Hyde Park public schools not good enough, looking for racists in small town America, what DO women want?, and dog whistling with lipstick
By LisaB on September 12, 2008 at 7:35 PM in Current Affairs
While Palin: the Interview is still the top news story, I thought I’d take a look around and see what else is out there.
1) The Chicago Sun-Times has an opinion piece detailing Obama’s missteps regarding Palin and a suggestion for further engagement with the Republican vice presidential nominee: Don’t.
The article started out rehashing the pig and lipstick kerfluffle. The writer thinks Obama brought the subsequent firestorm down on himself, even though the saying is an old one and used by many politicians, including John McCain and Ann Richards.
But none of that, none of that, can explain why the words came stammering out of Obama’s mouth the other day.
What was he thinking?
Read the rest ->
For starters, the Democratic nominee — for all his many positive attributes — is not “just plain folks,” as was only highlighted by his awkward delivery of the intended putdown, and therefore should not pretend to be.
But, more important, Obama knew as well as anyone listening to him that Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin has the market cornered on lipstick for this campaign season, even if she puts hers on a pit bull.
By invoking lipstick, Obama invoked Palin. Despite his protestations later, he knew it, or certainly should have known it.
And even though the line got Obama a big laugh from the partisan crowd, which clearly drew the connection, he blew it.
What was he thinking? He was thinking that he’d gotten away with it before and could certainly do it again. Anyone remember: the finger, saying Hillary “periodically” lashes out, threw the kitchen sink at him, using loaded lyrics in campaign music, brushing HRC off his oh-so-cool shoulders etc. etc.
Everyone knows the goal of a campaign is to stay on message, and, if possible, appropriate your rival’s message and turn it into something weak sounding or laugh inducing. I’ll buy the idea that Obama was only using a familiar saying to make a point. I’ll NOT buy the idea he didn’t think it would also refer to Palin. Truly, I’m amazed he thinks people are “that stupid.”
2) The Australian again has an interesting piece on the election. Overall, it sees a rather typical race with the usual states going for the usual suspects. However, it says choosing Palin was a strong move.
The Real Clear Politics tracking average of the main polls has McCain leading Obama by 48 to 45.6. The USA Today poll has McCain ahead by a whopping 10 per cent. However, perhaps the single most credible US poll, the Gallup tracking poll, has McCain ahead by the very significant margin of 4 per cent, 48 to 44. That is the lead for McCain among registered voters. McCain’s lead among likely voters is much higher. The Rasmussen tracking poll, on the other hand, has the contest even, at 48 each.
Within these big numbers, some individual results are astounding.
The Washington Post/ABC poll shows McCain now leading among white women by 53 per cent to 41 per cent, whereas a month ago he was trailing among white women by 42 per cent to 50 per cent. The polls also show McCain with a decisive advantage, of about 15 per cent, among the critically important independent voters.
McCain enjoys a huge advantage over Obama on who would make the better commander in chief and has radically narrowed his disadvantage, almost to the margin of error, on handling the economy. It seems Bill Kristol of The Weekly Standard was right. When the liberal media savaged Palin as, successively, a small-town nonentity, a slut, a nobody, a neglectful mother, a liar, a religious extremist, a sex object and an airhead, they enormously boosted support for her and McCain.
—————–Here’s one more fascinating fact. The charismatic Obama is running well behind the generic Democrat brand. The 72-year-old, rhetorically challenged McCain is running well ahead of the generic Republican brand.
—————-US presidential elections are the most complex and fascinating in the world. There are so many factors, so many moving parts. Rather boastfully, I will tell you that I have an excellent record of predicting US presidential elections. However, this is because there is one simple measure that embodies all other factors: the national polls.
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At this stage, that’s McCain but there is a long way to go. So far, Palin is proving the most electorally significant vice-presidential pick in modern US history. The discomfiture of the Left has been truly a joy to behold. Frank Rich in The New York Times, with splendid unconscious irony, accused the Republicans of trying to distract voters with celebrity.
Since we all get in the political weeds from time to time, it’s always interesting to see how the international press thinks things are going. The Australian has had several interesting articles in the last few months and this one is also worth a read.
3) The Weekly Standard says Obama made a strategic error in not choosing Hillary Clinton. The article goes on to articulate what the differences might be in the race had Obama selected Clinton. This includes: no Palin, no Biden, more likely Democratic unity, better odds in Ohio, Pennsylvania and Arkansas, and the possibility that Republican women would cross over to vote for Hillary. The article ends with this:
Because of all the problems associated with the Clintons–husband Bill, her relatively high unfavorability in polls, Clinton fatigue–Hillary Clinton appeared to be the wrong running mate for Obama. I thought so. I was mistaken. As Clinton won primaries in big states and developed a populist appeal to downscale white voters, her political value soared. As it turns out, Obama needed her. McCain is lucky Obama missed his chance.
McCain is lucky? HILLARY is lucky.
