Comments on Obama Clinches the Nomination

If a black Democrat man can't win an election after this horrible Republican Administration, our country is screwed.

What's that horrible sound? Oh. I guess it's the pooch screaming.

Consider that pooch screwed... Royally screwed.

....waiting for next update...

So, Dan, if in an alternative universe the opposite were true would you have said instead:
"Hey, the Democrats just nominated a white chick for president. For the first time in my adult life I’m proud to be an Ameri—oh, wait. Scratch that. It’s pretty cool, though, huh? Now here’s hoping we haven’t screwed the pooch with this historic move."?

Just curious.

@5 No he wouldn't, because that was a reference to a Michelle Obama quote. Duh.

@6 -- He could have still referred to the MO quote as it's in the context of the election and it's a well-known quote. I think the fear factor (quaintly delineated by the "screw the pooch" colloquialism) is completely appropriate for either a black man or a white women. In each case, it's wayyyyy farther out on the gangplank than the Dems have ever walked before.

Let's just hope Mr. Obama can step off the gangplank and walk across the backs of the sharks to shore.

I'm now pulling out my checkbook and, for the first time, writing a check to Obama '08.

I wonder how many times we'll hear pundits utter the words "Bradley Effect" over the next five months. I'll bet those words will become nauseating by mid-June.

Congratulations to Sen. Obama.

Interesting that the article doesn't throw up hard numbers. We know Obama is currently about 25 delegates short of tying up the nom, and that he's going to split the remaining delegates left in both SD and MT with Clinton, so he would still need some additional superdelegates to take him over the top. Given the current situation, it seems to me the so-called "private commitments" alluded to in the article have to be taken as speculative; if they were in fact actually committed to Obama, why wouldn't they have already said so publically?

I'm not counting out the probability that the requisite number of uncommitted supers will jump on the Obandwagon after these final two primaries are put to bed, but for the moment at least, the AP's presumption seems just a tad premature.

Yup, I just got my "stimulus" check yesterday (quotation marks fully intentional). Time to send my first donation to Obama.

Any bars with election coverage tonight? I want some CNN graphics with my celebratory beverages!

@12: Totes. A drink every time Hills says "I'm winning the popular vote"!

@5. Yes, I would've written something similar -- although nominating a woman move would have been *more* historic if the woman in contention hadn't have been married to a previous president, a la Eva Perone and Corazon Aquino. An American Thatcher or Merkel would be more historic—US-historic, not world-historic. We are sadly behind the UK, Germany, and freakin' Pakistan on the female-head-of-state front.

Please don't lump me in with the knee-jerk Hillary bashers. As i said throughout most of this campaign, I was for either or both. It wasn't until Hillary started working so hard to wound the man who was clearly going to get the nomination that I lost my patience with her.

I want Claire McCaskill to be our first female president, in 8 years. Time to start planning it.

From the start she was my last choice due mostly to her war vote and then her pledge to keep part 2 of DOMA. Over the course of her campaign she made it even difficult to support a VP bid for her.

Fuck— Aquino wasn't married to a previous prez, of course, but an opposition leader that Marcos crudely assassinated. Sorry about that.

Comte, they're not going to split MT and SD; Obama is going to take both by large margins. And Obama already has almost all of the remaining superdelegates lined up; and in the actual event, virtually all of them are going to vote for him, even most of the ones that previously pledged to Hillary.

The only thing that's left is symbolism: Obama superdelegates jockeying to be the one who gets the bullshit glory of putting him over the top, which ones are going to lead the inevitable mawkish tribute to Clinton, and how the vote is going to be orchestrated on the floor to give which state the pleasure of officially giving him 2118 or whatever it is. Hey, it could be us, we're close to the end of the alphabet.

Not lumping, just curious since I sort of see it the same way as #7, that either-or would be considered as pushing the envelope, even for Dems in the prudish US (especially in regards to the historic notables you cite). I guess you do too.

I guess we'll see if it results in any beastiality later. If it does, though, I really think it would have either way.

@15. Yes, McCaskill '16!

Typical comment:

@13 Obama himself used the popular vote yardstick many. many times.

Untypical quote, as I tend to focus on disagreement, not agreement, but here's the agreement side:

1. Congrats to Sen. Obama a great man and a great leader. He was right on the war, he speaks to change, he is a great orator/connector, which we need, and he ran a superlative, smart campaign.

2. Congrats and thanks to Obama supporters for being fired up, engaged and passionate.
3. I am glad he is black. This is historic and makes me more proud to be an American and a Democrat. I would not feel this bonus if he were white. Therefore, I do make a distinction based on race. I call this beneficient discrimination and I think we should be clear that yes, his race makes a difference and is a good thing.

4. I applaud him for reaching out positively to Sen. Clinton, today he is quoted as calling her an outstanding public servant. I hope she takes a breath, endorses him, and starts working for him very, very hard. It is his decision as to who should be VP. He will have time to vet and consider and not make a VP pick before the convention, I think. She will have a chance to show her bona fides by working hard for him between now and then. I hope she does. And if not chosen for VP, she should work very hard for him till November.

