“..which is why Joan Walsh makes me cringe 15 separate times in her piece today.”

Cringe-inducing a lot lately, that lady.
[maybe taking after Paglia?]

I don’t doubt that Obama won’t get the vote of blatantly racist white people, but I suspect most of them decamped to the Republicans in 1964 with Strom Thurmond.

The only bit of the post I’ll disagree with is this. I thought that as well, but I think in some of the primaries we saw lifelong Democrats who were not willing to vote for a black man (and I’m not tarring all Clinton supporters - just those who this applies to, who probably are not reading this blog). You know how we always bemoan people who don’t vote their economic interests and instead vote on abortion or gay marriage? Well, some of them never left the Democratic Party and kept voting their economic interests. The unknowns are what percentage of voters they represent and what they’ll do given the choice between Obama and McCain (as opposed to the choice between a white Democrat and a black Democrat).

Like the new format but I do miss the beer can (it was a beer can wasn’t it?).

My g/f was for Hillary and I for Obama and we’ve talked about this.  Neither of us can convieve of not voting for the Nominee.  It’s insanity.

While Obama isn’t the harbinger of the revolution, the movement he’s building is the pitchfork that will be wielded.

And that’s good enough for me.

What’s largely overlooked is the existence of older white women, feminists, who have supported Obama from the start. For example, my mom and her best friend, both 60-something. (Granted, they live in Illinois, where Obama’s super-popular, but still.) And that woman I was talking to at the gym yesterday, also in her 60s, while the TV showed post-AIPAC-speech talking heads.

These are also angry white women—angry that Senator Clinton is stubbornly trying to play a Rovean political game, angry about statements citing “hard-working white Americans,” angry that Clinton has done so much to shore up McCain’s strength against Obama. These are people who will vote for Obama, who will sport Obama bumperstickers on their cars. (And who would vote for Hillary in November if she were the nominee, despite having supported Obama early on.)

But for those who want a good reason to vote for Obama over McCain (I can’t believe I’m writing this) for feminist reasons, um, there’s the issues.

Would have been nice if pro-Obama supporters had stuck to the issues while campaigning against Clinton, instead of joining the trash-Clinton bandwagon, wouldn’t it?

FWIW, all the Clinton supporters I know personally, while disappointed of course that Clinton lost, and enraged by the misogyny she faced, and sad that the Presidency will remain a boys-only-club for at least another 8 years, are of course now supporting Obama.

Despite the ungraciousness in victory so many Obama supporters are displaying.

amanda, i really liked your post.

i agree with what you wrote about both clinton and obama being pro-choice candidates.

however, i lurk over at shakesville, and in the comments i see people repeatedly asserting that since obama said women should have “some” control over their bodies and that he believes they should consult with a minister before having an abortion, they don’t trust him to be truly pro-choice.  or something.

i don’t hold that position, myself.  i have no problem with the qualifier “some” control, because that’s all anyone, male or female has over their body.  nobody has complete legal control over their bodies; otherwise organ harvesting for profit would be legal.

i also tend to look at what i share in common with another, more than where we differ.  so while obama and i differ in the opinion of whether i should consult with a minister - i don’t have a minister, being an atheist! - prior to having an abortion, what we share in common is that we BOTH agree that the state has no business having a say in the manner.  and that is what matters to me, that we both agree on that point.

however, there are women posting at shakespeare’s sister who emphatically feel differently, and they are prepared to withhold their vote for obama as a result.  and there, apparently, is no talking about it with them.  i mean, they have the right to their opinion, and their vote is their own to choose whom to give it to.  but there’s a there there.

i don’t know if what we see in one corner of the blogosphere translates to huge numbers of actual feminist voters.  i hope you are right, i suspect you are, and that it doesn’t.

however, i lurk over at shakesville, and in the comments i see people repeatedly asserting that since obama said women should have “some” control over their bodies and that he believes they should consult with a minister before having an abortion, they don’t trust him to be truly pro-choice.  or something.

I’ve seen this, too, repeatedly, and I had a hard time not feeling like they were deliberately misinterpreting what he said, looking for a reason not to trust him. He wasn’t saying you must consult with a minister. To my mind, it was pretty clear that he meant that women should make the decision in consultation with the people in their lives whose opinions matter to them and whose judgment they value, as opposed to a law dictating their choice. For some women, that would be their partner, for others it might be a mother or sister, for some it might be their minister and for others it will be nobody but their own conscience. I actually thought it was good he brought up minister as an option, because it reminds people who care about stuff like that that not all religious people oppose abortion and abortion can be a moral choice made openly, not a sinful one made secretly.

There are other examples like that. Some commenters jumped on him because he said he wouldn’t want his daughters “punished with an unwanted pregnancy or disease” because they made the mistake of having unprotected sex. They tried to say he was using the same frame as people who see unwanted pregnancy as deserved punishment. To me, he was using the opposite frame.

Even online, the feminiists who’ve said they won’t vote for Obama is tiny, and that’s from an already small cross-section of the population. I’m not really concerned.

I can’t understand why HRC supporters feel why Obama, or his campaign, would be responsible for the coverage the media provided for the primary. After reading the article in Salon, all the anger seems to be directed at the sexist nature of the media coverage, and how the media itself treated the HRC campaign. Honestly, how is the Obama camp responsible for this? Were they not battling the underlying racist tones the media had such a hankering for at the same time? It would have been nice to see each candidate come out against the sexism and racism so openly on display in the coverage of the DEM primary, but of the two candidates themselves, I believe HRC made far more questionable comments of Obama than the other way around.

As for the throngs of supporters on both sides who are frothing at the mouth, making your politcal decisions based what some anonymous commentor from the other side is saying seems to be the height of stupidity, what with all the actual issues that need to be dealt with and all. Internet commentors, or even strangers face to face, can say whatever the hell they want. I am voting the issues.

Listening to both sides, it seems like the cults of personality that have developed amongst the supporters have blinded people as to what is at stake here. Even empty threats of sitting out the election, or voting for McCain, when Obama shares nearly every policy position your candidate has, seems petty and vindictive to someone who did not control the media narrative.

I choose to invest my passion with the issue themselves, and support whomever shares them and will do the most to bring about the change that I desire in this country. Right now, that is Obama. If HRC had won, it would have been her.

