the continuing story of the 2008 political election

[dieblucasdie]

And you're basing this on...?

Not attacking or anything, I'm just curious. Mrs. Obama's reasoning seems pretty lame to me.

Well, I mean, to its credit, this is something the feminist movement is well aware of, and there's been some serious soul-searching on the subject of intersectionality/multiple oppressions.  It's not something I think most feminists would even deny.  But to answer your question, I'm basing it on the experiences of feminists I know, stuff written by feminists (and several former-feminists who feel much the same way Michelle Obama does).

But really whether you think it's valid or not or she's overreacting or whatever, I don't think anyone denies that this is a huge issue facing the feminist community.

[elpollodiablo]

So you give up rather than try to amend things or change the discourse? Count yourself out because other people are counting you out?

That's what GYBE! do, blucas.






And I'm not denying that it's a huge issue facing the feminist community at all, I'm just saying that that statement smacks of measured political savvy more than anything else and perhaps you're being a bit of an apologist

[dieblucasdie]

Well, I mean, you could say that of anything someone in politics says or does; I doubt 90% of what comes out of any of their mouths is genuine.  Michelle Obama has been rather blunt talking about racism, though (moreso than her husband), so I'm not sure.

And anyway what I'm saying is that it's not something she made up; there's a whole community of women of color former-feminists who got fed up and stopped identifying as feminist.  And they are very much still part of the discourse.   

I mean, no one's really asking you to agree with her, I'm just trying to give background here.

[elpollodiablo]

Alright, a total apologist

[dieblucasdie]

Honestly I think *his* refusal to self-ID as feminist is totally about political expediency.  Hers I'm not so sure, maybe si maybe no.

[elpollodiablo]

I'm just effing with you brother, you no doubt know more about that statement and Michelle Obama than I ever will

[guanajuato]

you guys are krazy!

you know, now that mccain has the nomination tied up, if i was a thinking republican i'd try and mobilize a cross-over of republicans to vote hillary in these future primaries so she could win the nomination because betting folks don't like her chances against mccain.

[Andrew_TSKS]

the type of people who'd do that are too busy protest-voting for huckabee.

i'm wondering if the republicans are going to end up with something crazy happening at their convention. romney technically "suspended" his campaign rather than withdrawing, so that he's still got his delegates pledged to him. once the convention comes around, who knows? he could throw his support to huckabee and present a significant challenge to mccain. after all, huckabee keeps winning states.

[guanajuato]

i think romney came out in support of mccain when he suspended his campaign though -- if i remember correctly. i think romney only 'suspended' it because he wanted to save face, because he's planning on running next time. plus i think romney wants to perform various dario argento close-up kill scenes on huckabee.

[DCDave]

Guess who voted today.  THIS GUY.

[dieblucasdie]

Protest vote for Gravel?

[DCDave]

I do what I wanna do!

[Andrew_TSKS]

soon as i finish w/lptj and take a shower, i'm heading to the polling place myself. high fives.

[elpollodiablo]

Checked in some Obama staffers last night. Our county doesn't have much in the way of population, but it's one of the strongest democratic counties in the state.

[jebreject]

I still have a week left before I can vote for Ron Paul

[dieblucasdie]

http://www.mccainblogette.com/index.shtml

What the what!

She's totally angling for a VH1 reality show.

[Andrew_TSKS]

ok, so yahoo is calling va for obama and i'm not sure i'm reading it correctly but they may be saying he won all three states that voted today.

on the republican side, it's apparently too early to call va for huckabee or mccain.

[guanajuato]

yeah. it looks like obamania is in effect. not lookin good for the big hill.

[Thermofusion]

Nah, she'll win big in Texas + the DNC will reinstate the Florida delegates.  She'll be fine.  Obama still has the pretty difficult uphill battle of having to wrestle Ohio from her AND scrounge up enough delegates to make up for Hillary's Super Delegates.  If she gets too many of them, they'll combine to form Voltron and he'll be fucked.

[DCDave]

Nah, she'll win big in Texas + the DNC will reinstate the Florida delegates.  She'll be fine.  Obama still has the pretty difficult uphill battle of having to wrestle Ohio from her AND scrounge up enough delegates to make up for Hillary's Super Delegates.  If she gets too many of them, they'll combine to form Voltron and he'll be fucked.

