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Obama: Party Loyalty as New Kind of Politics?

In the Prologue to his book, The Audacity of Hope: Thoughts on Reclaiming the American Dream, Barack Obama writes:

Perhaps more than any other time in our recent history, we need a new kind of politics, one that can excavate and build upon those shared understandings that pull us together as Americans

So, you’d think a guy who wants to build on such “shared understandings” would break ranks from his party on a pretty regular basis. That’s not what the the Corner’s Yuval Levin found when he perused Congressional Quarterly “Vote Studies Workbook,” :

Obama and Biden, for instance, turn out to have very high party loyalty, following the extremely unpopular leaders of the Democratic senate on almost every close vote. Obama’s party loyalty score was 96%, making him a more orthodox Democrat than even the Democratic leader in the Senate, Harry Reid, whose score was 93%. Biden was tied with Reid, at 93%. John McCain, meanwhile, had a party loyalty score of 81%, among the lowest in the Republican conference, as many of his fellow Republican senators could no-doubt attest.

Maybe for Barack Obama and Joe Biden, excessive party loyalty, even exceeding that of the hyperpartisan Harry Reid, must define their new kind of politics.

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10 Comments

  1. What, so it’s good that John McCain doesn’t agree with Rupublican party policies? Thank God, then, that’ll he’ll clean up Washington and the Republican Party!

    Comment by Nurglitch — September 16, 2008 @ 8:51 pm - September 16, 2008

  2. Yeah, and McCain’s low rating kinda blows the “Bush Third Term” concept out of the water.

    Comment by Hunter — September 16, 2008 @ 10:02 pm - September 16, 2008

  3. Not to mention the fact that it makes Comrade Obama out to be the lying SOB that he is.

    Comment by ThatGayConservative — September 17, 2008 @ 1:24 am - September 17, 2008

  4. [...] Obama: Party Loyalty as New Kind of Politics? [...]

    Pingback by GayPatriot » This is the Voice of a Unifier? — September 17, 2008 @ 9:00 am - September 17, 2008

  5. [...] Obama: Party Loyalty as New Kind of Politics? [...]

    Pingback by GayPatriot » If Barack Obama had done this. . . — September 17, 2008 @ 10:14 pm - September 17, 2008

  6. The statements of Obama tell the story. He is not to be trusted. His idea of change is SOS: Same Old Stuff.

    Comment by Toughbugger — September 21, 2008 @ 7:32 pm - September 21, 2008

  7. [...] president, the record shows that he hasn’t brought it to Washington as a U.S. Senator.  He toes the Democratic Party line in the Senate more regularly than his party’s own Senate [...]

    Pingback by GayPatriot » USA Today finds McCain Better Uniter than Obama — September 22, 2008 @ 2:37 am - September 22, 2008

  8. [...] the Democratic presidential nomination has also shown a partisan streak that makes Obama’s voting record seem [...]

    Pingback by GayPatriot » In Obama-speak, Post-partisan means purely partisan — September 22, 2008 @ 7:18 pm - September 22, 2008

  9. [...] Instead of making hard choices himself, Barack Obama just follows the lead of congressional Democrats. No wonder he has a near-perfect record of party loyalty. [...]

    Pingback by GayPatriot » Exposing the Eloquent Fraud of Barack Obama — September 25, 2008 @ 5:01 pm - September 25, 2008

  10. [...] that Obama’s attempts to style himself a moderate are just that. Attempts to cover up a partisan record. Nothing more than [...]

    Pingback by GayPatriot » Presidential Election: Closer than it Ought to Be — November 3, 2008 @ 12:37 pm - November 3, 2008

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