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Sen. Obama says he's weighing 2008 run
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| LatinLover |
WASHINGTON - Sen. Barack Obama acknowledged Sunday he was considering a run for president in 2008, backing off previous statements that he would not do so.
he Illinois Democrat said he could no longer stand by the statements he made after his 2004 election and earlier this year that he would serve a full six-year term in Congress. He said he would not make a decision until after the Nov. 7 elections.
"That was how I was thinking at that time," said Obama, when asked on NBC's "Meet the Press" about his previous statements.
"Given the response I've been getting the last several months, I have thought about the possibility" although not with any seriousness or depth, he said. "My focus is on '06. ... After November 7, I'll sit down and consider it."
Obama was largely unknown outside Illinois when he burst onto the national scene with a widely acclaimed address at the 2004 Democratic National Convention.
In recent weeks, his political stock has been rising as a potentially viable centrist candidate for president in 2008 after former Virginia Gov. Mark Warner announced earlier this month that he was bowing out of the race.
In a recent issue of Time magazine, Obama's face fills the cover next to the headline, "Why Barack Obama Could Be The Next President." He is currently on a tour promoting his latest book, "The Audacity of Hope: Thoughts on Reclaiming the American Dream."
On Sunday, Obama dismissed notions that he might not be ready to run for president because of his limited experience in national politics. He agreed the job requires a "certain soberness and seriousness" and "can't be something you pursue on the basis of vanity and ambition."
"I'm not sure anyone is ready to be president before they're president," Obama said. "I trust the judgment of the American people.
"We have a long and vigorous process. Should I decide to run, if I ever decide to, I'll be confident that I'll be run through the paces pretty well," Obama said.
Yahoo News
Okay, now there is still hope for not only the Democratic party but most importantly America :D If Kerry and Clinton the best thing the Dems can produce the Dems are fuked :rolleyes: |
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| Renegade |
He would be a great candidate, I think. He comes across as being principled without being exclusionary and as moderate without being compromised. The only thing he's got going against him is his inexperience, but even that may not necessarily be an obstacle:
| quote: | He can be certain that 2008 will be a year with a wide open primary on both the Republican and Democratic sides in which neither a sitting president nor vice president will be running, a rare event in presidential politics that lowers the bar of entry for all candidates. He can have a high degree of confidence that if he waits until 2012, he will face the historically impossible task of unseating the incumbent president of his own party, or the historically difficult task of unseating the incumbent president of the opposition party. The 2016 race would probably be his final chance. But by waiting until then he would have to bet that the Senate has not destroyed his career, or, if he has moved to the safer confines of the Illinois governor's mansion--his next chance would be in 2010--that he has not already passed his political peak.
The kind of political star power Obama has doesn't last. My favorite law of American politics is that candidates have only 14 years to become president. That is their expiration date. The idea was conceived by a very smart political junkie who happens to be a senior aide to Vice President Cheney (don't hold that against him), and the law was popularized in a column by Jonathan Rauch of National Journal. As Rauch put it, "With only one exception [Lyndon Johnson] since the presidency of Theodore Roosevelt, no one has been elected president who took more than 14 years to climb from his first major elective office to election as either president or vice president." As Rauch showed, the majority of presidents since 1900 have fallen on the low end of this zero-to-fourteen-year spectrum: zero (Dwight Eisenhower, Herbert Hoover, William Howard Taft), two years (Woodrow Wilson, Theodore Roosevelt), four years (Franklin Roosevelt, Calvin Coolidge), and six years (George W. Bush, Jimmy Carter, Richard Nixon, Warren Harding). The lesson is that Obama must strike while he is hot or risk fading into obscurity. |
http://www.tnr.com/doc.mhtml?i=w051205&s=lizza120605
Definitely a better option than Clinton at the moment, in my opinion. |
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| LatinLover |
| quote: | Originally posted by Renegade
He would be a great candidate, I think. He comes across as being principled without being exclusionary and as moderate without being compromised. The only thing he's got going against him is his inexperience, but even that may not necessarily be an obstacle:
http://www.tnr.com/doc.mhtml?i=w051205&s=lizza120605
Definitely a better option than Clinton at the moment, in my opinion. |
True! The inexperience I dont think that can play a big part. If you look back at his career as a politician, he has been very active, he has lost some races but came up strong in the senatorial elections. He has been a very good senator for IL.
If you look back at history and analyze it, the best US presidents have been unknowns in the sense when they werent very popular within American politics, Lincoln, Teddy Roosevelt etc.. Clinton had the opp to be one of those, a great exmaple. He didnt come from a rich family, work his ass off to president. Had all the qualities, great speaker etc.. But you know how that turned off.
To be honest I had it with the Clintons :p Lets see new blood in the white house! It has been proven that when America is in bad shape those who have changed it, are people who have never heard of that has brought hope back to this great nation. And you know I would love for Obama to be that man, he posseses great qualities, just like clinton he did not come from a rich family, great speaker and a very appealing guy :p Hope that if he does run for Pres, he can make history by being our first black president :D This is what America is all about!
I know that and hope that if Obama runs for pres he wont do it as a Democrat, but as an American! |
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| Kapedan |
| He wont win, you know why? Because he is black, or half black, whatever. I think he is the best option for the Democrats, and I dont mind his as a politician, he seems like a good choice, but I highly doubt he will win. |
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| DJ Shibby |
| quote: | Originally posted by Kapedan
He wont win, you know why? Because he is black, or half black, whatever. I think he is the best option for the Democrats, and I dont mind his as a politician, he seems like a good choice, but I highly doubt he will win. |
LOL
You think that the people who wouldn't vote for him because he's black would vote for a Democrat anyway? |
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| Kapedan |
| quote: | Originally posted by DJ Shibby
LOL
You think that the people who wouldn't vote for him because he's black would vote for a Democrat anyway? |
Well not everyone is Democrat or Republican. You will have the ones in between. I just dont think that America is ready for a black president yet. |
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| Spacey Orange |
he'd be smarter to eat lower is goals for now and get some experience in the executive branch as a vp or as a governor of illinois. if i recall correctly, few senators in modern history have been successful in the nomination or election process.
also consider whether he has the financial backing of the heavyweight donors. |
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| pyro264jb |
| Ya but if he waits another 6 years he wont have the hype or momentum he has today. |
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| pyro264jb |
| quote: | Originally posted by Spacey Orange
he'd be smarter to eat lower is goals for now and get some experience in the executive branch as a vp or as a governor of illinois. if i recall correctly, few senators in modern history have been successful in the nomination or election process.
also consider whether he has the financial backing of the heavyweight donors. |
Kennedy was never a governor. |
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| Kapedan |
| quote: | Originally posted by pyro264jb
Kennedy was never a governor. |
And look where Kennedy ended up. |
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| Groundhog Boy |
| quote: | Originally posted by Kapedan
And look where Kennedy ended up. |
What the does him getting murdered have to do with anything?
I don't know if you've looked around the country, but your beloved Bush has Secret Service everywhere and is investigating children who vaguely threaten him on their myspace/blogs because he's so worried about getting whacked as a result of so many people hating him. Hell, his dissenters are coralled so far away from him during their protests that they wouldn't even have a chance if they wanted to. |
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| erdega |
| This guy is just an impostor like Bush and Clinton and his name rhymes with Osama , American people need a serious president with integrity and responsability |
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