No Concession....Obama Secures Delegates

CNN
(http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/06/03/election.democrats/index.html) is reporting that Obama has declared he will be the Democratic Nominee. However, although in her speech, Clinton repeatedly thanks Obama and his supporters (people like you and I), even calling him her "friend" and saying he has run an "extraordinary race," she does not concede the nomination. I wonder what she is waiting for. Tonight, Obama passes the threshold for the number of delegates needed to secure the nomination and it looks like superdelegates are still joining his side. Now is truly the time for everyone to start turning the page. The general election is now less than six months away. If Clinton does not concede now, it certainly does not make any sense and definitely hurts the party. However, we will see what is in store for the New York Senator.

McCain recognizes the fact that Obama probably will be his opponent and has already been trying to skew the idea given by Obama's message of change saying the country must now decide between "the right change and the wrong change, between going forward and going backward." Let's hope people are not fooled and keep listening to the true message of hope.

We need to continue to be vocal in our support of Obama. Six months until everything changes....

Obama Ties Clinton in Superdelegates - Because of YDA

CNN (http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/05/11/campaign.wrap/index.html) is reporting that Senator Obama today has officially tied Senator Clinton in the superdelegates column. But not just any superdelegate came out in support of the likely nominee; it was the Young Democrats of America's own Crystal Strait. As we reported a few months ago, Crystal, National Commitee Woman for YDA, was rumored to be leaning Hillary despite the overwhelming majority of young people in support of Obama. But as of today, Ms. Strait has pledged her vote to Sen. Obama and stated "listening to how young people voted and caucused around the country, I know this was the right decision."

She also goes on to state that she feels supporting Obama will cause those millions of young voters who have cast ballots in the last two general elections to remain involved and come out again this November for their third election in a row. And according to Democratic party research, and a theme consistently stated by YDA, if a young person votes for a particular party in three consecutive elections, they become a party voter for good. Dems for life, or so we hope. What is interesting, and rather powerful, about this statement is that she is implying that not only does she see Obama as the best candidate for President, but she also sees him as having the means to strengthen the Democratic party and its base. A view not always shared (for either candidate) by party players.

I for one am very glad that Crystal is following the voice of her constituents and those that elected her - the members of YDA. I truly hope that YDA's remaining two superdelegates will also make the same decision and pledge their support to the candidate that young people all over the nation have come out to support in mass.

Rolling Stone Endorses Obama

Here's the full article:

A New Hope
JANN S. WENNER

The tides of history are rising higher and faster these days. Read them right and ride them, or be crushed. And then along comes Barack Obama, with the kinds of gifts that appear in politics but once every few generations. There is a sense of dignity, even majesty, about him, and underneath that ease lies a resolute discipline. It's not just that he is eloquent — with that ability to speak both to you and to speak for you — it's that he has a quality of thinking and intellectual and emotional honesty that is
extraordinary.

I first learned of Barack Obama from a man who was at the highest level of George W. Bush's political organization through two presidential campaigns. He described the first-term senator from Illinois as "a walking hope machine" and told me that he would not work for any Republican candidate in 2008 if Obama was nominated. He challenged me to read Obama's autobiography, Dreams From My Father.

The book was a revelation. Here was a man whose honesty about himself and understanding of the human condition are both deep and compassionate. Born to a white mother and an African father, he was raised in multiracial Hawaii and for several years in Indonesia. He drifted through some druggy teenage years — no apologies! — before emerging as a star at Harvard Law School. He chose to work as a community organizer in the projects of Chicago rather than join the wealthy insider world of corporate law. And as a young adult, he searched, in the distant villages of Kenya, for the father and family he never knew.

As I read all this, so elegantly written, my mind kept rolling over: Might it be possible? Is there some fate by which we could have this man as president of the United States?

Throughout the primaries, and during a visit he paid to our offices, we have come to know Barack Obama, his toughness and his grace. He would not be intimidated, and he declined to back down, when Senator Clinton called him "frankly, naive" for his willingness to meet leaders of hostile nations. When one of her top campaign officials tried to smear him for his earlier drug use, he did not equivocate or backtrack. On the matter of experience and capability, he has run an impressive, nearly flawless campaign — one that whupped America's most hard-boiled political infighters. Indeed, Obama was far more prepared to run a presidential campaign — from Day One — than Senator Clinton. And at no point did he go negative with personal attacks or character assassination; as much as they might have been justified, they didn't even seem tempting to him.

Obama has emerged by displaying precisely the kind of character and judgment we need in a president: renouncing the politics of fear, speaking frankly on the most pressing issues facing the country and sticking to his principles. He recognizes that running for president is an opportunity to inspire an entire nation.

