Comments on: Obamania

By: BuzzMachine » Blog Archive » Finally covering Obamedia

BuzzMachine » Blog Archive » Finally covering Obamedia — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 14:03:21 +0000

[...] But at least on the op-ed page, there has been acknowledgment of the media’s issue. Here was David Brooks’ mockery of it a few weeks ago. And Paul Krugman today: What we do know is [...]

By: Highgamma

Highgamma — Fri, 22 Feb 2008 16:48:29 +0000

Of course, Mr. Brooks was citing “People for the American Way,” which, last I looked, is not “Americans For Democratic Action.”

I could say that Mr. Fikes should apologize for accusing Mr. Brooks of “making stuff up” (Read: lying, a pretty bad thing), but I’m pretty sure that Mr. Fikes will give one of those left-handed apologies that doesn’t mean anything. (Oh, the levels to which discourse has devolved….)

Maybe Mr. Fikes can prove me wrong and show me that things really are “different this time”.

By: Bradley J. Fikes

Bradley J. Fikes — Fri, 22 Feb 2008 07:20:36 +0000

Brooks is sloppy with his facts. It is not true that Obama is the most predictably liberal vote in the Senate.

The Americans For Democratic Action, lists Obama’s liberal voting record for 2007 as 75 percent. 21 senators had a more liberal rating in 2007 than did Obama.

Obama scored 95 percent liberal in 2006 — but 12 senators scored 100 percent liberal.

Obama scored 100 percent liberal in 2005 — but so did 21 other senators.

It’s good to skewer Obama where he deserves it, such as backing away from his public campaign funding promise, but that doesn’t entitle Brooks to make stuff up.

By: Ben Field

Ben Field — Thu, 21 Feb 2008 22:10:31 +0000

Obama-mania moves from place to place as the campaign does. In Washington, our caucuses are over, and a lot of new democrats are busy talking about how they are going to make an impact personally. Mania, no. I was also amused by the article because it’s cleverly written, but it is based on an old premise, because no movement sustains constant excitement at all times in all places. The question is what any movement ultimately brings about. Maybe the most telling sign from this article is that David really believes the campaign is nothing but hype and rhetoric. Clinton Democrats should take notice that the demographics of their party are changing very rapidly, and Obama is at the middle of it. I wouldn’t call that “hype” or “mania.” The changes are already underway, and he’s not even in office. The “damage” is done. Skewer away.

By: Kawika Holbrook

Kawika Holbrook — Thu, 21 Feb 2008 00:04:49 +0000

One person’s “amusing skewering” is another person’s “churlish diatribe,” I guess. Personally, I find it more useful to read why someone supports a candidate rather than why he doesn’t.

By: Sebastian

Sebastian — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 22:33:11 +0000

Yeah, what happened to ‘we’re the audience now’? Fail to give us what we want, and we’ll go elsewhere.

Looks like the democratic support base has gone elsewhere.

By: Harrison

Harrison — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 18:25:19 +0000

Wow. Wow. Wow. Wow. So Obama gets more popular then your candidate, so you jump on board with a Right Winger? You have no ideals, or beliefs, you have blind allegiance to a candidate and can’t admit when you’re wrong. What’s next, posting a column by Ann Coulter to show the world how much Obama sucks?

You haven’t posted a single compelling reason (saying someone is a manager isn’t a reason) in this blog to vote for Hillary. Just acres of reasons why you don’t like Obama. Ironically, he’s the one candidate who is inspiring people and shaking things up, which is what you CLAIM you want to do! Odd.

By: Eric Jaffa

Eric Jaffa — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 17:19:24 +0000

RE: “Obama says he is practicing a new kind of politics, but why has his PAC sloshed $698,000 to the campaigns of the superdelegates, according to the Center for Responsive Politics?”

Obama doesn’t live in a vacuum. Maybe leadership PACs should be eliminated. Maybe the superdelegate system should be eliminated.

But David Brooks isn’t calling for the elimination of either of these things. He just wants to use them for putdowns of Obama.

By: Jens

Jens — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 16:46:13 +0000

The extent to which Democrats seem to be able to damage their own candidates so that the other side has a great chance of winning is amazing.

I think this is just the beginning of the real infight. I think it will come done to a few votes on August 28th, when either Obama or Hillary are voted the Democratic Party’s candidiate. Even worse, it could go down a brokered convention route.

By that time, they may well both have damaged each other so much, that McCain might have an easy game. All he needs to do right now is to sit be the side and watch, as these two damage each other.

By: buzz

buzz — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 15:07:04 +0000

It’s the system that is broken. So much money is needed to campaign, that even the most idealist of candidates can get sucked into the vortex of the system.

Obama may have had an idea of how he wanted to do things, but once he gained the momentum he was quickly shown the only way to do things – thats with buckets of money going into influential pockets, flowery speeches be damned.

By: jamesk

jamesk — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 14:56:21 +0000

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robert-creamer/to-vilify-obama-for-his-a_b_87366.html