The 2008 Campaign: Huckabee, Obama Win Iowa
The New York Times has a funny line today: “Mr. Obama’s victory in this overwhelmingly white state was a powerful answer to the question of whether America was prepared to vote for a black person for president.”
Well, Obama is black*, not black. It does answer the question of whether a biracial guy can get votes in white America, though.
What Iowa did not do on the Democratic side is establish a clear frontrunner. Obama took Iowa. Hillary should still take New Hampshire. Edwards is still in the race, holding out for South Carolina and Florida, where stands an excellent chance.
I think Hillary’s candidacy is mortally wounded, but we’ll see. This is now an Obama-Edwards race. Lord, please let Edwards win the nomination–he’d be the first political figure in my lifetime I actually admired. He’d get us out of Iraq and he’d fuck over the corporations. Obama is an accomodationist; if he wins, it’ll be the do-nothing Nineties all over again.
If anything nasty comes out about Obama or he has a meltdown, Edwards wins. If not, then, well, I don’t know.
On the Republican side, David Brooks’ assertion in today’s Times that the GOP will turn to McCain is laughable. McCain is done. Huckabee is the clear and present frontrunner, propelled by anti-Mormon bigotry. Nice party you got there! It is an amazing victory, considering how little money he had to spend, representing the victory of hatred over cash. Romney could and should win New Hampshire, but you never know.
Huckabee may be nice and slim and stuff, but if he wins the presidency we’ll look back on George W. Bush and wonder why we didn’t appreciate him when we had him. Huckabee is either an idiot, or worse, a fake idiot who pretends to be dumb to pander to idiots.
A person who doesn’t believe in Evolution should be barred from holding any public office. Anyone who doesn’t believe in Evolution is too stupid to get the French fries into the big basket.
39 Comments.
Good to see this post. I was wondering what your thoughts were going to be on Iowa. The potential for a Huckabee win terrifies me. Absolutely terrified.
While it would be nice if someone actually supported a wholly progressive agenda, or went with your platform from "Wake Up, You're Liberal!", I think the best policy option out there would be Kucinich. With him standing no chance, though, I'm rooting for Edwards. I think the media's already decided for us that he'll fall short again, though.
And while I think it's absurd of the people who will vote against CLinton or Obama solely based on gender and race, if Edwards isn't the nominee, those same people will put another damn republican in charge.
You say "anti-Mormon bigotry" like its a bad thing.
Well, it certainly does not help Romney that he is a pandering dirtbag that will say anything he thinks people want to hear. You could have a three-way debate based on 1994 Romney vs 2002 Romney vs 2006 Romney and never get the same answer twice.
The GOP are scared to death of Edwards, and will do everything they can to prop up Obama or Hillary.
I agree about Edwards. His speech last night was incredible. The pundits called Obama's speech "soaring" – which is another way of saying, "full of platitudes that make middle aged white liberals feel good about themselves" – but Edwards had actual substance, talked about real people and real problems.
I have a little more confidence in Obama than you. I agree he is an accomodationist, yet no one other than Kucinich was proposing a single payer health care system, not even Edwards whose plan everyone else cribbed. Obama may offer a "third way" that is far more progressive than the DLC centrists of the Clinton years.
My worry about either Edwards or Obama is how well they will hold themselves against foreign policy hawks on the Republican side. Huckabee is not going to be the nominee, and McCain may stand a better chance than you give him credit for. Even so, it is best not to underestimate the impact of hoary old memes favored by Republicans that Democrats are weak on security. They have won on that before.
Ted,
Wow, what a set of acceptance speeches; you know if I had heard Obama say halfway through his speech "I am the second coming of Jesus Christ" I probably wouldn't have even raised an eyebrow. And you Know Huckleberry, he's preaching to his congregation.
All of this for the Repugs is child's play until we find out of the back-room campaigning of Giuliani actually works. The entire thing stinks of heist to me, though I'm glad he finished behind Paul.
Obama is the type of candidate that loses general elections for liberals, our political system is way too flawed for a candidate of platitudinal hope to win, unless that candidate is on the Wall Street take, in which they're the candidate of Hope, Inc (brought to you by your friendly overseer).
