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  Posted By:
  JasonAaron at 02/21/2008 4:36:14 PM
  Comment:
  All this talk about who has the most experience is bogus. According to the US Constitution. The minimum qualifications to be president are that you be at least 35 and a US citizen. Anyone can be president and Obama has enough intelligence and vision to make us another great nation for another 8 years at least.
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  Posted By:
  blessinggirl at 02/20/2008 11:29:49 PM
  Comment:
  I agree with the conclusion of the article, but please do not compare Senator Obama to Ronald Reagan. Ronald Reagan started this "I love being white and forget the blacks and the poor" juggernaut that led us to Bush II. He truly was an empty suit, and the inspiration he provided was to white folks who were truly beaten up after losing the Vietnam war, the energy crisis, when Arabia turned America upside down and ended cheap gas, and the multiple rights movements which proliferated after the Civil Rights era. He slashed federal poverty programs and his policies created and formed the permanent underclass. He did not bring down the Soviet Union, as legend has it. Comparing Obama to him is disrespectful.
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  Posted By:
  Vermeer at 02/20/2008 10:14:40 PM
  Comment:
  This analysis misses one significant point about Ronald Reagan; he was a
  two-term governor of California riding the crest of what the historian Kevin
  Phillips recognized as "the emerging Republican majority." Obama, whose
  inspired rhetoric has galvanized some dormant but mostly frustrated members
  of that same Reagan coalition, doesn't have much to run on beside his
  profile, opposition to the Iraq War, and what appear to be some demographic
  indicators favoring the Democrats and a Republican Party in freefall. This
  electorate is highly volatile and simply wishing that everyone should come
  to their senses and choose the "hope' that is Obama is frankly naive.
  Obama's rhetoric and vague longing for change could come crashing down in
  one bad debate performance leaving the electorate looking at a qualified
  senior (geezer) senator and war hero against a rookie senator who frankly
  still can't explain his 130 + "present" votes as a state senator in
  Illinois. Honestly, after eight years of the mess of this administration the
  idea the presidential election could boil down to that is frightening. I'm a
  little bored of the echo chamber of intelligent people like yourself who
  seem to believe that electoral politics is simply some sort of calculation
  that the public is exhausted with the Bushies and some revolution is in the
  offing because someone with charisma and smarts has now ascended to the
  podium. That's a delusion just as troubling as any of those held by the
  current office-holder.
  
  
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  Posted By:
  Vermeer at 02/20/2008 3:33:51 PM
  Comment:
  This analysis misses one significant point about Ronald Reagan; he was a two-term governor of California riding the crest of what the historian Kevin Phillips recognized as "the emerging Republican majority." Obama, whose inspired rhetoric has galvanized some dormant but mostly frustrated members of that same Reagan coalition, doesn't have much to run on beside his profile, opposition to the Iraq War, and what appear to be some demographic indicators favoring the Democrats and a Republican Party in freefall. This electorate is highly volatile and simply wishing that everyone should come to their senses and choose the "hope' that is Obama is frankly naive. Obama's rhetoric and vague longing for change could come crashing down in one bad debate performance leaving the electorate looking at a qualified senior (geezer) senator and war hero against a rookie senator who frankly still can't explain his 130 + "present" votes as a state senator in Illinois. Honestly, after eight years of the mess of this administration the idea the presidential election could boil down to that is frightening. I'm a little bored of the echo chamber of intelligent people like yourself who seem to believe that electoral politics is simply some sort of calculation that the public is exhausted with the Bushies and some revolution is in the offing because someone with charisma and smarts has now ascended to the podium. That's a delusion just as troubling as any of those held by the current office-holder.
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  Posted By:
  hesperia at 02/20/2008 5:25:20 AM
  Comment:
  Further, I guess it's cool that the center-left has embraced Obama. Too bad Obama doesn't embrace center-left politics on ONE SINGLE COUNT!
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  Posted By:
  hesperia at 02/20/2008 5:18:28 AM
  Comment:
  I sure wish someone could show me what Obama has done to earn his status as a "myth". I just can't help thinking that it's dangerous to attribute that kind of power to someone to has done so little to earn the reputation. In what sense is he anything more than a centrist Democratic hack with a new (actually, pretty old but no one remembers) style of speech making?
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  Posted By:
  Ms.Martin at 02/19/2008 11:15:15 PM
  Comment:
  I was wondering when someone would reach this conclusion! It is clear that Senator Obama is not only intelligent, but has a character full of substance. His mere level of intelligence alone elevates him above not only the current president but any other candidate in the race.
  
  I don't see how experience in the field of politics and bs makes you more qualifed than someone who is intelligent enough and who has enough character to do in one term that you haven't done in 35 years.