That's a typical argument from an Obama supporter. If you don't like him, you're a racist. That guilt trip ploy worked well enough in the primary to win the Democratic nomination (there's a lot of white liberal guilt out there), but it won't work in the general election, and a lot of people are starting to notice how Obama likes to turn arguments against him for any reason into racial ones.15QuestionsAway wrote:I'm calling you out, SSS. This guilt by association meme you're fixated on is a real problem. Honestly, when I read your posts, sometimes I think you've got a problem with Obama being Teh Black. I know you're hurt that Hillary lost, but you have to deal with it.
McCain's "character and integrity" is a chimera. The Straight Talk Express has turned into the Double Talk Express.
His policies are anathema to Democrats. If you truly support Democratic policies and objectives, a vote for McCain would just be bitter and spiteful. Do your research.
I know that McCain has done some flip flops in the past. All politicians have, and their policies and feelings evolve over the years. At least McCain has a decades-long record of public service so that people can gauge his judgment and point of view and make a decision based on that.
Obama is a will-of-the-wisp, someone who has worked hard to avoid stances on issues, instead relying on his "hope and change" image. He hopes to be all things to all people. Add to that an extreme lack of experience in government and politics and there's a lot that should worry people.
Obama's entire campaign has been about showing as little as he can about himself, then when things go bad, obfuscate, deny and then dump. The campaign finance issue is illustrative. On Tuesday, Obama's support for campaign finance was one of the campaign bullet points on his web site. By Friday, it had disappeared, as he tries to explain he never really meant it. Similarly, Wright and Pfleger disappear from their positions on his spiritual council, as if they never existed. This is strikingly similar to the news washing that periodically occurred in 1984, as all references to discredited past events were replaced by new, approved versions of what happened.
The bad apples from Obama's past: Rezko, Ayers, Wright, Pfleger and others, aren't neighbors, casual acquaintances or one-time donors to his campaigns. They are people who have been major influences in Obama's life, who worked with him for years, who helped serve as his religious or political mentors. When you have a candidate about whom you know as little as Obama, it makes sense to look past his campaign pitch and into his record and his background. And Obama's record is nearly devoid of substance (his last term in the state Senate, party leaders shoehorned him into "sponsorship" positions on a number of bills to pad his resume). So it becomes more important to look at his background.
It's one thing to change your position over a period of years. In fact, in some cases such as the energy crisis, the realities of the situation are quite different now than they were six or seven years ago. It's another to change from week to week or even from day to day as Obama has on the campaign trail. Do we really want a president who will decide on foreign policy by floating trial balloons about what he might do and then gauge public reaction and change his mind a couple of days later?
Progressives can and should be worried about Obama's shifting stance on the issues, his tendency to take the easy way out and his lack of specifics. Despite his rhetoric, he has played to the big money interests with the best of them (as his vote on the energy bill demonstrated). Keep in mind that as President, McCain will face a Democratic House and Senate that with anywhere from two to eight more Democratic Senators and ten to twenty more House members. They can keep a check on what he might propose in the way of Supreme Court justices or economic policies. Democrats will be hard pressed to oppose any Obama appointments or initiatives.
Every single pro-Obama argument I hear boils down to one or more of a combination of these arguments.
1) If you don't vote for Obama, you're a racist.
2) If you don't vote for Obama, you're a bitter Hillary supporter letting cutting off your nose to spite your face.
3) Hope and change, hope and change.
4) John McCain is a very bad person who will do very bad things.
No reasoned, factually supportable arguments about what Obama actually can or will do once elected. And that is it for a candidate who is the least experienced of any major party candidate in many years and about whose background we know the least.
By the way, Georgia had a presidential primary in February, but, like many states, the primaries for other offices, including Senate, Congress and state offices, are held later, in this case in July. In fact, the official qualifying period for Georgia elections wasn't until May.
