The Politics of Hope
By Thomas JeffreyArticle Posted: Monday January 14, 2008
Nearly a month ago, this LWNJ predicted that Mike Hukabee would win the Iowa Republican caucuses and that the Democrats would place Hillary third. However, I was off on my prediction about Barack Obama, believing instead that he would trail John Edwards when the votes were finally tallied in the Buckeye State. I based my prediction on the nearly two years of preparation that the former South Carolina Senator put into building up his operation in Iowa and the strong showing he had there in 2004. But what I failed to account for, like many other pundits and talking heads, was the strong desire for change in Iowa, something more than the same old same old that seemingly every candidate offers as they “come to the middle” as they say when they are out there campaigning for votes.
Mr. Obama and his message represented something much more than politics as usual, and the people of Iowa responded. Soon after, those same pundits and talking heads began sounding the death knell for any career politicians running for president this year, stating that the country was so starved for change that Mr. Huckabee and Mr. Obama were the perfect candidates for the times, as they were the only ones that embodied the freshness and newness that the country apparently now desired.
And then came New Hampshire.
With Mrs. Clinton’s victory, as small as it may have been, the pundits through their hands into the air and cried uncle, claiming to no longer understand the same electorate that just days before they claimed to have read like so many svengalis.
And even though the outcome had many scratching their heads, with the results not at all reaching parity with the poll numbers that had predicted an Obama landslide, this LWNJ has come to believe that the same hope that Mr. Obama speaks of will more and more play a larger role in this campaign, much to the chagrin of Mrs. Clinton and the other establishment candidates.
The results of New Hampshire, for the conspiracy theorist in me, brought me back to an election night in Ohio not even four years ago, where a Democratic presidential candidate named John Kerry was predicted to win that state by a healthy margin against and incumbent wartime president. When the votes were counted, however, it was apparently not meant to be — an outcome eerily similar to the results of January 8th. So much so that Representative Dennis Kuchinch, himself seeking his party’s nomination for president, has asked the state of the New Hampshire for a recount,expressing concern that something just doesn’t smell quite right. I’m keeping an open mind.
Ladies and gentleman, as many longtime listeners of this podcast know, I am not a fan of Mrs. Clinton’s campaign for president. I simply do not believe she is what his country needs right now, when her presidency would only add to the partisan bickering and gridlock in Washington. And whether it’s media hyperbole or whether we really are witnessing history in the making, it is with trepidation that this Leftwing Nutjob watches with renewed interest the campaign of Barack Obama. And forever mindful of history, this LWNJ has just two words for the junior Senator from Illinois as he continues on the campaign trail — be careful.
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Podcast #117
By Thomas JeffreyArticle Posted: Tuesday April 15, 2008
Leftwing Nutjob Podcast, Episode 117, for Sunday, April 13, 2008
Penn hits the bricks, Iran in the spotlight again, the Obama money machine, al Qaeda’s rising star and more!