates and proxies are going to throw the race card out there. While there may be a few people who will vote on that issue alone, the vast majority of the populace who won't support him will do so based on where he stands on the issues, and his inexperience. This is a man, as David Freddoso documents in his outstanding new book, that has climbed the political ladder, and done it on the back of Chicago Machine politics. But he hasn't taken the time to learn anything. He hasn't taken his lumps, and he hasn't taken a solid stand on a host of issues he now claims he knows so much about. That is what will kill his chances in the fall.
Publius II
At RealClearPolitics, Steven Warshawsky takes his supporters to task to emphasize the same conclusion we have come to -- Barack Obama will not be elected president:
There is palpable anxiety, even despair, among many Republicans and conservatives over the possibility that Barack Obama will be elected president this November. This anxiety is being fueled by the mainstream media's fawning coverage of Obama's every word, while shamelessly downplaying John McCain's campaign; by public opinion polls that purport to show Obama "leading" the race over McCain; and by political commentators, on both sides of the aisle, who believe this is the Democrats' "election to lose," based on historical cycles, an uneven economy, high gas prices, continuing opposition to the Iraq War, and President Bush's dismal approval ratings.
I don't share this anxiety. For months now, I have been reassuring my right-leaning friends that Barack Obama will not be elected president. If I were a gambling man, I would buy lots of McCain stock on Intrade. Why am I so confident that John McCain is going to win the election? In short, because Barack Obama is not an acceptable choice to lead the country. Let me explain.
Obama is too young and inexperienced.
One of Obama's most striking characteristics is how "green" he is compared to previous presidential candidates. Obama was born on August 4, 1961. He just turned 47 years old. The average age of elected presidents since 1952 (the era of televised politics) is 56.
If elected president, Obama would be the fifth youngest president in U.S. history. The only younger presidents would be Teddy Roosevelt, John F. Kennedy, Bill Clinton, and Ulysses S. Grant, all of whom were much more accomplished than Obama. Grant, Roosevelt, and Kennedy were war heroes. (Not Clinton, notoriously.) Roosevelt and Clinton had served as state governors. Grant had been the general-in-chief of the Union Army during the Civil War. The least experienced of the four, Kennedy, had served twelve years in Congress, six in the House of Representatives and six in the Senate, and had been a serious candidate for vice-president in 1956.
What has Obama accomplished to date? In truth, not very much -- except to master the art of self-promotion. ...
Obama is too liberal.
The last Democratic presidential candidate who garnered more than 50% of the popular vote was Jimmy Carter in 1976 - and Carter received only 51% of the vote in a political environment marked by defeat in Vietnam, the Watergate scandal, an energy crisis, and stagflation. There has been only one other Democratic president in the past 40 years: Bill Clinton. Despite campaigning as "New Democrat," Clinton received only 43% of the popular vote in 1992 (his victory was due to the third-party candidacy of Ross Perot) and 49% of the popular vote in 1996. Significantly, the Democratic candidate's share of the popular vote has gone down the last two elections. Al Gore received 48.4% of the popular vote in 2000, and John Kerry received 48.3% in 2004.
The Democratic Party has a terrible track record at the presidential level since the 1960s because it consistently nominates far left presidential candidates who do not represent the values, interests, and aspirations of most Americans. See McGovern, Carter, Mondale, Dukakis, Kerry. Even Gore, who was considered a "moderate" Democratic (no longer), lost to the uninspiring George W. Bush in 2000.
Barack Obama is no exception. In his brief tenure in the U.S. Senate, Obama has compiled a consistently liberal voting record, and was named the Most Liberal Senator for 2007 by the National Journal. This distinction does not augur well for Obama. John Kerry was named the Most Liberal Senator for 2003 -- the year before he lost the 2004 presidential contest to Bush.
