Obama raising huge money since Super Tuesday...

[Kevin M]

Maybe they're setting up for good cop/bad cop.

"We're sorry we hired such a douche. The new guy is going to be much nicer about dragging my opponent through the slime."

[sperry]

Well, at least he's working for the campaign I want to lose.

[knucklesplitter]

Obama's campaign guy, David Axelrod:

http://www.latimes.com/news/politics...0,610634.story

[knucklesplitter]

This just in... Clinton surrogate says all you Obama supporters are "latte-drinking, Prius- driving, Birkenstock-wearing, trust fund babies".

[Kevin M]

Damn, I'm O-fer on that score. Who do I have to vote for now?

[sperry]

Originally Posted by knucklesplitter

This just in... Clinton surrogate says all you Obama supporters are "latte-drinking, Prius- driving, Birkenstock-wearing, trust fund babies".

Ugh.

Here's what's gonna happen. Clinton is going to push her supports to hate Obama so much that when she loses the Dem nomination, she'll have left the party so split the democrats will lose the general election.

All hail our new overlord John McCain.

[Kevin M]

At least it's not Romney or Huckabee.

[knucklesplitter]

Lot more trustfund babies than I thought out there. Obama has had over 920,000 (and rapidly climbing) people donate to his campaign. That's pretty amazing.

(counter currently here)
http://www.barackobama.com/index.php#

[sperry]

Awesome.

Clinton just gave herself another $6.4M just to make sure that even though she's got virtually no chance of getting the Democratic nod over Obama, she's going to be able to fight long enough to ensure McCain wins the Whitehouse due to a divided Democrat party.

http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5j...BnGqwD90GUIOG0

[MPREZIV]

Originally Posted by sperry

Ugh.

Here's what's gonna happen. Clinton is going to push her supports to hate Obama so much that when she loses the Dem nomination, she'll have left the party so split the democrats will lose the general election.

All hail our new overlord John McCain.

You said it 2 months ago... Negrodamus?

[Dean]

She is trying to buy a VP spot on the ticket, though I think Colin Powell would still make a compelling ticket.

[Kevin M]

Originally Posted by Dean

She is trying to buy a VP spot on the ticket, though I think Colin Powell would still make a compelling ticket.

I'm pretty sure Colin Powell has zero interest whatsoever in high office of any kind. I also doubt Clinton would take the VP. If she lost the nomination and Obama lost in the general, she'd be a shoe-in for the '12 nomination. And if he won, she could probably take on whoever his VP ends up being and potentially win the nomination then.

[sperry]

Originally Posted by Dean

She is trying to buy a VP spot on the ticket, though I think Colin Powell would still make a compelling ticket.

I thought both sides had already ruled out sharing a ticket, though I think an Obama/Clinton platform might actually work well. I just think that after such a hard fight for the primary, neither will want to campaign with the other.

[sperry]

Originally Posted by Dean

She is trying to buy a VP spot on the ticket, though I think Colin Powell would still make a compelling ticket.

Colin Powell is a party-loathing Republican. I don't see him running for the Democratic VP nomination.

[Dean]

Originally Posted by sperry

Colin Powell is a party-loathing Republican. I don't see him running for the Democratic VP nomination.

What better opportunity could you imagine for a party-loathing republican. And talk about a change to the status quo.

[Kevin M]

It would definitely kick ass to see any of the remaining candidates actually think in terms of improving the country instead of filling their demographic gaps with their runningmate. But I don't see it happening this year.

[AtomicLabMonkey]

We got the job done here in Cackalack. I can't believe this primary fight is still going though...

[knucklesplitter]

It is done. AP says nomination is "clinched".

http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5i...54YCwD912RMEO0

[Kevin M]

Now the question is whether Clinton will step down before the convention.

[JonnydaJibba]

Wow, have we really not discussed politics in almost 5 months?

I have a question that I'm sure you SMRT guys can answer.

Let's discuss this "redistribution of wealth." I don't understand it at all. The way the Repubs explain it, he will take MY money and straight up give it to somebody else who doesn't make as much as me. The way I understand this part of Obamas tax plan is that people making more than 250k will be taxed at a higher rate. Will that money then be used to fund programs designed to help lower income people? Or am I going to get taxed higher and then that money will be given to people making less? What am I missing here?

