So you are undecided between Clinton and Obama and you have to make a decision before you go to the polls on February 5th. How are you going to make a decision? I will provide you ten reasons to choose Barack Obama.
10. Electability– Just this morning the San Francisco Chronicle reports on the differences in who supports each of the two candidates in California and how they match-up against a hypothetical McCain campaign. First, let’s look at the McCain match-up.
Clinton now clings to a bare 45 to 43 percent lead over McCain in a projected California presidential vote, down dramatically from her 17 percentage point margin just two weeks ago. Obama now holds a stronger 47 to 40 percent margin over the Arizona senator, but that’s only half the 14 percentage point advantage he had in mid-January.
If Clinton can’t break out of the margin of error in a contest with John McCain in California there are some serious electability problems for her campaign. A look inside the internals explains the problem:
While Clinton has a 37 to 31 percent lead over Obama among Democrats, Obama leads by an overwhelming 54 to 32 percent among nonpartisans, who will make up an estimated 13 percent of the primary voters.
As former deputy assistant to President Bush, Peter Wehner, explains in this morning’s Washington Post, even Republicans have a soft spot for Barack Obama.
A number of prominent Republicans I know, who would wage a pitched battle against Hillary Clinton, like Obama and would find it hard to generate much enthusiasm in opposing him.
All things considered, Barack Obama appears to be the more electable of the two candidates.
9. The Youth Vote– We all know that children are our future, and young voters are the future of the Democratic Party. According to the San Francisco Chronicle article, “[w]hile people aged 18 to 29 [in California] back Obama by a margin of 11 percentage points, voters 65 and older support Clinton, 40 to 18 percent.” This is a reflection of the other early primary and caucus contests: In Iowa, Obama won the youth vote 57%-11%, in New Hampshire he won 18-24 year-olds 60%-22%, in Nevada 59%-33%, and in South Carolina 67%-23%.
According to Youth Voter PAC, which has been tracking youth voter turnout, there has been a notable uptick in participation. For example:
Young people continued the trend of increased turnout and preference for Democrats in the South Carolina Primary. Young people almost tripled their turnout numbers from 2004 and almost doubled the turnout numbers of young Republicans…
…Young people were 9% of the overall Democratic primary vote in 2004 and increased that to 14% in 2008.
Young Democrats continue to outnumber young Republicans at the polls continuing a trend in every state since Iowa.
While the Clinton campaign is causing its own excitement, it’s clear that Obama’s campaign is the driving force behind this unprecedented swell in youth turnout, and that could translate into enormous coattails for down ticket races for governors, senators, and congresspeople.
8. Change (Part One)
The last time we had a presidential election without a Bush or Clinton on the ballot was 1976. The last time we had an administration in office that didn’t include a Bush or a Clinton was January of 1981. There is something fundamentally wrong with a system where two families trade power back and forth over a period of 36 years (that’s how long it would be if Clinton serves two terms). Perhaps this isn’t the best idea. Perhaps it would be good to give someone else a chance.
7. Change (Part Two)
The Clinton administration was very successful on many levels, but we all remember the scandals (both real and imagined). Do you want to refight those battles? Do you even want to hear them discussed? Or would you like to begin fresh with new start?
6. Position/Ideology within the party
The Clintons are philosophically aligned with the Democratic Leadership Council and Hillary chairs the DLC’s American Dream Initiative. The DLC is represented in Congress by the New Democrat Caucus (of which, Hillary is not currently a member). Take a look at the membership of the New Democrat Caucus and ask yourself if they are your kind of Democrats. If you are frustrated about how the Democrats have voted on the war, on bankruptcy protection, on illegal combatants, take a look at the voting record of New Democrats and compare that record to the Progressive Caucus, or the Democratic caucus as a whole.
Many political insiders suspect that the Clintons, if they win the nomination, will replace Howard Dean as president of the Democratic National Committee with the president of the Democratic Leadership Council, Harold Ford, Jr. Is Harold Ford. Jr. your kind of Democrat?
Barack Obama is not a member of the DLC, nor has he ever been closely aligned with them. His background as a community organizer in Chicago strongly suggests that his natural affinity lies more with the Progressive Caucus (mostly made up of urban pols) than with the DLC. His surrogates do not have an adversarial relationship with Howard Dean.
5. The Kyl-Lieberman Amendment
On September 26, 2007, the Senate passed the Kyl-Lieberman amendment that provided a legal framework for the Bush-Cheney administration to expand the war into Iran. Clinton voted for it. Obama did not leave the campaign trail and return to Washington to vote (something he regrets, although the vote was 76-22 so it hardly mattered), but he did voice his strong objection at the time.
4. His positive campaign
While Clinton surrogates (and campaign director) have talked about Obama’s past drug-use, raised (falsely) that he might have been a drug dealer, falsely claimed that he attended a Madrassa, called him (in coded language) an Uncle Tom, and tried to tie him to divisive black leaders like Jesse Jackson, the Obama campaign has never raised the Clintons’ checkered past as a reason to vote against them. Do you want to reward this kind of negative campaigning?
3. The Authorization to Use Military Force in Iraq
Hillary Clinton not only voted for the AUMF-Iraq in 2002, she voted against the Levin Amendment. Former senator Lincoln Chafee explains the significance of the Levin amendment:
Senator Levin’s amendment called for United Nations approval before force could be authorized. It was unambiguous and compatible with international law. Acutely cognizant of the dangers of the time, and the reality that diplomatic options could at some point be exhausted, Senator Levin wrote an amendment that was nimble: it affirmed that Congress would stand at the ready to reconsider the use of force if, in the judgment of the president, a United Nations resolution was not “promptly adopted” or enforced. Ceding no rights or sovereignty to an international body, the amendment explicitly avowed America’s right to defend itself if threatened…
Those of us who supported the Levin amendment argued against a rush to war. We asserted that the Iraqi regime, though undeniably heinous, did not constitute an imminent threat to United States security, and that our campaign to renew weapons inspections in Iraq — whether by force or diplomacy — would succeed only if we enlisted a broad coalition that included Arab states.
We went through an election in 2004 where our candidate could not convincingly explain his vote to authorize force in Iraq. Do we want to repeat that experience, or do we want to try a candidate like Barack Obama, who opposed the war from the beginning?
2. Judgment
Obama was right on the war, he was right on the Kyl-Lieberman amendment, and Hillary Clinton sided with Dick Cheney and George W. Bush on both of those votes. Who has the better judgment?
1. Inspiration
Ethel, Teddy, and Caroline Kennedy all recognize in Barack Obama some of the intangible leadership qualities that they saw in John and Robert Kennedy when they were alive. Obama is packing stadiums with adoring fans, inspiring young people, wooing independents, and disarming conservatives. And he is doing it with an uplifting message that is critical of Republicans leadership without coming across as harsh or alienating. If anyone can help us move forward with a little more unity as a nation, it is not Hillary Clinton, but Barack Obama.
For these 10 reasons, I implore you to choose Barack Obama over Hillary Clinton on Tuesday.
