The Obama Campaign is running Ads in Arizona! Forcing John McCain to campaign there on Monday. The Day before the election McCain is going to be defending his own state!
YOUNGSTOWN, Ohio — In a bold move brimming with confidence, Democrat Barack Obama broadened his advertising campaign on Friday into two once reliably Republican states and further bedeviled rival John McCain by placing a commercial in the Republican presidential nominee's home state of Arizona.
Obama's campaign, capitalizing on his vast financial resources and a favorable political climate, announced that it was going back up with advertising in Georgia and North Dakota, two GOP states that it had teased with ads earlier in the general election campaign but then abandoned.
I don't think Obama is doing this because he thinks he is going to win there. I think he is doing this to show just how Screwed Senator McCain is.
I have tried to not post any McCain-Palin stuff this week. This week is not about John McCain. My thoughts on this week, and the next few days, I will hold onto until Wednesday morning.
With Four Days to Go I have basically fallen off of the face of the blogging map. I don't know what happend.
I am somewhere between completely confident, and petrified. I can't wait for the next few days to go by.
Here is what I know: If Obama wins Virginia, and Pennslyvainia, or Ohio this thing is over. Period. McCain has to win all of the Bush '04 states (which he wont) and Pennslyvainaia in order to win. Which he wont.
What worries me is that Obama needs more than a 275-265 win. Obama needs an electoral Mandate to have any power at all.
Do a similar excercise with Senator Obama. A young man raised of a single mother, fed off food stamps, never knows his father. He puts himself through the best schools in our country by taking out student loans. Instead of working at any number of high paying law firms, he chooses to go to Chicago's North Side and help those who need it most. He marries a beautiful and successful woman, one he wins over by playing basketball with her brothers. They have two perfect daughters. He delivers THE SPEECH of the 2004 Democratic Convention. He becomes the talk of the Democratic Party. He soundly defeats the most popular brand in American Politics by organizing people in a way that Presidential Politics have never seen. He delivers the most moving convention speech in history infront of 85,000 people. He is a running against a party that has run this country into the ground in every way possible for eight long years. His opponent is unable to seperate himself from that administration. He is ahead by double digits in the polls in every key state one week from the election.
Now Imagine he is white.
He is going to win this. He is going to win this is a landslide.
That being said, RACE continues to be an issue in the country. The media will frame this as Obama's problem.
This is not Obama's problem. This is America's problem.
Obama is going to change that.
When a black man runs for high office, or a black woman for that matter (Hillary Clinton you deserve recognition here), it will be "normal" because of Barack.
When I am interviewing students about what they want to be when they grow up, and they say Teacher, or Doctor, or Lawyer, or President. I won't bat an eyelash, because of Barack.
One week out I am not pulling my hair out in fret. I am not panicked about assasination threats, or voter fraud.
I am in a sublime state of confidence. I am enjoying every minute of this. I don't want to look back years from now and think about how stressed I was before this happened. I cannot change what is going to happen. But I can enjoy it.
To a group of 14 and 15 year-olds at East High, why does this Matter?
It matters because as cliche as it sounds, there simply is nothing more important than education. I realize that saying something like that, and proving it to high school students are two completely different things.
Without Education, who will run our banks, our stores, our factories? Who will pave our roads, and fix our cars? Who will teach our children, and their children? Who will be our President?
There is an awesome responsibility on the students of today to achive towards tomorrow.
No Child Left Behind is a federal law that places an emphasis on results, specifically test scores, to demonstrate the effectiveness of the learning that is taking place.
This law places a tremendous responsibility on both teachers and students. Without results, schools can be forced to close. This means less schools, less teachers and less choice. The less schools their are, the larger the class sizes are going to be creating a more difficult situation for learning.
No Child Left Behind creates a vicious cycle where teachers are pressured into teaching to tests in order to keep thier jobs.
Barack Obama plans on reforming this system. The inherent failure of NCLB is that it has never been properly funded. Schools have been mandated to show vast improvements in tests scores, while being denied the federal support that they require to effectively deliver the education necessary to reach the bench marks that have been put in place.
This means less teachers, less Text Books, less time to teach, and more emphasis on Standardized Tests. Tests that fail to judge the ability of a student.
Education is a Democratic Platform. Republicans believe in less Government, which means no publicly financed education.