[knucklesplitter]

Obama's plan is basically a tax cut for everybody making less than $250k/year, and those making more than $250k/year will be taxed at pre-GWBush rates. I wouldn't call that "socialism" like the McCain/Drudge/FauxNews crowd tends to do. In fact Mcain opposed the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy back when he was more of a real maverick, and nobody called him a socialist.

Here is an online calculator if you want to see what would happen to you if the plan gets implemented:
http://taxcut.barackobama.com/

[sperry]

Originally Posted by JonnydaJibba

Wow, have we really not discussed politics in almost 5 months?

I have a question that I'm sure you SMRT guys can answer.

Let's discuss this "redistribution of wealth." I don't understand it at all. The way the Repubs explain it, he will take MY money and straight up give it to somebody else who doesn't make as much as me. The way I understand this part of Obamas tax plan is that people making more than 250k will be taxed at a higher rate. Will that money then be used to fund programs designed to help lower income people? Or am I going to get taxed higher and then that money will be given to people making less? What am I missing here?

A lot has been made of nothing IMO, simply because of the phrase "spread the wealth around a little". Fundamentally, both parties want to redistribute money around to save the economy... the difference is in how they want to do it.

The "standard" Republican method is via tax cuts to the rich. The idea is that by saving the big businesses money, they have more to spend in improving their business, which in turn creates more jobs, which in turn puts money into the hands of the middle class, who in turn are supposed to buy more stuff and therefore make the big businesses more successful, and thus upward-spiral the economy into better days. This is basically what they mean by "trickle down economics", in that you make policy changes to a few at the top of the pyramid that eventually make it down to everyone.

The Democrat method has the same goals, but focuses on the middle class first. The idea is you cut the middle classes taxes so they have money to spend in the economy that eventually makes its way into the hands of the big businesses. But in order to pay for gov't services, taxes have to be raised on the rich... but IMO, the top 1% can afford the cost much more easily than the rest of us... afterall, paying say 20% more in taxes when you make $50M/year is the difference between getting both a Porsche and a Ferrari or having to pick one, whereas 20% more taxes when you make $50k/year is the difference in making your mortgage payment or not.

And IMO, there are several other problems with McCain's plan:

1st, trickle-down doesn't work so well. It was trickle-down policies that got us into the whole housing meltdown (de-regulation of the industry was supposed to allow them to regulate themselves and choose their own risk, but we see how well that worked out). Plus, when you give a big cut to the top, they just pocket half of it for themselves, then trickle only 50% of the savings down to the next guy so takes his half then passes it along... so a $4B tax cut to ExxonMobile ends up doing what for the middle class, saving us $0.03/gal? Big whoop.

2nd if we're cutting taxes to the rich, how do we fund the insane costs of the gov't? Republicans used to be able to suggest tax cuts because they used to also operate on a platform of less and cheaper gov't, but that's not the case with today's Republicans that want to fund a $1 trillion war and a $1 trillion economy bailout (which the Republicans support even though it's far more socialist than Obama's tax plan, figure that one out). If we're cutting taxes to the rich to spur the economy, how do we fund the gov't properly? McCain's said little more than "we'll make it work because American is awesome!".

IMO, the Democrat plan is far more realistic, well thought out, and will have a better over-all effect on the economy. Cutting taxes to the middle class puts money directly in the hands of the people that need it the most when the economy sours. The bailout gets funded by the people that are directly benefiting from the bailout (rich bankers) who are the people that aren't going to be in the poor-house over having to pay more taxes.

It seems to me, we're in for hard times regardless of the plan used... it just seems fair that those that benefited the most at the top during the boom should be the people that step up the most to help the nation recover during the bust. The middle class are going to have a hard enough time with unemployment, inflation, etc... taxing the rich has less of a burden on less people.

[JonnydaJibba]

That really cleared it up for me. Thanks for the posts guys.

[Nick Koan]

Go ahead, milk your 15 minutes. Milk it baby!

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1008/15072.html

[sperry]

Originally Posted by Nick Koan

Go ahead, milk your 15 minutes. Milk it baby!

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1008/15072.html

I hope he makes more than $250,000 off his fame, and Barak's plan taxes his ass. Then everyone forgets about him and he has to go back to making $25k/year plumbing.