Obama's catching heat this week for his campaign advisor's statement that Hillary shares some of the responsibility for Bhutto's assassination.
It's true.
Sucks to be you, Hillary, but you voted for this dumb assed war that Obama said from the start would be a disaster. If we weren't fuckin' around in Iraq, we might have actually caught bin Laden and Zawahiri by now and al Qaeda would be a historical footnote. Instead, they're in functional control of a whole provinces in Pakistan and the old Taliban is on the move in Afghanistan. Not to mention that the Iraq War has itself greatly fanned the flames of anti-American Islamic fundamentalism all over the region, including in Pakistan.
We done fucked up and what happened in Pakistan is just the "chickens coming home to roost," in the immortal words of El Hajj Malik El Shabazz (Malcolm X).
But alas, the truth is sometimes hard to take, thus the uproar about Obama. But that's also what keeps driving people to Barack. Truth equals "authenticity" -- a hard to define by critical attribute for a politician, and one that Barack enjoys in spades.
Comments?
Saturday, December 29, 2007
Wednesday, December 12, 2007
Obama, Race and the Progressive Blogosphere
With Barack Obama's campaign for the Democratic nomination on a roll, the "long knives" have come out of their sleeves. While the attacks have come from all sides, the most disturbing ones, from my perspective, are being launched from the progressive blogosphere.
The acknowledged founder of said blogosphere, Jerome Armstrong, recently posted a diary on MyDD questioning Barack's electability, the first few lines of which contained the following admonition:
Mr. Armstrong is, of course, far more evolved than that:
All of that combined with the counter-intuitive illogic of the claim that Barack's chances in the general election will be somehow compromised by his insufficiently partisan rhetoric during the primary leads me to believe that there's something a little deeper going on here. For those new to progressive politics it might sound novel, but for many of us who know the history, it's an old story: white progressives are uncomfortable getting behind a black standard-bearer for the progressive movement who they cannot control.
Whether it be Paul Krugman's rants about Obama's failing to tow the progressive line on Social Security and health insurance mandates, the "McClurkin" controversy, or any number of other things, the problem isn't so much that Obama's not really a true progressive at heart (his biography and record are crystal clear on that), but that he's his own man; when confronted with a demand that he "back down" on mandates or "exclude" an ex-gay gospel singer from his campaign, Obama refuses to do so.
It would be one thing if there were a viable capital "P" Progressive Party with a track record of winning elections; that would be a great argument for enforcing a party line. But we all know how far from the truth that is. With very limited exceptions, the progressive movement has been on a losing streak in America for decades and the inability of white progressives to find a way to work with black leadership is a big part of that history of failure: without black support, progressive victories are few and far between, and without black leadership, there is no black support.
So, even though the progressive movement is presented with what would appear to be its greatest chance in history to simultaneously help America take a huge step forward in realizing it's age-old dream of racial equality while at the same time electing the most self-evidently progressive President in our lifetimes, apparently many would prefer to stay on the sidelines, sniping at Barack Obama, suppesedly for failing to march in lockstep and/or throw a sufficient amount of rhetorical red meat at the base, but in actuality because they're just not comfortable with the emergence of a free-thinking black man as the leader of the progressive movement.
Fortunately, however, through Barack's unique force of personality and charisma, and maybe also because of the presence on the scene of a new, younger generation of progressive activists who are more accustomed to working on an equal basis with people of other races, this historic logjam in the progressive movement appears to be breaking down. Once we begin to separate out the more established leaders who have a vested interest in Obama's defeat, i.e. paid and/or high-profile supporters of one or another of the other candidates, by and large progressives at the grass roots level across America are getting "fired up and ready to go" behind his candidacy. Barack's army of field volunteers now numbers in the hundreds of thousands and is growing by thousands more every day.
I'm confident that twenty years from now, many of Obama's detractors will be writing books and articles with not a hint of irony about how Barack rejuvenated America by putting together a new progressive majority that was able to bring about incredible changes in America life and politics on a par with that accomplished FDR and JFK. I won't mind at all.
