WTF, Obama supporters....?

[Harlowe]

Well, here is a big one - add Colin Powell to the list of Republican Obama supporters.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gz49wFWgSR8
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1008/14714.html

Retired General Colin L. Powell, one of the country's most respected Republicans, stunned both parties on Sunday by strongly endorsing Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) for president on NBC's "Meet the Press" and laying out a blistering, detailed critique of the modern GOP.

"I think he is a transformational figure," Powell said. "He is a new generation coming ... onto the world stage and on the American stage. And for that reason, I'll be voting for Senator Barack Obama."

Powell, making his 30th appearance on "Meet the Press," led into that by saying: "We've got two individuals — either one of them could be a good president. But which is the president that we need now — which is the individual that serves the needs of the nation for the next period of time.

"And I come to the conclusion that because of his ability to inspire, because of the inclusive nature of his campaign, because he is reaching out all across America, because of who he is and his rhetorical abilities — and you have to take that into account — as well as his substance — he has both style and substance, he has met the standard of being a successful president, being an exceptional president."

Powell, speaking live in the studio, told moderator Tom Brokaw that he is "troubled" by the direction of the Republican Party and statements by the campaign of Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), and said he does not believe Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin is ready to be president.

The statement will help Obama convince skeptical centrists that he is ready to handle the challenges of commander in chief, and undercuts McCain argument that he is better qualified on national security.

Powell, 71, criticized McCain for invoking the former domestic terrorist William Ayers as an Obama associate.

"They're trying to connect him to some kind of terrorist feelings, and I think that's inappropriate," Powell said. "Now I understand what politics is all about — I know how you can go after one another. And that's good. But I think this goes too far. And I think it has made the McCain campaign look a little narrow. It's not what the American people are looking for. And I look at these kinds of approaches to the campaign, and they trouble me.

"And the party has moved even further to the right, and Governor Palin has indicated a further rightward shift. I would have difficult with two more conservative appointments to the Supreme Court, but that's what we'd be looking at in a McCain administration."

Powell said he has "heard senior members of my own party drop the suggestion [that Obama's] a Muslim and might be associated with terrorists."

"This is not the way we should be doing it in America. I feel strongly about this particular point," Powell said. "We have got to stop polarizing ourselves in this way. And John McCain is as non-discriminatory as anyone I know. But I'm troubled about the fact that within the party, we have these kinds of expressions."

Powell, a four-star Army general, was national security adviser to President Ronald Reagan; chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff during the 1991 Persian Gulf war, when George H.W. Bush was president; and President George W. Bush’s first secretary of State,

Powell has consulted with both Obama and McCain, and the general’s camp has indicated in the past that he would not endorse.

"I've really been going back and forth," he said. He added that if he were choosing on the basis of race, he would have made his choice months ago.

Powell said McCain “was a little unsure about how to deal with the economic problems.”

Powell said a big job of the new president will be “conveying a new image of American leadership, a new image of America’s role in the world.”

“I think what the president has to do is to start using the power of the Oval Office and the power of his personality to convince the American people and to convince the world that America is solid, America is going to move forward … restoring a sense of purpose,” he said.

[Alluveal]

Everyone wants change. As someone who votes more on the conservative side, I want change. I also want what is best for the country, even if it goes against my own personal agenda.

[Kulaf]

I would consider voting for Obama too if conditions in Congress were different. But Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid are going to be the ones driving the bus here. If you don't think those two are going to have a major say in what happens in the next 4 years and somehow Obama is going to get only what he wants.......yer seriously delusional.

[Harlowe]

Actually, he shows a great deal of strength and intelligence. I think you are way underestimating the man (and perhaps a bit delusional and paranoid yourself), if you think people like Nancy Pelosi & Harry Reid are going to be able to drive him anywhere. He has his agenda and his ideas, neither one of them have the strength of character he does. Frankly, Pelosi is a shrill light weight.

[Lurker]

I have more faith in Obama's ability to control the direction of this country than I do in Pelosi and Reid's ability to rein in McCain / Palin. We've also seen over the last eight years the damage that a radical President can do on their own with signing statements and departmental appointments. The country would be in extreme jeopardy under a McCain/Palin presidency.

I also think that electing McCain / Palin would be a death blow to our reputation throughout the world.

[Lurker]

Here's Powell's press conference following his Meet the Press endorsement. He talks more about the horrible tone coming from the McCain campaign, the bullshit 'socialist' charge, and gives a shout out to Harlowe's wacky congresswoman.