All this was made clearer by the contrast with Hillary Clinton, a capable and personable senator who has run the kind of campaign that reminds us of what makes us so discouraged about our politics. Her campaign certainly proved her experience didn't count for much: She was a bad manager and a bad strategist who naturally and easily engaged in the politics of distraction, trivialization and personal attack. She never convinced us that her vote for the war in Iraq was anything other than a strategic political calculation that placed her presidential ambitions above the horrifying consequences of a war. Her calibrated course corrections over the past three years were painful. Like John Kerry — who also voted for the war while planning a presidential run — it helped cost her that goal.

Although Obama declined to attack her personally for her vote for the war in Iraq, he did call it, devastatingly enough, a clear demonstration of her so-called experience and "judgment." He has also spoken forcefully about the need to break the grip of lobbyists — at a time when Clinton is the largest recipient of drug-company donations of anyone in Congress. Clinton could not address this issue at all, and neither will John McCain, who is equally a player in Washington's lobbyist culture.

Obama also denounced the Republican campaign of fear. Early in the campaign, John Edwards took the lead, calling the War on Terror a campaign slogan, not a policy. Obama rejected the subtle imagery of false patriotism by not wearing a flag pin in his lapel, and he dismissed the broader notion that the Democratic Party had to find a way to buy into this entire load of fear-mongering War on Terror bullshit — to out-Republican the Republicans — and thus become, in his description of Hillary Clinton's macho posturing on foreign policy, little more than "Bush-Cheney lite."

The similarities between John Kennedy and Barack Obama come to mind easily: the youth, the magnetism, the natural grace, the eloquence, the wit, the intelligence, the hope of a new generation.

But it might be more to the point to view Obama as Lincolnesque in his own origins, his sobriety and what history now demands.

We have a deeply divided nation, driven apart by economic policies that have deliberately created the largest income disparities in our history, with stunning tax breaks for the wealthiest and subsidies for giant industries. The income of the average citizen is stagnant, and his quality of life continues to slowly erode from inflation.

We are embittered and hobbled by the unnecessary and failed war in Iraq. We have been worn down by long years of fear- and hate-filled political strategies, assaults on constitutional freedoms, and levels of greed and cynicism, that — once seen for what they are — no people of moral values or ethics can tolerate.

A new president must heal these divides, must at long last face the hypocrisy and inequity of unprecedented government handouts to oil giants, hedge-fund barons, agriculture combines and drug companies. At the same time, the new president must transform our lethal energy economy — replacing oil and coal and the ethanol fraud with green alternatives and strict rain-forest preservation and tough international standards — before the planet becomes inhospitable for most human life. Although Obama has been slow to address global warming, I feel confident that his intelligence and morality will lead him clearly on this issue.

We need to recover the spiritual and moral direction that should describe our country and ourselves. We see this in Obama, and we see the promise he represents to bring factions together, to achieve again the unity that drives great change and faces difficult, and inconvenient, truths and peril.

We need to send a message to ourselves and to the world that we truly do stand for life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. And in electing an African-American, we also profoundly renounce an ugliness and violence in our national character that have been further stoked by our president in these last eight years.

Like Abraham Lincoln, Barack Obama challenges America to rise up, to do what so many of us long to do: to summon "the better angels of our nature."

Why We Need Universal Healthcare

If anyone questions why we need universal healthcare in America, they have not seen this story:

Young Democrats of America to Ignore Members and Vote Clinton?

The Young Democrats of America, the official arm of the DNC for people under 36 across the country, has three superdelegates that will be able to cast their votes at the convention in Denver. As we all know, every superdelegate vote is going to mean something significant...at least if the nomination process continues to be as tight as it has been. Each of these three people, the YDA President, National Committeeman and National Comitteewoman, were elected at the YDA Convention in Dallas by the members of YDA.

A few weeks ago, YDA President David Hardt, declared to the press that he was supporting Sen. Clinton, after receiving calls from the whole Clinton family (and yes, Bill included). Of course it is against the YDA rules for the organization to endorse a candidate in the primary, so why is David announcing he is voting for Clinton to the press when he represents YDA more than anyone?

From the Statesman of Austin, TX: http://www.statesman.com/search/content/region/legislature/stories/02/07/0207texprez.html

"Superdelegate David Hardt of Dallas, officially uncommitted because he is president of the Young Democrats of America, plans to vote for Clinton after fielding calls from her, her husband and their daughter Chelsea, who also visited him."