The acknowledged founder of said blogosphere, Jerome Armstrong, recently posted a diary on MyDD questioning Barack's electability, the first few lines of which contained the following admonition:
First, let me just say that anyone who accuses skin color as some part behind the reasoning will find themselves banned--there is zero tolerance for accusations of racism.Mr. Armstrong's bold attempt to censor any discussion of the issue of race in connection with his critique of Barack's electability is stunning. Having talked to hundreds of people about Barack's candidacy over the past year or so, I can say with a great degree of certainty that the number one issue going through most people's minds when they consider Barack's electability is the obvious one: Is America ready to elect a black President for the first time in its history?
Mr. Armstrong is, of course, far more evolved than that:
I don't even view Obama as black or with racial distinction. Identity-wise, I can understand why he's seen as such, but in that regard (and I have two kids with this same beauty), it points to a bright future when such fallacies such as 'race' become historical dust, and racism ceases. One day, let's hope. Having black skin is not totally gone as an electability issue, but it's as negligible as being a woman, a southerner, or a northeasterner. You can ask Harold Ford if you doubt it's still an issue in certain races-- but nevermind, because he would have to say otherwise in public, and I hope one day he will be able to win in Tennessee-- but it no longer is an insurmountable hurdle to being elected President.According to Mr. Armstrong then, it's not the racists who will pose the greatest risk for Barack Obama in the general election; no, the bigger electability problem for him is that the progressive base of the Democratic Party will abandon him in the face of the Republican assault that is sure to come.
The skepticism about Obama's electability isn't grounded in empirical polling (which are too early to matter); instead, it's more just a feeling that, given how well he's positioned his candidacy with the media's blessing, he's setting himself up for being torn down without a partisan base to rely upon for pushing back.The amazing thing to me is that Mr. Armstrong can so casually dismiss "empirical" data, totally ignore the fact that Obama has the most progressive biography and record of any of the major candidates, admit that his sentiments are based on nothing more than "just a feeling," and then use his position as the owner of a supposedly "democratic" political forum to squelch any discussion of the possibility that the very factor most talked about with respect to Barack's electability -- race -- might have played a role in how he, himself, arrived at this "feeling."
Yes, right now, Obama does pretty well among Republicans & Independents. But there's been more and more of a dissonance growing between Obama's campaign and among progressive partisan Democrats.
All of that combined with the counter-intuitive illogic of the claim that Barack's chances in the general election will be somehow compromised by his insufficiently partisan rhetoric during the primary leads me to believe that there's something a little deeper going on here. For those new to progressive politics it might sound novel, but for many of us who know the history, it's an old story: white progressives are uncomfortable getting behind a black standard-bearer for the progressive movement who they cannot control.
Whether it be Paul Krugman's rants about Obama's failing to tow the progressive line on Social Security and health insurance mandates, the "McClurkin" controversy, or any number of other things, the problem isn't so much that Obama's not really a true progressive at heart (his biography and record are crystal clear on that), but that he's his own man; when confronted with a demand that he "back down" on mandates or "exclude" an ex-gay gospel singer from his campaign, Obama refuses to do so.
It would be one thing if there were a viable capital "P" Progressive Party with a track record of winning elections; that would be a great argument for enforcing a party line. But we all know how far from the truth that is. With very limited exceptions, the progressive movement has been on a losing streak in America for decades and the inability of white progressives to find a way to work with black leadership is a big part of that history of failure: without black support, progressive victories are few and far between, and without black leadership, there is no black support.
So, even though the progressive movement is presented with what would appear to be its greatest chance in history to simultaneously help America take a huge step forward in realizing it's age-old dream of racial equality while at the same time electing the most self-evidently progressive President in our lifetimes, apparently many would prefer to stay on the sidelines, sniping at Barack Obama, suppesedly for failing to march in lockstep and/or throw a sufficient amount of rhetorical red meat at the base, but in actuality because they're just not comfortable with the emergence of a free-thinking black man as the leader of the progressive movement.
Fortunately, however, through Barack's unique force of personality and charisma, and maybe also because of the presence on the scene of a new, younger generation of progressive activists who are more accustomed to working on an equal basis with people of other races, this historic logjam in the progressive movement appears to be breaking down. Once we begin to separate out the more established leaders who have a vested interest in Obama's defeat, i.e. paid and/or high-profile supporters of one or another of the other candidates, by and large progressives at the grass roots level across America are getting "fired up and ready to go" behind his candidacy. Barack's army of field volunteers now numbers in the hundreds of thousands and is growing by thousands more every day.
