Monday, July 2, 2007

Obama v Clinton and the Corporate Democrats


Since when did a viability as a candidate equate to how much money one can raise? OK, Obama can raise money, does that mean he can govern? All we hear nowadays is how great a fundraiser Obama is and how Clinton has sewn up the election because of her fundraising prowess. So, they can raise money and they have the support of the rich, famous and powerful, all those who subvert the public interest - usually.

Democrats can now fundraise with the Republicans. To me, this is bad news. It means (as Michael Moore's premise in Sicko discusses) we are all being subverted so the rich and powerful and corporations take over our elections. For this we receive substandard health care, a war without an end, stolen elections (at least the appearance), global warming, etc. This is terrible news for the democrats, whom I always considered the party of the people, until say - the 1980's. The proper stance for a democrat is publicly financed elections. Period. Nothing else will do. It is probably the most important issue facing America today (outside of tragic humanitarian issues that we face or have caused).

In 2004 when Governor Dean began raising lots of money there was a different feel to it. There was a sense the candidacy would change things, move America in a different direction (don't get me wrong the candidacy had problems, not the least of which was race). I do not get that sense from Obama, though I heard him speak on publicly financing elections and he supports the idea. I guess, he would say it is a means to an end. But, when does the "means" start to taint the end. As for Hillary I wrote her off a long time ago.

She hasn't represented the people since the stunt she pulled around the time of the Iraq war. Remember this? She asked her supporters should she vote for the authorization for the war in 2002? The calls were 70-30 percent against voting for the authorization. She voted for it anyway. Her rationalization? She thought those who supported the war authorization didn't call in to voice their opinion as much as those who opposed. As if the warmongers in this country weren't heard enough during that time or as it were - our time.Who can decide upon these bunch of corporate democrats? Who doesn't like Kucinich, but he does not stand a shot. Dodd? Richardson? It seems it is a three person race. Clinton, Obama and ???? no, not Edwards although I would like to see it. The wildcard is Gore. See this interesting poll if you have not already. Gore outpaced Clinton 32% to 26% when asked if Gore were to enter the race would you switch your support from the candidate you are currently supporting to him?

Count me in as one of those people.

5 comments:

magda flores said...

While I agree, raising lots of money does not a quality statesperson make, I have to speak up for Obama. He, like Dean, is getting lots of small donations. Obama has raised all of his dough from 258,000 donors, while Clinton raised an extraordinary amount from considerably less. It is disgusting that it costs so much to run for office in this country, but I find it admirable that more of the smaller donors support Obama. Feels slightly more grassrootsy. (or perhaps I'm being idealistic and really want Obama to be the quality candidate I've made him in my mind)

Anonymous said...

Yeah, I agree Magda with that to a degree. He certainly has raised more from more folks...but he gets a lot from the banking industry. Too much in my mind. And while I am supporting him right now, I am just so tired of the money. We could have an election without all this money, then maybe me and you could run for office:-)

magda flores said...

Didn't know about the banking money. Damn. That's very disappointing.

I'm not sure I ever want to run for office. I'll just support ya. It's a shame these bought off people won't institute real campaign finance reform. Maybe one day...

Anonymous said...

I do have to agree with you kid radical, but I also would like to say that the mainstream media has done a good job of taking the focus off what these candidates think on issues, and focused it, like you said, on just money. Money is all-too-important, but Obama does have good ideas, and I have to hope that they will be followed through upon, if he is elected.

A mentality that is: give up on politicians because the system demands money-grubbing is counterproductive. we must stay aware, fight for the issues that matter, and force the candidates to listen or lose.

Anonymous said...

During the second quarter, Barack Obama brought in $10.3 million dollars online, or about a third of the $32.5 million he raised overall this quarter. This ups his total online haul for the year to $17.2 million. Both of these online fundraising numbers are very large and indeed are records for this point in the campaign.

Since the beginning of the campaign 110,000 people have given online to the Obama campaign, or more than 40 percent of his donors. For year year, 90 percent of the online donations to the Obama campaign have been in amounts of $100 dollars or less, and a half of the online donations have been in amounts of $25 or less.

We'll get you the numbers for other candidates as they're released, but if you're interested in reading a comparison between online fundraising numbers this cycle versus the previous one, Jerome has a very interesting take. Quickly, Howard Dean raised about $25 million online of the $50 million or so he raised over the course of 2003, so Obama appears to be on pace to top that online fundraising record by a fairly large margin (though Obama's offline contributions make up a larger proportion of his overall fundraising than did Dean's).

This asks the question where are the off-line donations coming from? See some of David Sirota's work on Obama to see. Don't get me wrong, I am an Obama fan...I just have reservations.

Kid Radical