There could be a difference between the percentage of “angry white women” and the percentage of feminists that go to McCain.  Sure, probably anyone who describes themselves as a feminist would vote for Obama on the issues.

But what’s unknown is the number of women who aren’t feminists, are relatively independent and not party-focused politically, but who were still attracted enough to the idea of a woman president that they supported Clinton for that reason.  For whatever reason or host of reasons (“bitterness” about her defeat, taking her previous words seriously about who of the 3 candidates is qualified to be commander-in-chief, pre-existing social or economic inclinations, etc.) to vote for McCain rather than Obama.  A lot of (white) women voted for Reagan who most feminists wouldn’t consider to have had enligtened policies.

i lurk over at shakesville, and in the comments i see people repeatedly asserting that since obama said women should have “some” control over their bodies and that he believes they should consult with a minister before having an abortion, they don’t trust him to be truly pro-choice.

That was infuriating! They’re looking for a reason to poke at him. They choose to look past every vote he’s cast and every bill he’s sponsored in favor of a minor choice of words in a single statement made to a largely pro-life audience. Did they get as annoyed over Clinton’s description of abortion as a “tragic choice to many women”?

The same thing comes up with gay issues - admittedly, there’s a bit more to pick at there (e.g. Donnie McClurkin), but on the whole it’s still absurd to claim that Obama has been less gay-friendly in his policy positions and platform than Clinton to any significant degree at all.

however, i lurk over at shakesville, and in the comments i see people repeatedly asserting that since obama said women should have “some” control over their bodies and that he believes they should consult with a minister before having an abortion, they don’t trust him to be truly pro-choice.  or something.

What people tend to forget (or suppress) is that when Obama talked about women have “some” control, it was in response to this question:

The Questioner: “I see a great a contradiction going on in our society, right now, and I don’t understand it. Maybe you can help me out. On the one hand, we see a guy like Michael Vick, who will likely lose his livelihood and spend some time in jail and there’s been a tremendous outcry against this man because of fighting dogs. There’s been a huge, huge reaction. On the other hand, we have 34 years and counting where thousands of innocent, sweet babies are being killed every day through what we call abortion, yet that voice has seemingly died out. What would you do about that and what’s happening in our society when people can’t seem to see this contradiction?”

So, no, he was not stating his pro-life position.  He was putting it to the questioner that the issue of abortion was not as easy as the issue of animal cruelty.  Here’s the whole graf of what Obama said when he said women should have “some” control:

Mr. Obama: “The issue of abortion, I don’t think, has gone away. People think about it a lot, obviously you do and you feel impassioned. I think that the American people struggle with two principles: There’s the principle that a fetus is not just an appendage, it’s potential life. I think people recognize that there’s a moral element to that. They also believe that women should have some control over their bodies and themselves and there is a privacy element to making those decisions.

So, yes, the people running around screaming that Obama is going to ban abortion are ignorant at best, and dishonest at worst.

Oh, and in that exact same speech where Obama is accused of thinking women should only have “some” control when it comes to abortion? 

I don’t think people take the issue lightly. A lot of people have arrived in the view that I’ve arrived at, which is that there is a moral implication to these issues, but that the women involved are in the best position to make that determination. And I don’t think they make it lightly. I don’t think they make it callously, so I reject a comparison between a woman struggling with these issues and Michael Vick fighting dogs for sport. I don’t think that’s sort of how people perceive it.

Yep, that sure sounds like someone chomping at the bit to put Teh Bitchez in their place to me.

fyi the stick figures should probably be sourced http://xkcd.com/

Considering Obama spoke at Planned Parenthood’s anniversary fundraiser in Chicago, praising the organization for all the good things it does for women…I feel pretty confident in his Pro-Choiceness.

The bigger threat than pissed off feminists voting for McCain - oh, c’mon, I don’t know a single feminist would vote for McCain short of having a pistol to their head, and some of them not even then - is that the arrogance of Obama’s supporters, a large number of them being bad winners, will keep a small but real percentage of feminist voters home come election day.

Which might be enough come election day to swing states like Ohio and Florida towards the Republicans - but the notion that feminists will, en masse, vote for McCain is so far at variance from the truth it makes me wonder if the person knows any actual feminists.

Incertus:

Their argument is that he didn’t stand up against the sexism and so was complicit in the sexism.

Yes, and after the “hard-working whites” flap Clinton could have stood up in West Virginia or Pennsylvania and said, “If the reason for your choice is that you won’t vote for a black candidate, I don’t want your vote.”

Fifty-five year old woman here.  I consider myself a feminist and have for 35 years.

At this point, I’m not voting for Obama or McCain.  I’m thinking of writing in Sen Clinton’s name on my absentee ballot.  Now I may change my mind by Nov, but I am so angry at this point over how she and her supporters were treated, even by our so-called allies, liberals and progressives.

I thought I was used to sexism and misogyny.  When I applied to medical school, I had two interviews, one with a woman who asked me how I planned to be a physician and a wife and mother (I was single and childless at the time and had no plans to marry or have children).

First real job I had, a construction worker who was helping to build an extension on our lab had a crush on me, followed me around.  I wasn’t interested and made that plain to him.  But who got the heat?  I was told that I better do something to discourage him since my boss was getting annoyed at me.

Grad school in engineering at the “Harvard of the West.”  Nearly one third of the grad students were women.  We had regular seminars each week.  One visiting speaker proceeded to sing the praises of his company by telling the audience that our wives would love us working for it since the pay and benefits were great.  A luncheon with affiliate companies, a speaker addressed an audience of grad students, once again at least a quarter women, as “Gentlemen.”

So, I’m no hothouse flower who just was exposed to sexist behavior, I’ve experienced it all my freaking life.  But this campaign has been so damn ugly, so full of misogyny from media and many Obama’s supporters, so many people denying that the sexism even exists, that I’ve had it.  I’m irrelevant and I don’t matter to the Democratic Party?  Fine, then it doesn’t need my vote.

Linda

Hi, Amanda,

So it all comes down to the Supreme Court nominations?

Sorry, but considering how the Democrats rolled over and played dead over the last two SC justices, I don’t think my one write-in vote for Sen Clinton is going to make any difference a all.  If Obama wins, no worries.  If McCain wins, maybe the Dems will stand up to him with his nominations in a way they didn’t with Bush.

