I’ve just recently discovered your blog–and I think it’s great. Thanks for promoting thought-provoking and feminist dialog. :)

Also, I’m pretty sure that Obama’s blood is red just like the rest of ours. *rolls eyes*

By the way, for all the bigots out there of all kinds, Barack Obama is actually of mixed race, with a white mother and black (African from Kenya) father. It doesn’t really matter to me, since I’m mixed too, but some folks find blood of this color to be a positive and that color to be a negative–he’s got both.

I’m sure that those racists are other people, though. Not the ones telling us to not vote for Obama because he’s black, but the ones who . . . uh, are telling us to not vote for Obama because he’s black?

Of course these things are of genuine concern, and the Dems should be thinking about how to handle the attacks now. But they’re also a bit of a self-fulfilling prophecy, and hardly the way to make voting decisions. If the polls are wrong, we’ll find out soon enough, when people all across the country get into their voting booths in the next month or so, now won’t we?

Voters act very differently in the privacy of the voting booth than what they tell public pollsters.

The Dems would be mad to nominate Obama: not only would the Repubs eat him alive for his total lack of experience, but white voters in the crucial states wouldn’t vote for him, regardless of what they tell the polls.

The allegation that Obama has no qualifications to be president (only a federal Senator for 3 years – compare that to JFK’s 8 or Warren Harding’s 6) will not be a smear, it will be a fact, and the Repubs will flog it for all it’s worth. That, on top of the Bradley Effect and the racist campaign the Repub grassroots will run, would make Obama’s job very difficult, whatever the polls say now.

And actually, Obama has the longest record in public office when compared to both Clinton and Edwards. I agree with you that Obama’s policies are more rhetoric than actual plans, but I do think that will change somewhat once he wins the nomination. It also doesn’t seem to be bothering the people all over the country who are placing him first in the primary polls.

You’re also right that the Republicans will run a racist campaign if Obama gets the nod. But here’s a clue: the Republicans always run a racist campaign. And do you think they won’t run a sexist campaign if Hillary wins? And that they won’t run just a plain old dirty, deceitful campaign like they did to bring down Kerry and Gore? Because they’re all white. There are more than enough overt racists out there — I write about them regularly. I also try to not make my political decisions based on what racists think.

It now appears that he may well be able to beat Clinton and bluff his way to the nomination, but if he is nominated the Repubs will absolutely eat him alive, particularly if they have enough brains left to nominate McCain, a man percieved by many as having real substance and integrity and with a distinguished personal and political record. Not only will the Repubs quite legitimately be able to attack Obama for his non-existent record and experience, and for the shallowness of his policies, which are mostly just slogans, they will also run a covert racist campaign that will undermine his support everywhere except on the liberal coasts.

Given Bush’s record, the Repubs ought to be heading for a massive defeat in November, but the Dems might just have found a way to lose again – by nominating a candidate with zerocredentials to be president and massive vulnerability to the kind of dirt campaign the Repubs do so well. It’s hard to credit, really.

(and it’s only January . . . !)