(no subject)

[brokenrecord]

I haven't posted about politics yet even though I've been following all the primaries very closely, but I figure now's a good time to ramble about what's going on.
So, part of the reason I haven't been talking about politics is because I was stuck between Clinton and Obama for a long time. I voted for Clinton in the CA primary back in February, but afterwards I was still conflicted. However, after the past few weeks, I've decided that I support Obama. I'm really turned off by all the negative campaigning Clinton is doing. I think (hope) Obama's going to be the nominee, but I'm afraid she's going to tear him down and the Democrats will be divided and McCain will win. I actually don't hate McCain, I think he's an improvement over Bush, but I still like him less than either Clinton or Obama.

I'm just really afraid about what's going to happen to the Democrats come election time, no matter who's the nominee. I feel like this election should be easily won by the Democrats after how much resentment there is about the Iraq War and the economy and the Republican party, but I'm afraid they're going to end up screwing themselves over.

The whole superdelegates thing is really freaking me out, too. It looks like Obama is going to come out on top with regular delegates, and I feel like the superdelegates should vote as the American people do. But I read this one article about one of the superdelegates (who's a Clinton supporter, what a shock) who said that the purpose of superdelegates isn't just to do whatever the people vote for. But just... that leaves me with a really bad feeling. Because I thought this was supposed to be a democratic process, but then it turns out these 800 people know what's best for the American people better than the American people do? Then again, the American people did vote Bush into office. Twice. I don't know. I just don't like it. And part of that I'll admit is that I do support Obama, and if they go by the delegates, it'll be Obama. But I think even if I were supporting Clinton, I'd feel weird about this.

I don't know. I just had such high hopes and expectations for this election. And now it just seems like everything's going down the drain and the Democrats will be stuck in this battle until August and McCain won't even have to do any negative attacks towards them because they'll tear down the party theirselves. (I must say, another thing that really turned me off of Clinton is that not only is she turning negative on Obama, but she's simultaneously attacking him while supporting McCain. She'll reference how Obama isn't ready to be commander-in-chief, or whatever, but that both she AND McCain have experience and can handle the job. Just, WHAT? Are you trying to totally screw over the party? Because even if you DO get the nomination, then you're going to have to turn around and start attacking McCain, and you're going to have all these previous remarks about him that are SUPPORTIVE of him. I mean, why does McCain even need to campaign? Clinton's going to attack the Democrats and campaign for him all by herself! He can just sit back and relax and watch everything happen.)

I also hate what's going on with Florida and Michigan. I realize that the states broke the rules or whatever and the Democrats don't want to reward them for that, but the people in the states who vote and care about the election DIDN'T break the rules. It's not their faults the primaries got moved up, they had no say. And it's only fair that they DO have a say in the election, just like everyone else. Splitting the delegates evenly between the two nominees is better than nothing, just so the delegates will have a seat at the convention, but it's terribly unfair. Just... ugh. COME ON, DEMOCRATS. THIS ELECTION SHOULD'VE BEEN SO EASY FOR YOU TO WIN! But now I'm getting the feeling like we're going to have another Republican in office for four years (I can't imagine McCain will run again. He'll be what, 75 in 2012? He'd leave office then at 79!). lakjf; this is really frustrating me.

Comments

[just-believe.livejournal.com]

I LOATHE Hillary. I'll be sorely disappointed if Hillary gets the nomination - then I won't want to vote for ANYONE.

[http://users.livejournal.com/brokenrecord__/]

I'll be very disappointed, but I'll still vote for her if she gets the nomination. I'd rather she be in office than McCain (even though I think that he, too, is a step up from Bush). But I definitely want Obama to win the nomination, and I hate how Clinton's been running her campaign, especially aligning herself with McCain.

[singingrl.livejournal.com]

They're going up against a man who finished at the bottom of his class at Annapolis! We should stop treating McCain like he's a war hero and start to tear the guy down or at least expose him for what he is. I'm actually starting to warm up to Clinton, Obama's been landing attacks on her since the beginning of primary season and I feel like it's time for her to fight back. My only gripe is that it's late and she should never have praised McCain while ripping Obama's credibility to shred. At the end of the day, one of them is going to be the nominee and those soundbites (from both candidates) are going to come back and haunt them.

What these people really should be running on is the Supreme Court. Several Justices are about to retire, someone has to appoint their replacements...God help us if it's McCain, that's all I'm going to say.

[http://users.livejournal.com/brokenrecord__/]

What sort of attacks has Obama been landing against her? I'm genuinely curious, not trying to be defensive or anything. I haven't noticed anything from Obama attacking Clinton, but I've definitely been visiting more Obama-friendly sites than Clinton-friendly, so I'd imagine that biases my view. I've been following everything really closely the past few weeks, but I wasn't paying attention as closely at the beginning of the primary season, so I may have missed his attacks against her. Her praising McCain while ripping apart Obama is what bothers me the most. I expect her to attack Obama, but aligning with McCain is going to do nothing but help him. I mean, like you said, at the end of the day, one of them is going to be the nominee, and it could very well be Obama.

Ugh, I wasn't aware that several justices are about to retire. This is going to make it even worse if a Democrat isn't in office.

[singingrl.livejournal.com]

The Obama camp basically implicated Hillary Clinton in the assassination of Benazir Bhutto. I think what bothers me most about Obama is how two-faced he appears to be. It's not so much that he openly attacks Clinton, it's that he takes former President Clinton's and her words and twists them to make them sound racist/bigoted. Take some of this with a grain of salt, but this article made quite a bit of sense to me. Here's another site that has some interesting pieces. I'm not saying you should change your preference, I'm just a little skeptical that he's as inclusive as he claims to be. He spent a few days this fall doing a gospel tour with an ex-gay gospel singer. There are just too many conflicting messages and honestly, I don't believe any one is as honest and sincere as Barack Obama purports to be. Maybe I'm just a cynic, I don't know, but I'm just really sick of the pro-Obama rhetoric. I can pretty much guarantee any Obama supporter that a vote for Obama is a vote for the status quo. He campaigned and stumped for *Lieberman* when Lieberman ran as an Independent (because the Democratic party basically gave him a vote of no-confidence) How much barn-raising has he done in the US Senate? So, yeah, I've got issues with Obama. Don't get me wrong, I have big issues with Clinton too, but I know she's corrupt. The Republicans tried for 8 years to fry the Clintons, Whitewater didn't stick, because it was essentially baseless, no one seems to remember that though.

So, when I hear Democrats spouting Republican talking points, recycled from 1998, I just feel sorry for our party. That might sound controversial...sorry.

[http://users.livejournal.com/brokenrecord__/]

I wasn't aware that the Obama camp had implicated Clinton in that. Those articles were also very interesting, so thanks for linking them to me. I don't think that Obama is perfect, and I don't expect that he's as amazing as his speeches make him out to be. I do agree somewhat that a vote for Obama is a vote for the status quo in that I don't really think that he would bring about significantly more change than Clinton would (although I could be wrong, of course). I honestly don't think their policies are significantly different. Right now I think my main problem with Clinton is just her recent alliance with McCain, since I'm really worried about the general election and I'm afraid that this is all going to play out really badly once we do finally have a nominee.

Anyways, thanks again for your comment. As I said, I've been reading a lot of stuff from pro-Obama people, and I know I've been getting a biased view of how things have been going. In any case, I am going to vote for a Democrat in the general election, whether it's Clinton or Obama, and I'm hoping what goes on between them now won't hurt whoever is the nominee come November.