Monday, April 07, 2008

Obama and Clinton

I promised to write a blogpost about Obama and Clinton's speech's at the ND Democratic Convention last Friday, so here it is. Although the internet is supposed to be about "cutting-edge" events, I prefer to make a slower, thoughtful post after having some time to reflect. (Either that, or I procrastinated all weekend watching "Penn and Teller's Bullshit" on immediate download on Netflix).

First, a small point about why the ND Democrats suck: they have absolutely no ability to predict who is coming, and what to do about it. To go to the convention, you either had to talk to your district representative to get seats on the floor, or you had to go to the ND website to get a general seating ticket. If you got a general seating ticket (as I did), they sent you a generic ticket, which you could print four times. There was no limit on getting a ticket; ND does not register voters, so you could be a Republican, a Minnesotan, anyone to get the tickets, and they did not limit the number of the tickets either. In this email, they did not include things like what you could not bring into the auditorium (you couldn't bring food or drinks, and you also couldn't bring a backpack; the last one annoyed me even more, because people were bringing purses way larger than my backpack). They only had four metal detectors, and the lines up to the metal detectors were a holy mess (for godless sake, invest in a few poles and pieces of string).

Now, on to the speeches. Obama's speech was a speech about unitity and change; how we had the ability to make the world a better place. He was full of idealism and seemed genuinely concerned about the state of the country. He was all about the pathos; and the energy he created was palpable, with the noise never died down. His audience was college aged-students, and this was shown by letting the college-aged Democrats stand behind him (something Clinton did not do). He was endorsed by Dorgan, Conrad, and Pomeroy, the Congress people

Yet, his speech did not make very many substantive points. He said a lot of phrases that sounded good, but he did not actually say what he was going to do to improve the country. And while messages of unity, and across the aisle bipartisanship, basically sits unevenly with me. I do not actually think that bipartisanship is actually a universal good; it's good if it's for a politically neutral goal, but when it comes right down to it, I want to see "my" side win- I want to see the progressive agenda to get actual play in the United States. I'm not entirely sure how I can compromise with someone who sees me as less than a full citizen, as the Republican aisle does.

Senator Clinton's speech, on the other hand, was heavy on the logos- she was very specific on what she wanted to do, and her speech was peppered with facts and figures. She did have some jokes, the clip that keeps getting an insane amount of air time about how she and her husband don't hate rich people, was actually pretty well received. I was with there with my friend PE, and he said "I can't believe it- she actually has a sense of humor", which I had told him before but he didn't believe me because of the hatchet job she gets in the media.

Her's did not create the sense of energy; leaving the auditorium I heard a lot of college-aged students talking about how she was too long winded and was bogged down in details. Her plane was also late, so by the time she came here a few hundred people had already wandered away.

As for the predictions, Clinton only mentioned the Flood of '97 once, instead of twice. Otherwise, I was right on. Obama expressed how Clinton would be better than McCain, Clinton did not reciprocate.

8 Comments:

At 7:15 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

We get it, you are an atheist. Now stop fucking saying 'godless sake' you attention-whore.

 
At 11:21 PM, Blogger Ben said...

Cassandra,

Very interesting observations on the event. I've not been to the Alerus center before; that's truly ridiculous that they have all those crazy rules. I've been to the Fargodome, and while I don't remember as many, it was still a hassle.

It's definitely good that Hillary Clinton is getting credit for her humor. Her humor's rather subtle at times (the kind of humor I like), so yeah, people overlook that, which is too bad.

BTW, is it best not to feed the trolls like this anonymous poster?

 
At 11:38 PM, Blogger Teddy said...

Hi troll, random idiot here.

All people with blogs are by nature an attention whore. For pete's sake, they expect you to read their boring opinions and give a crap?

Also, there's no need for a hyphen as the phrase "Attention Whore" is simply a noun modified by an adjective, nothing overly complicated. However, the fact that the rest of your post is mostly grammatically correct astounds me. Would it hurt you, though, to simply press the Shift key while typing a quote? Only within a quote do you use a single-mark, as such:

"That troll is, as Jon Stewart would say 'A Douchebag' and ought to be shot".

TRH

 
At 3:34 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Ah true, but personal antipathy drives me. Actually, I think you missed a grammatically error of mine. I do believe there should have been a comma between 'godless sake' and 'you.'

However, that was an odd and empty way to rebuke a troll.

I do wish blogger allowed image comments so I could draw a picture about why she was wrong.

 
At 1:21 PM, Blogger Goddess Cassandra said...

Anonymous,

Actually, I self-identify as "agnostic" not an atheist. So, obviously you don't "get it". "Godless sake" is merely a personal preference in my writing, and is hardly offensive.

I truly find it interesting that you call me an "attention-whore" but I don't advertise, so the only way you could come to this blog is if you went searching it out. If you are not fond of my writing style or my professed opinion, absolutely nothing is stopping you from leaving, nor is there anything keeping you here.

Ben, I'm not sure if it was Alerus's rules, or the Dems rules, or some combination there of. I'm glad people had a real chance to see Clinton's humor, however :).

 
At 6:32 PM, Blogger John J. said...

The thing about Obama and his stump speeches is that, when he first ran for state senate, he was a policy wonk and that's what his speeches focused on. He was then resoundingly defeated. The next time he ran on the same policies, but instead of just talking about them in his speeches, he used his speeches to inspire and now he has a better than 50% chance of being our next president.

 
At 12:25 AM, Blogger Teddy said...

John: I know, I know, I'm doing all sorts of horrible things here by saying this, not the least of which is potentially invoking Godwin's law, but Hitler ran on the same platform of empty inspirational speeches selecting a certain demographic of the populace and blaming them for the nation's ills.

Take that with the knowledge that I'd rather him than Hillary, though. It's just, I would appreciate a president who can not only inspire me, but also strike me with creative and effective policy decisions.

Ultimately, though, Obama has the American attention because he says what people want to hear: "We will make this country once again amazing".

TRH

 
At 3:09 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

I don't think what Obama means by "unity" is the same as what's usually meant by "bipartisanship"

 

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