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"No really... what gives?"

As for Barack Obama, it seems more polls equates to more bad news. Once again serving up the latest hot electoral mess are Gallup and Rasmussen, among others. As we have seen previously, both Gallup and Rasmussen call the presidential race a statistical dead heat. But the real news is that Gallup now quantifies what both Democrats and Republicans have long suspected.

In a separate analysis, Gallup confirms John McCain's "significant advantage" over Obama with white males, with McCain beating Obama 55 percent to 35 percent. Among white women, the two candidates tied at 44 percent.
Democratic presidential candidates have generally done less well among white men than among white women in recent elections. But the gap between the two genders among whites is significantly larger this year than it was in 2004. In Gallup's final poll of registered voters in late October 2004, Kerry trailed Bush by 9 points among non-Hispanic white women and by 16 points among non-Hispanic white men. That produced a 7-point gender gap, about one-third the size of this year's 20-point gap.
Gallup goes on to point out that Obama's deficits among white males are more than offset by his gains (relative to John Kerry in 2004) among Caucasian females. Nevertheless, Obama's various plusses and minuses still yield a result that has him dead even with his underfunded and out-organized challenger.

So again, what gives? Maybe it has something to do with a published report from the New York Times to the effect that Barack Obama has
"yet to convert his popularity among many Americans into solutions to crucial electoral challenges."
Mr. Obama has run for the last 18 months as the candidate of hope. Yet party leaders — while enthusiastic about Mr. Obama and his state-by-state campaign operations — say he must do more to convince the many undecided Democrats and independents that he would address their financial anxieties rather than run, by and large, as an agent of change — given that change, they note, is not an issue.

"I particularly hope he strengthens his economic message — even Senator Obama can speak more clearly and specifically about the kitchen-table, bread-and-butter issues like high energy costs" said Gov. Ted Strickland of Ohio. "It's fine to tell people about hope and change, but you have to have plenty of concrete, pragmatic ideas that bring hope and change to life."

Or, in the blunter words of Gov. Phil Bredesen, Democrat of Tennessee: "Instead of giving big speeches at big stadiums, he needs to give straight-up 10-word answers to people atWal-Mart about how he would improve their lives."
But how can he? The Democrats who propelled Obama's candidacy through the primaries did not choose him because he had "straight-up 10-word answers" to anything; to be sure, he's never met a teleprompter-abetted stemwinder he didn't like. Moreover, in a world beset by complexity, his catalog of relevant experiences and accomplishments reads like something out of a "Dick and Jane" primer. And you can rest assured that even the voters who haven't been paying attention understand as much.

Four More Years!!
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On Asses and Carts

Every once in a great while, the intuitively obvious answer is the correct one. For example, if you took two schoolchildren from the same race, and stipulated that one came from a home where the parents' educational attainment and household income were less than that of the other, you would predict that the child of the ill-starred family would have lower educational outcomes that his more fortunate peer.

We also assume that factors such as a stable home environment, minimal exposure to television and having a two-parent family can impact a student's educational outcomes. Furthermore, we can rightly presume that all of these things would impact cross-racial comparisons, particularly between African Americans and whites. And indeed, we see evidence of race-based educational disparities as evidenced by the much-vaunted "achievement gap."

It's a good thing (he says tongue grafted to cheek) that Rev. Al Sharpton has distracted himself from other matters such that he can turn his attention to the education of black pupils. Predictably, Rev. Sharpton has directed his preponderance to advocate for the one thing that has been repeatedly demonstrated to have zero impact on school performance: namely, per-pupil spending (PPS). Over the weekend, Sharpton added his voice to those calling for a boycott of Chicago public schools on the first day of class next month.

Sharpton's fulminations aside, PPS has exactly no bearing on children's school performance (as discussed ad infinitum elsewhere.) Even the definition thereof is sufficiently nebulous as to account for funding of activities that are well upstream of what goes on in the classroom. Everything from plush retirements for bootlicking bureaucrats to "educational" seminars for administrative pogues to filling the hog troughs of teacher's unions with the swill of new property tax dollars can be accounted for as per-pupil spending.

And as mentioned elsewhere, if PPS had a direct impact on education, we would see evidence of improvements in academic achievement.
While not entirely surprising, the most disturbing fact is that these sorts of abysmal performance outcomes come with an exorbitant cost. According to data from the website of the Institute of Education Sciences (IES), over a relatively brief timescale - 1961 to 2003, to be precise - expenditures per pupil for primary and secondary education have more than tripled, from $2,507 to $8,468 in 2004-05 dollars. And according to the IES' Common Core of Data, for the 2004-05 fiscal year, per student expenditures ranged from $14,117 for students in New Jersey to $5,216 for Utah students, with absolutely no correlation between per pupil spending and educational outcomes.
Everywhere we look - from the Abbott districts in New Jersey, to the hardscrabble streets of South Central Los Angeles to the killing fields of Chicago - we have seen no return whatever for this level of investment in education.