Unity!

#20, McCaskill does have a similar "spark" to what we saw in Obama way back during his speech the last convention doesn't she?

@21 what do you mean Obama has "used the popular vote as a yardstick" ?

Sorry, but I will continue to ridicule Clinton for at least the next 24 hrs . It will take a while for the sympathy to set in.

unPC, you asshole. Have you forgotten that Hillary began this election with the African American vote all on her side? Have you forgotten when Obama wasn't "black enough"? That all changed when you white supremacists jumped in on Hillary's behalf. You drove blacks away from her and gave Obama all the momentum. The rest is history.

It's your fault Hillary lost. It's your fault she can't even get VP. You should hide yourselves in shame at what you've done.

Thank god, we've ended the Clinton, Bush, Reagan, and Kennedy dynasties.

Now we can truly live in the 21st Century, instead of the past.

Well, that's one way to solve the "free puppy" shortage.

Don't count your donkey-lemming hybrids before they hatch, though.

The concept of Actual Sentient Humans in the cabinet, like Joe Biden as Sec of State, and John Edwards as Attorney General(!) is too much to resist. Or is it just pinko liberal me?

Thanks, (un)PC. Now let's crush McCain like a bug.

I just don't believe it yet. I'm still going to have nightmares for weeks about Hillary insisting she won the popular vote (if you keep these states and exclude these other ones for the hell of it) and announcing her independent bid, surrounded by a crowd of furious Baby Boomers who think Obama's a closet Muslim.

Please, for the love of some deity or other, just let this fucking thing end already. Please.

"@13 Obama himself used the popular vote yardstick many. many times."

The difference being that his method of counting upheld some semblance of sanity.

Odrama and his supporters can gloat all they want until November. McCain will be the next president.

You think Obama is gonna make any changes to the Washington political culture? You think he is above corporate and lobbyist influences (he supported the pork laden $345 billion farm bills) ? Think again you all naive dumb asses. And he wants to increase more taxes and spending if he becomes the prez (which he won't this year). Not that Clinton or McCain is any better.

#2, #3, #31: oh just shut the fuck up, already. Or just go to noquarterusa.net where your senseless pessimism is welcome.

Non-sequitur, much, W-o-S? Most of us are already (as if there were a choice) living in the 21st century. Don't understand how "we've ended" all those dynasties. There has only been one Clinton, one Bush, one Reagan and one Kennedy. To have a dynasty you must have a succession of rulers from the same family presumably in the same capacity, i.e. king, president. This has not been the case.

Um, RHETT? George Bush, Sr.? Ring any bells? not to mention ol' Prescott.

Two President Bushs. And I don't know how many Senator Kennedys. Or Senators Kennedy? And almost two Clintons, but unPC stopped her.

Yeah, there were two Bush presidents, but Reagan dynasty? I could see Kennedy, but they still only had some Senators and one president.

Unless he was talking about all of them as a single dynasty, which, um, if i remember correctly, there were a few presidents between Kennedy and Reagan.

"Thank god we've ended this dynasty of Washington, Adams, Jefferson, Madison, Monroe, Adams, Jackson, Van Buren, Harrison, Tyler..."

What Will was probably trying to articulate, in his usual inept fashion, is that Reagan's presidency was also Bush Sr.'s vice-presidency, meaning that a Bush has been president or vice-president for 20 of the past 28 years, and a Clinton or a Bush for all of them. 36 years of that would be too much.

Mea culpa... How could I have forgotten Poppy? So two Bushes (non-successive/non-successful administrations) does not a hedgerow make. This country has been ruled on the back of dynasties - whether in elected office or not. But the definition says a dynasty must be a succession of rulers in the same office. Picking the nit to be sure, but that's what I do. A-200 anyone?

I have no wish for Clinton supporters to act happy -- it makes sense for them to be depressed, maybe even angry. But if you feel no kind of excitement at all in Barack Obama winning this nomination then I doubt you are in any way a Democrat. You may in fact be a Republican.

After that whole flap over Michelle Obama's remark about the first time she was "proud" to be American, I thought about it and came to the conclusion that I'm with her. If Barack, or even Hillary, were to be elected, I would be proud too. I am not sure why I am supposed to be "proud to be American." After traveling the world I can whole heartedly say I am "glad to bean American" but I have often been ashamed to be an American like I can be ashamed at looking like I'm white (I'm Cherokee/Choctaw/Irish).

Can someone explain why Barack Obama is black? His Mother is white, his Father is black. And as I understrand it he was raised by his white Mother. Why does this make him any more black than he is white? Just truly curious. This may be one of those times where the description “person of color” is actually more apt. Admittedly, I may not be able to understand either description as I am not a person of color, and therefore I must by default be a colorless person. Anybody have a good explanation? And since we seem obsessed by the color of his skin to the point of paying almost no attention to the fact that his voting record is to the left of a Socialist (Bernie Sanders), perhaps this would be a good time to note that his lips are actually sort of purplish-blue. It may be time to ask the question, is America ready for a president with blue lips?

Your Average Colorless Person