<p>Does my agreement with Tsdad considering him a “right-wing Democrat” count? (In my book, that’s pretty damning.)</p>
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<p>No, the opposite. A person with Aspergers or autism could not adapt to the speech patterns of a regional audience or a group of peers or even one on one. At least not to my knowledge.</p>
<p>Not sure how I miscommunicated this point with my previous post:
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<p>Notice the word “don’t.”</p>
<p>Obama, like Oprah or any other gifted communicator, adapts quite well.</p>
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<p>And, as I’ve already pointed out, he spent years in inner city Chicago, working with the unemployed and disenfranchised. He surely would have had to accommodate his speech patterns to connect with those constituents. His church is predominantly black, and so are his in-laws. Speech patterns don’t occur in a vacuum. It’s all about the desire to make a connection.</p>
<p>I was born in segregated Virginia, and all my closest influences spoke with a southern black dialect. Sometime around adolescence, not long after schools desegregated, I made a conscious decision to learn how to speak accent-less standard English. This was entirely motivated by the desire to be taken seriously within the wider community which I suddenly found myself. I learned that I wouldn’t be immediately dismissed if I spoke “proper English”, that teachers were more inclined to see me as an intelligent and capable student. Also, I wanted friends who were white and black, and everything in between. Eventually, that’s exactly what happened. Today, my social circle encompasses people from many different races and religions. And that’s just how I like it;).</p>
<p>Quote: "I think I’ll just start spreading that rumor about him and his Aspergers. "</p>
<p>That is of course if it hasn’t already been used by the Clinton campaign. :rolleyes:</p>
<p>From New York Times:
“Mrs. Clinton’s new TV spot accuses Obama of putting out “false attack ads” in response to her original TV spot that criticized him for not agreeing to debate her in Milwaukee. Mr. Obama’s ad, put out Thursday, said that the 18 past debates and two upcoming forums in Ohio and Texas were enough.” :(</p>
<p>Her new campaign manager better have some family obligations to attend to REALLY soon too! :eek: This will surely backfire. And now it definitely reeks of desperation. Sorry.</p>
<p>^^this makes even more sense, poetsheart.</p>
<p>Actually if you did that, Obama would bring Steven Spielberg and Bill Gates, since both have Apsergers. Aspergers is a highly functioning autism, the highest end is also known as social ADD. The person can not understand social cues, i.e. stands to close, takes things as literal</p>
<p>I didn’t know that about Steven Spielberg. Wow, makes his accomplishments even more impressive since directors need to be able to communicate well with all sorts of people on the job.</p>
<p>“Steven Spielberg and Bill Gates, since both have Apsergers.”</p>
<p>Bill has never been diagnosed to have AS. Its been speculated, but there has never been a definitive diagnosis (made public) or press release confirming AS</p>
<p>Actually, Janieblue, I’d be interested to learn of substantive issues involving Obama. He’s pretty much a blank slate upon which other project things, and I’d be interested in substantive criticism of things he’d done. I just don’t buy the “he changes his accent so he’s a phony” argument - for Obama, Clinton, Bush or anyone else, for that matter. (Unless it’s an English accent. Anyone who fakes an English accent is a phony, and a dangerous one, in my opinion. 
) </p>
<p>I’ve wondered why Edwards dropped out when he did, too. My guess is that we’ll find out in about ten months, give or take a few weeks…</p>
<p>good point, Kluge. </p>
<p>When do new Presidents announce their cabinets, by the way? Is it always after inauguration or can they announce before (or allow leaks to inform)?</p>
<p>I remember Bush announcing in the summer or early fall after the RNC that Colin Powell would be in his cabinet</p>
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<p>Well, that’s certainly my problem with him. I think he’s a great speaker, very charismatic, seems to have a great personality, obviously very smart and thoughtful-- but, you know, so is my dentist. </p>
<p>I do have a problem with the fact (brought up in the SC debate, as I remember) that he voted “present” over 100 times (in the Illinois Senate). So, you know-- it’s easy to avoid criticism if you don’t have a record of taking a firm stance on anything. I honestly don’t feel I know enough about him to be for or against him. I’ve read his policies and I’ve read Hillary’s, but honestly, I think they both borrowed their policies from Edwards, who had all his stances on the issues/ policies printed on his website long before either of them did. I am impressed that Obama has managed to get people excited about this election, and he can sure bring in the crowds-- but I don’t know if that’s enough to make him qualified to run a country. ??</p>
<p>I just got an email from John Edwards (well, me and his thousands of other supporters). I’ll look at it and see if he’s endorsing anybody yet. :)</p>
<p>Do you think he is going to agree with McCain and only stay with federal funding? He promise he would if he got the nom.</p>
<p>janieblue: Obama’s present votes have been analyzed by the media (NYTimes, NPR) and there are simple explanations for most of them. Present votes are standard legislative tools in the Illinois legislature and Obama’s votes are no different than other legislators. Realize that they were only about 100+ present votes among 4000 votes total. In some instances they were cast due to his concerns for unconstitutionality (remember he is a constitutional scholar). In others they were actually brave votes to support the fight against Republican attempts at forcing other Democrats to vote against abortion. Were some of his present votes cast due to political expediency? Probably. But they are not representative of his legislative record. NY Times has a pretty balanced article about them. They also go into the whole Rezko affair.</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/20/us/politics/20obama.html[/url]”>http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/20/us/politics/20obama.html</a></p>
<p>“I’ve read his policies and I’ve read Hillary’s, but honestly, I think they both borrowed their policies from Edwards,”</p>
<p>That is true. Krugman wrote and OP-ED piece that said both H and O are running on a platform Edwards built.</p>
<p>“Do you think he is going to agree with McCain and only stay with federal funding? He promise he would if he got the nom.”</p>
<p>Hope not. Republican special interest PACs would eat him for breakfast.</p>
<p>There was an interesting op-ed in the NYT about Obama’s use of “present” as a tactical vote. <a href=“http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/16/opinion/16mikva.html?_r=1&th&emc=th&oref=slogin[/url]”>http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/16/opinion/16mikva.html?_r=1&th&emc=th&oref=slogin</a></p>
<p>“Republican special interest PACs would eat him for breakfast.”</p>
<p>No different than special interest Democratic PACs. Moveon.org come to mind?</p>
<p>That was an interesting and enlightening piece in the Times, mathmom. Of course, the reason the Clinton campaign uses the “Obama merely voted “present” X number of times while in the Illinois Senate” is because they know that, on the surface it looks bad. In the absence of knowledge of the constitutional law governing such a vote, people would naturally assume it means apathy or an unwillingness to commit on the part of a legislator.</p>
<p>poetsheart: I’ve read articles before about the 139 “present” votes, and while it does look bad on the surface, I think it’s also a good idea to look more indepth at some of those votes, too. While Obama has come up with some good reasons why he voted the way he did on some of these, I’m a little uneasy about the heavy influence Planned Parenthood, for instance, apparently had on this one particular vote of his. I’m pro-choice, but I am still left uneasy by this. There are other instances, given in some of these articles, where I would question his choice to vote “present,” too.</p>
<p>Other senators and presidential candidates are influenced, too, but Obama always tries to make the case that he’s different. I don’t think he is-- at all; I just think he’s younger and is a great motivational speaker. I don’t think he’s any different than any other candidate who can be influenced by outside groups. He basically casts votes depending how it might effect him in future. I think that’s probably wise, but I think we need to acknowledge that he’s no different from any other candidate protecting his political future.</p>