4) USAToday’s blogpost on Palin echoes others about the likely impact she will have on the idea of feminism.
To put it plainly, Palin is seriously messing with our templates. We know what political women in the USA are supposed to look like — and she’s not it.
Palin fits no model we’ve ever seen, and we’re not sure what to do with her. Equal parts Dr. Quinn Medicine Woman and Stands With A Fist — with a little Barbarella thrown in — Palin is a unique and unfamiliar brand.
She’s what some might call “Trouble.” And proud of it, too.
———————McCain can hardly wipe the grin off his face. He gambled and won — Big Time. His biggest score has been among white women, who have abandoned the Obama camp and hauled their teepees over to the McCain reservation. Before the Republican convention, white women were leaning 50% for Obama to 42% for McCain, according to ABC News/Washington Post polling. Post-convention, the numbers have shifted to 53% for McCain and just 41% for Obama among white women.
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What has become abundantly clear in the meantime is that we have reached a crossroads in our nation’s gender trajectory. Always burbling beneath the surface of American life and politics, gender has erupted the past few days into a geyser of emotion and vitriol.
The author goes on to say that HRC represented the old template for what feminists wanted in a candidate. However, I’m not sure I’d agree. With organizations like NARAL endorsing Obama before he clinched the nomination, I don’t think feminists were all that behind Hillary. I think they broke ranks and gambled on Obama for some reason I don’t yet understand.
The author does end by saying “the sisterhood” is “on notice.” THAT, I’d agree with.
5) Financial Times has a short story on how Democrats on Capitol Hill are seeing the GE shape up. Apparently, some are worried.
A Democratic fundraiser for Congressional candidates said some planned to distance themselves from Mr Obama and not attack Mr McCain.
“If people are voting for McCain it could help Republicans all the way down the ticket, even in a year when the Democrats should be sweeping all before us,” said the fundraiser, a former Hillary Clinton supporter.
“There is a growing sense of doom among Democrats I have spoken to . . . People are going crazy, telling the campaign ‘you’ve got to do something’.”
This is the first “worried” down-ticket Democratic candidate story I’ve seen. When campaigns go badly, you see these more and more. But it’s tepid – the election is still several weeks away. Still, it’s worth keeping an eye on publications like this one. Their sources may be a bit different than MSM and these publications aren’t the ones people are familiar with. To me, that means FT sources may speak just a little more freely.
6) Realclearpolitics addresses the “what is feminism” question in the wake of all the Palin stories questioning her as a real woman.
First, there is a particular class and professional bent to the practitioners of feminism. Sarah Palin has as many kids as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, she has as much of a prior political record as the once-heralded Rep. Geraldine Ferraro, who was named to the Democratic ticket by Walter Mondale in 1984 — and arguably has as much as, or more executive experience than, Barack Obama. Somehow all that got lost in the endless sneering stories about her blue-collar conservatism, small Alaskan town, five children, snowmobiling husband and Idaho college degree.
Second, feminism now often equates to a condescending liberalism. Emancipated women who, like Palin, do not believe in abortion or are devout Christians are at best considered unsophisticated dupes. At worse, they are caricatured as conservative interlopers, piggybacking on the hard work of leftwing women whose progressive ideas alone have allowed the Palins of the world the choices that otherwise they would not now enjoy.
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Third, hypocrisy abounds. Many female critics of Palin, in Washington and New York politics and media, found their careers enhanced through the political influence of their powerful fathers, their advantageous marriages to male power players and the inherited advantages of capital. The irony is that a Palin — like a Barbara Jordan, Golda Meir or Margaret Thatcher — made her own way without the help of money or influence.Fourth, most Americans still believe in the old feminism but not this new doctrinaire liberal brand. Consequently, a struggling John McCain suddenly has shot ahead of Obama in the polls. Apparently millions of Americans like Palin’s underdog feminist saga and her can-do pluckiness. Many are offended by haughty liberal media elites sneering at someone that, politics aside, they should be praising — for her substantial achievements, her inspirational personal story and her Obama-like charisma.
Younger women have long held differences with the older generation of women about what it means to be a feminist, with young women eschewing the term entirely. Older women feel disrespected by this, hence many arguments. I think the advent of Sarah Palin will tip the argument toward younger women. Of course, as we all age, that was likely anyway. As some older AA advocates feel their positions are becoming eroded by a person like Barack Obama, some long-time feminists may find themselves in a similar place. But, quite frankly, in neither case do I feel this is necessarily a bad thing. Life moves on and things change – including what it means to be part of any group.
7) At Salon is an article about whether “small town America” will vote for a black man named Barack. The beginning of the article suggests the author thought he’d find lots of “low information” (aka racist) voters.
With less than two months until voting day, there are doubts hanging over Barack Obama’s campaign — and they aren’t just due to Alaska’s top moose-hunting hockey mom jolting the race and electrifying the Republican faithful. Although Obama has touted himself as a post-racial candidate, whether America is ready to elect a black man for president remains a vexing question for his supporters. In a tight national race, Obama continues struggling to gain wider support, particularly among white working-class voters and independents in battleground states.