I'm confident that twenty years from now, many of Obama's detractors will be writing books and articles with not a hint of irony about how Barack rejuvenated America by putting together a new progressive majority that was able to bring about incredible changes in America life and politics on a par with that accomplished FDR and JFK. I won't mind at all.
Monday, December 3, 2007
Why I Support Barack Obama for President I
Like anyone else I suppose, my support for Barack stems from my own political beliefs. Although I have a passion for politics and policy, particularly insofar as they relate to social justice, I have spent relatively little energy engaging in electoral politics for one simple reason: from everything I can tell, money rules politics in America.
Almost everyone I've ever talked to, whatever their political philosophy, believes the same thing. At all levels of government and in all parts of the country, those who are able to back candidates with significant amounts of money get to decide who those candidates will be and which ones will win. That being the case, those who are not able to "ante up" do not have a voice, and the objective merit of any particular course of action counts far less than the pure self-interests of those who have ante'd up. In my opinion then, the most fundamental project for any progressive movement, the thing on which all other progressive possibilities are contingent, is political reform.
With that reality and goal in mind, I and most of my friends/allies have "retreated" in a sense to grassroots, community-based politics outside of the electoral system where we use community organizing, independent policy advocacy and legal intervention in order to bring the "people's" voice into the decision-making process. At the local level, at least, it is possible to make elected officials accountable to the people, if only because we can physically get in the way of stuff and bring uncomfortable truths to the public light. But the limits of our myopic focus on local, grassroots political activities has been amply demonstrated by the extreme havoc that the current administration has wreaked on the world. Therefore, even before Barack Obama's campaign, I, for one, was "fired up and ready to go" behind any Democrat who could at least put at stop to the "bleeding", so to speak.
My most significant previous foray into electoral politics was at the local level as well -- Jerry Brown's campaign for Oakland Mayor in 1998. In that campaign, Jerry refused any contribution over $100, made promises to nobody, but listened to everybody, and avoided a run-off by winning each and every precinct (save the home precinct of the runner-up) in the most racially diverse city in America against seven other candidates. One can argue one way or the other about Jerry's program once in office, but he served two terms, changed the face of what had been a down-at-the-heels town and was able to use his record there as a springboard for a successful run for California Attorney General.
But the most important lesson I took away from that experience is that it takes a special kind of candidate to actually pull off an insurgent, anti-big money, for-the-people campaign. There have been hundreds, if not thousands, of attempts across the country over the years, most of which failed. What is that special something? It's charisma.
And this is where we come to Barack Obama. Who can doubt his charisma? Tens of thousands flock to his speeches in all corners of the country. Hundreds of thousands donate to and volunteer for his campaign. Millions respond viscerally and immediately to his appeal. In my mind there are just a few political figures in modern American history that had a comparable appeal: John F. and Robert Kennedy, Malcolm X and Martin Luther King, Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton. That's it. No one else.
But more importantly, this kind of charisma is pointless from my perspective without a program of real change behind it. Reagan and Clinton wasted theirs by and large on misguided reactionary conservatism or triangulation and personal pecadillos, respectively. But if Obama's career has been about anything, it's been about real, substantive political reform. After cutting his teeth as a community organizer working to involve disenfranchised people in the decision-making process in Chicago, he passed landmark ethics and lobbying bills in the Illinois State Legislature and in the United States Senate. The recent string of high-profile Republican retirements such as Trent Lott is due in no small part to the fact that after Jan. 1 of this year, they will no longer be able to lobby their old colleagues immediately after retirement because of legislation spearheaded by Obama.
As a Presidential candidate, he has refused to take money from PAC's and federal lobbyists, instead raising tens of millions through small donations and low-dollar fundraisers. His campaign strategy prioritizes grassroots organizing. His platform includes support for new initiatives on lobbying reform, transparency, honesty and accountability. Finally, buried in his brilliant speech at Google, is to my mind maybe the most important idea Barack has put forward yet.
Almost everyone I've ever talked to, whatever their political philosophy, believes the same thing. At all levels of government and in all parts of the country, those who are able to back candidates with significant amounts of money get to decide who those candidates will be and which ones will win. That being the case, those who are not able to "ante up" do not have a voice, and the objective merit of any particular course of action counts far less than the pure self-interests of those who have ante'd up. In my opinion then, the most fundamental project for any progressive movement, the thing on which all other progressive possibilities are contingent, is political reform.
