You know, is it just me, or is Romney every bit as unlikeable as Kerry was? I mean, is this the sacrificial candidate because they know they can't win this election? Romney seriously might be a fucking alien. Kerry might have been reanimated as the undead though, so I guess they're similarly un-fucking-relateable.

Fair enough :)

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As to the convention speeches. I watched Obama's - I felt it was good, but not as good as Clinton's which I only watched because I heard such rave reviews of it and which lived up to the hype. Credit where credit is due, Clinton can turn a policy speech into a roaring political rally like no other. There's no getting away from it, the man is good. When he's on, he's on - and all other cliches that can be thought of.

Obama was inspiring and had the advantage of comparing himself directly to Romney's speech. But I felt, as usual in Obama's speeches, he was light on specifics. However, it was better in that regard than his other speeches though. One thing I dislike is when politicians talk about the man from wherever they met and use that drive some point home. Doing so once in awhile is fine, but all politicians evoke that refrain way too often and Obama does it too often as well. Frankly I find that annoying. Maybe I'm alone in that? It must be effective or I can't imagine politicians would keep doing it. The joke at the beginning of the speech, "this message brought to you by Barack Obama", was pretty good.

I didn't see Romney's so I can't compare. I understand it was fine, but overshadowed by Clint Eastwood's chair. If Obama is overshadowed by Clinton, I think he is in a better position.

Ah well - probably all nonsense. Any bump to be gained from these conventions will no doubt be ephemeral. There are many more weeks for each party to take quotes out of context, twist words, mangle facts, and outright lie with a press corps to let them get away with it until some meaningless debates.
I am surprised by how poor the Republican field was. Barack Obama should be vulnerable and I would've thought their stars would've lined for the chance. I have a feeling the real reason is that most of them don't want the helm since continuing a path of recovery out of a recession is hard and if something goes wrong, you'll get the blame. It's safer to wait. Another reason is that Romney was the anointed one since he was the real main challenger for the last Republican primary. That's generally the way the Republicans pick their nominee - the main guy (not "fringe" candidate) to lose the last primary, wins the next primary. It's been their system for awhile as it keeps the chaos of the primary down and tries to avoid potentially damaging in-fighting. This was the first primary where that really got tested.

8 CHA? More like base 3 with +1 from the glasses and +1 from the implant.

Though he is still a corporate-owned President I give props to Obama for talking like a liberal for most of his speech, rather than talking like a conservative and winking at liberals.

my point i'm always trying to make is this:

nobody knows what their talking about. they can't. there is too much deception and there is no clearly defined facts that seperate one view from another.

in politics, "Facts" are just numbers that rarely ever mean anyhitng CLOSE to what people are trying to say. and they are NEVER the right facts. their always perfect facts for what you THINK is right. people who look for the facts, aren't even looking for facts, their just looking for numbers that back up their theorys.


and on that note, i'd like to admit that i'm a republican, not becuase i KNOW they are the right way, but becuase i agree with them on what they THINK will help this country.

and the social issues!

Funny you should mention that, I believe Kerry is going to be the "Romney" stand-in for Obama's debate prep. :)

(btw, despite the smiley face, I'm not joking, I believe Kerry really, actually, truly is the stand-in for Romney in the Obama debate prep)

Kerry and Romney are both throwaway candidates IMO, sent out to fail.

While Romney may be more likely to lose than not, he still stands a pretty decent chance of winning. True if the election were held right now, he'd probably lose, but November is still quite a few weeks away and given the fact he only has to move the electorate in a few key states rather than the country, it's not inconceivable that he'll come out on top. The election is a lot closer than Dems may like, but, truly, running Obama against a candidate like Romney is about as good as they could (reasonably) hope for.

You don't have a "throwaway" candidate in an election that showcases the weakest incumbent president since 1980. Americans understand 2008 was a big mistake - why would anyone consider this election "unwinable"?

I'm joining the debate after the battle :)

First of all, I want to say something that is very important to me : thank you to almost every poster who kept this an interesting read. That confirms that GOG is really "a different place" on the Internet. You obviously have lots of different opinions and still you managed to discuss about them in a rather civil way, WITHOUT ANY FORUM MOD NEEDED. That's a feat even the most heavily moderated big media wibsites can't achieve these days. ^_^

I wrote a rather long post describing why, as a french guy (Japan is where I currently live and work), I love universal health system, why I can't really understand why so many american people see it as "evil" and that no, there is NO socialist government in Europe (don't tell me about "my" new president François Hollande), but I think it would be rather useless so I deleted it.

EDIT> just a footnote : Tangledblue, wow, you seem to be a man of nuances!! ^_^ Stop dissing european countries when you obviously haven't the faintest clue about them.

Do they indeed? I far from consider this election un-winable for Romney, but if the election were held right this instant (or anytime this summer after the Republican primary ended), Obama would beat Romney. Now Romney still has an excellent chance of turning his fortunes (couldn't resist the pun) around, but this is a very divided electorate.

Making blanket statements about what Americans want is a bit silly. Shockingly different americans want very different things. I hate when politicians (and everyone else) say things like that regardless of their political orientation - as if 51% polling means "America has spoken". When it's your party, making a decision that happens to agree with polls is serving the people and leadership when it does not. When it's the other party, it's weak-willed cowardice when the decision agrees with polls and defying the will of the American people it does not. The same goes double-all for elections. 53% one way or the other become "a mandate". Even if true in terms of political power, it's silly to then say "Americans want X" as though we all agree.

Further Orcish and Velvet are right in that Romney is about the weakest, reasonable candidate the Republicans could've fielded. Many Republican stars did not, for some reason, want to run for the office right now. Hence their statement, that Romney appears sacrificial.

The messaging gets dumbed down to a "good vs. evil" battle of perspectives which is why you perceive our views incorrectly. Americans - for the most part at least - are a hard working and independent people. We also understand that there is no such thing as a free lunch. All those social benefits and universal healthcare you enjoy are paid for by someone else.

Your country is a perfect example of why America doesn't want what you have. France is in horrendous economic shape and moving to left is only going to make things worse. Greece is a few steps ahead of us all and they've had to cut medical services because they can't afford them anymore.

I would also mention that Americans tend to be avid historians and the history of socialism extolls two traits more than any other: murder and poverty. I will simply say I disagree with your assessment of not having socialist governments. To some degree most western European countries are socialist (and America too, of course) they just aren't maxed out on the scale of socialism. Because America is lower on that scale, we still draw people because of opportunities for a better life if you're willing to work for it. I would never even consider leaving the US for France in hopes of finding a better life.

Agreed and perfectly exemplified by the follow diatribe:

I'm referring to the fact that 2/3s of Americans say the country is moving in the wrong direction. It is difficult to discuss politics and civics with people when I have to start from the foundation on every single comment.

It is not a blanket statement. The vast majority of Americans know this is not what we need. If not for our freakish media outlets Romney would be up +10 right now. I still think he'll win popular vote by 3-4 points in November.

sigh ... you say that this piece of polling data is the important one. This other piece of polling data, since it doesn't support your premise, is unimportant and influenced only by the freakish media which otherwise would show what you want it to. Do you not think that this is because of what you want to be true, rather than what is? Just maybe?

Romney may very well win in November, but let's keep the discussion reality-oriented. Romney is behind in the polls. However, people are dissatisfied. This gives Romney an opportunity he wouldn't otherwise have. However, he hasn't so far been able to convince people that his unspecific plan will work better than Obama's unspecific plan. Obama will link Romney's policies to the cause of financial collapse and Romney will link Obama's to the glacially slow recovery saying he could do it better and faster. Who will win is not actually clear, but Obama is (currently) winning.