I've also noted that what besets African Americans vis-a-vis education is only minimally about economics, and reflects more of a poverty of culture rather than material goods. (So as not to seem to self-obsessed, I am loathe to reference posts to that effect.) In reviewing the situation here in Chicago, a fellow blogger cites a Schott Foundation for Public Education study, and concludes that "African American males in Chicago's public schools are less than half as likely to graduate as their white peers." Dennis Byrne surmises that culture - particularly that embraced by young black males - is the predominant factor contributing to any observed gaps in achievement between the races. 
[I]f resource inequities account for the poor performance, why don't their white male, Hispanic and black female counterparts do as badly? After all, they are going to the same public schools in Chicago... Is it part of the state funding formula to somehow apportion less funding to black males? Are black males forced to use 20-year-old textbooks, while everyone else gets new ones? What precisely is there about how money is spent that mainly leaves black males so dismally out of it?

Maybe a complex of factors, other than funding disparities, explains the troubling performance of black males, and thus, a large part of the schools' problems. Perhaps the same thing that accounts for the decay of neighborhoods at the hands of black male gangs, or for the absence of fathers in the unraveling African-American family. These are symptoms of a cultural climate—corrupted by loosening morals, radical individualism, materialism, Hollywood's adulation of violence and parental irresponsibility, among other strands—that converges on African-American males in particular with all the focused and destructive force of a tornado... What is needed is not so much a change in the school funding formula, but a fundamental change in attitudes about family and society.
Even as Al Sharpton and his confederates bray for more money for their student constituents, it is curious that they never specify a dollar amount that would bring black students up to par academically with whites and Asians. The cry is always for more, with PPS serving as the perfect bogeyman to explain black underachievement. More accurately, it is a tool with which to deflect attention away from the singular shame of African Americans. As long as other races outperform blacks academically, our innate equality remains an open question. In a convoluted sort of way, Sharpton is performing a service of sorts as a champion of the idea of black intellectualism. But his "good" intentions do not make up for the fact that the cart remains before the donkey.
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In Microcosm

induction (in' duk shun) n. the inference of a general law from particular instances.

For the eleventh straight day, Gallup informs us that the 2008 presidential race continues to be a statistical (if not, as it has often been, an actual) dead heat. For its part, the Rasmussen Report notifies us that the race breaks 45 percent for Barack Obama versus 43 percent for John McCain.

Rasmussen also does us the favor of pointing out that as of today, 87 percent of Republicans intend to vote for McCain, while Obama would garner the votes of 80 percent of Democrats. But the most interesting thing that we can gather from the Rasmussen data concerns each campaign's momentum.
For the first five weeks after clinching the nomination, Obama was at 46% support each week and at 49% with leaners. Over the last four weeks, his support has been down a couple of points in both measures.

The reverse was true for McCain. He was at 40% in the poll for the first five weeks after his opponent clinched the nomination (generally at 44% with leaners). Since then, the presumptive Republican nominee has done a bit better. His support grew to the highest level yet recorded for the week ending August 3. It will be interesting to see if McCain can maintain that level of support as the Democratic National Convention approaches.

The bottom line is that Obama's lead has declined from the 5-6 point range for the first five weeks and has fallen to the 1-3 point range for the past four weeks.
Clearly, something is afoot (and Hillary Clinton knows it.)

If I may make an unwieldy segue from the facts to the truth, the problem with Obama's stalled momentum may have something to do with an observation I made last week. While I blog for sport, I work a day job to pay the bills. In said day job, I had occasion to speak with a woman named Chris (with no quotes, as this is her real name - although I should ask if that's short for Christine.) In her day job, Chris is a chemo nurse, which definitionally makes her smarter than the average bear as she is responsible for mixing and administering toxic drugs to cancer patients without causing undue injury.

Chris is a single mom to two teenagers, and has leaned Democrat for most of her adult life. On the matter of Barack Obama however, her party allegiance wavers. With no prompting from the suave Republican sharing lunch with her, she commented that "Obama's lack of experience is a problem," looking forlornly into her plate of grilled vegetables as if to underscore the point. Her other comment was to the effect that "John McCain is a good man."

And therein lie Obama's problems. First, images of Himself before slobbering Berliners aside, Americans are only able to really perceive Obama from an oblique. If we try to look at him dead-on, he disappears (or more precisely, he sublimates into a vapor under the most exiguous scrutiny.) And what we are able to see - namely, his patent lack of any discernible qualification - does not commend him to the leadership of the free world.

Secondly, Democratic smears to the contrary, John McCain is indeed a manifestly "good man." His essential demeanor is such that he cannot be painted as a religious zealot, a power-mad warmonger or a mumbling booby. McCain is everything that he appears to be, and what we see pleases us. It makes us as secure in him as he is in himself.

Liberals know as much, and they exhaust themselves trying to make reference to McCain's age (never mind the fact that 100 years ago, William Howard Taft won his presidential contest against William Jennings Bryan at the ripe old age of 51 - when the life expectancy of a white male was 49.9 years) or his computer illiteracy (as if he needs to send text messages to his BFFs in Congress.) Right-thinking Democrats are doubtless embarrassed by these affronts, and by the fact that they have settled for what Garrison Keillor would otherwise describe as "a fifty-dollar [or more rightly, a $500 million dollar] haircut on a fifty-cent head."