Who will vote for her in Texas, specifically? Obama had 60% of all demographics today.  Also, Super Delegates will flip - They're party hacks and they're not going to keep backing someone who just lost 7 primaries in a row.  Your electoral map reading is a bit fucked.

[Thermofusion]

DCDave - massive Hispanic support in Texas for the Clintons, a state where certain Latino & Hispanic issues are a little more immediately relevant to voters.  Which is cool; I think the Clinton administration was awesome to actually view Hispanics and Latinos as people, which we've natually failed to do since then.

Eh, one more general comment:

If the polls are to be believed, Obama's got the youth vote as his trump card, though.  Having debated my ass off in vigorous, spirited political debates on a few Facebook political groups with 10,000+ members, it's really, REALLY nice to watch the tired Gen X attitude of using detached cynicism to justify political laziness give way to a new generation of politically engaged young people.

There was always a healthy medium to be found between the unchecked idealism of the babyboomers and the "all politicians are undeniably corrupt devil worshippers who'd sooner make Faustian bargains with lobbyists than even lend one ear to their constituents, so why vote in the first place?" paranoid lethargy of the Gen X'ers.  Finally, finally, people have found the middle, where it's okay to understand that most politicians kiss a little ass here and there, but most of them haven't actually sold their soul and a few of them are actually pretty amazing individuals trying to make a real change.  So happy about this.

[Good Intentions]

Dave, could you disagree with someone without stooping to insult their intelligence? At the very least what he says is in line with a lot of received wisdom, and deserves better than your condescension.

Edit: Thermo, politicians ARE spurious fucks who will reward your enthusiasm by shitting all over you.

[Thermofusion]

*sigh*

I'm not taking your bait, GI.  Again, I'm sorry I insulted you earlier in the thread.

[DCDave]

DCDave - massive Hispanic support in Texas for the Clintons, a state where certain Latino & Hispanic issues are a little more immediately relevant to voters.  Which is cool; I think the Clinton administration was awesome to actually view Hispanics and Latinos as people, which we've natually failed to do since then.

Eh, one more general comment:

If the polls are to be believed, Obama's got the youth vote as his trump card, though.  Having debated my ass off in vigorous, spirited political debates on a few Facebook political groups with 10,000+ members, it's really, REALLY nice to watch the tired Gen X attitude of using detached cynicism to justify political laziness give way to a new generation of politically engaged young people.

There was always a healthy medium to be found between the unchecked idealism of the babyboomers and the "all politicians are undeniably corrupt devil worshippers who'd sooner make Faustian bargains with lobbyists than even lend one ear to their constituents, so why vote in the first place?" paranoid lethargy of the Gen X'ers.  Finally, finally, people have found the middle, where it's okay to understand that most politicians kiss a little ass here and there, but most of them haven't actually sold their soul and a few of them are actually pretty amazing individuals trying to make a real change.  So happy about this.

She had the Latino vote until she fired her Latino campaign manager over the weekend, and some of the Latino political leaders in the Democratic party excoriated her for it.  Also, the Latino vote in Texas aren't as strong of a democratic voting block as Austin liberals or DFW/Houston Blacks, who will get mobilized by their churches.  In order to organize a successful GOTV campaign among Latinos you need to be doing bilingual GOTV work in rural communities, and even then it's a broad mobilization effort.  She might carry Latinos by 60% and still will lose the state. 

Secondarily, prominent Latino political leaders in Texas have endorsed Obama in the last week.

[elpollodiablo]

Dave, could you disagree with someone without stooping to insult their intelligence? At the very least what he says is in line with a lot of received wisdom, and deserves better than your condecescension.

Edit: Thermo, politicians ARE spurious fucks who will reward your enthusiasm by shitting all over you.

You pretty much took the words out of my mouth in both instances. The Latino vote in Texas is gonna give it to HC, is the conventional wisdom; my state is going to be a major battleground, though, so it's hard to say how it'll work out in the end.

And I most definitely agree with your second assertion as well, though I still participate for reasons that are beyond me even in my most lucid moments.