As an added bonus, here's a story on Bachmann hiding in the bushes.

[Harlowe]

I just think it's laughable to entertain thoughts of Pelosi/Reid driving someone like Obama or rallying their party in a direction that Obama does not want to go. Seems like just another "fear tactic" when good judgment tells you he is what we need right now.

[Kulaf]

Obama's power here is simply veto. The rest is cajoling and pressure from the WH. We all know who controls the purse strings in our government. Sure Obama will have some leverage if he wins......more if it is a landslide win......but Pelosi and Reid can claim responsibility for increasing margins for the Dems in both houses (likely to happen). They are going to extract their due on every bill they choose to.

The we will see how Obama "controls" his party. Wil he be a Johnson......or a Carter.

[Harlowe]

I have every confidence, that he will have much more power than just the veto with regard to influence within his party. And the Democratic party hasn't exactly ran like a machine together, in fact they are well known for their lack of cohesion.

If what you say was a legitimate concern out there, there wouldn't be so many conservatives, republicans and right-leaning organizations supporting Obama.

****Another right-leaning paper that has not endorsed a Dem since 1964, endorses Obama, a Texas paper no less.

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/edi ... 65490.html

After carefully observing the Democratic and Republican nominees in drawn-out primary struggles as well as in the general campaign, including three debates, the Chronicle strongly believes that the ticket of Sens. Barack Obama and Joe Biden offers the best choice to lead the United States on a new course into the second decade of the 21st century.

Obama appears to possess the tools to confront our myriad and daunting problems. He's thoughtful and analytical. He has met his opponents' attacks with calm and reasoned responses. Viewers of the debates saw a poised, well-prepared plausible president with well-articulated positions on the bread-and-butter issues that poll after poll indicate are the true concerns of voters. While Arizona Sen. John McCain and his running mate Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin have struck an increasingly personal and negative tone in their speeches, Obama has continued to talk about issues of substance.

Perhaps the worst mistake McCain made in his campaign for the White House was the choice of the inexperienced and inflammatory Palin as his vice-presidential running mate. Had he selected a moderate, experienced Republican lawmaker such as Texas Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison with a strong appeal to independents, the Chronicle's choice for an endorsement would have been far more difficult.

Back in the spring, Obama's sentiments seemed more a hope than reality. Since then, we have watched him grow in the roles of candidate and leader, maintaining grace under fire without resorting to political expediency. He is by far the best choice to deliver the changes that Americans demand.

[Kulaf]

Had he selected a moderate, experienced Republican lawmaker such as Texas Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison with a strong appeal to independents, the Chronicle's choice for an endorsement would have been far more difficult.

Well I wil agree with them there. The only problem is that Kay Bailey Hutchison made it known in no uncertain terms that she was not at all interested in the job. I would actually love to see her run for President in 2012.

[Harlowe]

It seems like a lot of them say that, but when they actually are tapped; they change their minds. I'm pretty sure I've said this before, but I'd love to have known what this campaign would have looked like had McCain chosen someone like Hutchison or Olympia Snowe. I really like them both. If McCain wouldn't have turned into such a bitter, petulant, divisive asshole - i.e. if he were the old McCain running with either of them and I never saw the guy I've been seeing the past month, I'd probably be torn this election.

[Kulaf]

No I think she made a calculated move. I think she thought there was no way any Republican was going to win this election so why damage herself with a failed run. Whether or not that is true is not really material.....but I am betting that is what she thought.

[Harlowe]

I don't think Obama is so very far ahead of McCain that it wouldn't have been possible. He'd still be grappling with the economy issue, but if he would have responded less erratically, less arrogantly during the initial phase of the financial crisis and had a well respected female running mate (either of those women) - he would have had enthusiastic support from women, conservatives and moderates - not the rabid support of the fringe elements. Rabid won't keep the rational, intelligent people on your team. A steady hand, a less negative/divisive campaign and a solid running mate....I think he'd be at the very least neck-in-neck, if not ahead. He would have had to have been the "old" McCain people reminisce about though.

Granted he wouldn't have engaged the far-right base as much as that inflammatory, divisive idiot Palin did, and those two candidates support Roe vs. Wade - but those rabid Palin fans would have still voted for McCain because he is pro-life and at least it's not the dirty liberal satanic elite Dem's.