All of which explains Chris' electoral diffidence. It also informs the disparity in support for each party's presumptive nominee. To be sure, more than a few Democrats are less than enthused by their candidate (see NObama Network, Chicagoans Against Obama, Tom in Paine and NotFallingInLine.org for evidence to that effect.) Whatever happens in Denver and beyond will likely hinge on the degree to which Democrats like Chris acknowledge or deny their "voter's remorse."
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Daley's Machine

This video came to me through a circuitous route (i.e.: by way of The Interface via Illinois Review under the auspices of Reverse Spin with the assistance of the Boston Globe.) While the original Globe story (along with their own video) presents itself as an indictment against Barack Obama's support of federal subsidies for private entrepreneurs to build and maintain low-income housing, it is as least as much a slap to Obama for his lax legislative oversight of Grove Parc Plaza while he was an Illinois State Senator.

It also calls into question the credentials and motivations of the people with whom Obama has surrounded himself. From Valerie Jarrett, chief executive of private firm that managed Grove Parc and a senior adviser to the Obama campaign, to Allison Davis, a developer involved in the early stages of Grove Parc and a top fundraiser for Obama's U.S. Senate campaign, to indicted Chicago "wheeler-and-dealer" (and Obama fundraiser) Antoin "Tony" Rezko, Sen. Obama has encircled himself with persons of dubious intentions.

This level of overt malfeasance belies Obama's message of change, but as a life-long Chicagoan, I am not at all shocked that the politics of hope would be subsumed into the enduring realities of graft, mismanagement and general crookedness. But let's be clear about one thing; the cynosure of dishonesty in Chicago is not Obama, as he is merely the newest fool trying to play and old game. The real and present danger of an Obama presidency is that he would be another patsy for Chicago's Mayor-for-life, Richard "Baby Doc" Daley.

As it is, Daley is perhaps the most powerful mayor in America, with sock puppets operating at his behest at the local, state and national levels. Should Obama become President, Mayor Daley would be able to extend his tentacles right into the Oval Office. In as much as Jarrett and Davis, along with Obama campaign vizier David Alexrod are confirmed members of the Daley machine (and prime beneficiaries of its largess), there is no doubt that there would be a direct line of communication from the fifth floor of Chicago's City Hall to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. Again, as a life-long Chicagoan and someone who grew up not far from Grove Parc Place, I can assure you that this would not be good.
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This can't be good for the Blue Team!

While the latest Gallup poll shows Sen. Barack Obama with a three point lead over John McCain (46 percent to 43 percent), the race for the White House remains - as it has been for several days - a statistical dead heat for all practical purposes. And if Monday's Rasmussen Report is to be believed, the race is actually tied at 44 percent a piece (with John McCain slightly ahead if so-called "leaners" are counted.)

Rasmussen goes on to point out:
McCain is currently viewed favorably by 55% of the nation’s voters, Obama by 51%. That is the lowest rating for Obama since he wrapped up the nomination. Obama is viewed favorably by 83% of Democrats, 22% of Republicans, and 47% of unaffiliated voters. For McCain, the numbers are 87% favorable among Republicans, 26% among Democrats, and 61% among unaffiliated voters.
So what gives? Why is Barack Obama - as George Will inimitably described it - "dramatically underperforming?" This is especially curious given the Republican Party's season of doldrums, unparalleled Democratic fundraising and the apparent enthusiasm on the part of Americans for that ambiguity of ambiguities, change. Will and others have their assorted theories, but the common thread appears to be a recognition amongst the electorate of the staggering gulf between Obama's titanic ambition and scant accomplishment.

To be sure, there is nothing in Obama's public record to suggest that he would be able to force the levers of government in order to bring about the change that he so incessantly trumpets. As much as his supporters hope that he will bring about all good things merely by way of rhetorical flourish, for his part, Obama hopes like hell that likely voters will not trouble themselves with looking beyond carefully crafted images of buoyant adulators cheering on their conquering king.

Besides having a limited knowledge of how government actually works, Barack Obama's lack of political tenure leaves him bereft of a certain stamina of character. Simply put, Barack does not wear well; his political hide has not been seasoned for the rigors of a long campaign.
(Sen. Hillary Clinton may have swerved into a truth when she spoke of not wanting a "one-night stand" with Iowa voters, as it appears that Obama wishes that the whole thing were just about one night or one photo-op.) The more we are exposed to him, the less we like him and the more inconvenient questions we have about him.

That phenomenon may explain another result from Rasmussen polling. According to a survey of approximately 15,000 adults conducted in July, the number of Americans who consider themselves Democrats fell by two percentage points to 39.2 percent, the lowest level since January (compared with 31.6 percent who considered themselves Republicans.) Whether this is a reflection who's at the top of the Democratic ticket or more directly reflects the abysmal approval rating of the Democrat-controlled Congress is not entirely clear.

What is evident is that the Left seems prepared to spend something north of $500 million to elect a candidate who represents the political equivalent of a Ferrari Testarossa. Barack Obama is sleek, rhetorically curvaceous, and polished to a high shine (courtesy of the MSM's detail shop.) What is also evident is that Americans are beginning  to observe that the job of moving America forward is better accomplished with a sturdy pick-up truck than a sports car.
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"Oh where has my 'Berlin Bounce' gone?"

