Obama: "I'm the Uniter"

Obama, in his well-delivered speech, want's America to know that he represents the death of the politics of the past:

For 18 long months, you have stood up, one by one, and said enough to the politics of the past. You understand that in this election, the greatest risk we can take is to try the same old politics with the same old players and expect a different result. You have shown what history teaches us — that at defining moments like this one, the change we need doesn’t come from Washington. Change comes to Washington. Change happens because the American people demand it — because they rise up and insist on new ideas and new leadership, a new politics for a new time.

I'd love nothing more than if it were true.

Obama loves to point out, as he did again tonight, that McCain votes with Bush 90% of the time. This is a deceptive statistic, and it's time I called him out on it. What is not stated, and what most Americans probably don't realize, is that many votes that take place are bi-partisan. They don't get the coverage as the really divisive issues, but yes, there are some things the bluest Democrat and the reddest Republican agree on.

Here's the proof. If you asked the average American how often Obama agrees with Bush, what do you think they'd say? On average, I'd bet the number would be pretty low. The facts are that Obama agrees with Bush 40% of the time.

Of course it's no shock that McCain agrees with Bush more often than Obama. The point here though is that Obama claims to be the face of the "new politics." So the stat that is most interesting to me is that Obama agrees with the Democratic position about 97% of the time.

Of course if you agree with 100% of the Democratic position, that's not a bad thing for you. The only reason McCain's perceived partisanship is a problem is because Bush is not popular. But no matter what your political persuasion, these numbers prove that both of these men are part of the old partisan politics.

Wrong Rating: 1 out of 4 (spin)