As a U.S. Senator, Obama has voted along Democratic Party lines 97 percent of the time, almost 10 percentage points higher than the average for Senate Democrats. So much for his "bipartisan" image. He opposed funding for the War on Terror that was not tied to a timetable for withdrawal from Iraq. He opposed strengthening the ability of the federal government to monitor terrorist communications. He voted in favor of providing habeas corpus rights to detainees at Guantanamo Bay. He supported the failed "comprehensive immigration reform" bills. He voted against the Federal Marriage Amendment. He opposed a bill that would have reduced the federal estate tax. He voted against the confirmations of John Roberts and Samuel Alito to the Supreme Court. ...
Obama is too race-conscious.
Finally, we come to the "hot button" issue in this election: Obama's black racial consciousness.
Contrary to what Obama and his supporters want the American people to believe, Obama is not a "post-racial" politician. As abundantly demonstrated in his two autobiographies, his 20-year membership in Rev. Jeremiah Wright's "unashamedly black" Trinity United Church of Christ, and his "intensely race-conscious approach" to politics as an Illinois state senator (see here), Obama is deeply committed to his "black" identity -- despite having a white mother and being raised for much of his childhood by his white grandparents. Furthermore, Obama built his political career on promoting the interests of the black urban community. Right or wrong, fair or unfair, Obama's black racial consciousness is going to have a negative effect on his campaign for president by undermining his appeal among white working- and middle-class voters.
Let's look at some numbers. According to the CNN exit poll, in the 2004 presidential election, the electorate was composed of 77% whites, 11% blacks, 8% Latinos, 2% Asian, and 2% other. They voted as follows: whites 58-41 for Bush; blacks 88-11 for Kerry; Latinos 53-44 for Kerry; Asians 56-44 for Kerry.
I see little reason to believe that the Latino or Asian votes will change substantially in 2008. Clearly, the black vote will shift even more strongly in favor of the Democratic candidate. However, the white voting population is seven times larger than the black voting population. Consequently, a shift in the black vote of seven percentage points is roughly equivalent to a shift in the white vote of one point. Even if Obama were to receive essentially all black votes, which is unlikely, a loss of less than two percentage points of the white vote would be enough to offset these gains.
So the key to the upcoming election is whether white voters will be more, less, or equally likely to vote for Obama as for Kerry. I believe the answer is less likely. ...
As I wrote last December, "[t]he pundits can talk until they are blue in the face about Obama's charisma and eloquence and cross-racial appeal. The fact of the matter is that Obama has no chance of being elected president in 2008." I am more convinced of this conclusion than ever.
We have been convinced that he is not ready for primetime. While he can deliver a prepared speech, or comments off a teleprompter better than most, he is hardly the "second coming of Reagan" when it comes to speaking. Reagan could speak off the cuff with the best of them, and it's clear to us that he simply can't do that. When he goes into the presidential debates, he will be in hot water with voters who will tire of hearing him stumble. It may not be a gaffe, or even a mistake, but the "ums" and "uhs" coupled with the stuttering will show the nation that this man does not think beyond himself.
Throw in the points that Mr. Warshawsky points out, and he has a very weak hand before the river is dealt. He is playing poker with the nation, and a lot of us know that he's bluffing. His pair of deuces can't beat McCain's three aces, but he's going to try to urge people to back his play. We don't think the electorate, once it begins paying attention to this race, are going to buy into the bull he's shoveling.
Come November Barack Obama isn't going to be pleased with the election results, and no doubt his surrogates and proxies are going to throw the race card out there. While there may be a few people who will vote on that issue alone, the vast majority of the populace who won't support him will do so based on where he stands on the issues, and his inexperience. This is a man, as David Freddoso documents in his outstanding new book, that has climbed the political ladder, and done it on the back of Chicago Machine politics. But he hasn't taken the time to learn anything. He hasn't taken his lumps, and he hasn't taken a solid stand on a host of issues he now claims he knows so much about. That is what will kill his chances in the fall.
Publius II
posted by Syd And Vaughn | 12:49 PM
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