Linda

At this point, I’m not voting for Obama or McCain.  I’m thinking of writing in Sen Clinton’s name on my absentee ballot.

If you live in a swing state and are voting absentee for purely anti-Obama reasons (not because you already have plans to be away from home,  for instance), you will officially no longer be a feminist the moment you do that.

And don’t think we’re not coming to reclaim that toaster. 

Less flippantly, wow, who knew older feminists were so fucking spiteful.  “Heck, I’ve been through menopause already, what do I care if Roe gets reversed?  Those silly little girls should have voted for Clinton if they wanted reproductive rights so badly…  Let’s see how the McCain administration treats them!”

“So, I’m no hothouse flower who just was exposed to sexist behavior, I’ve experienced it all my freaking life.  But this campaign has been so damn ugly, so full of misogyny from media and many Obama’s supporters, so many people denying that the sexism even exists, that I’ve had it.  I’m irrelevant and I don’t matter to the Democratic Party?  Fine, then it doesn’t need my vote.”

Then I completely question your attachment to what you claim are your feminist convictions.  You obviously don’t much care about the actual tenets of feminism if you so willingly allow the enemies of what feminism is about to take office because your feelings are hurt.  Not by the candidate, mind you.  But by some of the candidate’s followers and the media.  Your feelings are more important than ending the war, getting some form of universal or almost universal health care, ending the trashing of the Constitution of the Bush years, the environment, the income gap, the power of lobbyists, domestic spying…I could go on and on.

Personally, I’m only five years younger than you are.  In attitude, though, I’d have to say my maturity level may make me older than you.  I am certainly old and mature enough to know that everything isn’t always about me.  Sometimes you have put hurt feelings aside and do the right thing.  Especially as, as you put it yourself since you gave no examples other than those of the media and some supporters, the candidate himself has done none of the things you are “punishing” him for.

Bravo, geg6. I’m a 48-year-old white woman and feminist and I’m appalled by people who say things like that. Did we learn no lessons from the Nader fiasco of 2000? Do we really want another four years of this shit?
It also means lives. 3000 Americans and countless Iraqis have already lost theirs. It could be another 10,000 Americans and countless Iranians if Bush and McCain get their way and bomb Iran, even if Roe v. Wade doesn’t matter to you because it’s not personal anymore and you don’t seem to have any daughters, granddaughters, or nieces who might suffer. I’d argue Griswold v. Connecticut is in grave judicial peril, too, if McCain gets to nominate the next SC justices.

But this campaign has been so damn ugly, so full of misogyny from media and many Obama’s supporters, so many people denying that the sexism even exists, that I’ve had it.  I’m irrelevant and I don’t matter to the Democratic Party?

Where did you get the idea that the media supports the Democratic Party?  They did everything in their power to create divisions in our party this year and, sadly, some people online fell for it, on both sides.  For every DailyKos, there was a TalkLeft.

Deciding that you don’t want to vote for Democrats based on what the media said is like the chicken deciding that the fox is right and he really does have the chickens’ best interests at heart when he guards them.

I understand being pissed off at the media, but if that’s the case, why the hell are you doing exactly what they want you to do?

My mom said that, since Hillary won’t be on the ballot, she’s going to vote for Nader.

chingona, mnemnosyne and amanda, i agree with your interpretations of obama’s words about abortion.  i have absolutely no problem with anything he’s said so far, and more importantly anything he’s done (i.e. voting record) in terms of his being a pro-choice candidate.

i don’t know what to think about the posters at shakesville who see things so differently though.  i mean, i keep hearing about how we obama supporters are supposed to reach out to the clinton supporters right now, and in theory i have no problem with doing that.  i just don’t know how right now.  we all believe ourselves to be feminists and all believe we are, you know, working to advance our ideals.  but there seems to be such a chasm to how to go about doing that - and the pro-choice issue is just one of several when it comes to obama.

oh, and the whole argument if mccain gets elected we can kiss our reproductive rights goodbye?  that’s called “threatening women with a coathhanger if they don’t fall in line”.

i don’t know what to say!  my point here isn’t to slag another blog, but i am responding to your initial post that feminists won’t act this way.  and i see some of them doing just that - though hopefully the actual real voter numbers are very very small and this is just a particularly vocal corner of teh internetz.

and again, i don’t know how to make the connection.  i don’t know how to reach out.  but then, hopefully if the numbers really are that small, there’s no point in even trying.  i dunno.

signed, more than a little flummoxed.

Yeah, I’m voting for McKinney.  I’m over the Democratic Party:  I have seen nothing in the past eight years that indicates they will protect any progressive issue.  When the party leaders stop talking about crossing the aisle to shake hands with people who diametrically oppose everything we supposedly stand for, they’ll get my vote again.

i don’t know what to think about the posters at shakesville who see things so differently though.

Honestly, I don’t worry about Shakesville too much.  Most of the regulars are reasonable people and so are the hosts themselves (including Melissa).  Presenting the case once things calm down that, no, Obama will be MUCH better on women’s issues than McCain, isn’t going to be too hard.  Getting some of the more vocal triumphalist Obama assholes to STFU will help a lot, too.  Apologies from the nuttier anti-Clinton conspiracy theorists would be nice, but I’m not holding my breath.

I’m more worried about the people at places like Hillaryis44.com or TalkLeft, who really have gone completely around the bend and are talking about stolen elections.

Selecto-vision. Like not seeing Bill stiff arm his wife out of the way in order to be first on podium Tuesday night.

oh, and the whole argument if mccain gets elected we can kiss our reproductive rights goodbye?  that’s called “threatening women with a coathhanger if they don’t fall in line”.

No, it’s called The McCain Administration.

If you live in a solidly blue state, sure, stay home, or vote Green or write in Clinton or your mom or Wonder Woman or Gloria Steinem if you want.  Be irrelevant—see if I care.  I hope you feel like an ass in 20 years when your grandkids ask what it was like to get to elect the first black president. 

I have seen nothing in the past eight years that indicates they will protect any progressive issue.

I’m not sure if you knew this, but the Democrats have held virtually no power in at the federal level for the past 8 years.  I think you’re confused.  You mean the Republicans, right?

