Are there?

I don’t quite understand why progressives would feel punked. Perhaps, I’m just a cynic but I voted for Obama in the primaries, because I thought he was most likely to beat John McCain–not because I thought he was to the left of Hillary Clinton. Obama always struck me as a very talented and cerebral politician, with a left-ish bent. Again, maybe I’m a cynic, but his flip-flops don’t really surprise. Isn’t this what politicians do? – Ta-Nehisi Coates

As any long time reader can tell, I’ve shied away from politics & blogging for some months now. There is no let down, disappointment, shock, what so ever in President Obama’s performance. It is all exactly as expected. Boringly so.

It has me looking forward to doing nothing in 2012.

Over at the Daily Kos they’re holding an all day symposium on “Why Clinton lost.” I have my own views on the matter; Bryan of “Why Now?” has his, but let me first highlight one of the most pervasively wrong reasons, as illustrated by Carl from Simply Left Behind:

…The most important outcome of your candidacy, perhaps it will be your Pyrrhic victory, is the acknowledgment, finally, that even the Democratic and Progressive movements are not fully free of misogyny. Just the comments at this blog alone demonstrate the hatred white men have towards you, but the Tennesee Guerilla Women can cite chapter and verse the hate spewed by the Obombersand their media co-horts.

Perhaps it’s not race that needs a dialogue, but how fully half the population can be so denied of their legitimacy by the other half.

When those two numbnuts in New Hampshire (I think) held up an “Iron My Shirt” sign, people laughed.

Imagine if that sign had said “Pick My Cotton” at an Obama rally?

There, right there, is why you lost, Mrs. Clinton. Despite your overwhelming qualifications for the Presidency, despite your dynamic and well-thought-out agenda for your administration, despite every piece of evidence that says Senator Obama will be a disaster in the White House, if not just the campaign trail, you were the butt of savage sexist jokes.

He was not the subject of savage racist jokes, at least none that were accepted in the mainstream media. Even his pitiful speech on race, which so many have touted as a watershed in American politics, ultimately did nothing to advance the cause of equality, because the Senator did not even repudiate those on his side of the colour line who spew hatred towards American. And white women, so amply demonstrated by the Rev. Pfleger.

Carl brings up a few different things that have more than a small measure of legitimacy, but they mostly get washed away by his other outrageous claims that have no basis in reality. There was sexism, misogyny, and racism all throughout this primary. But that’s not why Clinton lost nor why Obama won. People have sited various reasons for her loss; she had the wrong position on Iraq when it mattered most, her fundraising machine relied on big donors who maxed out their contributions quickly, the generational divide. All these reason have been, and will continue to be, mulled over for years to come. The media did what the media does. Bloggers did what bloggers do. It all comes back to the fact that Obama played it straight.

Set aside the rabid grassroots supporters, the bloggers, the media, various low level campaign advisers. At no time did Obama’s candidacy try to delegitimize Clinton’s in the ways that Clinton’s run tried to undercut Obama’s. The experience and electability question has been put to bed. The call for reconciliation and unity has been made by both camps in a real and compelling way. Time to move on.

To be continued…

Ladies and Gentlemen, the Next President and First lady of the United States of America.

We’ve certainly had our differences over the last sixteen months. But as someone who’s shared a stage with her many times, I can tell you that what gets Hillary Clinton up in the morning—even in the face of tough odds—is exactly what sent her and Bill Clinton to sign up for their first campaign in Texas all those years ago; what sent her to work at the Children’s Defense Fund and made her fight for health care as first lady; what led her to the United States Senate and fueled her barrier-breaking campaign for the presidency—an unyielding desire to improve the lives of ordinary Americans, no matter how difficult the fight may be. And you can rest assured that when we finally win the battle for universal health care in this country, she will be central to that victory. When we transform our energy policy and lift our children out of poverty, it will be because she worked to help make it happen. Our party and our country are better off because of her, and I am a better candidate for having had the honor to compete with Hillary Rodham Clinton. – Barack Obama

Of course I was listening to all this speeding away into the night on my way to work. As the miles ticked by each of the three candidate’s words–guided by satellites in the heavens–issued forth from the radio in succession. My blood flowed as my thoughts did; at times steady, at others quick, and sometimes not at all. One thought was that McCain has the most curmudgeonly whiny voice a myopic old man could possibly have, another was that Senator Clinton will not stop until she is asked to be Vice President. She might not accept, but she damn well expects to be asked. All the conventional wisdom on the topic was thrown out the window when I heard the tone in Hillary’s voice. I basically heard what others saw. Lastly, can you imagine what a tried and true Republican was thinking…hearing the roar of that crowd in St. Paul? They already know how this is going to go down. Watch out, they’re dangerous when cornered.

“Denver, Denver!”

My thanks to (clockwise from the top); Mark Penn, Bill Clinton, Harold Ickes, Terry Mcauliffe, and Lanny Davis…

Inspiration:

• Insane Clinton Dead-Enders Celebrate Glorious Puerto Rico Victory
• Clinton camp converging on New York Tuesday, and shedding staff
• More Coverage of the DNC RBC Meeting!
• Hillary: my part in her downfall

…and furthermore:

I admit I really don’t care at all about the DNC R&B meeting today. There’s no grand principle at stake here and I have no interest in listening to people pretend that there is. The primary system is a weird hybrid of things far removed any concept of “one person one vote.” And it isn’t really a public election the way, say, voting for your Congressman is an election. It’s a contest whereby members of a club choose the leader of that club, who then goes on to participate in a real election.