I don't agree that McCain is dead, at least not politically… biologically there is some question. I think he will win New Hampshire, sinking Romney into the sewer where he belongs, and then it will be seen on Feb. 5 if Republicans will cozy up to the 2008 version of Bob Dole, or roll the dice with a candidate projected to lose by double digits to any democrat.
Again, McCain can't win South Carolina because they think he's black.
We are long overdue for a contender from North Carolina though, I still stand by Edwards to pull out SC and FL then roll on Feb. 5 like a hurricane tidal surge.
Dave
Aggie dude, the Dems aren't counting Florida votes this year. They cut us off because our Republican-majority state legislature picked a primary date they didn't like. As a Florida Dem, I'm pretty mad about it.
steve – the people that scare me are the ones who would vote for Hilary simple becuase of her gender, not the other way 'round. I mean, i don't like Hilary, and don't want to see her Presidency, but i wouldn't mind another woman (like Granholm from Michigan, who's gotten dealt a bad hand), the woman from Massachussets, or Christie Todd Whitman. I just find Hilary grating and second coming of John Kerry (pandering etch-a-sketch changing with the wind).
I like to see Edwards as the candidate who's rocking out with his c**k out, because really, what's he got to lose?
What we need is someone like him, who'll take care of the poor, potentially (Huckabee is also sympathetic to the downtrodden, gotta give him that) – or someone like Jesse Ventura who's beholden to no one, doesn't front, and certainly doesn't give a f**k about "the game".
What a breath of fresh air that would be. It'd be like how everyone remembers Andrew Jackson….. could you imagine a Prez like that in this modern world?
Ted:
I am not that enthusiastic about Edwards…didn´t he vote the war in Iraq too? The only decent democratic candidate is Kucinich, and he does not stand a chance of anything…
Perhaps the first corporation Edwards will "fu*k" will be S Corporations used by trip and fall lawyers to sue the hell out of Doctors with phony science then avoid paying taxes by distributing the funds through a shareholder distribution instead of a salary. The breck girl is just slick enough to become the democratic nominee.
Okay, so he's black* not black. Still, I think he is too black to survive the South. Edwards ftw.
"A person who doesn't believe in Evolution should be barred from holding any public office."
I'm generally pretty conservative when it comes to the Constitution (and ONLY when it comes to the Constitution), but that's one Amendment I could definitely get behind…
Biracial? Come on! Sure, Obama's biracial, but that's not really an issue. In the U.S., we whites think of people by the way the appear, and Obama appears to be black. He looks black on TV. That makes him effectively black, with all the advantages and disadvantages that come with that. If an anonymous Barack Obama tried to hail a cab in Midtown Manhattan, he'd likely get passed over for the paler guy wearing the exact same $600 suit half a block up. If Obama were a biracial guy whose skin looked whiter, he'd be treated as a white guy. Fair or not, that's how it is.
That said, Edwards is my preferred candidate, and I live in mortal fear of Clinton snagging the nomination.
It depends how you look at it (regarding Hilary). She came placed third in a state she was never expected to carry in the first place, so I don't think she should be written off by any means. Huckabee beat Romney by a wider margin then Obama did over Hilary AND Edwards, so you have to wonder how representative Iowa really is of the country. Also, with the exception of George W. Bush in 2000, the Iowa caucus has't produced a candidate who won nationally: Kerry, Dole, Gephardt, Mondale, Gore,Harkin, etc. Candidates like Gephardt and Harkin never even made it through the primaries.
Obama's victory is significant but his supporters need to drop back down to earth now. They've already shown that he only won because of support in urban areas. He trailed badly in the more rural sections, which clearly is not a sign of crossover appeal. He's got a lot of work to do. If Hilary Clinton wins in New Hampshire, it's going to really set Obama back because he's now the front runner and all it will look like on the news is "Obama slips to second/third, while Hilary rises…".
Don't forget that that last poll by the Des Moine Register before the caucus had Hilary and Edwards polling at 24-25%. BOTH of the did better then anyone expected them to do in Iowa.
We've already had this argument in person, but Obama is no more black with an asterisk than anyone is any race with an asterisk. All racial identifications have an implicit asterisk, since race is an arbitrary invented pseudo-scientific construct. But it is also a historical and cultural reality, and in America, Obama is black, and identifies himself as black (AND biracial, but still black). In another country, he might be seen or identify personally as "colored" or "Creole" or one of the many classifications, but we're talking about how American voters see race, no?
