Arkansas Blog

>>Obama got about 80 percent of the black vote, which accounted for more than half of all voters. He got 25 percent of the white vote.<<

The "hip" commentary story line leading to South Carolina in Time and on CNN.com was that the media had it wrong. Voters won't break along racial lines the way conventional wisdom suggests. Four out of five black voters in South Carolina voted for the black candidate. Three out of four white voters there went with white candidates.

Looks like those "the media is wrong" stories were uh wrong.

Frank Rich says, "There's little more transparency at 'Little Rock's Fort Knox' than there is at Giuliani Partners."

See, that's the problem. And when people contributing to the Times blog shrug their shoulders and write "Yawn" when discussion of The Problem arise, they're contributing to the problem. Or when they treat the electoral process like a football game rather than a serious and much-needed discussion of the future of the nation--a game to be won by brute strength or pulling rabbits out of a hat at the last minute....

Arkansas is the problem in miniature. We're a state in which people claim to be Democrats, but can be counted on to endorse Republican "values," over and over again. We're a state where, when people push for open discussion of the underlying issues that demand discussion if we're to have a brighter future, the movers and shakers simply write "Yawn." Or worse yet, they "politely" change the subject. They refuse to engage the issues.

We are not a transparent society. We are a society in which a few movers and shakers determine just about everything for the rest of us. And when those same movers and shakers profess to be value transparency, inclusivity, justice--but thwart all open discussion of those concepts and what they mean, concretely, in our lives--people WILL look for alternatives.

In such circumstances, people will see the untested new as more attractive than the tried old, particularly when there are big gaps between what the old regime professes and how it behaves.

It's time to give young folks in our country a chance to have a future. Though I have some significant questions about Obama (and have posed them on this blog), I'm with Caroline Kennedy when she says in today's NY Times, He [Obama] has built a movement that is changing the face of politics in this country, and he has demonstrated a special gift for inspiring young people - known for a willingness to volunteer, but an aversion to politics - to become engaged in the political process."

Um, Muddling, I enjoy your analysis and commentary on a regular basis. That said, you read WAYYYY too much into my comment of "Yawn" on the Beth Arnold article from the Huffington Post. Take a deep breath. I would vote for ANY of the current Democratic hopefuls. Personally, I do prefer Hillary to Obama. But my comment merely reflected on the article itself, and its whole "I knew the Clintons once, but no longer" tone. As another poster pointed out, just who exactly would pay Beth Arnold for a pro-Hillary article, except the Clinton campaign?
So I appreciate your passion and enthusiasm, but don't EVER take my "Yawn" to mean that I don't care or don't actively participate in the political process. I'll try to extend you the same courtesy.

If it's about winning the White House back from the likes of President Shit for Brains, I'll choose the winning Clintons over losers like Kerry. I'll be tickled pink with either Hillary or Obama; but I don't think Obama can win against the Republican Machine in 08. If he's really all about unity (and I think he genuinely believes the stuff he says), he'd welcome a chance at the VP slot IF he doesn't win the nomination. If 'they' do a fair job, he'd eventually be a shoe-in for the Presidency.

Monkeyboy is the WORST President I've witnessed and whose poll numbers are pathetic. So those Dems who couldn't displace him in 04 have as much campaign credibility as Bill Kristol has WMD credibility. (On second thought...Kristol has no credibility PERIOD.)

Maybe we need to get out of Hell before we start dreaming about Heaven.

"Arkansas is the problem in miniature. We're a state in which people claim to be Democrats, but can be counted on to endorse Republican "values," over and over again."

Posted by: MuddlingThrough

You said it, brother. (And I'm not talking about Mrs. Frankweiler's yawn here.) I know many, MANY people who seem to vote blue or red, just because their parents do, or because their church people or work friends do. Or just because they always have. They go to the same old watering troughs (Ark. Democrat, 3-letter network news, Fox, whatever...) for their news and information and they just lap it up. Going to the polls to them is like going to the barber shop they've always gone to to get that flat-top crewcut, just like they always have. And they are so self-satified that they are "engaged in the process", and that they are really "on top of politics".

I was precisely the same way until the internets came along and I learned that most of those media watering troughs are owned by the same handful. I was dismayed one day a few years ago when I went over to my parents' house (they're 80-ish now) and they had FOX NEWS on the tube. Ye Gods!, I said. "Don't y'all know that's not real?" They hadn't a clue.

I don't consider myself politically savvy by any stretch, but I'm worlds ahead of where I was when I believed everything I read in the papers or saw on the evening news. I'm grateful we have more options nowadays.

