Is This What It Has Come To?

For my inaugural post I would like to say that I'm very excited to have this opportunity to share some of my thoughts with the public. It has been a passion of mine for quite some time to debate the issues that are affecting my country and the world. Below I have added my response to my friend Kyle's post on his blog (friarsblog.com). I look forward to sharing my views with you.

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It has been widely reported that it is virtually impossible for Clinton to catch Obama in the popular vote ( estimates put him ahead by about 1 million votes) or in the delegate count. In fact it has been estimated that the only way for Clinton to catch and pass Obama would be for her to win at least 56% of the vote in every contest; and that still doesn’t give her the necessary delegates to get the nomination. Obama on the other hand needs to carry just 46% of the vote in every other primary to win the nomination.

What has deeply troubled me with the Clinton campaign strategy over the course of the past month and a half has been the same strategy that has brought us to this point in history. When your ahead in the game keep being positive; talk about your stances on the issues and policies at hand. But if you should find yourself behind in a contest, you must use every possibly questionable decision regardling stances on issues, former acquaintances, or just plan old legitimacy. While in most elections this tactic has worked to the advantage of the accuser, this election is different. There is finally a canidate that has found the fine line between unsubstantiated political attacks, and differences in political positioning. This is more commonly refered to as the “false choice” theory. Obama has countered with something that the Clinton camp refers to as “excuses” with something I call an explaination; all the while not making the mistake of attacking right back with almost 25 years worth of dirt that he could smear her with.

We can go through all the different ways that the Clinton camp has tried to use this method in this campaign, but the most troubling is her recent use of fear as a method for creating political uncertainty. Most resently with the completely over used “phone call in the night” campaign ad. This has been a strategy that has been around as long as politics, but has most recently been brought to the forefront with the Republican party of the early 90’s - present day. Al Gore wrote an entire book on how fearful people make vastly different choices from people that are in a calm state of mind. But I believe that a former politician sums up my arguement best.

” Now, one of Clinton’s laws of politics is this: If one candidate’s trying to scare you and the other one’s trying to get you to think, if one candidate’s appealing to your fears and the other one’s appealing to your hopes, you better vote for the person who wants you to think and hope.”
Bill Clinton- October 25, 2004