The Dish

Mark Blumenthal:

Obama is certainly rising, the only question is by how much.

Marc didn’t see Clinton lose her cool at all. Focus group video here. Actual alleged flash of Clinton anger here. I think "infuriated" is a better description. I think she’s actually offended that anyone is challenging her for the Democratic nomination, after all she’s gone through and all the hard work she has put in. And she must be amazed that he has now knocked her instantly onto the ropes in the first round. What I saw in that flash of the eyes was: "How dare you do this to me?"

I do think she has worked extremely hard for the things she believes in over the years. She is diligent whatever else you want to say about her. But when you examine Obama’s career, it is no flight from social responsibility and hard work either. She’s right to be proud of her own efforts. She’s wrong to dismiss those of others’.

A reader writes:

I read your essay, studied his campaign, and just did not see it. How could a conservative get behind Barack Obama?  Well after he won in Iowa, I saw it. His victory speech in Iowa was the purest example of William F. Buckley’s words of standing "athwart history, yelling Stop" that I have heard out of any of the candidates running for office. 

I most likely will not vote for Obama but I can’t help but think since Thursday night that if he were elected President, it would be a breath of fresh air that the likes of George W. Bush, Al Gore, and John Kerry did their damnest to pollute the last few Presidential elections. 

Obama has definitely won my respect.

Another writes:

I thought some more about Obama’s speech(es), and a thought occurred to me. I’m an educated, politically savvy, 24 year-old college graduate who should not be prone to "the moment."  I have my fair share of cynicism in me.  Why, then, do I get sucked in by Obama?  Whatever it is, my wall of cynicism falls down whenever I hear a speech like Thursday’s. I go from being a cynical liberal, to an idealistic liberal, waiting for the possibility of the future.

I know, my "rational" part tells me, "You’re being hopelessly romantic." Yet, I don’t care.  I like feeling idealistic, on occasion. I like feeling this way. I don’t want it to stop. Not now, not yet.

Me neither.

Some candor from Tyler Cowen:

Health care has a murky relationship to human health, pharmaceuticals and broken limbs aside.  A version of the single-payer system, as might be adopted in the United States, would not lower costs.  We would be raising taxes and lowering medical innovation to give poor people a good deal more financial security and a slight bit more health; that is the relevant trade-off.

A reader writes:

Obama won’t earn my vote until he stands up to his boorish supporters, the boorish "Hillary Haters" of the Right, and the media. Substituting "generational war" for "culture war" doesn’t get us anywhere toward "unity" or a better America. Especially when that "generational" war appears to just be a new name for the same old thing; hostility and disrespect toward the women who, bearing the brunt of massive social change over the last 40 years, stepped up to the plate, accepted new responsibilities, and worked to create new and better conditions and opportunities for their sons and daughters. Obama would not be where he is today without 40 years of commitment from the liberal women, black and white, of Hillary’s (and my own) generation. That unique "biography" that you claim as Obama’s advantage isn’t Obama’s alone — it is his mother’s, too, and perhaps most of all.

I’d like to see Obama, if he gets the nomination, choose a woman VP. My vote would be for Janet Napolitano of Arizona. She’s a very successful and popular 2-term governor from a Mountain West state — a region in which Democrats need to make more gains in order to balance their loss of support in the South. In terms both of her personal qualities and experience, and the party’s strategic best interest, it makes real sense.

It would also help convince life-long Democratic women, like me, that Obama really is seeking to lead the country past the old politics of "culture war" — so much of which has always been based in fear of the changing role of women in our society and economy — rather than just exploiting that fear in new and more subtle ways.

A brutal debate review – by and large – from a New Hampshire focus group. Money quote: "we had eight years of not trusting our government and she’s no different."

Must-read.

Make your own mind up:

Around a year ago, when I was first struck by Barack Obama’s oratory, I decided to use the Dish to record his speeches in full as they occurred. I did it because they are rare among contemporary political speeches in being readable and literary. But also because I had the sense I was witnessing history. Here are some links to those posts – and the full text of various speeches – for those of you who would like to hear Obama in less frenzied times over the last twelve months, as he laid out his concrete proposals and general ideas and approach to politics.

Here he is at DePaul, the moment when he reignited his fall campaign. And here’s his address at Howard in the wake of the Jena 6 controversy. Here’s a commencement address from last summer. Here he is on foreign policy. And here on poverty. There is a meme beginning to go around that he is vague and empty. If you do not know what Obama is proposing in many areas, it’s only because you don’t know how to use Google. If you want to know more, click the links. One section of his June Hampton University address resonates with JFK echoes:

The truth is, one man cannot make a movement. No single law can erase the prejudice in the heart of a child who hangs a noose on a tree. Or in the callousness of a prosecutor who bypasses justice in the pursuit of vengeance. No one leader, no matter how shrewd, or experienced, or inspirational, can prevent teenagers from killing other teenagers in the streets of our cities, or free our neighborhoods from the grip of homelessness, or make real the promise of opportunity and equality for every citizen.

Only a country can do those things. Only this country can do those things. That’s why if you give me the chance to serve this nation, the most important thing I will do as your President is to ask you to serve this country, too. The most important thing I’ll do is to call on you every day to take a risk, and do your part to carry this movement forward. Against deep odds and great cynicism I will ask you to believe that we can right the wrong we see in America. I say this particularly to the young people who are listening today. …

I know that you believe it’s possible too.