Right.  And being the minority party allows a distinct kind of freedom to show what they *would* do if they *were* in power.  What did they tell us they would do?  Help pass shitty Republican bills and vote consistently for horrible judicial nominees.  Now they are bending over backwards to recruit people like Bob Casey and put anti-choicers like Harry Reid in positions of power. 

The Democratic party doesn’t represent the values I want in a political system.  I can’t in good conscience vote for them anymore.

At what point do folks get over the “here is my age and life story, as to lend credence to my political views!!!” bullshit, anyways? Or is it an individual thing?

My quick and dirty rule of thumb is it’s some combination of lying, trolling and astro-turfing. That and endless diatribes. If you can’t to the point in a couple of paragraphs, your position sucks. YMMV

I think this is the best way to describe this situation and how many many of Clinton’s supporters should have a should be looking at this-
In a race for office- You don’t support WOMEN you support A woman. You don’t support African-Americans you support AN African-American. You don’t pick a president or official because of the GROUP they belong to because that’s prejudice.
That’s what this is about - that’s what the National Organization for WOmen is about that’s what many right’s groups are about we should be judged on our merits not by what group we are in.

This is why all the women who claim to be feminists handwringing, pearl-clutching, lashing out, name calling and DESPAIRING is ridiculous.

This is not a once-in-a-lifetime thing for women in office (unless you’ve got terminal cancer or are planning on offing yourself shortly)- we have MORE women in office than we’ve had at any time in American history. We will have a women president. Hillary was not the right candidate at the right time- Barack was the right candidate at the right time and got more votes no matter how many times they moved the goalposts.

Barack is already making change in the Democratic party - they are no longer accepting PAC contributions. That’s a big step in the right direction and he’s not even president yet.

They say Democrats fall in love with candidates, and Republicans fall in line.

For someone who was in love with Hillary-the-candidate, “Obama is better than McCain” is a negative reason to vote for Obama against McCain, not a positive reason to fall in love with Obama.  What’s more, it comes across as a command to fall in line.  And as a threat (vote for us, or else you’ll get him) rather than an invitation.

If Hillary supporters were the sort who wanted to be told to fall in line, they’d be Republicans.  To get not just votes, or staying home in November (abstaining from voting for McCain), but enthusiastic support, (volunteering, donations) they need to be wooed, not commanded. 

Yes, it’s an emotional thing, rather than a purely rational thing.  But emotions are a natural part of how humans make decisions, and need to be taken into account. 

The same feeling of being taken for granted which pushed some people towards Obama early in the primaries, when Hillary was being anointed before anyone could vote, could push Hillary supporters away from Obama, if there isn’t a feeling that they are respected, that their votes are not just owed to Obama, but wanted by him and his supporters, and that the concerns that led them to prefer Hillary over Obama are being taken seriously.  No one likes to be taken for granted.

Obama gets this, I think.  But some of his online supporters don’t seem to get this.  Insulting Clinton supporters, dismissing their concerns, calling them sore losers or crybabies only serves to tell them that their support isn’t wanted, and that they aren’t welcome.  And if they are unwanted and unwelcome, why should they join up? 

I’m not sure how to solve these problems.  Some are obviously beyond the control of Obama and his official campaign.  Some need to be more directly addressed, in some way.  Some may be a matter of time, giving things a few weeks to settle down.

the whole argument if mccain gets elected we can kiss our reproductive rights goodbye?  that’s called “threatening women with a coathhanger if they don’t fall in line”.

You need to consider the difference between a threat and a prediction. 

“If you shoot yourself in the foot, it will hurt.”

“Don’t you DARE threaten me!”

[BANG]

“Ouch!”

[already tried posting this once…]

Hey Purple Turnip-

I’m over the Democratic Party, too. But I’m going to vote for Obama anyway. Know why? Because I never identified with the Democrats in the first place! It is, nevertheless, still the only viable option, I think. You don’t have to agree with everything they do—I certainly don’t.

Look, if we had a parliamentary system, I’d almost certainly vote Green. But we don’t. We have a weird-ass federal republic which is a two-party system. That gives radicals very few options if they want to engage in electoral politics (which they may not want to do, but if they do…):
(a) a popular front-type strategy where you vote for the more left of the two parties and do what you can to pull it further left
(b) vote for a third-party that focuses on attainable goals (ie, mostly on the local level)
(c) vote for a third-party to “make a statement”

Given that (b) seems not to be an option this time, we’re left with (a) and (c). Here, I think (a) wins every time since (c) is pointless. What exactly would voting for McKinney accomplish?

PS Of course Democrats have to TALK about crossing the aisle! They’re trying to get elected. If you want them to stop, then you have to change the nature of the electorate. But given who votes in this country, you’re asking them to talk in a way that’s impossible for them.

I won’t even be old enough to run for president til later this year, so I guess I’ll be sitting over here in my highchair, awaiting the day I can finally! make it to the kiddy table.

Kucinich was who I really wanted, but talk about unelectable..
Among the mainstream candidates - Edwards was my first choice, I was thoroughly impressed with Richardson’s resume, and I felt confident that I would have been pretty happy with a Dodd presidency. But did the rest of the Democratic Party give two shits about my thoughts and feelings about poverty, diplomacy, and the illegal acts of the current administration?
No?
Huh.
This is my problem with these so-called “feminists” for Clinton:
Whatever their motives, from my perspective, it’s like they’re asking for special treatment. Hell, there’s a comment in this here thread calling out Obama for not rushing to her rescue (or maybe it was just someone relating another’s opinion).
Did Hillary ever seek to rescue Obama from the “is he black enough” crap or the “omfg he is too black, has a black preacher and everything” bullshit?

Then again, being as I’m such a youngin an’ all, maybe I just don’t really get what feminism is really about.

I for one am getting really sick and tired of Clinton supporters demanding “graciousness” from me.

If you’re going to do that, then I would like you to sit down and tell me exactly what this “graciousness” would entail because I am pretty sure you can’t define or outline it, and that no amount of grovelling would make you happy.

Every single speaker I’ve seen—every superdelegate or Obama campaign surrogate has bent over backwards to basically lick Hillary Clinton’s ass talking about what an amazing and awesome candidate she was and how she has run a great campaign. I disagree with every word, but I recognize that they are being _gracious_. 