[Harlowe]

Another from the heart of Texas, who in the past 50 years has never recommeded a Democrat for president ...
http://www.theeagle.com/editorial/101908-President

In the past 50 years, The Eagle has never recommended a Democrat for president. We made no recommendations in 1960 and 1964 -- when Texas' own Lyndon B. Johnson was on the Democratic ticket -- nor did we in 1968 -- although we did praise Vice President Hubert H. Humphrey's position on the Vietnam War. We did not in 1976 and 1980. In 1972, The Eagle recommend Richard Nixon, in 1984, Ronald Reagan. We recommended George H.W. Bush in 1988 and 1992 and his son in 2000. We recommended Bob Dole in 1996.

Four years ago, the Editorial Board couldn't recommend George W. Bush for a second term, but we also couldn't recommend Sen. John Kerry either, so we made no choice.

This year is different, in large part because of the very difficult challenges facing this nation after eight years of a failed Bush administration. We are faced with a choice between Sen. John McCain, who claims to be an agent of change but promotes the policies of the past, and Sen. Barack Obama, who also wears the change mantle, but offers a vision for the future, even if he has yet to fully explain how he would carry out that vision if elected president in little more than two weeks.

Every 20 or 30 years or so, a leader comes along who understands that change is necessary if the country is to survive and thrive. Teddy Roosevelt at the turn of the 20th century and his cousin Franklin Roosevelt, John F. Kennedy and Ronald Reagan -- these leaders have inspired us to rise to our better nature, to reach out to be the country we can be and, more important, must be.

Barack Obama is such a leader. He doesn't have all the answers, to be sure, but at least he is asking the right questions. While we would like more specificity on his plans as president, we are confident that he can lead us ever forward, casting aside the doubts and fears of recent years.

John McCain is a great American, no question. He served his country with honor in the Navy - enduring five years of hell in a North Vietnamese prison -- and he has represented Arizona and, indeed, the country well in the Senate. He has been a maverick at times, but his unbridled support for the Iraq War shows a lack of understanding at the weariness of the military and the country to remain much longer in a country unwilling or unable to govern itself.

Perhaps Obama won't be able to bring American men and women safely home from Iraq in the promised 16 months, but at least he is willing to make the effort.

Also of great concern is McCain's selection of Sarah Palin as his running mate. Like Obama, she has little experience in governing, but unlike the Illinois senator, she is a candidate of little intellectual curiosity who appears to be hopelessly unready to be president. The fact that people are confused by the difference between Palin and comedian Tina Fey's caustic impersonation is clear evidence that Palin should not be, as they say, a heartbeat away from the presidency.

We also are dismayed by the tenor of the McCain-Palin campaign. If their goal is to severely wound an Obama presidency should that come to pass, they are dangerously close to succeeding.

It is time for America to look to its future with hope and optimism. It is time to say we can be better. It is time to redefine who we will be as a leader of nations.

With hope in our hearts and confidence in our choice, The Eagle recommends a vote for Barack Obama for president.

[Harlowe]

Kathleen Parker (NRO) defends Buckley

Radical conservatives are still having an interesting time of it, though these days they are being mutilated by fellow “conservatives.” The well-fed Right now cultivates ignorance as a political strategy and humiliates itself when its brightest sons seek sanctuary in the solitude of personal honor.

The truth few wish to utter is that the GOP has abandoned many conservatives, who mostly nurse their angst in private. Those chickens we keep hearing about have indeed come home to roost. Years of pandering to the extreme wing — the “kooks” the senior Buckley tried to separate from the right — have created a party no longer attentive to its principles.

Instead, as Christopher Buckley pointed out in a blog post on thedailybeast.com explaining his departure from National Review, eight years of “conservatism” have brought us “a doubled national debt, ruinous expansion of entitlement programs, bridges to nowhere, poster boy Jack Abramoff and an ill-premised, ill-waged war conducted by politicians of breathtaking arrogance.”

Republicans are not short on brainpower — or pride — but they have strayed off course. They do not, in fact, deserve to win this time, and someone had to remind them why.

Christopher Buckley, ever the swashbuckling heir to his father’s defiant spirit, walked the plank so that the sinking mother ship might right itself.

I find all this dramatic discourse and upheaval in conservative circles really exciting, because the pollyanna in me believes they will rebuild, abandon the divisive, negative, extremist influences that have taken over and be the next great leaders. Okay maybe I'm living in fantasy land, but these are the people that really inspire me.

