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"The pundits like to slice-and-dice our country into Red States and Blue States; Red States for Republicans, Blue States for Democrats. But I've got news for them, too. We worship an awesome God in the Blue States, and we don't like federal agents poking around our libraries in the Red States. We coach Little League in the Blue States and have gay friends in the Red States. There are patriots who opposed the war in Iraq and patriots who supported it. We are one people, all of us pledging allegiance to the stars and stripes, all of us defending the United States of America."  Barak Obama U.S. Senator from Illinois.

"Obama, who will be 47 in 2008--one year older than Bill Clinton was in 1992--sounds increasingly like someone who is considering a run. And if he isn't, he should."    Ryan Lizza is a senior editor at The New Republic. "The case for running now is not that it is the perfect moment for him to run. It's not.  It is just that it may be the best chance he will ever get."

If not now…, when will we have the next chance to win?   I am being practical.  Pragmatic.  When people ask about Barak's record, they may be asking the wrong question.  The right question is do we really want to lose the presidency in 2008? Do we want Hillary Clinton or some other Bush apologist to lose an election we must win? What did Clinton do before he was elected?  He was virtually unknown a year before he was elected. What got him elected was brilliance,  charisma, and the populist message he delivered. All Bush did before he was elected was fail in business and fail in running the state of Texas. Fortunately or unfortunately, elections are about who wins. Barak Obama has intelligence, charisma, and is running on a populist agenda which can rally the troops, enlarge the tent, and win the election. That is how Clinton won... twice. When Barak's basic intelligence, clean record, and capacity to move voters, are joined by a cadre of seasoned advisors, savvy strategists, and union solidarity... he can turn this country around. And the question remains, Do you see a more viable candidate? Read some of his ideas below...   And listen to him speak... http://www.writingresource.org/obama.html http://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/convention2004/barackobama2004dnc.htm Then tell me who else you think has a chance in hell of beating John McCain, the guy who surrendered our habeas corpus while playing kissy-face with George. There is a reason the right wing pundits are encouraging Barak to run and "lose," it is because they are terrified that he will run.... and win big. Timothy Flanagan, editor of The Wordsmith Collection

"The man more and more Democrats are putting their hopes in is Obama, the junior Democratic senator from Illinois whose new book is being released this week in what many see as a first gentle toe-dipping into the presidential waters. (Obama is on the cover of this week’s Time magazine; you can read an excerpt of his book here.) Whether Obama should start a presidential campaign now, after just two years in the Senate, is not a simple question—Ezra Klein made the argument against it here, while I detailed some arguments in favor here."     The Obama Zeitgeist  Paul Waldman

If not now…? tim | Uncategorized | Monday, October 30th, 2006    Hope for the future    Senator  Barack Obama stands for public education, health care, civil rights, economic growth, jobs and support for working families.  He is a bright, articulate, charismatic Illinois state senator who  works passionately for civil rights, ethics reform and criminal justice.   If not now, when?     http://www.WritingResource.org/obama.html Comments (1)

Democrats must capitalize on recent election victories   The Brandeis Hoot, NJ - Nov 17, 2006 ... Barak Obama. Like Bill Clinton before him, he has the support of the feverous American youth, but he also has a name recognition that Clinton never had before ...

"Like so much of the American story, once again, we face a choice. Once again, there are those who believe that there isn’t much we can do about this as a nation. That the best idea is to give everyone one big refund on their government—divvy it up by individual portions, in the form of tax breaks, hand it out, and encourage everyone to use their share to go buy their own health care, their own retirement plan, their own child care, their own education, and so on.

In Washington, they call this the Ownership Society. But in our past there has been another term for it—Social Darwinism—every man or woman for him or herself. It’s a tempting idea, because it doesn’t require much thought or ingenuity. It allows us to say that those whose health care or tuition may rise faster than they can afford—tough luck. It allows us to say to the Maytag workers who have lost their job—life isn’t fair. It let’s us say to the child who was born into poverty—pull yourself up by your bootstraps. And it is especially tempting because each of us believes we will always be the winner in life’s lottery, that we’re the one who will be the next Donald Trump, or at least we won’t be the chump who Donald Trump says: “You’re fired!”

But there is a problem. It won’t work. It ignores our history. It ignores the fact that it’s been government research and investment that made the railways possible and the internet possible. It’s been the creation of a massive middle class, through decent wages and benefits and public schools that allowed us all to prosper. Our economic dependence depended on individual initiative. It depended on a belief in the free market; but it has also depended on our sense of mutual regard for each other, the idea that everybody has a stake in the country, that we’re all in it together and everybody’s got a shot at opportunity. That’s what’s produced our unrivaled political stability.

And so if we do nothing in the face of globalization, more people will continue to lose their health care.
....

More companies like United Airlines won’t be able to provide pensions for their employees. And those Maytag workers will be joined in the unemployment line by any worker whose skills can be bought and sold on the global market.

So today I’m here to tell you what most of you already know. This is not us—the option that I just mentioned. Doing nothing. It’s not how our story ends—not in this country. America is a land of big dreamers and big hopes.

It is this hope that has sustained us through revolution and civil war, depression and world war, a struggle for civil and social rights and the brink of nuclear crisis. And it is because our dreamers dreamed that we have emerged from each challenge more united, more prosperous, and more admired than before.

So let’s dream. Instead of doing nothing or simply defending 20th century solutions, let’s imagine together what we could do to give every American a fighting chance in the 21st century.

What if we prepared every child in America with the education and skills they need to compete in the new economy? If we made sure that college was affordable for everyone who wanted to go? If we walked up to those Maytag workers and we said “Your old job is not coming back, but a new job will be there because we’re going to seriously retrain you and there’s life-long education that’s waiting for you—the sorts of opportunities that Knox has created with the Strong Futures scholarship program.

What if no matter where you worked or how many times you switched jobs, you had health care and a pension that stayed with you always, so you all had the flexibility to move to a better job or start a new business? What if instead of cutting budgets for research and development and science, we fueled the genius and the innovation that will lead to the new jobs and new industries of the future?

Right now, all across America, there are amazing discoveries being made. If we supported these discoveries on a national level, if we committed ourselves to investing in these possibilities, just imagine what it could do for a town like Galesburg. Ten or twenty years down the road, that old Maytag plant could re-open its doors as an Ethanol refinery that turned corn into fuel. Down the street, a biotechnology research lab could open up on the cusp of discovering a cure for cancer. And across the way, a new auto company could be busy churning out electric cars. The new jobs created would be filled by American workers trained with new skills and a world-class education.

All of that is possible but none of it will come easy. Every one of us is going to have to work more, read more, train more, think more. We will have to slough off some bad habits—like driving gas guzzlers that weaken our economy and feed our enemies abroad. Our children will have to turn off the TV set once in a while and put away the video games and start hitting the books. We’ll have to reform institutions, like our public schools, that were designed for an earlier time. Republicans will have to recognize our collective responsibilities, even as Democrats recognize that we have to do more than just defend old programs.

It won’t be easy, but it can be done. It can be our future. We have the talent and the resources and brainpower. But now we need the political will. We need a national commitment."