finknottle

Looks like the race-baiters who started this thread have been proved wrong again - Bridget has gotten play in the video, a stand up introduction, and mention of her story in Cindy's speech.

The wierd thing is Cindy McCain's speech: it's surprisingly good, better than most of the politicians. I had no idea she had any talent in tis area. And yet, the crowd reponse is surprisingly muted, missing alot of otherwise well-delivered applause lines. I can only assume they are looking ahead to McCain himself.

When I said the outrage has subsided, I meant the outrage against McCain over his bill - not the outrage on the immigration issue itself.

He needs a one sentence summary, like "high youth turnout for Obama could make a big difference; but since such drives are often mirrored by higher turnouts in other groups and the loyalty and dependability of the youth vote is fickle, the impact is usually les than one would expect." At least that's what I got out of it.

Not sure what you are getting at - his immigration plan is dead. The outrage subsided because he basically has been saying "I've heard the will of the people, I'll secure the borders first, and only then deal with amnesty." And despite the way it is portrayed in the media, most of the outrage was over the sense of losing control of the borders and the laws, not the issue of the immigrants themselves. There is still some distrust, but his mea culpa's and clear statements on what his priorities will be have pretty much neutralized the revolt.

Elitist is code for uppity, according to the article. Bush I was also attacked as having been born with a silver spoon in his mouth. That's code for having enjoyed a fairy tale life, and we all know what *that* really means!

JK2000 needs the night off to watch the convention - I'll take over the job of posting pointless inflammatory partisan political minutia. Interesting tidbit in the latest Rasmussen poll: Pretty embarrasing for Obama - it's like being sent down to the minor leagues. http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_con...l_tracking_poll

Agreed, more or less, but wind farms are killing grounds for migrating birds. Most people chortle at that objection, but it bothers me a great deal more than a nuclear power plant.

I remember both Bush's being painted as elitist - I didn't realize the family was black.

Unless McCain is genuine about reform - so you might say it is win-win-win.

Surprisingly, not as big as one might think. African-Americans only make up 13% of the population (one person in seven), and the voting trends mirror those of other groups (offset in participation rates). In presidential elections, support for the democrtic candidate has already been in the 80-90% range, so by 'coming out in force' you are looking less at unifying behind one side (already done, historically) and more at upping the participation rate. Census figures say 68.7% of eligible african-americans were registered, of which 60% voted. This contrasted with 73.6/65.4 for whites, 51.8/44.1 for asians, and 57.9/47.2 for hispanics. Upping registration to 90% and turnout to 70% (a herculean task) would add less than .5% of the total vote to a candidate in a presidential election. Given the fact that the population is not evenly distributed across the country, this would not have a huge impact on national elections unless there were critical swing states with large african-american populations where an overall bump of 2-3% was decisive. Here is a readable fact sheet on African-American voting: http://www.nwaforchange.org/nwa/priority_h...sheets_AfAm.htm Here are the census results on the past bunch of elections (from which I derived the voter registration/participation estimates): http://www.census.gov/population/www/socdemo/voting.html

So you believe that schools use the same distribution of grades and distribution of ranking distinctions today that they did 5, 10, 20, and 50 years ago. There is no such thing as grade inflation, and there is no such thing as tightening up on grades. Fine - I'll cede you your fantasy. So that leaves us with Harvards own statement. Today (and according to you, since time immorial) , those with a score of 7.2 or higher graduate summa cum laude. The next 10% graduate magna cum laude, and the next 30% graduate cum laude. So he's not at the top of the class. How many are? Gee - it depends on the grading curve, and Harvard won't release any information on it. Could be one person, could be 10% of the class, could be 60%! But here's a fun exercise. Google 'summa cum laude, harvard law, and some year' and see how many names pop up. It's more than one or two.

My findings were not that different from Kelly's, the current policy for which he provided a link. So read it or STFU. The only significant difference is whether 10% were graduating summa cum laude in the 90's, and I have no interrest in trying to dig that up again. And as I pointed out, there was no definitive and consistent answer.

If I were a jackass like you, I'd be starting 50 threads an hour claiming that Obama's entire academic career is the product of affirmative action, constantly being elevated into a better school than his grades warranted. And I'd be throwing crap out like - do you really believe that every C student from Occidental with no extracurriculars can transfer into Columbia, - do you really believe that a mediocre Columbia student with no academic distinction can get into Harvard Law, - do you really believe that every Harvard Law student can get himself a book deal for his autobiography, before he even graduates, - do you really believe that the University of Chicago would offer a tenure position to an adjunct lecturer who has never published a legal article and has only taught for two years : So keep trumping Obama's educational achievements and denigrating everybody elses, without offering a shred of information about them.

And even if he loses.

It has varied over the years - grade inflation is an issue everywhere. I did alot of digging some time ago and couldn't get a consistent answer. It was not at all clear that at that time ranking was tied soley to grades and not effected by other considerations (editing the law review, getting published, whatever). The likliest information that I could come up with was that in the early 90's, the top 10% graduated summa cum laude, the next 20% (10-30) graduated magna cum lauda. and the next 50% (20-80) graduated cum laude.

Last time I checked, Obama was running for president. Palin is not. And how do you know Obama's Ivy League education wasn't mediocre? How do we know that his grades won't be at odds with his mystique, like when it turned out that Kerry's were actually lower than Bush's? But go ahead and keep probing - maybe there's something in Palin's elementary school record that will make Obama a superior choice for president than McCain.

Infantile avoidence.

I didn't look at it from the personal perspective of liking their policies, just handicapping the performances. In terms of positions, I am dead set against Huckabee - but that doesn't stop me from giving credit where credit is due. The man is Clintonesque in his ability to connect with and move a crowd. He's good - always. Guilaini is more hit-and-miss, and last night I thought he was on his game.

I don't know that anybody has asked for Palin's records yet. But you are avoiding the real issue: much is made by the democrats of McCain's poor grades, which he readily admits to, yet Obama will not release his own. That is odd since it is constantly suggested that he was an academic star.

My point is not to be snippy - I genuinely think that the democratic party is out-of-touch on this issue, and that people could care less. But the party treats it like a third rail, and assumes the country is with them 100% in their revulsion. And ironically, on this issue they are as guilty of ignoring science as the republicans are on climate change. Just my opinion.

And Obama didn't finish where he started out either - big deal. Btw, why hasn't he released his college transcripts? Surely he would want to rebut the claims that his was an affirmative action trajectory? We know nothing of his class standing anywhere, except that there is essentially no information available about his years at Occidental; he graduated Columbia with no honors at all; yet was still admitted to Harvard Law (nice break if you can get it!), where he graduated magna cum laude (probably putting him in the top 20-40% of his law class). No information on grades, at all. http://www.oxy.edu/x7992.xml http://www.nysun.com/new-york/obamas-years...-mystery/85015/

I think you over-estimate the opposition to nuclear power. In fact, I would lay money that given a choice, people would rather see a nuclear power plant in their neighborhood than a coal plant or a refineary.

Don't know if this anarchistic bombing plot is related: http://washingtontimes.com/news/2008/sep/0...tion-bomb-plot/

Would you be ok with an employer choosing not to hire a woman who just gave birth, based soley on what he concludes about her judgement in returning to the workforce? Just wondering...