Those of us who live in the Chicago area are well aware of the left-leaning sentiments of the Chicago Sun-Times - which are especially noteworthy considering the stench of liberalism that fairly oozes from the pores of the MSN. Even in that company, the Sun-Times stands out for special opprobrium. This is the rag which, with some fanfare locally, announced that it was returning to its progressive origins.

About this time last year, former Sun-Times editorial page editor Cheryl Reed waxed thusly:
If you've been an avid reader of these pages, then you'll know you're reading history in the making. We are returning to our liberal, working-class roots, a position that pits us squarely opposite the Chicago Tribune — that Republican, George Bush-touting paper over on moneyed Michigan Avenue. We're rethinking our stance on several issues, including the most pressing issue facing Americans today: Bush's war in Iraq.
Reed's petulant tirade notwithstanding, no one who is even vaguely familiar with the practice of journalism in Chicago over the last 20 years would conclude that the Sun-Times ever left its "liberal, working-class roots." Her outburst caused caused one blogger to opine, "You cannot return home when you never moved out of your room."

All of that is prefatory to an observation made by the Times' Carol Marin to the effect that - after a concerted effort to reach out to women, particularly supporters of Hillary Clinton - women voters are not entirely embracing the candidacy of Barack Obama. Marin describes her encounter with an acquaintance after attending an Obama fundraising luncheon in Chicago on Monday.
A few hours after leaving the "Women for Obama" luncheon, I ran into Sarah, not her real name. I've known her for a few years. A single mom, she free-lances, working as many jobs as she can to support two growing boys. She dreams of a permanent gig with benefits, but it's still just a dream.

A 37-year-old Democrat, she is also a college grad and a news junkie who has watched this campaign like a hawk. She surprised me with her anger Tuesday, saying she's voting for McCain.

To Sarah, Barack Obama is like the organic chicken at lunch. Sleek, elegant, beautifully prepared. Too cool.
To be sure, "Sarah's" perceptions are hardly isolated. While Obama wows the throngs in Berlin (to negligible effect), he continues to poll just ahead (read just outside the margin of error) of John McCain among registered voters, and trails McCain among likely voters. (H/T: RealClearPolitics.) Clearly, there is a plurality of the electorate, of whom many are female Democrats, who remain nonplussed by Obama.

As much is evident from reportage by the "Bush-touting" Chicago Tribune, which informed its readers that some traditionally Democratic-leaning states in the Midwest may now be in play. Again, this is due in large measure to Obama's inability to appeal to women voters.
Michelle Brasza, a kindergarten teacher and mother of three who usually votes Democratic, said this year she can't decide whom to support.

"I feel like I don't know Obama. I feel like he just popped up out of nowhere," said Brasza, who lives in Macomb County [Michigan], the original home of the so-called Reagan Democrats and a swing section of the state. "I haven't heard of him. I think he's only been a senator for four years, if my memory is correct, and that makes me nervous."


Brasza said she is familiar with McCain from his years on the national stage and feels more comfortable with him because of his experience. "I have this little battle going on in my mind," she said.
In answer to the question of where Obama's "Berlin Bounce" went, suffice it to say that it went the way of most fleeting infatuations. I have said elsewhere that chief among Hillary Clinton's electoral obstacles is the fact that she reminds most men of their ex-wives. Barack Obama is similarly afflicted with women, in that he seems to remind more than a few of them of their ex-boyfriends. These exes were polished, handsome, well-spoken, and much like Obama himself, entirely self-centered. The Cheryl Reeds of the world may yet be unwilling to concede that Obama has miles to go before he sleeps in courting the votes of average American women, but I suspect that they will be shown the error of their thinking in the fullness of time (which as of this writing will be in about 96 days.)

Four More Years!!
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More Bad News for Barack

When I think of how Sen. Barack Obama has been doing in many recent polls, I am reminded of a lyric from an old song...

"Well they call it Stormy Monday, but Tuesday's just as bad."

That is to say, if Friday's Gallup poll results weren't bad enough news for Obama, Saturday's poll won't give him much to cheer about either. While he maintains a numerical lead of Sen. John McCain (45 percent to 43 percent), the result is within the margin of error - as it was on Friday - and the race remains in a statistical dead heat.

Which brings us to the other bit of not so good news for Obama. Another Gallup factoid informs us that six of the last nine July leaders in "competitive" races lost the November election.

Gallup "bottom lines" it thusly:

Barack Obama has consistently led John McCain in Gallup Poll Daily tracking for the past month, but by an average of only three points among registered voters. His largest lead since July 1 has been six points, although in the latest Gallup report, based on interviews conducted July 3 and July 5-6, it is just four points, 47 percent to 43 percent.

History provides no clear indication of the relationship between this narrow margin and the eventual outcome in November. The pattern that occurred in several presidential years suggests that the convention period could be crucial for either cementing Obama's slight advantage or establishing McCain as the new front-runner... If neither convention succeeds in transforming the election, the race could very well remain close right through the home stretch.
The foregoing is Gallupspeak for "If the Dumbo-eared guy isn't leading by 10 or more points in July, he's toast in November."

Oh and by the way, Gallup also lets us know that more Americans believe John McCain "can handle the responsibilities of Commander-in-Chief of the military" versus Obama (80 percent to 55 percent, respectively.)