It's the hypocrisy of Bill Clinton that upsets me most of all re his war slamming of Obama.. Obama wasn't able to vote since he wasn't a senator during the AUMF vote.. That would be a fair place to work in a jab (low experience.. no record of making tough decisions in tough times etc..) .. But both Bill and Hillary have lots and lots of innocent blood on their hands. And both Clinton and Obama have not fought the good fight towards ending needless war and torture.. simply put.. their votes to continue funding it all each year is bad enough.

Bill Clinton is a war criminal for what he did during his presidency in Iraq.. and Hillary didn't even read the NIE before she voted to send Bush and Cheney back into our ongoing 18 year Iraqi nightmare. Bush and Cheney took it to another level because they lied about it and are still lying about it..

The point being.. We the people have to quit knowingly electing people who intend to be war criminals if we are at all interested in true national security in the short or long term... much less interested in our own morals or basic human decency... and we can't keep borrowing trillions for needless war forever.

We wont be able to stop our addiction to genocide if we keep electing the same people expecting different results.. Hillary is as establishment neo con as Bill, Dick Cheney, Joe Lieberman, John McCain or Mark Pryor.

Odds are Obama will be too... but we don't know it for sure.. Any slight possibility of change is better than repeating our genocidal sins over and over again.

If we don't realize this and understand very clearly that the rest of the world not only thinks much the same way and they are watching us much more closely than we are watching ourselves.. we will be in for a very rude awakening on many levels.. none of which are pretty.

The Republicans have done an outstanding job of co-opting the Values Market and making Liberal a dirty word. Which helps me understand why such a valueless gang continually rolls over more ethical and middle-class championing Democrats. And why obviously Democratic people support an Ideology that is the antithesis of their day-to-day lives (aka my relatives). Clearly the Repubs have a much better PR Department.

Maybe I'm just more jaded than you, eureka (if my family could see that line ha), but I thought every politician played fast/loose with their opponent's record; I thought it was 'Politics.' Plus I am paranoid after the last two elections. I can't stay sane through another Republican warmonger/Constitution destroyer.

But you're absolutely right about Hillary's Warmongering. She can parse words all she likes and it doesn't change the reality that she and her fellow Dems enabled Monkeyboy's carnage/torture/etc.

Zelda, We have to admit our own parties failings, culpability, where it fits. I think it fits in the half our members re war mongering and destruction of our constitution and rule of law, especially with Clinton and their DLC loving buddies.(only 34 senators, all D's voted correctly last week re PAA/FISA) which shows once again precisely what D senators are as determined to destroy our constitution as all Republicans... neither Clinton nor Obama have shown up for at least the last two votes on this crucial issue.

I think Bill helps the neo con ways with his hypocritical attack on Obama on this point and he destroys real honest positive discussion in the D party. Both Bill and Hillary due to their past are the best protection for Bushco's crimes.. because they all have blood on their hands.. thus they will keep it up rather than end it and or risk allowing us to take a look at our actions in detail or hold anyone accountable. We cannot stop or prosecute war criminals while simultaneously, consistently, electing them in either or both parties.

If Bill and Hillary can keep the details from being discussed.. they win.. America and the world looses.

i agree that bill needs to shut up some. as to the library , have the names at the bush or regan librarys been released yet? this seems like standard practice. why the rush for this one. the bush is where george is hiding his governors papers in texas. hillary needs to look more like she is the candidate and not relying on bill. he can't resist a camera as we all know and has an opinion on everything but he needs to learn to go to the background immediately. if the voters don't recognize that hillary is the one that is going to be president then they may do a frank white on her.

I apologize if I read too much into your comment, Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler. I suppose if I am impatient, it's with the way we keep promising to talk--really talk--about the issues.

And then we don't.

The rabid right have made race and gender into monstrous issues for all of us, fractured divides that we walk over as if walking across broken glass shards. They're watching in glee as the Democrats tear themselves apart over these issues.

And yet we have no choice except to talk. To the extent that we prescind from the issues, we play right into the hands of the rabid right, who claim that we are only paying lip-service to these (and other) issues.

Obviously, one of the things I'm most impatient with in my own state is a culture of pretend transparency, openness, hospitality, which we belie by refusing to open up to public inspection many of the ways we resolve conflicts, many of the ways we allocate power. We don't talk about how our hospitality, genuine and warm-hearted though it be, has so many limits. There has long been a racial limit to whom we welcome into our homes or churches.

