Campaign '08 as sport
ILLUSTRATED: Be optimistic about Obama
A couple months ago, I wrote some verbal ammo for the horse race between Obama and McCain. Let me reiterate that last point I made that this is not a fair fight.
Political talk shows are like sports pre-game shows: they talk about the big personalities and strategy. They do that because they get the highest ratings.
A football analogy is just how a football game that is within a field goal going into the last quarter, that game will be decided on the line of scrimmage. In politics, if a race is within the margin of error going into the last week, that race will be decided in volunteer field offices. It's relatively boring to talk about, so the media doesn't focus on it.
As for looking at this race in the last 13 weeks, soccer is a better analogy. Soccer is wide open and improvised, just like resource allocation among swing states. McCain will have $84 Million. Obama might have twice that. So McCain is like a soccer team with 11 players. Obama might have 25. So Obama can play man-to-man defense, AND zone defense, AND his forwards can swamp McCain's defense. Forcing McCain to spend resources anywhere is a tactical victory, since it thins him out.
That said, get out there and canvass.
A couple months ago, I wrote some verbal ammo for the horse race between Obama and McCain. Let me reiterate that last point I made that this is not a fair fight.
Political talk shows are like sports pre-game shows: they talk about the big personalities and strategy. They do that because they get the highest ratings.
A football analogy is just how a football game that is within a field goal going into the last quarter, that game will be decided on the line of scrimmage. In politics, if a race is within the margin of error going into the last week, that race will be decided in volunteer field offices. It's relatively boring to talk about, so the media doesn't focus on it.
As for looking at this race in the last 13 weeks, soccer is a better analogy. Soccer is wide open and improvised, just like resource allocation among swing states. McCain will have $84 Million. Obama might have twice that. So McCain is like a soccer team with 11 players. Obama might have 25. So Obama can play man-to-man defense, AND zone defense, AND his forwards can swamp McCain's defense. Forcing McCain to spend resources anywhere is a tactical victory, since it thins him out.
That said, get out there and canvass.
posted by Teka Thomas at 3:11 AM
1 Comments:
Very soon Senator Obama will be making public his choice for the person who will be the next Vice President of the United States. As I have discussed before on this blog, this is a critical decision for Senator Obama.
There are Africans that Senator Obama can choose and I have discussed this with him on several occasions. While I feel the Senator understands my point of view and what is at stake here historically, I am disappointed that he'll likely be making a political choice and not a moral one.
It is not likely that Louis Farrakhan will be his VP selection but he can be a key advisor to President Obama's administration. Senator Obama has great respect for Minister Farrakhan and I hope he will continue to play a role in his life.
Al Sharpton, Julian Bond, Kweisi Mfume, Maxine Waters, Benjamin Chavis Stephanie Tubbs Jones and Cynthia McKinney would all be fine choices for the Vice Presidency.
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