Sure he's also biracial, and he's also of more recent African descent than many other African Americans, but that doesn't make him any less black–not by the rules and history of race in America. It's not up to you to decide whether he's "authentically" black or not.
That said, white voters most certainly are more likely to feel "safer" with Obama, but that's skin color prejudice, not because he isn't "really" black. Walking down the street anywhere in America, everyone who seems a man who looks like Obama sees a black man. A man who looks like Obama faces racism in hiring, in hailing a cab, in housing, etc. Maybe less racism than a darker-skinned black man, and certainly less racism than someone without his money, class position and manner of dress, but he's still a black man.
Sure, it's still fucked up and probably true that his white ancestry and lighter skin makes him "safer" for white voters, but that doesn't mean he isn't black.
P.S. On a totally different note, Huckabee frightens me to death and so does Romney and so does Giuliani… And I can't stand Hilary or Obama. I'm praying in my atheistic way for an Edwards win.
but urban areas often carry states (and electoral votes) – MO swings to whoever carries STL and KC, IL to Chicago, etc. states may be purple, but cities tip the balances in a winner-take-all situation.
Ted, your losing your focus in this comment. "A person who doesn't believe in Evolution should be barred from holding any public office. Anyone who doesn't believe in Evolution is too stupid to get the French fries into the big basket." A shameful comment. Just because someone does not share your "faith" in evolution does not make them stupid.
I must quote from one of my undergraduate Biology texts (and I went to a very liberal school, not to a fundamentalist college):
The question of the origin of life is not simple. One cannot go back in time and watch how life originated; nor are there any witnesses. There is testimony, in the rocks of the earth, but it is not easily read, and often this record is silent on issues crying out for answers. Perhaps the most fundamental of these issues is the nature of the agency or force that led to the creation of life. There are, in principle, at least four possiblites:
1. An unknowable agency . . .
2. Natural outside agency . . .
3. Supernatural outside agency . . .
4. Evolution . . .
In this book we deal only with the fourth possibility, attempting to understand whether the forces of evolution could have led to the origin of life and, if so, how the process might have occured. This is not to say that the fourth possiblity is definitely the correct one. Any one of the four possiblities might be true. . . .
"Biology." Raven and Johnson. 1986 ed. (pp 37-38)
This coming from biologists who believe that evolution is the correct answer. One must admire them for stating that evolution is not a fact but a theory, and it may be wrong.
Ted, by making blanket statements stating evolution is fact, and that people are "stupid" for not "believing in evolution," you are starting to sound like Hannity and Combs. I do not think you want to go there because your are implying: if people do not believe your way, they are stupid, and should be barred from certain functions like government. This implies they they are untrustworthy because they do not agree with you.
Sounds a bit like the Third Reich to me, except from a liberal bias.
John, evolution is both a fact and a theory, as is gravity. Theory has a different, specific meaning to scientists contra its use in the vernacular.
Any of the four possibilities they list could be correct; more than one could be correct, but only the fourth explanation is scientific.
mikhaela, thanks for your opinion on a biological subject. It's always helpful to have input from a cartoonist on a technical matter that you're entirely unqualified to comment on.
"Ted, by making blanket statements stating evolution is fact, and that people are "stupid" for not "believing in evolution," you are starting to sound like Hannity and Combs. I do not think you want to go there because your are implying: if people do not believe your way, they are stupid, and should be barred from certain functions like government. This implies they they are untrustworthy because they do not agree with you."
The Origin of Species was published in 1859. It was acceptable, in 1870, say, to question and discuss Darwin's findings and conclusions. It's been 150 years; the debate is hereby closed.
Should we still be presenting "both sides" of heliocentrism too?
Evolution is a fact. Anyone who denies it at this late date is a fool.
John, it sounds like you had a crummy biology textbook. The theory of evolution in no way addresses "the agency or force that led to the creation of life". It addresses the development of new species from old. That this leaves open the question of where the first species came from does not undermines the validity of evolution in explaining modern species and the fossil record for the past 300 million years or so.
I can see it now. Someone is going to ask Obama to comment on John Horn.
Will he attempt to win over the red necks? Might be his only chance.
Evolution is not a fact.
At the very least Darwinism is crippled by gaping holes in the theory.