You aren’t asking for grace. You are basically saying that people who supported Obama are not allowed to celebrate his win because he didn’t win by a big enough margin/the right kind of delegate (oooh, this one is choice)/at all. Everything, right down to Hillary’s speech on Tuesday night was calculated to make sure that nobody felt like they could get uppity and celebrate for reals.

Obama was my third choice for the presidency. I actually had to hold my nose in order to vote for him in the CA primary, but I would _always_ have voted for Clinton if she had got the nod. Always. Even after she totally lost me by lying about everything ever, even after her constant goalpost moving and even after her insisting that the MI primary was totally fair and square and she should get all the delegates from it (talk about something enraging), I would have voted for her. To do otherwise would be to betray everything I believe in.

Insulting Clinton supporters, dismissing their concerns, calling them sore losers or crybabies only serves to tell them that their support isn’t wanted, and that they aren’t welcome.

Which reminds me of my current crusade:  when you run across people claiming that Clinton supporters are “sore losers,” remind them that there’s only one thing worse than a sore loser—a sore winner.  STFU and be gracious in victory, or you look like the world’s biggest asshole.

Obama is managing this.  I wish a lot more of his online supporters would do the same.

For what it’s worth, I (personally, not speaking for anyone else here) won’t blame anyone who feels they must vote third-party if Obama loses the election. That’s your right. I have my vote, you have yours. I will not vote third-party anytime in the forseeable future, but in 2000, a far bigger problem than folks who voted for Nader was registered Democrats who voted for Bush. And if Obama loses to McCain, it won’t be because a few disaffected white feminists vote for Cynthia McKinney or write in Clinton. It will be because Obama couldn’t persuade that mushy middle that doesn’t identify politically and doesn’t care about issues and votes with their “gut,” whatever that means, that he has whatever the hell it is they look for in a candidate.

Joan has always made me cringe. 

I have a co-worker who is one of those rabid Hillaryites, and will vote McCain in November even if Hill endorses Barak.  The thing is that she’s a republican through and through and wouldn’t have voted for a Democrat anyway, except for Hillary.

the bit i posted above about threatening women with a coathanger is not my view, it’s what i’ve seen elsewhere.  i posted it to show the difficulty of engaging a conversation on this subject.

i agree that it is a prediction not a threat, but that’s not how it’s received.  ::throws up hands::

though again you all are probably right that it is a small portion of the electorate, and that obama is better off focussing on ‘the mushy middle’.

“To get not just votes, or staying home in November (abstaining from voting for McCain), but enthusiastic support, (volunteering, donations) they need to be wooed, not commanded.

Yes, it’s an emotional thing, rather than a purely rational thing.  But emotions are a natural part of how humans make decisions, and need to be taken into account. “

I suggest roses and soft lighting.

At what point do folks get over the “here is my age and life story, as to lend credence to my political views!!!” bullshit, anyways? Or is it an individual thing?

Its a tell.  “I got shafted, my candidate lost, I feel hurt and shafted again, me me me me…”

Seriously, if you get someone who’s argument boils down to “Fuck you, its all about me and my hurt feelings,” then its time to tell them to go ahead and vote for this guy or this guy because progressive politics isn’t for them.

It will be because Obama couldn’t persuade that mushy middle that doesn’t identify politically and doesn’t care about issues and votes with their “gut,” whatever that means, that he has whatever the hell it is they look for in a candidate.

The problem is, in this society, when people’s “gut” tells them they shouldn’t vote for Obama, a lot of the time, it’s because their gut is whispering inaudibly, he’s a scary scary black man! what if They do to you what you’ve done to them?

The subconscious is a freaky thing.  It won’t be a conscious feeling, just an odd “there’s something not quite right” notion in the back of your head that you’ll look for evidence to support.  And some people will find it, like the people who decided that Rev. Wright pointing out that America hasn’t exactly fixed all of the problems in the black community meant that he was a Scary Scary Black Man who wanted to kill them all.

The Democratic party doesn’t represent the values I want in a political system.  I can’t in good conscience vote for them anymore.

OK, it’s official.

Nobody learned ANYTHING from the 2000 elections.

A few thoughts….

1.  Would have been nice if pro-Obama supporters had stuck to the issues while campaigning against Clinton, instead of joining the trash-Clinton bandwagon, wouldn’t it?

One of the problems with this campaign has been that, with the notable—and highly significant—exception of Clinton’s pro-war vote in 2002, very little separated these two candidates on the issues. Their supporters were more or less guaranteed to focus on something else. And while there has been plenty of misogyny directed at Clinton, all of which deserves to be condemned, there have been plenty of valid, non-misogyinist reasons to criticize, or even trash, her campaign.

2.  Anytime someone tells you that they’re voting for a third-party candidate or that they’re staying home, the very first question should be: “What state do you live in?” The vast majority of Americans live in states in which their votes simply won’t count, so long as states use a winner-take-all system to allocate their electoral votes. This election will be contested in around seventeen battlegrounds states.  All the arguments about votes for third-party candidates leading to McCain’s being elected are only pertinent in these states. Otherwise, the argument that a vote for a third party candidate is a vote for McCain is simply nonsense. The electoral votes of my state—Oklahoma—are going to John McCain. The electoral votes of NY are going to Obama. Nothing that an Oklahoma or a NY voter can do other than actually voting for McCain can be called voting for McCain. And even that won’t really make any difference. It sucks that we’re all effectively disenfranchised, but it’s true. On the other hand, it lets us freely vote our conscience…though in Oklahoma, the lack of write-ins and our ridiculous ballot access laws will make it literally impossible for me to vote for my (Green) party’s nominee.

3. One of the big things that separated the Obama campaign and its supporters from the Clinton campaign and its supporters was message discipline. Yeah there are yahoo Obama supporters commenting on blogs. But the number of prominent Clinton supporters—like Joan Walsh and Geraldine Ferraro—who keep writing really idiotic things is astounding.

Ok, I have a question.

When is it ok for the Obama supporters to celebrate?

From what I’ve seen online it looks like we cannot ever be happy that our candidate went the distance without someone from the Clinton camp jumping up and down and calling us all sorts of derogatory names and throwing out a fine mist of anger and bs. They say the election was stolen. They call us reverse-racists (whatever the hell that means) and misogynist. They smear our candidate ruthlessly and declare they that will never vote for him. I’ve seen so many feminist declare they they didn’t care men, that blacks only voted for BO because he was black, and they any women who didn’t vote for Clinton was some kind of gender traitor.

