Nation-Building

This Dem primary has been invaluable in the sense that it has been a goldmine for the demographics of the liberal, Democratic-leaning electorate. In a post I did a while back, I compared the primary outcomes for Ohio to Wisconsin and found that the two looked remarkably different: Wisconsin is not a rust belt state like OH and PA and hence economic concerns (especially NAFTA-gate, which turned out to have been wholly false) play a greater role in the voters’ consideration. Wisconsin has a much more diverse economic foundation and thus I think Wisconsin was more receptive to idealistic arguments than mere pocketbook and standard of living ones. The electoral maps of Ohio and Wisocnsin are almost inverted: Obama consistently does well in urban areas but the rural regions of both states were played quite differently. Like many others, I predicted that the PA map would resemble Ohio more than Wisconsin, and that turned out to indeed be the case: It's interesting to note that Indiana ...

far from being weak on electability, obama is a genuine map-changer . Not only that, despite the claim that obama won only on the backs of "elite" voters, Obama made concrete *gains* in *every* core demographic at Clinton's expense since Ohio. Clinton's claims to being ahead in the popular vote are, shall we say, selective . Or maybe it depends on what the definition of "popular" is? But why didn't he win ? He spent more money !

The usual suspects are crowing that the Terrorists endorse Obama. It turns out that Ahmed Yousef, one of the top political leaders within Hamas, said the following : During an interview on WABC radio Sunday, top Hamas political adviser Ahmed Yousef said the terrorist group supports Obama’s foreign policy vision. “We don’t mind–actually we like Mr. Obama. We hope he will (win) the election and I do believe he is like John Kennedy, great man with great principle, and he has a vision to change America to make it in a position to lead the world community but not with domination and arrogance,” Yousef said in response to a question about the group’s willingness to meet with either of the Democratic presidential candidates. Stepping away from the braying of those who will use this as an excuse for their usual smearing of liberals in general and Obama in particular (sort of v2.0 of the muslim smear), it's actually very interesting that Ahmed Yousef said that. He’s an interesting characte...

Even as Pennsylvania looms like a storm on the horizon, the dry spell between primaries has left the fields of the liberal blogsphere in substantive-debate drought, ablaze with the fires of fraternal warfare. The lines of polemic have consolidated around several narratives: - Hillary should resign, because she can't win - Obama is a weak candidate in the general election - Hillary is destroying the party by giving the GOP ammunition/using their attacks - Obama is just another politician who lies and panders - McCain is benefiting from the delay in choosing a nominee - The damage to the Democrats from this civil war is permanent I like to think of these tropes as She's Lost, He'll Lose, She's a Traitor, He's a Liar, We're Screwed, and Why Can't We All Get Along, respectively. And yet all of these, every single one, is completely wrong. Let's take a cool and clear-headed view at each in turn. She's Lost For Hillary to win, she needs to win win by the r...

... if we can indeed have an occupation in which no American troops are "injured or harmed or wounded or killed". RedState is rather freaked out about the McCain/100 years meme , claiming that Obama, the media, the Democrats, the Easter Bunny, etc are all conspiring together and this misrepresentation of John McCain is proof of a "national security distortion field" around Obama et al. They insist that the full quote from McCain somehow provides exculpatory context: "We've been in Japan for 60 years, we've been in South Korea for 50 years, that'd be fine with me as long as Americans are not being injured or harmed or wounded or killed . That's fine with me and I hope it would be fine with you if we maintained a presence in a very volatile part of the world where Al Qaeda is training and recruiting and equipping people." (extra-special emphasis theirs, not mine.) However, the critique against McCain is not that he wants 100 years of warfare....

as I have been arguing repeatedly, no Democratic President will leave Iraq . This is just further evidence . A key adviser to Senator Obama's campaign is recommending in a confidential paper that America keep between 60,000 and 80,000 troops in Iraq as of late 2010, a plan at odds with the public pledge of the Illinois senator to withdraw combat forces from Iraq within 16 months of taking office. The paper, obtained by The New York Sun, was written by Colin Kahl for the center-left Center for a New American Security. In "Stay on Success: A Policy of Conditional Engagement," Mr. Kahl writes that through negotiations with the Iraqi government "the U.S. should aim to transition to a sustainable over-watch posture (of perhaps 60,000-80,000 forces) by the end of 2010 (although the specific timelines should be the byproduct of negotiations and conditions on the ground)." and, frankly, I think "conditional engagement" is valid and that a total withdrawal of ...