Obama is also focusing on affordable higher education. Offering a $4000 a year credit to any student who performs community service or volunteers.
When I try to explain the importance of education to a teenager I say this: Education gives a young person options. You start life with an unlimited number of possiblities for what you can choose to do with your life. As you grow and make choices, your possibilities are either increased, or decreased depending on the consequences of the choices that are made.
More education means more possiblities. Period. If I choose at 25 that teaching isn't what I want to do, I can choose to do something else, because my education has granted me possiblities.
Had I not graduated from college, had I not graduated from high school, those possiblities would be limited.
I am in no way saying that you absolutely have to go to college to have a good life. What I am simply saying is that More Education = More Choices.
Barack Obama is going to make getting an education easier. He is going to make the education that high schoolers are currently getting more effective, thus creating more possibilites.
Obama on the left McCain on the right We can talk politics all night And you can vote however you like You can vote however you like, yeah
Democratic left Republican right November 4th we decide And you can vote however you like You can vote however you like, yeah
(McCain supporters) McCain's the best candidate With Palin as his running mate They'll fight for gun rights, pro life, The conservative right Our future is bright Better economy in site And all the world will feel our military might
(Obama supporters) But McCain and Bush are real close right They vote alike and keep it tight Obama's new, he's younger too The Middle Class he will help you He'll bring a change, he's got the brains McCain and Bush are just the same You are to blame, Iraq's a shame Four more years would be insane
Lower your Taxes - you know Obama Won't PROTECT THE LOWER CLASS - You know McCain won't! Have enough experience - you know that they don't STOP GLOBAL WARMING - you know that you won't
I want Obama FORGET OBAMA Stick with McCain and you're going to have some drama We need it HE'LL BRING IT He'll be it YOU'LL SEE IT We'll do it GET TO IT Let's move it DO IT!
Obama on the left McCain on the right We can talk politics all night And you can vote however you like You can vote however you like, yeah
Democratic left Republican right November 4th we decide And you can vote however you like, I said You can vote however you like, yeah
I'm talking big pipe lines, and low gas prices Below $2.00 that would be nice
But to do it right we gotta start today Finding renewable ways that are here to stay
I want Obama FORGET OBAMA, Stick wit McCain you gone have some drama MORE WAR IN IRAQ Iran he will attack CAN'T BRING OUR TROOPS BACK We gotta vote Barack!
Obama on the left McCain on the right We can talk politics all night And you can vote however you like, I said You can vote however you like, yeah
Democratic left Republican right November 4th we decide And you can vote however you like, I said You can vote however you like, yeah
Why this Matter? A question I am trying to answer. I think maybe one long windy response to that question is not appropriate. I am going to attempt to break it down into smaller sections. Here goes the first one. Family Values
I would preface this by saying, "In my opinion", but this is my site, so of course it is my opinion. The title is "Terry-Gilmores-Head".
For too long, far, far too long the right wing of American politics has had a monopoly on the concept of "Family" and "Values". I believe that those days are numbered. The portrait of the American Family is no longer a beautifully colorless canvass painted by Norman Rockwell.
No longer is the "Greatest Generation" one that is suck in a mindset that was developed during some of the darkest times in America's history.
It is my contention that the Greatest Generation is one in which Color, or Faith, or whatever has in the past been used to divide us, no longer holds sway.
The New Greatest Generation is one that in a time of need, turns to perhaps its most capable leader. Regardless of his name, or where his father was born.
There is a theory that from Crisis comes our greatest Opportunity. An Oppertunity for Change. Real, meaningful Change.
It was during a time of Crisis, an unsettled period of American History that Barack Obama shaped his world-view.
It is during a similar time of Crisis that we need that world view more than ever.
The Fatherless has become the Father. Barack Obama has been recently accused of being too eloquent. That he is too good with words.
What Barack Obama has said to me, without speaking a word, is that all Families have Value.
We may not fit easily into a Norman Rockwell painting. We paint our picture with our own brush. And our Palette contains many more colors.
What Barack Obama says without speaking that that the child of a single parent is in no way limited in what he or she can accomplish. That the daughter of a single father and a single mother is capable of being what ever she wants to be.
What Barack Obama says to me, his lips never moving, is that a ceremony on a beach means just as much, if not more than one held in a church, or a back yard.
The Obama's are the new portrait of an American Family, and that is why this matters.
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