Four More Years!!
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Comfortably Numb

It's a bit hard to believe how much consternation can be generated by a single image on the cover of a relatively obscure magazine. I suspect that most people who are concerned with "Covergate" reacted more to the image itself, and were largely unfamiliar with The New Yorker. For their part, the editorial staff of the magazine submits that they were attempting to satirize the "misinformation" surrounding Barack Obama's candidacy (nearly all of which was generated by surrogates of Hillary Clinton.)

While liberals are exercised over the New Yorker cover, Republicans are inured to this sort of leftist nastiness; conservatives take the brunt of abuse from progressives on a near-hourly basis. Moreover, we have borne witness to the scurrilous rantings of prominent Democrats directed towards Obama. Who can forget the comments of Bill Shaheen, Geraldine Ferraro, Hillary ("Spadework") and Bill ("Fairy Tale") Clinton, Ralph Nader, Andrew Young and Bob Johnson, among others?

Indeed, now is the campaign silly season when Democrats go into their circular firing squad formation, taking potshots at each other. But in this election cycle, the fratricide seemed to start earlier (see here and here) and threatens to continue right up to the DNC Convention (see the PUMA phenomenon.) The precipitating factor for all of this is Obama himself. The MSM's fawning notwithstanding, Obama will not inspire the type of celluloid hagiography that occasioned the Kerry-Edwards debacle; he simply has no story to tell.

Both elected and rank-and-file Democrats look at Obama and say to themselves "Why him?" And it is his seeming lack of what MSM-types describe as "gravitas" (such as when they openly questioned whether George W. Bush had it) that makes Obama ripe for satire. Sure, he is smooth and charismatic (and "articulate" and "clean"), but he is also double-minded. This was no more apparent than during Obama's remarks to to this week's 99th NAACP Convention.
So yes, we have to demand more responsibility from Washington. And yes we have to demand more responsibility from Wall Street. But we also have to demand more from ourselves. Now, I know some say I've been too tough on folks about this responsibility stuff. But I'm not going to stop talking about it. Because I believe that in the end, it doesn't matter how much money we invest in our communities, or how many 10-point plans we propose, or how many government programs we launch - none of it will make any difference if we don't seize more responsibility in our own lives.

That's how we'll truly honor those who came before us. Because I know that Thurgood Marshall did not argue Brown versus Board of Education so that some of us could stop doing our jobs as parents. And I know that nine little children did not walk through a schoolhouse door in Little Rock so that we could stand by and let our children drop out of school and turn to gangs for the support they are not getting elsewhere. That's not the freedom they fought so hard to achieve. That's not the America they gave so much to build. That's not the dream they had for our children.

That's why if we're serious about reclaiming that dream, we have to do more in our own lives, our own families, and our own communities. That starts with providing the guidance our children need, turning off the TV, and putting away the video games; attending those parent-teacher conferences, helping our children with their homework, and setting a good example. It starts with teaching our daughters to never allow images on television to tell them what they are worth; and teaching our sons to treat women with respect, and to realize that responsibility does not end at conception; that what makes them men is not the ability to have a child but the courage to raise one. It starts by being good neighbors and good citizens who are willing to volunteer in our communities - and to help our synagogues and churches and community centers feed the hungry and care for the elderly. We all have to do our part to lift up this country.
Apparently the conservative message of personal responsibility is good enough for African Americans, but not so for whites. Obama almost never chides white homeowners facing foreclosure for taking out risky mortgages, or young white males for staying in low-skill, easily exportable occupations. The self-evident doublespeak understandably rankles even the most die-hard liberals.  (See the Fox News Channel interview on "N-wordgate" here.)

In any event, is is crystal clear that Barack Obama's biggest political challenge is not whether people think that he is Muslim or that he and his wife give each other "terrorist fist bumps", but rather an arrogance that outstrips any demonstrated competence. Obama is presumptuous enough to believe that African Americans will vote for him no matter what he says, and that he need only appeal to (young) whites. The black community has again found itself in a position to which it has become accustomed - in possession of a freshly-renewed "chump certificate" courtesy of the Democratic Party. Sadly, conservatives are as well accustomed to witnessing that sort of thing.
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Four More Years, pt. 4

As stalwart readers will recall, over a year ago I predicted that a Republican would win the 2008 presidential race. At the time, I did not devote much attention to the then-nascent campaign of Barack Obama, except to point out that he was "little more than a cipher, a tabula rasa upon which his supporters can project their wishes and/or fantasies."

Since then - and particularly since he has clinched the Democratic nomination - Illinois' junior Senator has proven himself to worse than a cipher. By way of his frenzied efforts to overcompensate for his manifestly liberal record (such as he has one to speak of), he has singled-handedly alienated his core supporters (see the New York Times) without doing much to endear himself to those who are more typically in the
center-right
of the electorate, such as religious voters.

Among other things, it is Obama's gift for political flexibility that has led at least one contributor at the American Thinker to suggest that this could be a breakout year for John McCain, who continues to play the tortoise to Obama's hare. Kyle-Anne Shiver posits that with the advent of YouTube, "[e]very gaffe, every misstep,
every flip-flop, turn-around and attempted take-back that [Obama] utters... will be viewed by hundreds of thousands of people, who then take their impressions to the office, the diners, the bus stops, the hairdressers and the assembly lines."

