On unity

Posted at 9:23 AM on August 28, 2008 by Bob Collins (3 Comments)
Filed under: Politics, The political conventions

According to Rasmussen Reports today, 74% of those surveyed say the convention has them united.

If 1 out of ever four Democrats says he/she is not on board with Obama (or don't know if they're on board with Obama), doesn't that mean they're not united?

Consulting dictionary.com on united:

1. made into or caused to act as a single entity: a united front.
2. formed or produced by the uniting of things or persons: a united effort.
3. agreed; in harmony.

Three out of four Democrats aren't behind the Democratic nominee? That's the kind of unity that loses elections.

In the last presidential election, John Kerry had 89% of the Democratic vote, and still lost.

Discuss.

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Comments (3)

Lack of unity doesn't translate to the percentage of Democrats that will or won't vote for Obama. For example, I wasn't "united" behind Kerry but I still voted for him.

Posted by Aaron | August 28, 2008 10:01 AM

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"the convention has 'them' united."

What was the actual phrasing of the question?

It's all about parsing words. The conclusion doesn't explain who the "them" are. So you could argue that those 75% who back Obama ARE united with each other. You could even say the 25% who aren't united behind Obama are united in their non-unitedness.

If you're talking about ALL demorcrats or ALL Repuclicans being united behind a single candidate, well, then unity will never be achieved.

Even the definitions don't explain how many it takes to form a union. 2 could be a union. It simply takes any grouping of things or people to come together over some agreement form a union. So those 75% are unified. With each other. And with Barack.

And hopefully that unity will grow to include more people; Democrats, Republicans and Independents alike.

Posted by Joel | August 28, 2008 10:27 AM

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I think Aaron hit on something. What exactly is unity? For all we know, the non-uniteds might disagree

Joel, however, gets the gold for "united in their non-unitedness."

Wish I'd written that.

Posted by Bob Collins | August 28, 2008 10:38 AM

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