Editorial Comment

The back and forth Democratic primary between Sen. Barack Obama and Sen. Hillary Clinton is one of the closest in the 200-year history of the process. At this rate, one day after Hillary won the Pennsylvania primary by a 10 percent margin, neither candidate can reach the 2,025-delegate platform with pledged delegates, so they'll be forced to use the superdelegates to decide the nominee. This can't happen. Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean needs to figure out a way to end this seemingly never-ending battle before the Democratic National Convention in Denver in August. Otherwise, the former Vermont governor will have a split party and then this country will have yet another Republican president, more tax breaks for the richest Americans, 5 dollar gasoline, 5 dollars for a gallon of milk and etc. etc. etc. It's ridiculous. After having one of the worst presidents ever (and yes, it's partly my fault, I voted for him twice), this country needs to move in a different direction, and the Democrats, with this extended brouhaha called primary season, are inching ever so closer to screwing it up. Message to Dems: Get your act together, enough of this primary nonsense, get some party unity so you can beat John McCain in November.

Posted by Adam Samrov at 11:56 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Barack Obama's comments about bitter working class voters are creating a typically overblown issue for the talking heads to rage about, even eclipsing whether Bill Clinton should zip his lip to avoid damaging his wife's campaign.
But the comments do point out the split that has damaged the Democrats in presidential elections since 1968. Obama was speaking to a group of wealthy, liberal supporters in San Fran, not to a working class crowd, and he apparently said something off the cuff that he never would have said in Pittsburgh or Gary, Ind. The real problem for the party this year, and every election year, is how to unite the working class Dems and the so-called latte Dems that Hillary and Bill have always been able to attract while apparently putting off the liberal wing of the party --- Ted Kennedy, etc.
My advice: They have to team up and win or McCain could grab those working class Dems and the party will be looking at 1972 or 1980 all over again. One of them might win on their own, given the economy, but as Dirty Harry said, "Do you want to take a chance? Well, do you?"

Posted by Jim Therrien at 11:20 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

If people are asked what is the worst thing that has happened to the United States over the past couple of decades, some would say the wars we've found in the Mideast and elsewhere, others would say the slow, steady destruction of the environemnt and global warming. Others would cite the bitter partisanship in Washington.
But how about the massive federal deficit, now pegged at around $9 trillion, and our refusal to even attempt to pay it off? Reagan launched it with his economic voodoo proposals but since then both Democrats and Republicans in the White House and in Congress have kept it going, although Bill Clinton and the Newt Gingrich-era Congress made moves in the right direction and actually slowed it down. Bush II has acted as if it wasn't there.
The worst part of it is not even the debt but our endless credit card mentality, somehow developed over the past 30 years. This isn't the America you read about in the history books. Is it?
Jim Therrien

Posted by Jim Therrien at 12:27 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)