She goes on to add:
Americans tend to be a forgiving lot, but each one of us has his own personal limit to the number of take-backs he is willing to allow a single person. I'm predicting that as Obama continues to morph into new positions nearly every day, that a great many voters are going to reach the limit, the point where they stop listening to this candidate because they simply stop trusting his word.

Trust is usually proffered generously, but once lost, disillusionment rarely permits its return, at least not within the confines of 113 days.


How many voters will still trust Obama by November 4th? Perhaps far less than the conventional wisdom is predicting. Time is not on Obama's side.

If anything is for certain this campaign season, it is that Barack Obama has peaked too early - and too spectacularly - as a political contortionist. The recent "Nutgate" flap is yet another concrete example of how the coalition undergirding Obama's candidacy is already fraying under the strain of supporting his titanic political ambitions. In any event, Obama's flip-flops have done him little good overall; as the latest Gallup poll data indicates, McCain and Obama are still in what amounts to a statistical dead-heat.

Four More Years!!
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Nuts to You

Having been burned by both black and white preachers, Sen. Barack Obama must be searching his now-swollen Rolodex for the name of a Buddhist monk or a Native American shaman to associate with. While at what became an "open mic night" during a taping of "Fox and Friends", Rev. Jesse Jackson expressed his desire to turn Obama into a eunuch (as seen on yesterday's Fox News Channel's "The O'Reilly Factor".)

Jackson's ire was raised by comments Obama made in regard to faith-based charities receiving government funds, and by extension (at least according to CNN), Obama's recent speeches to parishioners at black churches on the need for African American fathers to assume more responsibility for their children. As Jackson explained to CNN's "Situation Room", "
I was in a conversation with a fellow guest on Sunday. He asked about Barack's speeches lately at the black churches. I said he comes down as speaking down to black people."

And here is where we see the mental gymnastics that have sustained Jesse Jackson's career lo these many years. By suggesting that black men see themselves as fully-formed human beings having moral capacities and responsibilities - as opposed to Jackson's formulation which posits that everything that ails African Americans is entirely a result of material deficits - it is Obama who is condescending to blacks.

The irony is furthered by Jackson - ostensibly a man of the cloth - displaying the barrenness of his own moral landscape by suggesting castration as the preferred means of resolving his disagreement with Obama . We see again that the prophetic wind blows in only one direction, that is away from accountability for the behavior of the so-called prophets.

The idea that African Americans should not be held responsible as moral actors is surely not novel. It is as least as old as the countercultural Left itself. And all that besets the black community presently are as branches of the tree of moral infantilism . By continuing to propose that African Americans are plagued by problems of a material nature that can be solved by a government-enforced redistribution of resources, Jackson is as savage an oppressor as the black community has ever endured.
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"...but when Democrats do it, it's called moving to the center."

The list of Sen. Barack Obama's clarifications, flip-flops and outright prevarications is getting longer and longer. And as the campaign grinds on, the sources are becoming more varied. Beyond predictable (and by my lights, justified) critics as NewsBusters The Weekly Standard and Hip Hop Republican, Obama now faces scrutiny from reliably liberal outlets such as the Associated Press and the Washington Post.

As another service provided gratis by yours truly, I commend your attention to some of Obama's latest "repositioning statements" on the following issues:

- on "mental distress" as a justification for late-term abortion

- on Iraq (and for that matter, Iran)

- on individual gun rights

- on Jerusalem being the site of the U.S. Embassy in Israel
To be sure, this is a short list that will only grow in the weeks ahead. And while it goes without saying that Sen. John McCain has made his own contributions to the Museum of Advanced Flip-floppery, all the difference between the two rests in how each candidate's elucidations are regarded, particularly in the press. As Rick Moran noted some time ago at the American Thinker blog,
"if John McCain wins in November, he will have overcome the most incredible, one sided, blatantly biased reporting in the modern history of American journalism."
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Things that happened while we weren't looking

For someone who presumably is interested in keeping union within the Anglican Communion, Bishop V. Gene Robinson has an curious way of trying to help. Months after he expressed his desire to be a "June bride," Robinson and his longtime partner Mark Andrew held a private civil union ceremony in Concord, N.H. on June 7, 2008.

On the eve of the Archbishop of Canterbury's Lambeth Conference, Robinson's 2003 ordination - and his behavior since - will doubtless be the root of much conversation. His ordination continues to roil the U.S.-based Episcopal Church, with church bodies in Virginia splitting off from the main church to seek more conservative leadership from elsewhere within the Communion.

For their part, conservative Anglican leaders meeting at the recent Global Anglican Future Conference (GAFCON) say they will not quit the Communion, but have said that Anglicanism is not "determined necessarily through recognition of the Archbishop of Canterbury," signaling their continued dissatisfaction with the liberal cant of the Anglican Church, and a willingness to challenge what they described as a "false gospel."

As frequent readers will attest, far from begrudging Bishop Robinson his position on based upon his orientation, I am troubled by the fact that he is gratuitously antagonistic, needlessly confrontational, wholly graceless and totally tacky. Rather than yielding to any sort of Christian conciliatory reflex, Robinson goes out of his way to create controversy and draw attention to himself; indeed, he appears most gratified when doing so.