We all know this, but it remains the elephant in the living room. And even as the churches (and Huckabee!) claim to "repent" of the ugly unwelcome shown by white churches to black Christians a half century ago, those very same churches refuse at all to talk about the precisely similar unwelcome shown by churches to gay Christians today.

A case in point: Hilary Clinton's own church, the United Methodist Church, is gearing up for its national meeting this spring. Every indicator shows that, yet again, the UMC will hotly contest the issue of welcoming gay believers.

And every indicator shows that, just as in the several past national meetings where the UMC bickers over this issue, "ex-gay" advocates will be allowed to address the national assembly while openly gay Methodists will be excluded. Gay people will be talked about, but will not be present for the deliberations about their future, to speak for themselves.

As this happens, UMC state conferences in some areas (the Carolinas, FL) are about evenly split over the question of whether gay members can even be ADMITTED to the church.

These issues need to be discussed. I applaud Hilary Clinton for discussing the issue of gay teen suicide this past week. I applaud her for saying that the primary issue for gay teens is believing that anyone really cares about, accepts, and loves them.

But I'd be more heartened by her rhetoric (and, yes, Obama's) about such issues if they then went the next step and became outspoken advocates within the hearts of their own faith communities for greater justice to match the rhetoric of love, compassion, and inclusion.

Here in Arkansas, this would mean the world of difference for LGBT young folks. We are a land of churches on every corner. No social institution holds more influence in our state than the churches.

We have a lot of work to do to renegotiate race and gender (and the gender-related issue of sexual orientation) in our nation and our state. That renegotiation requires talking--openly, honestly, with full transparency and accountability.

I appreciate your shared concern for this, and apologize if I misinterpreted your remark.

The media/Republican narrative was confirmed by last night's exit poll results. It was on CNN. I even linked to it in the primary thread.

By all means, I hope Clinton continues to be a tremendous asset to his wife's campaign. With assets like these, who needs opponents?

Now that Obama`s political patron Tony Rezko is under indictment. It will be interesting
if Obama is proved to be just another corrupt Illinois Politician. Since Abe Lincoln, Illinois hasnt
been able to produce very many honest public officials.

What concerns me in a nutshell;

We may be nominating the most inexperieced candidate in our field, although a bright political future, no one can say Obama will hit the ground running - he'll be doing some on the job training... and how did that work out for us in the last 7 years?

and the Thugs

will probably hold their noses and nominate McCain, the most experienced candidate in their of field.

So we, the democrats will be beat to hell and back because our candidate is inexperienced, and they'll have no problem throwing Junior under the McCain train, saying our times are too dangerous to have a President that needs on the job training. McCain is a hero and has experience.

They've been consolidating power, building multi-million dollar corporations, no bid contracts and filling goverment jobs with republican yes men and clones...does anybody think that they'll not do "anything" to win? They will not throw away 25 years of power and money on the whim of us pesky voters...

We're gonna need an organization and a candidate that will, if they must, go nukaler on the McCain or Romeny - not sure our man is Obama.

I have nothing against Barack Obama and will be happy to vote for him if he is the nominee this November....I mean it...happy as a little clam! But politics is dirty business and anyone who has climbed thru it to the top already has some kind of blood on their hands. While we all want a Saint in the White House, it's like expecting the madam of the largest whorehouse to be a virgin.

I'm sure our Republican friends will dig up every bit of dirt to be found on Obama and by the end of the primaries we'll know he ain't no boy scout. I'm prepared to live over it. Being an adult is messy business, being an adult on the political fast track is very very messy business. I am just not willing to help the Republican Swiftboaters do to the Clintons what they did to John Kerry. Imagine trashing the Clinton record while we wallow in the misery of the still running Bush record. Imagine a draft-dodger managing to make a purple heart the symbol of cowardliness? I won't stand by and watch the same thing done to the Clintons! Or John Edwards! Or Barack Obama!

Barring another blowjob, the Democrats have the next election in the bag! The surge in Democratic primary voters prove it's landslide time this November no matter who we nominate. Pretending the Republicans have a chance is dishonest. It's just another rightwing ploy to confuse the voters. Though we must realize Cheney-Bush can stop the next election with a staged 9-11 Jr., and you're a fool to think they wouldn't do such a dastardly thing, they kill daily without losing a wink of sleep. This isn't high school elections, it's for all the power, all the wealth and the future of the world, so quit expecting polite, bloodless campaigning on anyone's part. Some people will kill ya for 5 bucks, Cheney-Bush will kill millions for the chance to steal another 5 bucks.