But it does not stop there. The YDA National Committeeman to the DNC, Francisco Domenech, has even officially announced he is supporting and voting for Sen. Clinton at the convention. The National Committeewoman, Crystal Strait, has yet to announce anything officially, but is rumored to be joining her fellow officers in casting her powerful vote for Clinton as well. As reported on the blog FutureMajority.com at http://futuremajority.com/node/981

"Domenech declared his support for Hillary Clinton in December. Crystal Strait would not declare support for a candidate during our conversation, but the youth rumor mill has it that she will likely cast her ballot for Clinton..."

While there is no official poll of YDA members to show who the body's members support, more than 60% of young people have turned out to vote for Obama in the primary elections held across the country according to exit polls and national media polling. In fact, as I have reported on this blog before, the young vote has been the deciding factor in several states for Sen. Obama. This sounds like a pretty good way to me to determine who the membership of YDA supports. And just looking around the conference hall of a recent YDA meeting will give you the exact same impression: The majority of YDA members support Obama.

I understand each superdelegate has the ability to vote for whomever they choose, I think the leaders of YDA need to recognize who they represent and, more importantly, how they represent them - they were elected by the members. The members who support Sen. Obama. If all of the YDA superdelegates cast their vote for Clinton, it shows that YDA casts its vote for Clinton. And this is just simply not the case. Follow your members David, Francisco and Crystal - support Sen. Obama.

Mayor Bloomberg is Out

It's official.

Mayor Bloomberg of New York City will not run for President of the United States.

Bloomberg is a highly respected politician. He has worked vigorously and successfully to reform the city's education system, keep guns off the street, maintain a strong economy and solve global warming.

Bloomberg's success is due to his ability to act independently of any one party's ideological constraints. Thankfully, in a NY Times editorial, Bloomberg has vowed to stay involved in national politics and endorse a truly independent candidate:

If a candidate takes an independent, nonpartisan approach — and embraces practical solutions that challenge party orthodoxy — I’ll join others in helping that candidate win the White House.

I believe that Generation Obama believes in Barack, because we believe in a new approach to politics. We believe in Senator Obama, because he believes in a nonpartisan approach to solving America's problems. Generation Obama is excited about a new approach to politics that escapes the partisan gridlock of the past.

I encourage all of you to send a message to Mayor Bloomberg that lets him know we would welcome and appreciate his endorsement, and that explains why you believe that Senator Obama is the true independent in this race that he is looking for:

Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg
City Hall
New York, NY 10007
PHONE 311 (or 212-NEW-YORK outside NYC)

FAX (212) 788-2460

E-MAIL:
http://www.nyc.gov/html/mail/html/mayor.html

Houston, We Have Liftoff

After an exciting win in Wisconsin last night, Barack Obama gave an inspiring speech in Houston. What follows is a firsthand account from Generation Obama member Christopher Gregg of Houston, TX:

It was amazing to walk to the Toyota Center and see the line to the entrance wrapped around the corner. It seemed as if all of Texas was represented in the line.

Before Barack spoke, I had a chance to sit with this older African American man and just talk about Barack. He had to be in his 70's, and he had a lot of good things to say. What really hit me, was when he started to talk about some of the struggles he had gone through growing up here in America. Then he kind of paused, looked up, let out a breath of relief and said, "I never would have thought in my lifetime I would ever see this day.”

That did it for me. I understood exactly what he was saying. I understood even more so how important this time is for America. The beautiful things is, what he said is exactly what Barack Obama's message is all about: Hope and Change.

When Barack came out, the place went nuts. You know when you witness something real dynamic and you start to get chills? When you can look in the audience and you know you are with the right party because you feel so comfortable? It was one of those moments.

The thing is, Barack has not changed or wavered from what he believes in and still manages to grow his party. I guess what I got out of the whole thing is what everyone is starting to get. McCain, Hillary and the others want to talk policy, which is fine. Barack has a plan of action also. The major difference that he brought last night is opening up the grey area between old America and the new America. That is the Change that he is talking about and Hope he explains.

He made a very good point at the end when it came to Hope. He explained how he was raised by a single mother and his grandparents after his father left when he was two. He went on to talk about how he went to school, got his education, did his time as a Senator, and now he is standing in front of us today. The place erupted and cheered, "That is what Hope is all about!”

Hands down this is one of the most important things I have ever experienced and I am so glad I had the chance. Most of the people I know have parents that fought, struggled, and suffered so we could get to this point. Let's not let them down, it is now our turn to do our part. They got us the right to vote, let's make the right choice!

And in case you missed the Houston speech, here it is:

Part I

Part II