They call us to court them ‘or else’ and see nothing wrong with that. On a historic night their candidate wouldn’t even concede the race even though she’d lost and we’re supposed to, what, baby her? And her constituency as well, it seems. Try to point out how ridiculous that was, that if the roles were reversed and B-rock had lost and decided to use the black vote/youth vote as a bargaining chip they’d be just as pissed, you get met with a wall of “but that’s different.”

All this and then WE get called ungracious? We’re the sore winners?

I swear, the dems must be the party of vampires. How else is it that they can’t their own hypocrisy staring them in the face?

The electoral votes of my state—Oklahoma—are going to John McCain. The electoral votes of NY are going to Obama. Nothing that an Oklahoma or a NY voter can do other than actually voting for McCain can be called voting for McCain.

I wouldn’t be 100 percent sure about Oklahoma—you guys had an early primary when things were still up in the air, and you still had about 84,000 more Democrats show up to vote than Republicans.  (Numbers from WashingtonPost.com).  That means that in your primary, 417,000 Democrats and 333,000 Republicans voted.  If you get those same numbers in the general, the Democrat will win Oklahoma.  Unless, of course, people take your advice and vote McCain when their vote for Obama may well have made a difference.

Alaska, on the other hand?  No chance for a Democrat.  May as well vote for Kang.

Before you decide your state is hopelessly Republican, take a look at the turnout numbers for the primaries, because you may be surprised.

Hillaryis44.org is teh scary.

They need to get a new URL and have the current site redirect to McCainis44.org, because it’s been a long time since I’ve seen a single issues-related post on that vile website.

The bigger threat than pissed off feminists voting for McCain - oh, c’mon, I don’t know a single feminist would vote for McCain short of having a pistol to their head, and some of them not even then - is that the arrogance of Obama’s supporters, a large number of them being bad winners, will keep a small but real percentage of feminist voters home come election day.

Which might be enough come election day to swing states like Ohio and Florida towards the Republicans - but the notion that feminists will, en masse, vote for McCain is so far at variance from the truth it makes me wonder if the person knows any actual feminists.

An excellent point, indeed, my friend.

Which is the exact reason why I, as an Obama supporter, strongly urge my fellow Obama supporters to chill out on the anti-Clinton rhetoric IMMEDIATELY.  Please, cease and desist.

We won.  No need to gloat.

And to Clinton supporters who really do choose to vote McCain this November, I say “don’t let the door hit you in the ass.”  But I truly, sincerely, and fervently believe to the core of my being that 99.9% of Hillary’s supporters are rational, intelligent, and logical people who will join us in stopping John McCain from becoming the next POTUS.

To the 0.1% who don’t, it’s your loss.

Even online, the feminiists who’ve said they won’t vote for Obama is tiny, and that’s from an already small cross-section of the population. I’m not really concerned.

Do you recall the small group that still thinks the Iraq War is a really great victory?  In any issue, 15% of the population will adopt the stupidest position.

BTW, that 15% will include you and I on some issues.

But I truly, sincerely, and fervently believe to the core of my being that 99.9% of Hillary’s supporters are rational, intelligent, and logical people who will join us in stopping John McCain from becoming the next POTUS.

I agree, and I also think that we ALL need to chill on the denunciations until the convention.  As she is not dumb, I’m sure that right now Hillary is negotiating the planks she wants in the party’s platform and figuring out which of the various floated positions she might want.

This isn’t like the Republicans in 2000, where Bush’s camp spread rumors about McCain’s (nonexistent) illegitimate black baby and then made him kiss Bush’s ass at the convention.  Our primary was a tough campaign with two great competitors, neither of whom did something approaching that level of assholishness, and neither of whom is going to make the other eat dirt.  So let’s calm down and work together to defeat McCain, shall we?

So, I’m no hothouse flower who just was exposed to sexist behavior, I’ve experienced it all my freaking life.  But this campaign has been so damn ugly, so full of misogyny from media and many Obama’s supporters, so many people denying that the sexism even exists, that I’ve had it.  I’m irrelevant and I don’t matter to the Democratic Party?  Fine, then it doesn’t need my vote.

You’re not being asked to vote for the media.  You’re not being asked to vote for any of Obama’s supporters.  You’re not being asked to vote for Hamas, or John Cole, or Amanda Marcotte. You’re not even being asked to vote for the Democratic Party.

You’re being asked to vote for John McCain, or Barack Obama, or not to vote at all.  Clinton got shit hurled at her because she was born with one set of genitals.  If you wish to hold Obama personally responsible for the shit hurled at Clinton, and you’re sure it has nothing to do with him being born with the other set of genitals, that’s your prerogative. You’re an adult, and no-one is entitled to tell you what to do with your franchise.

Linda -

You’re anger at the sexism you have seen play out is legitimate and real.  I myself have been disgusted by the sexist comments that I’ve heard from a small but very real and very vocal group of fellow Obama supporters.

Stereotypes suck.

Just as I don’t believe that all, or even most, Clinton supporters are patently racist, I’ve seen a small group of them who very clearly are.

Not evn knowing you, I truly doubt that you are a racist.  And it would be terribly unfair of me to characterize most of Hillary’s supporters as racists or to assume that you are a racist because a tiny fraction of Hillary Clinton’s supporters have made racist comments.

Just the same, it is terribly unfair of you to focus on the small group of sexist Obama supporters and paint us all with a broad brush.  Though I am an Obama supporter, I do not consider myself a sexist, and I would be as offended by you calling me a sexist as I am sure you would be if I were to suggest that you are a racist.

Most of us aren’t sexists, just as most Clinton supporters aren’t racists.  It’s unfortunate that a few rotten apples have tried to spoil the bunch in both camps.

Unfortunately, only one candidate could emerge as the nominee.  In a perfect world, wouldn’t it have been something if the 2008 candidate had in fact been both a person of color AND a woman?  I hope I live to see the day that such a thing happens.

I just urge you to take a serious look at the issues, despite some of the ugliness that has reared its head in this campaign.  John McCain will not help the feminist cause, even remotely.  If given the power to appoint two or even God forbid three Supreme Court justices, he could knock the women’s right’s movement back 40 years.