According to the Telegraph, some Anglicans accuse Robinson of conducting his ceremony prior to GAFCON and Lambeth
"in a bid to embarrass church leaders."
And despite the fact that he was not invited to Lambeth, he plans to attend "fringe events" at the conference - with bodyguards no less, noting, "I don't want to be a martyr - I just want to be a bishop."

Martyr, no - cynosure of attention, most certainly. To Robinson's reckoning, his own open homosexuality is by no means sufficient. He attempts to universalize homosexuality within the Church by claiming "[e]veryone knows we have gay clergy, gay bishops," adding, "I've probably met 300 gay clergy in the Church of England."
Of course Robinson's averments miss the point. The issue is not whether the Anglican Communion has gay clergy, but whether they - along with their heterosexual co-religionists - will abide by the practices of the church and the dictates of the Gospel, the promulgation of which seems to be of little concern to Robinson at present.

By way of his setting aside the Gospel in favor of a gospel of equalism and post-modern moral relativism, Gene Robinson has signed the death warrant for the Episcopal Church. Even as individual congregations struggle with indebtedness, scandal and schism, the larger church appears unable to provide its membership with anything resembling authoritative moral leadership. The question begged by all of this is
if the Bishop and his confederates wish to set themselves above their church and its laws, along with those of the worldwide Communion, why aren't they the ones who seek to leave and start a "Cult of Robinson" where parishioners can be governed by whatever he decides is correct on any given day.
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The Obama Effect(s), pt. 2

For better or worse, it is sometimes the case that the better part of research on a blog post is done once it is published. Such was the case with a recent commentary in this space. After noting Barack Obama's inability to "close the deal" against John McCain (a sort of electoral dysfunction that Obama has evidenced before), I surmised that Obama is a serious contender only as a result of a wholesale abandonment of any skepticism of his seemingly implausible campaign.

Thinking myself clever enough, I described this phenomenon as the "Obama effect." As I alluded to in an addendum to that post, there was at least one other previous reference to an Obama effect. Andrew Sullivan at The Daily Dish cited reporting from the Times of India that proposes that Obama
But here's a trivial observation that suggests why Obama, because of his eclectic and unusual upbringing, may be different: He's the only American leader who has been heard to pronounce Gandhi and Pakistan correctly — just like it's pronounced in the subcontinent (Gaan-dhi, not Gain-dee; Paak-isthaan, not Pack-is-tan). In other conversations, Obama has also referred to Indian success in technology fields, and drawn comparisons between his father (who came to the US "without money, but with a student visa and a determination to succeed") and the experiences of Indian immigrants.

Such empathy and "connection" to immigrants from the subcontinent is only one part of Obama's plural multi-ethnic background and wide-ranging eclectic education (American, African, even part-Asian) that makes him arguably the most unusual and exciting presidential candidate in US history — more universalist than American. (Emphasis added.)
While the TOI article concludes that - irrespective of whether Obama wins in November - India will have to "tread carefully and tread its own path," Sullivan's (and TOI's) not so subtle inference is that an Obama presidency will have the benefit of creating more intrinsic connections between Washington and New Delhi, thereby reviving the staid argument that a Democratic administration will raise America's standing in the world.

Other references to an Obama effect include everything from
"motivating folks who were previously uninterested in politics to run," to setting "a new standard of decency" in Canadian politics to his effect on small children. The most illustrative description (outside of my own) comes from Running Commentary. A post there makes reference to George Packer's New Yorker piece "The Choice." In his article, Packer recounts the afterglow of an New Hampshire Obama rally.
Obama spoke for only twenty-five minutes and took no questions; he had figured out how to leave an audience at the peak of its emotion, craving more. As he was ending, I walked outside and found five hundred people standing on the sidewalk and the front steps of the opera house, listening to his last words in silence, as if news of victory in the Pacific were coming over the loudspeakers. Within minutes, I couldn't recall a single thing that he had said, and the speech dissolved into pure feeling, which stayed with me for days.
Whatever I and others might say about any Obama effect, and however it is variously described, the common factor is that it is observed entirely beneath of the level of cognition. It both manifests itself in and depends upon a transcendental derangement from rational thought; such is the sole predicate for Obama's campaign. He intends to substitute emotion for reason, swelling rhetoric for serious discourse and nebulosities such as "hope" and "change" for policy prescriptions that might engender either hope or change. His appeal is to "pure emotion" and if we were electing a lover, he would be a shoo-in.

What I find most disconcerting about Sen. Obama's candidacy is that it seeks to engender a kind of affirmative action-like credulity that would allow a man who can't carry Colin Powell's jock strap to seriously contest for leadership of the Free World. He wants us to ignore the fact that he is African American, except to the extent that we would be proud to vote for the first black president. For my part, I am done voting for "first blacks" as my recent experience (see "Papa Doc" and "Baby Doc" Stroger here in Chicago) shows that doing so does little to improve the political or socio-economic quality of life. Rather, I will satisfy myself with voting for the most sensible candidate and hope for the best.