Because that's what evolution is: a theory.
It happens to be by far the most plausible current explanation for the origin of species and development of life on earth, but a fact?
Give me a break.
If it were a fact, they'd call it the Law of Evolution and there would be no further discussion because there would be proof.
You don't hear arguments about heliocentrism, thermodynamics or gravity these days because they have been proven.
Over and over. And over.
The problem with evolution is that it is untestable and therefore is unlikely to ever be truly scientifically proven.
Unless you have in your pocket the outlines of an experiment that exactly, observably and replicably reproduces the processes that led to life on earth and the origin of species.
Do you?
Thought not.
This is why laypersons should never meddle in the affairs of science.
If there's proof, you'll hear about it.
If the bugs are still being worked out, leave it to the experts who understand that there are very few processes that can be proven by science.
If it's there, it will be found.
Until then, ascribing "fact" status to something that is entirely informed conjecture leads us to the problems we currently face.
Do I believe in evolution? Absolutely.
Is it possible that new findings will render the entire current study of evolutionary biology a joke? Absolutely.
Scientists don't deal in facts. We deal in reality.
The current reality being that evolution remains a work in progress.
K, you're totally wrong. The history of racial classifications in America is a sociological and historical subject, not a biological subject. Whether someone is seen as black by the rules of race in America is not a biological fact, it's a social fact. On the other hand, whether someone is of African descent according to their DNA is a science thing.
You assume that cartoonists haven't studied anything but cartooning. My academic background is in anthropology and sociology, not art. So I'm much more qualified to speak on this subject than you think.
Mikhaela, yes. And Barrack is not black in the sociological and historical sense, right?
There is nothing black about him. I am blacker than him. Having taken anthro 101, I gotta agree with you about race, though. Total BS.
You need proof of evolution??? Ask A priest what your appendix is for.
Not all of Christianity believes literally in the Bible. I'm not positive, because I'm not Catholic, but I think the Catholic church has generally conceded evolution. Maybe its just because I didn't go regularly but I don't remember being taught literal biblical creationism in church as a kid – we were always told the six days were "God" days and not earth days and probably lasted the millions of years that it took for the atmosphere and living things to develop.
It seems wrong that religion should be a qualifying or disqualifying factor but at the same time, it would be wrong for a president to adopt policies based on a specific group of a sect of one particular religion and I don't see Huckabee being able to do that. One thing to watch out for though, many traditional Southern Democrats are jumping to the Huckabee camp as the parties come a full 180 on the religion plus populism combo. That may give him more support than people are crediting him with right now.
Don't forget that that last poll by the Des Moines Register before the caucus had Hilary and Edwards polling at 24-25%. BOTH of the did better then anyone expected them to do in Iowa.
You have to remember that the Democratic caucuses require viability. That is, in most, the candidates need 15% of the voters to be counted at all. In my caucus, Richardson, Biden, Kucinich, and Dodd had a total of 22% of the voters after the first division, but none were viable individually. Those voters then went to the Obama, Edwards, and Clinton groups.
The Iowa results really reflect a combination of first and second choices.
"Perhaps the first corporation Edwards will "fu*k" will be S Corporations"
Yeah, Edward, cause thats the epitome of corporate influence killing democracy…
To promise, say, clearing the streets of rabid dogs, and then, when elected, you only go after a few rabid chihuhuas would be lame. Breck girl? Here's a vote for saving the Ann Cuntler memes for the conservative blogs.
Edwards FTW!
Ted,
No, a theory is not a fact. It is the Theory of Evolution, not the Law of Evolution. You can observe gravity. It is measurable. There is even a Gravatational Constant. Evolution does not have that rigour. Did you not read the quote from my Bilogy textbook?
comsympinko is right, he is obviously a scientist.
I spent decades as working as a very sucessful scientist. Have written patents. Was respected by my peers.
Ted, you really lose your effectiveness when you do not stay with the facts, and I know you can do better. I have seen you give fantastically logical arguements.
If you are going to convince anyone who would be a supporter of a person like Mr. Huckabee to change their mind, stating things like "Evolution is a fact, you are stupid for not believing it." is counterproductive and really plain wrong. It is abusive. This is the same way Hannity and Combs distort facts and call people names for not believing their theories. Why would you want to step down to their level? It is really not like you.
john, evolution is observable and measurable and has been observed and measured. It is a fact and a theory both, like gravity.