If you live in a solidly blue or red state and wish to abstain from voting this year as a matter of principle, I can accept that position.  But if the state you live in is at all in play this year, I urge you to think long and hard about the potential ramifications of a McCain Presidency and to ask yourself if it is worth it to you.

I truly believe that you will find that it is not.

In any case, and whatever choice you ultimately make, I bid you peace, and thank you for your heartfelt support of women’s issues.

So, yes, the people running around screaming that Obama is going to ban abortion are ignorant at best, and dishonest at worst.

Bwahaha, good one Mnemosyne! [And, for the record, it’s both ignorant and dishonest.]

his isn’t like the Republicans in 2000, where Bush’s camp spread rumors

Yes it is. The McCain campaign was openly recruiting agit-propiteers. There’s a dopey consistency to most of the Democrats for McCain posts. They have to hope they can wedge something from the Democrats or it’s gonna be a wipeout. The MSM is all handwringy about Hillary and her voters. Meanwhile Obama is now polling ahead of McCain in Missouri.

Would have been nice if pro-Obama supporters had stuck to the issues while campaigning against Clinton, instead of joining the trash-Clinton bandwagon, wouldn’t it?

At the end of the day why does it matter?

Obama_Rules639 isn’t running for office, and ProgressiveDude7 isn’t going to be SecDef.

My vote depends on yours. New Jersey and Maryland have decided to allocate their electoral votes to the winner of the popular vote. So in order for Obama to get the electoral votes of these two traditionally blue states, he also needs to win the popular vote. In the long run, this a great way to break the Electoral College (if other states go along with this plan in 2012 and even more do in 2016, by 2020 it will in effect be dead). In the short run, my state’s electoral votes could go for McCain when in the past they have safely gone for the Democratic candidate. Something had to be done in response to 2000, but I can’t say I’m too excited that it’s my blue state that it is staring it. If it were a blue and red state with the same number of electoral votes I wouldn’t mind so much - it would be an equal gamble. But with two blue states, whether or not Obama picks up 25 votes that he should easily have is dependent on the popular vote. Please vote for him, no matter how safely red or blue your state is, because I don’t want my state’s votes going to McCain. We’ve won the popular vote once and lost the electoral vote. I don’t want us to lose the popular vote, come close to winning the electoral vote, but lose it because of Maryland and New Jersey. (As if the Supreme Court wouldn’t find for McCain this time, but still.)

Yes it is. The McCain campaign was openly recruiting agit-propiteers. There’s a dopey consistency to most of the Democrats for McCain posts. They have to hope they can wedge something from the Democrats or it’s gonna be a wipeout. The MSM is all handwringy about Hillary and her voters. Meanwhile Obama is now polling ahead of McCain in Missouri.

Sorry, I think you misunderstood me.  I was saying that Obama vs. Clinton never sank to the nastiness that Bush vs. McCain did in 2000.  I have no illusions that McCain vs. Obama will not sink to those levels. 

The Republicans are merrily doing as much ratfucking as they possibly can, because they know their ONLY hope of winning in November is to suppress the Democratic vote.  They’re going to spread rumors, they’re going to purge people from the rolls, they’re going to reprogram the voting machines.  Because it’s the only hope they have left of retaining office.

I wouldn’t be 100 percent sure about Oklahoma—you guys had an early primary when things were still up in the air, and you still had about 84,000 more Democrats show up to vote than Republicans.  (Numbers from WashingtonPost.com).  That means that in your primary, 417,000 Democrats and 333,000 Republicans voted.  If you get those same numbers in the general, the Democrat will win Oklahoma.  Unless, of course, people take your advice and vote McCain when their vote for Obama may well have made a difference.

Alaska, on the other hand?  No chance for a Democrat.  May as well vote for Kang.

Before you decide your state is hopelessly Republican, take a look at the turnout numbers for the primaries, because you may be surprised.

Sorry, Mnemosyne, that dog won’t hunt.

Many registered Democrats in Oklahoma don’t vote Democratic for president or senate. The most Democratic part of the state is the rural southeast. These are old-style, Southern Democrats who have elected Dan Boren, the single most conservative Democratic member of Congress.  Democrats have always outnumbered Republicans in my state, while Oklahoma has been redder than anywhere but Utah and has elected Sens. Inhofe and Coburn over (quite conservative, actually) Democratic opponents.

In a total landslide (i.e. over forty state) victory, Hillary Clinton might have been competitive in Oklahoma.  But Barack Obama also received a lower percentage of the vote in Oklahoma’s Democratic primary than in any other state.  If Barack Obama won 48 states, one of the two losses would likely be Oklahoma.

On the other hand, Alaska might actually be competitive this year.  But don’t believe me, look at the poll numbers over on fivethirtyeight (probably the best poll analysis site out there), which gives Obama a 0.0% chance of winning Oklahoma (Clinton, by contrast, would have a 1.1% chance).  In contrast, Obama has a 17.9% chance of winning Alaska.

Footnote to all of this: there’s really no style of political argument I dislike more than the pseudo-realist attempt to prevent people from voting for third-party candidates. You want to make a consequentialist argument about the real effect of such a vote? Fine. Make it based on the real world in which we live, a place where most of our votes don’t make any difference because of the electoral college.  The truth is that the Green Party has about as much chance of winning the presidency as Barack Obama has of winning Oklahoma (or John McCain has of winning, say, DC).  If you want to stop others from engaging in political fantasies, y’all have got to stop engaging in them yourselves.

Many registered Democrats in Oklahoma don’t vote Democratic for president or senate.

So registered Democrats in Oklahoma turn out to vote in the Democratic primary, but then turn around and vote for the Republican in the general?  Do you have actual numbers on that?

i’ll be voting for obama. i even like him. always have. i was originally an edwards supporter. but he ‘suspended’ his campaign before making it down here and i went for clinton in the primaries. i thought long and hard about it. i debated. i wavered. it was never a lock.

but, yes, i’m pissed.

and i love this blog.

and there is plenty wrong with clinton. no doubt.