————-For three months during this summer and early fall, I’ve been traveling across America, exploring the nation’s small towns and rural areas and meeting the people there. From Michigan to New Mexico to North Carolina, I’ve conducted dozens of interviews with white working-class voters across 18 states, gauging, among other things, their thoughts and feelings about the first black man to have a serious shot at winning the White House. Beyond Obama’s race, what I found was a more complicated set of concerns — whether accurately informed or not — about his religious faith, values and cultural and educational background. That is, many of these white rural voters expressed a discomfort that may have more to do with unfamiliarity about the type of person Barack Obama is, rather than with direct concerns about his race.
The rest of this piece is snippets of conversation with, presumably, “typical voters.” If you don’t want to read it, all you need know is the author found a few people who expressed racists views (and notes they wouldn’t vote Democratic anyway) but that the concerns about Obama reflect more a confusion about who the candidate is and whether or not he does or can understand them.
Duh. If you’ve been reading NQ for any length of time, you’ll know we’ve been saying this for months now. No need to read this article to find out what you already know.
8 ) A more whimsical, yet frustrating piece can be found at the NYT blog. The writer is a “PTA mom” from Los Angles who has written a book about trying to find a public school for her child and about her own involvement in her child’s public school education. It’s a sleeper article – it seems light when you first read it. However, it touches on several themes in this campaign about whether “middle America” is being well served by either candidate.
The author begins by noting, in despair, that Barack Obama sends his children to private school. As a strong public school Democrat, this is a problem.
I do not know why Barack and Michelle Obama cannot send their children to a nice public school in Hyde Park. You understand that I am a bit unstable this election season (I voted for Hillary) and I do my research by erratically Googling from home. And all I know about Hyde Park — and, readers, I’d love to be corrected if I’m wrong — is that even though real estate prices seem high, the brave little public schools in its ZIP code seem to be flailing. Their scores on www.greatschools.net are largely 2’s and 4’s (on a scale of 1 to 10, 10 being the best). When you read the tea leaves as manically as I do, those low numbers suggest that few children of educated, middle-class children are attending the local schools. Rather, they’ve withdrawn, with nary a ripple, into their whispery private enclaves.
Let us not even touch the term “community organizer,” so buffeted about, by both sides, like a balloon at a rock concert. Let us just say that if Mr. and Mrs. Obama — a dynamic, Harvard-educated couple — had chosen public over private school, they could have lifted up not just their one local public school, but a family of schools. First, given the social pressure (or the social persuasion of wanting to belong to the cool club), more educated, affluent families would tip back into the public school fold. And second, the presence of educated type-A parents with too much time on their hands ensures that schools are held, daily, to high standards.
Here, the author quotes some research about what happens to schools when the educated and comfortable remove their children from those schools. Then there is this:
So it is with huge grief-filled disappointment that I discovered that the Obamas send their children to the University of Chicago Laboratory School (by 5th grade, tuition equals $20,286 a year). The school’s Web site quotes all that ridiculous John Dewey nonsense about developing character while, of course, isolating your children from the poor. A pox on them and, while we’re at it, a pox on John Dewey! I’m sick to death of those inspirational Dewey quotes littering the Web sites of $20,000-plus-a-year private schools, all those gentle duo-tone-photographed murmurings about “building critical thinking and fostering democratic citizenship” in their cherished students, living large on their $20,000-a-year island.
The writer goes on to say that Joe Biden’s children all went to private school and so did John McCain’s four children (and McCain donated big bucks to that school).
The writer ends with this:
And yes, I know I appear to be ranting on like a pit bull without lipstick, which brings me to the final nail in the coffin in this sorry election year. As a Democrat I am horrified that Sarah Palin is the one who snagged the deeply profound — and absolutely ignored by professional smart people — emotional real estate of “P.T.A. mother.” I too am, in fact, not just “my kids’ mom” but their Title I Los Angeles public school P.T.A. secretary. This unheard female howl is, for better or worse, what Ms. Palin has set out to tap into; it is real, and I am sick that we’ve let the Republicans charge this ground.
Sarah Palin’s children went to what looks like a humble little public school: Iditarod Elementary on Wasilla Fishhook Road. The school’s score on www.greatschools.net is a 4. That’s a lot of street cred, for a gun-totin’, snow-mobilin’ creationist-lovin’ lady.
Oh, I’m such a depressed, Democrat P.T.A. mother.
I guess Obama’s Annenberg work was not as successful as he might have wished, if he chooses not to send his children to Hyde Park community schools. I also think, aside from living in a very expensive area, sending your children to private schools damages the whole “community organizer” persona.
I wonder if Bill Ayers ever had anything to say to Obama about this choice. But don’t forget that when Obama is talking about education issues, fairness and what children really need, he’s already opted out of his local school.
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