With that reality and goal in mind, I and most of my friends/allies have "retreated" in a sense to grassroots, community-based politics outside of the electoral system where we use community organizing, independent policy advocacy and legal intervention in order to bring the "people's" voice into the decision-making process. At the local level, at least, it is possible to make elected officials accountable to the people, if only because we can physically get in the way of stuff and bring uncomfortable truths to the public light. But the limits of our myopic focus on local, grassroots political activities has been amply demonstrated by the extreme havoc that the current administration has wreaked on the world. Therefore, even before Barack Obama's campaign, I, for one, was "fired up and ready to go" behind any Democrat who could at least put at stop to the "bleeding", so to speak.
My most significant previous foray into electoral politics was at the local level as well -- Jerry Brown's campaign for Oakland Mayor in 1998. In that campaign, Jerry refused any contribution over $100, made promises to nobody, but listened to everybody, and avoided a run-off by winning each and every precinct (save the home precinct of the runner-up) in the most racially diverse city in America against seven other candidates. One can argue one way or the other about Jerry's program once in office, but he served two terms, changed the face of what had been a down-at-the-heels town and was able to use his record there as a springboard for a successful run for California Attorney General.
But the most important lesson I took away from that experience is that it takes a special kind of candidate to actually pull off an insurgent, anti-big money, for-the-people campaign. There have been hundreds, if not thousands, of attempts across the country over the years, most of which failed. What is that special something? It's charisma.
Charisma: A rare personal quality attributed to leaders who arouse fervent popular devotion and enthusiasm.Without charisma, the politician needs money to succeed. They can be independently wealthy or they can find the backing of people with money, but in either case, their ability to really confront the status quo has already been greatly compromised long before they get into office. It's an unfortunate reality of the times in which we live that something as ephemeral and superficial as charisma is a prerequisite for something as serious and substantial as political leadership, but I believe it to be true nonetheless.
- American Heritage Dictionary
And this is where we come to Barack Obama. Who can doubt his charisma? Tens of thousands flock to his speeches in all corners of the country. Hundreds of thousands donate to and volunteer for his campaign. Millions respond viscerally and immediately to his appeal. In my mind there are just a few political figures in modern American history that had a comparable appeal: John F. and Robert Kennedy, Malcolm X and Martin Luther King, Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton. That's it. No one else.
But more importantly, this kind of charisma is pointless from my perspective without a program of real change behind it. Reagan and Clinton wasted theirs by and large on misguided reactionary conservatism or triangulation and personal pecadillos, respectively. But if Obama's career has been about anything, it's been about real, substantive political reform. After cutting his teeth as a community organizer working to involve disenfranchised people in the decision-making process in Chicago, he passed landmark ethics and lobbying bills in the Illinois State Legislature and in the United States Senate. The recent string of high-profile Republican retirements such as Trent Lott is due in no small part to the fact that after Jan. 1 of this year, they will no longer be able to lobby their old colleagues immediately after retirement because of legislation spearheaded by Obama.
As a Presidential candidate, he has refused to take money from PAC's and federal lobbyists, instead raising tens of millions through small donations and low-dollar fundraisers. His campaign strategy prioritizes grassroots organizing. His platform includes support for new initiatives on lobbying reform, transparency, honesty and accountability. Finally, buried in his brilliant speech at Google, is to my mind maybe the most important idea Barack has put forward yet.
Technology-enabled citizen participation . . . can help connect government to its citizens and engage citizens in a democracy. Barack Obama will use the most current technological tools available to make government less beholden to special interest groups and lobbyists and promote citizen participation in government decision-making. Obama will integrate citizens into the actual business of government by:This would be a subtle, yet profound revolution in the way governmental decisions are made in America. Barack is the person who can make that happen.
—Establishing pilot programs to open up government decision-making and involve the public in the work of agencies, not simply by soliciting opinions, but by tapping into the vast and distributed expertise of the American citizenry to help government make more informed decisions.
—Lifting the veil from secret deals in Washington with a web site, a search engine, and other web tools that enable citizens easily to track online federal grants, contracts, earmarks, and lobbyist contacts with government officials.
—Giving the American public an opportunity to review and comment on the White House website for five days before signing any non-emergency legislation.
-- http://www.techcrunch.com/2007/11/14/barack-obamas-google-friendly-technology-platform/
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