[Harlowe]

The Idaho statesman endorses Obama.

http://www.idahostatesman.com/opinion/story/542582.html

Over the ensuing months, the Illinois Democrat has shown American voters something more subtle, but something more important. He has demonstrated the superior intellect and the calm command our nation needs now.

The Statesman editorial board endorses Obama in the 2008 presidential election.

This is not an obvious choice for a newspaper in a historically Republican state. Nor was it a unanimous choice. But we have to think about what's best for our nation, which is facing challenging and confusing times that call for even-tempered, clear-minded leadership. When the partisanship of this election finally subsidies, Obama is the man who can reach reasoned conclusions, reach across the political divides, and reach out to the common American.

[Harlowe]

Here is a crazy one...Ken Adelman

Ken Adelman is a lifelong conservative Republican. Campaigned for Goldwater, was hired by Rumsfeld at the Office of Economic Opportunity under Nixon, was assistant to Defense Secretary Rumsfeld under Ford, served as Reagan’s director of arms control, and joined the Defense Policy Board for Rumsfeld’s second go-round at the Pentagon, in 2001. Adelman’s friendship with Rumsfeld, Cheney, and their wives goes back to the sixties, and he introduced Cheney to Paul Wolfowitz at a Washington brunch the day Reagan was sworn in.

In recent years, Adelman and his friends Cheney, Rumsfeld, and Wolfowitz fell out over his criticisms of the botching of the Iraq War. Still, he remains a bona-fide hawk (“not really a neo-con but a con-con”) who has never supported a Democrat for President in his life. Two weeks from now that’s going to change: Ken Adelman intends to vote for Barack Obama. He can hardly believe it himself.

Adelman and I exchanged e-mails today about his decision. He asked rhetorically,

Why so, since my views align a lot more with McCain’s than with Obama’s? And since I truly dread the notion of a Democratic president, Democratic House, and hugely Democratic Senate?

Primarily for two reasons, those of temperament and of judgment.

When the economic crisis broke, I found John McCain bouncing all over the place. In those first few crisis days, he was impetuous, inconsistent, and imprudent; ending up just plain weird. Having worked with Ronald Reagan for seven years, and been with him in his critical three summits with Gorbachev, I’ve concluded that that’s no way a president can act under pressure.

Second is judgment. The most important decision John McCain made in his long campaign was deciding on a running mate.

That decision showed appalling lack of judgment. Not only is Sarah Palin not close to being acceptable in high office—I would not have hired her for even a mid-level post in the arms-control agency. But that selection contradicted McCain’s main two, and best two, themes for his campaign—Country First, and experience counts. Neither can he credibly claim, post-Palin pick.

I sure hope Obama is more open, centrist, sensible—dare I say, Clintonesque—than his liberal record indicates, than his cooperation with Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid portends. If not, I will be even more startled by my vote than I am now.

[Taxious]

“Many teenagers that come in should be paying the employer because of broken dishes or whatever occurs during that period of time. But you know what? After six months, that teenager is going to be a fabulous employee and is going to go on a trajectory where he’s going to be making so much money, we’ll be borrowing money from him.” —Michele Bachmann, 1/26/05, explaining why teenagers should pay employers for the privilege of working instead of receiving minimum wage.

This was actually my favorite, like all sixteen-year-olds are too retarded to hold on to dishes or something. I thought Colorado had it bad with Marilyn Musgrave...

[Taxious]

Speaking of righties turning left, my grandma is a big Obama supporter. She hasn't voted for a democrat as president since I've been alive. My family thinks it's hilarious that she has Obama signs all over her lawn.

[Freecare Spiritwise]

Lots of high paying industries have internships where a young adult gets paid nothing in exchange for the job experience, which I'm fine with. A kid having to pay McDonalds to flip burgers? Where's the mutual RL benefit?

I think I was 23 when I was working for a large insurance company and they promoted me from file clerk to product analyst. It was a huge break for me, and I jumped halfway up the org-chart, but it didn't come with a raise. They told me the job title was 10 times better than the raise, and they were right (well, after I went to a different company). There was a mutual benefit, and both parties were satisfied with the arrangement.

But I agree tax. A kid paying for the priviledge of washing dishes so that he gains the experience to make a career out of it - exceedingly retarded - not to mention resturants would go out of business for lack of employees. But legitimate internships? Everyone wins.