BUT—do you guys listen to yourselves? do you read what you’ve written before posting it and not see how you sound so completely patronizing, snarky, sarcastic, dismissive?

you’re going to sit there and dismiss someone as less mature than you for disagreeing? dismiss them as racist (not that i saw in this particular thread, but it’s been happening)?

reading the threads at all my usual haunts that i like to keep up on, the comments are almost always dominated with the most patronizing sneering language. mostly from obama supporters.

my friends are mostly obama supporters and none of them act this way. i suppose i’m not the supposedly typical clinton supporter being as i’m not technically white, i’m not old, and i’m a perpetual grad student. though, i am certainly broke beyond belief.

but on the threads. dailykos. eschaton. salon. here… not all obama supporters, but a lot, seem to think it’s a-ok to belittle and sneer and call names like that’s debate. i can almost hear the disdain when i read the comments.

that’s the problem. sure, i think it’s a huge, huge mistake to not support obama. but, you don’t convince people who have doubts by sneering at them. poor rhetoric, bad pathos, to say the least.

maybe try talking to them like they are adults and stop pretending like you read their minds and know, just know that they aren’t real feminists, or they are looking for reasons not to like obama, or they’re racists, or… whatever. maybe pretend like they are people like you or me and thought about it and truly have doubts. the people i know who did support clinton, primarily did so because of worries about electability. you might think that’s wrong. but treating them like they’re idiots for it, especially given mixed messages in the media and polls, isn’t fruitful.

hell, even with the concession issue. history, people. it was absolutely no big deal that she didn’t concede that night. it wasn’t even expected, if you bother looking at the reports: it was reported that she would not concede. in fact, she’d have really hurt her supporters feelings at the very least. i don’t mean her stupid super-delegates from NY. i mean the voters…. further, reagan, kennedy, jackson, to name a few, went all the way to the convention and with less votes. whyyyyyy? power for their causes for their people. that’s what i heard in her speech.

you wanna win? we need unity. it takes two to tango and she got a lot of votes and it’s just willful blindness to dismiss that as just about her having name recognition, or angry white women, or racists, or whatever. and while i think obama himself has almost always handled himself quite well and treated clinton and her supporters with respect, i haven’t seen that from whole heaping load of obama supporters online, and from a number of them in the news. yeah, there were some real freakin’ idiots in clinton’s camp too… but most of what i saw was from obama’s so-called supporters.

we’ll get passed this. but, frankly, i’m really disheartened about the state of racism and sexism in our own ranks. but, also… the weird competitive, totally mean-spirited and generally kind of cruel way people have treated each other.

i want us to win. so badly. i fear for this country and this sort of gloating patronizing is soooo frightening because i think it has the potential to fuck it all up. please. seriously. try to tone it down. this whole ‘no real feminist woman won’t not vote for obama’ is just not provable, deeply patronizing, and a waste of time. men voted for her to, remember? and people are complicated and often self-contradictory and while they might mean well and think about it hard, treating them poorly can interfere with that process.

let the flaming begin? i hope not. i expect better on this site anyway. and, generally, the dumb comments have been less bad here than at other places. but still.

So registered Democrats in Oklahoma turn out to vote in the Democratic primary, but then turn around and vote for the Republican in the general?  Do you have actual numbers on that?

I really didn’t say that.

417,207 Democrats voted in the 2008 Oklahoma primary.

Here are the 2004 general election results:

Bush   959,792   65.57%
Kerry   503,966   34.43%

Many if not most of the Democrats who vote in the primary may vote for Obama (though he got only 130,130 votes), but that’s not nearly enough to win the state.

Nobody, and I mean nobody, who has any idea what he or she is talking about thinks that Obama can win this state.  It really is no more likely than Cynthia McKinney being inaugurated next January.

I really didn’t say that.

Actually, I started looking up statistics from the Oklahoma elections office last night and it looks like that may be exactly what happens.  You can’t go by 2004 because you had a Republican incumbent (which means that fewer Republicans would bother to vote in the primary), but if you look at 2000, there was a much bigger turnout for the Democratic primary than for the Republican primary, but Gore got thumped in the general.  Seriously, what’s up with that?

My vote depends on yours. New Jersey and Maryland have decided to allocate their electoral votes to the winner of the popular vote. So in order for Obama to get the electoral votes of these two traditionally blue states, he also needs to win the popular vote…In the short run, my state’s electoral votes could go for McCain when in the past they have safely gone for the Democratic candidate. Something had to be done in response to 2000, but I can’t say I’m too excited that it’s my blue state that it is starting it. If it were a blue and red state with the same number of electoral votes I wouldn’t mind so much - it would be an equal gamble. But with two blue states, whether or not Obama picks up 25 votes that he should easily have is dependent on the popular vote. Please vote for him, no matter how safely red or blue your state is, because I don’t want my state’s votes going to McCain.

onejewishduke: I think you’ve misunderstood. NJ and MD (among other states) have indeed signed the National Popular Vote compact. But the crucial point is that it will only take effect when a certain number of states have signed up - specifically, states with a majority of electoral college votes (271 votes). Until this happens - and it hasn’t yet, the total is only 45 - the the winner of NJ’s popular vote will get NJ’s electoral college delegates, regardless of what happens elsewhere in the country.

So don’t worry.

Seriously, what’s up with that?

Oklahoma is politically rather like the deep South twenty years ago, but with many fewer African Americans.  Although our Congressional delegation has been almost entirely Republican for over a decade, our legislature has only just switched from Democratic (which both houses had been, uninterrupted except for four years in the 1920s) to Republican.

Oklahoma’s Democratic voters are more rural than urban. I suspect a lot of them are Democrats because Pappy was a Democrat and they can’t quite see joining the party of Lincoln.

Our Democratic governor was originally elected in 2002 in a three-way race (the third candidate was an economic populist former Republican federal prosecutor running on a small government platform).  One theory of how he pulled it off (upsetting then-rising GOP star Steve Largent) was that an anti-cockfighting initiative was on the ballot. Largent, a Christian conservative, opposed cockfighting, in part because it was a gambling sport (though gambling on it was illegal), as did most urban Democrats (for animal welfare reasons).  The initiative passed. But it brought to the polls a lot of rural Democrats who probably wouldn’t have otherwise voted. And as long as they were voting, they pulled the lever for the Democrat.  Coincidental but creepy fact: the ballot sign for the Oklahoma Democratic Party isn’t a donkey. It’s still the white rooster.

It’s a weird state.

Totally with you whydidimovetoalabama? and Ursula