It's been pretty quiet since Reagan took a bullet. We've been lulled into an idea that everyone's civilized. We can't be bothered to take to the streets to protest the loss of our rights, the loss of our honor, the loss of our dignity. The bad guys know we're dull and lazy...ripe for takeover. They're halfway home already......expect the worst in the next few months, don't waste your time believing Bill is kicking sand at Obama. The shadow of a giant boot is hanging over America as I type. The American Dream is almost extinguished.

Between now and Christmas our fate will be sealed. We're fighting WWII & 1/2 minus the tanks, guns, and planes. It's a dead serious time to be alive and we need to cut thru the crap and focus on what could be the final chapter unfolding ahead. If we don't defeat the Republicans and the Republican sympathizers like Mark Pryor our children will live in misery. Wake up! Be mad! Be loud! Don't die rared back in your Barcalounger! Clinton-Obama '08

You blacks, you may come up on the porch and have lemonade, but the democrats (bill and hillary) will never let you in the house, but go and get me a cold glass, and i'll feel your pain.

I don't care which Dem makes it to the Porch...as long as one of em can get into the White House. Rove/Cheney have been holed up there for eight years so you can bet entry isn't going to be as easy as we'd like to think.

Many good comments and I enjoyed reading all of them.

Sure the R's have had better PR departments. But it's no longer PR. It's Frank Luntz with his dial-groups evaluating every word and phrase that comes from their mouths and shaping it to seem like something else. That's how they get average working people to vote against their own interests. They have-with your money- "reframed" all issues and arguments. They have turned the tables:

"For years the Democratic candidate was the one that smiled; the Republican candidate was the one that was angry. And all that began to change in 1994, and finally came to fruition in 2000. Now it's the Democrats who are angry and the Republicans who are hopeful."
Frank Luntz

Slowly but surely governments (fed, state, local) have been used to shift the flow of tax receipts to the upper classes in accellerated ways while making it appear that the people are getting a benefit.
Outsourcing is nothing new except now the contractors are getting 5x of what government could do it for from embassy security to Medicare administration. We have our own Lords' Ranch who must love government spending while professing to support candidates who profess lower government spending. That's the pea-shell game few are watching.

But the jesus show-values stuff is about over as I predicted two months ago. It's now who can straighten out Cheney's mess and likely one of their own can't hold much of a claim. Since McCain was clearly not a full-time Bush butt-boy he has a chance but not as much as Romney who is the likely nominee.
Billary knows this much better than any of us. It's just getting a Frank Luntz to shape the dials. Bill can't do it alone.

"But the jesus show-values stuff is about over as I predicted two months ago."

I really do hope so, elwood, and I agree--for the most part.

Still, look at how the Jerry Cox contingent are once more dragging out that tired old gay adoption crap. What's perhaps most disturbing about this is that they count on appealing to the basest instincts of Arkansans to get the vote out one more time for the Republicans. They count on us to be stupid, not to see through their flim-flam.

Ugly, cynical, deeply anti-Christian, and insulting to the people of Arkansas....

The right doesn't really know where to turn now. We can't openly admit that we're racist, though we will gladly pull the all-white lever in the inner sanctum of the voting booth. Even being misogynist is going out of fashion, as an openly acceptable prejudice, though Lord knows, misogyny is alive and well across our land.

The anti-abortion movement is losing steam, given that the numbers of abortions are going down. It's interesting to watch the dismay of many on the right at this development, which they've claimed is one of their main goals for some time now. They're losing a juicy good wedge issue there.

What's left? Gay marriage and gay adoption, of course, which really means gays, period. In much of the nation, though, people are waking up to the fact that they've been played for fools re: that issue. As the Republicans have cynically manipulated homophobia, they've robbed us blind, while telling us they're protecting the sanctity of marriage and safeguarding values.

It's time to turn the focus to the economy, the war in Iraq, and at the same time, to be honest about these wedge issues, which the right wants to keep putting on the table. It plays into the hands of the right when we stop discussing those issues.

But if we want to be more than defensive--and the Democrats desperately need to stop being only defensive--we have to turn the tables and make those other value-laden issues of the economy, healthcare, the war, torture of prisoners, violation of civil liberties, and lying over and over the central issues of this election.

It's about finding a way to hope for the future of our nation again. This may well be our last chance.

Way too many long posts to read.

Nevertheless, I get the impression that the once wonderful Frank Ritch is now off limits.

Hard to keep up with this adolescent journalism judging.