I read your and comsympinko's comments and they are rife with ignorance.
Try reading at least the 8 page summary brochure from the National Academy of Sciences on the topic, which can be found here: http://www.nap.edu/catalog.php?record_id=11876
What is your appendix for???
Talk about ignorance.
Scientifically speaking it is impossible for something to be both Theory and Law.
The word "fact" doesn't even apply in science.
I'd really like to be shown one single instance where an organism of a particular species has been observed morphing into a completely different species through natural processes.
Just going about its business, occupying its niche, and then POOF! different species.
Even with sudden, massive environmental change an organism will not become a different species. The fit will survive, the weak will die, and the fit will pass on their survivability to future generations.
This is called the Law of natural selection, not the Theory of evolution, and is called a Law because it is observable and repeatable.
Spontaneous, de novo change of an organism from one species to another would be the best evidence yet of evolution in action, but even this would not prove the larger theory as the earth cannot be observed from its beginning until now.
Unless you've got an alternate universe with an alternate earth, you start the clock now and report your findings in 5 billion years.
Then do it again. And again. And again. Ad infinitum. And get exactly the same result every time.
That–and only that–would be scientific proof of the Theory of evolution.
There are certainly instances where organisms develop new characteristics to cope with changing environments.
This is adaptation, not evolution, in action and is caused by the aforementioned Law of natural selection.
For instance, the appendix. Once it had a purpose, now it does not. The human body has adapted to change over time, but our status as homo sapiens remains the same.
Our genome has not changed and our capacity to reproduce has not changed.
We have adapted, not evolved.
Show me an instance of an organism in its natural environment, even a radically changing natural environment, going through a spontaneous, de novo change from one species to another, altering its genome and reproductive capacity. Just one.
Even then, you'd better get cracking on your alternate universe. I'll be eagerly awaiting your findings.
Oh, and allow me to reiterate:
Darwinian evolution remains by far the most probable explanation for the origin of species and diversity of life on this planet.
I believe in evolution, I just can't prove it.
It's kind of like a god that way, which seems to be why everyone gets their shorts all in a knot when its shortcomings are discussed.
from the National Academy of Sciences text that you couldn't be bothered to educate yourself with:
"Is Evolution a Theory or a Fact? It is both….The formal scientific definition of theory is quite different from the everyday meaning of the word. It refers to a comprehensive explanation of some aspect of nature that is supported by a vast body of evidence….In science, a “fact” typically refers to an observation, measurement, or other form of evidence that can be expected to occur the same way under similar circumstances. However, scientists also use the term “fact” to refer to a scientific explanation that has been tested and confirmed so many times that there is no longer a compelling reason to keep testing it or looking for additional examples."
Evolution can occur without speciation, and scientists have observed evolution, as in the increase in occurrence of antibiotic resistance genes in bacteria.
Speciation has been inferred to occur rarely in one giant step, known as autopolyploidy, wherein there is a multiplying of the entire genome. There are two species called the gray treefrog in the southeastern U.S. They cannot interbreed, and are nearly morphologically identical. One species has twice the chromosome number of the other.
Wikipedia gives also potatoes, apples, and bananas as examples (although I thought banana polyploidy was from human manipulation, so that might not be correct). Autopolyploidy appears to be much more common in plants than in animals.
I read the NAS text, it is written for the non-scientist and is wrong.
Any text that would suggest that an unproven element of science should be abandoned to convenient "fact" status because there is substantial evidence for its veracity is pandering to the uninitiated and giving nothing more than a quick and dirty way to prove a point.
It defines a non-scientific term.
I will agree that according to this definition evolution is indeed a "fact."
A term which does not exist for the scientist.
Evolution is not a Law, and therefore must be defined as not proven.
Antibiotic resistance in bacteria is adaptation, not evolution, and as any scientist knows unicellular organisms tell us nothing about how multicellular organisms function.
You are correct in that this adaptation results in a change to the genome, as this is the only change that can occur in bacteria as bacteria are nothing but a genome and do not reproduce sexually so cannot technically evolve.
As for autopolyploidy, this could be seen as a track to speciation, yet most polyploid animal species are sterile and only lower species can reproduce at all (through parthenogenesis), ergo the problem with your tree frogs.
