Watching MSNBC’s coverage of the Democratic Convention, one thing is clear — there is way too much down time for the talking heads, who insist on talking and talking and saying nothing. Ugh.
Tag: presidential election
Obama no longer Biden his time
Barack Obama is a liberal centrist — always has been. In fact, the Democratic primary featured just two candidates who could not be characterized in that way — the progressive Ohio Congressman, Dennis Kucinich, and former Alaska Sen. Mike Gravel, who cannot be categorized.
So the short list of vice-presidential candidates — and the eventual choice of Joe Biden — fits within the world view of Barack Obama.
Biden offers several pluses on the electoral front, as all the pundits point out: He is willing to go on the attack and he has long experience in foreign affairs, Obama’s weakest area (experience-wise).
And there are negatives — speaking his mind sometimes means speaking to much.
(TPM Election Central has the most interesting take on the Biden pick.)
What I find interesting, however, is the impact that Biden could have on governing. He offers Obama someone who is respected in the Senate, who has a history of working across party lines (with arch-conservative Jesse Helms, for instance), but who is not afraid to tangle with the GOP, to battle for what he believes in.
In the end, however, Obama’s choice will matter little. The election will not hinge on the choice of Biden — orMcCain’s eventual choice — but on the candidates at the top of the ticket.
Attacks and responses
Josh Marshall offers an interesting take on the GOP strategy of attacking Democratic presidential candidates that seems to make sense. The gist is that the substance of the attacks is not important — only plays to the committed conservative — so much as the attack itself and the response it engenders. A poor response creates the impression of a weak candidate, which dooms the candidate in the mind of voters.
More on race and the race
Just to add an exclamation point to my earlier posts and column on race and the race, check out this Reuters piece posted on The Raw Story:
Elements of Obama’s biography including the fact that his father was from Kenya and he grew up in Hawaii make him seem strange to some voters, said David Leege, emeritus professor of politics at the University of Notre Dame in Indiana.
Other factors making it harder for Obama were reservations about his race and concern he would use presidential powers to favor African Americans over whites when distributing government resources, Leege said.
In recent elections, nearly 20 percent of voters were susceptible to subtle appeals to race, though a smaller percentage were repelled by those kinds of appeals, Leege said.
“The reason the polls are close is partly because of the sense of antagonism that Obama might serve interests other than white interests and the doubt about: ‘Should you really take a risk on someone who is very different from us,'” Leege said.
The McCain health tax
Matthew Yglesias comments today on something that really deserves far more attention than it is getting (actually, it has gotten almost no attention…): John McCain’s plan to tax our benefits. As Yglesias points out,
at the moment compensation you receive from your employer in the form of money is subject to income tax, but compensation you receive from your employer in the form of employer contributions to health insurance premiums is not taxed. McCain proposes to change this and start subjecting those benefits to taxation.
He quotes James Kvaal, who says that
McCain’s plan “would tax workers’ health benefits, which are largely tax-free today,” thus increasing the amount of tax people need to pay, which is a tax increase in any common sense understanding of the term.
It’s not just that McCain wants to tax workers’ health benefits, which is, no matter what the McCain campaign says, a tax on middle-income people at a time that he wants to cut taxes for the rich. He’s also making healthcare less affordable for working people at a time when too many people in the United States are uninsured or underinsured.
Hank Kalet 