Four More Years!
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The Obama Effect

As seen at Newsweek's website, an Associated Press reporter asks the best question in the simplest way:
If Barack Obama's got so many issues going for him in the presidential election, from the economy to war fatigue to a national hunger for change, how come John McCain is so close to him as their race begins in earnest?
The AP's Alan Fram is not the only person to observe that Obama has been fought to a virtual draw in a race that Democrats should be winning in a walk. Gallup Poll data also show Obama and McCain locked in a dead heat. And in the bellwether states of Nevada and Texas, McCain holds either a slight lead or, as in Lone Star country, "dominates Barack Obama." Moreover, a Washington Post-ABC News poll shows both candidates are "even among political independents."

While RealClearPolitics shows Obama holding a four point lead in its poll aggregations, Fram's question resonates with Obamicans who note along with the Post that,
"at this point four years ago, Democratic Sen. John F. Kerry held [similar] leads over President Bush among all adults and among registered voters."
With five months to go until chads are left hanging in Florida and elsewhere, progressives are doubtless concerned that Obama's tenuous lead could evaporate as quickly as did Kerry's.

They may well be acknowledging the damage done by the protracted Democratic primary; the irony is that rules designed to provide for "proportionate representation" created a situation not unlike that seen in the 2000 presidential election, where the candidate who won the popular vote did not win the contest. The internecine conflict did much to further fray relations between races, genders and classes within the party.

With due cause, Democrats may also be concerned about the "Bradley effect" (as discussed elsewhere.) As they view politics through a prism of race, liberals are understandably concerned that white poll respondents may refuse to admit their covert biases. My own sense is that there is indeed some manner of self-deception that contributes to poll results tilted in favor of Obama. For simplicity's sake, we will refer to this presently observable phenomenon as the "Obama effect"

In as much as the former is to be differentiated from the latter, is is a measure of both how far America has come - and how far we must go - vis-a-vis race. Rather than denying latent racism, voters possessed of the Obama effect fail to acknowledge their own colorblindness enough to recognize that they are not racists if they do not vote for the first presidential candidate in modern times with so thin a resume of experience. (As much complicates his choice for VP, in that whomever Obama selects must shore him up in everything from foreign affairs to fiscal policy to finding the bathrooms on Air Force One.)

The verifiability of the Obama effect is manifested in its reproducibility. Whatever the merits of Geraldine Ferraro's comments on Obama's candidacy, to assert that a white candidate would never have survived "Bittergate," "Wrightgate," "Ayersgate" and the unfolding scandal involving real estate developer Antonin "Tony" Rezko is unarguable. To be sure, Barack Obama is yet in the running to be president entirely because of a preternatural forbearance on the part of the American people. Democrats must sense that to some voters, such forbearance seems more akin to enabling.

In all of his set piece speechifying, Obama has held himself up as one who has transcended race.
I can only suggest that Americans take Barack Obama at his word and embrace their own indifference to race, considering only his character and body of experience contrasted with that of John McCain. If the aforementioned polls are any indication, Americans are beginning to do exactly that.

Four More Years!

Addendum: Although I was unaware at the time, after publishing this post, I discovered a similarly titled post on Andrew Sullivan's blog. Rest assured that, other than the titles, the content is entirely dissimilar and no effort to poach from Mr. Sullivan's material was intended.
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Not Like the Others

A favorite show from my childhood had a sing-along game that asked the musical question, "Which of these things is not like the others?" Feeling a bit of whimsy, I will apply this question to the Amnesty International's latest "State of the World's Human Rights" report. To wit, which of these countries is not like the others: Russia, China or the United States.

Sadly, this is not a rhetorical question. As they have in the past, this year's AI report lumps America in with the worst of the world's human rights violators. The U.S. comes in for opprobrium because of alleged denial of habeas corpus to GITMO detainees, the death penalty, "disparities in law enforcement" directed toward minorities, and violence against women.

That no one at AI is willing to make distinctions of degree between the U.S. and other nations is indeed sad but not entirely surprising. For years now the United Nations - Amnesty's fellow traveler in denigrating Western-style democracies - has issued dozens of Security Council resolutions against Israel.
Many of the resolutions either "condemned", "censured" or "deplored" Israel or its actions, with the UN not concerning itself at all with the barbarity Israel's sworn enemies in the region.

All of this is troubling for a number of reasons. Both organizations seem to see themselves as voices in the wilderness speaking against occidental hegemony. But if AI - and by extension, the UN - cannot differentiate between nations that establish a right to habeas corpus to begin with, versus the continental concentration camps that are China and Russia (or even more virulent regimes such those in Cuba, Iran, North Korea or Zimbabwe), then neither organization can reasonably be trusted to serve as a guardian of individual rights.

Moreover, by attempting to indict the U.S. and/or Israel as their own whimsy strikes, both outfits actually serve to absolve culpable nations; if everyone is equally guilty, than everyone is equally innocent. They also trivialize the true suffering occurring in Darfur, Lebanon, Myanmar, Syria, Tibet, Turkmenistan, Venezuela and elsewhere. Indeed, the fact is that most of the world is shrouded in a Stygian darkness unmitigated by any basic human rights whatsoever. Amnesty's report suggests that the darkness of the human condition is compounded by Amnesty's own moral opacity.
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