As I am not a botanist I was unaware of the immense degree to which autopolyploidy is present in plant species, but polyploid plant species can interbreed and therefore do not seem to be as significantly altered as animal species; indeed polyploid plants are not classified as different species but as subspecies.
I get where you're going with all this and agree with you for the most part, but the bottom line remains that "facts" do not exist in real science and the Theory of evolution remains unproven.
Biologists, especially ecologists and evolutionary biologists don't use the word "proven" to describe support for or confidence in our hypotheses and theories. We advance by disproving alternative hypotheses (see: Popper). Proof is left for mathematics, which relies on pure logic and absolutes, something often missing in complex systems, such as organisms and higher levels of biological organization (populations, species, communities, etc.). The physical laws (e.g. Laws of Thermodynamics) describe absolutes of very simplified conditions.
Since the National Academy of Sciences isn't good enough for you, I don't know what will convince you, but "NAS is wrong", isn't a valid refutation. If it is, here's my refutation of your point: you are wrong.
Here, from A Dictionary of Ecology, Evolution and Systematics:
theory: A scientifically accepted general principle supported by a substantial body of evidence offered to provide an explanation of observed facts and as a basis for future discussion or investigation
emphasis mine. Apparently, scientists do use the term "fact".
Adaptation occurs through evolution, which at its most basic level is a change in allele frequencies in a population over generations.
Same dictionary:
adaptation: 2: process of evolutionary modification which results in improved survival and reproductive efficiency; 3: any morphological, physiological, sensory, developmental or behavioral character that enhances survival and reproductive success of an organism
"…as any scientist knows unicellular organisms tell us nothing about how multicellular organisms function."
I'm a scientist, specifically a biologist and I don't know that. In fact, since unicellular and multicellular organisms share many cellular properties (Krebs cycle, glycolysis, DNA as heritable material) we actually can learn a lot from multicellular organisms, although many differences exist as well.
Populations don't have to reproduce sexually to evolve.
There is no problem with the tree frogs. They cannot hybridize, but they are fertile and sexually reproduce within their own species. One species apparently arose from the other by duplication of the genome. They are not sterile. Also, there is a triploid species of snake that reproduces asexually (parthenogenesis). You challenged me "I'd really like to be shown one single instance where an organism of a particular species has been observed morphing into a completely different species through natural processes." I've done that, and the relative frequency of occurrence of the phenomenon is irrelevant, you were ignorant (i.e. didn't know something). Actually, a sudden creation of a new species is called saltational evolution, autopolyploidy is one mechanism, allopolyploidy is another mechanism. Several salamander and lizard species appear to have arisen by allopolyploidy.
Autopolyploid plants are sometimes interfertile with their parental (sub)species, but not always, and therefore would be considered new species.
I don't expect to convince you, because you don't seem open to learning, but I hope I've convinced others that you don't know much about evolution, even if you "believe" in it. Science isn't about belief, it's about what the evidence supports, and the confidence we have in the evidence and the confidence we have in our inference from that evidence.
Mikhaela:
If race isn't biological, why did the FDA approve a drug treatment for African-Americans only? There is more than one concept of species, and there is more than one concept of race. If you and comsympinko stick to pronouncements only in your area of expertise, we'll all be better off.
I'm not a physicist, I don't have any strong opinion on string theory, for example.
http://www.stephenjaygould.org/library/gould_fact-and-theory.html
I think that different people here are using "fact" and "theory" in different ways, so let's just accept that different opinions are in play, and get back to criticizing Mike Huckabee.
Huckabee stated after the May 7th debate:
"If you want to believe that you and your family came from apes, that's fine. I'll accept that. I just don't happen to think that I did."
There's two things to attack here; firstly, he seems to think that being descended from apes is not a scientific/factual question, but instead is one of belief. Belief doesn't enter into it: all forms of biological research confirm that chimpanzees are our sister taxa, and that our two evolutionary lineages separated somewhere in the neighborhood of 7 million years ago.
Secondly, his denial of this fact is based on …well, what exactly? He says he doesn't "think" he is an ape relative, but when intellectual push comes to shove, he doesn't think so, he believes so, based on a book written thousands of years ago by a society which thought that the Earth was flat and the stars were holes in the firmament above the Earth.
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