It isn’t important that muckety mucks from Florida and Michigan get to go to the big party in Denver. The only real issue is if what’s decided today impacts the ultimate outcome – who becomes the leader of the club – and whether that’s seen as legitimate by both sides. Personally I think changing the rules midgame is not the way to do things, though if it doesn’t impact the outcome it doesn’t really matter, but I guess some people differ on that.

• Toxic
• The Nightmare Ticket Is Dead
• Bill Clinton: Florida, Michigan Penalty “Appropriate”

May 22, 2008
Paterson Sees ‘Desperation’ By Clinton, Disagrees On Florida And Michigan

Gov. David Paterson, who is right now being interviewed by WAMC’s Alan Chartock and taking calls from listeners on “Vox Pop,” just disagreed sharply with his presidential candidate, Hillary Clinton, on her last-ditch efforts to seat the Florida and Michigan delegations.

While he stressed that he continues to support Clinton and will do so until “she makes a different determination,” Paterson, a superdelegate, said he doesn’t believe the DNC should change the rules after the fact on Florida and Michigan and added that he’s not buying her claims about leading the popular vote if the ballots cast in those states were counted.

First Hillary is on one side of an issue, then the other–then Bill goes and does the same damn thing. I hope she’s not confused about why Obama’s going to reject her angling for the VP spot. Even a blind man can see what’s going on here…literally.

Man these Brownies are making me lightheaded, what did you say was in these?

• Grading McCain’s veep prospects
• Many Florida Jews Express Doubts on Obama
• Clinton’s Shocking Florida Gambit

-Jews doubt Messiah, News at 11:00. /snark

Senator, put the phone down, just, please just put it down…

• Gender Issue Lives On as Clinton’s Hopes Dim
• Obama Gets More Super-Delegates Over The Weekend
• Clinton-Obama Grudges Linger For Some Voters
• Clinton Headed for Sure but Hollow Victory in Kentucky

-The Dead Enders continue to sow the seeds of dissension. Will they just get it over and come out with their McCain endorsements already?

Click for wallpaper size.

“Whoever must be a creator always annihilates” – Nietzsche

To a Florida dinner gathering, Obama has paved way for McCain presidency
By John Vinocur
Monday, May 5, 2008

NICEVILLE, Florida: If only 27 percent of America’s voters have positive opinions of the Republican Party, and the GOP is less trusted to fix the economy than the Democrats, how in hell is it going to elect a president in November?

Simple.

Down here, where George W. Bush got elected and re-elected with scores of 70 percent plus – and old colonels, the Christian right, and convinced conservatives live a kind of wary symbiosis – their combined wisdom says John McCain will beat Barack Obama because Obama has become unelectable.

“Thank God,” one of those retired colonels said last week at a pasta dinner with five Republican friends and a visitor. Amused to think of themselves being portrayed as part of the American right wing’s collective belly of the beast, they accepted a trade of anonymity for frankness.

Synopsis: Tuesday night’s Democratic primary results would make no difference in the outcome. Obama would be the Democratic nominee. McCain would beat him in turn. The miserable economy, the war in Iraq, Bush’s unpopularity? Sure, but:

For these conservatives, white and middle-aged, Obama has transmogrified before their eyes from a remarkable prestidigitator into a divine target.

For the Red Neck Riviera of Florida’s Panhandle (or the Emerald Coast in the more genteel vocabulary of the tourist brochures) Obama has become so totally exposed – as a leftist, an elitist out of touch with vast segments of the white majority, a dubious healer saddled with disreputable friendships and unknown debts and obligations – that the colonel could say “McCain is seven strokes ahead on the back nine,” and the presidency is in Republican reach.

Let Hillary Clinton keep softening Obama up. No worries there about an eventual contender. “She’s got more negatives than Bush himself,” exclaimed a woman in the group.

I have consigned my self to the fact that John McCain will be our next President. He will most likely be a one term President–if his health holds–but none the less, a one term President. The only thing I’d argue with here is that Obama himself didn’t pave the way, Hillary Clinton did. Her transmogrification into a rabid Rightwinger before our very eyes is (albeit predictable) one of the most astounding acts in modern politics.

White Stripes – Effect and Cause (Live)

I guess you have to have a problem
If you want to invent a contraption
First you cause a train wreck
Then you put me in traction

Well, first came an action
And then a reaction
But you can’t switch around
For your own satisfaction
Well, you put my house down, then got mad
At my reaction

Well, in every complicated situation
You’re the human relation
Makin’ sense of it all
Take a whole lot a concentration

Well, you can blame my baby
For her pregnant ma
And if there’s one of these
On the order for laws
It’s that you just can’t take the effect
And make it the cause

Well, you can’t take the effect
And make it the cause
I didn’t rob a bank
Because you made up a law
When you people robbin’ Peter
Don’t you blame Paul
Can’t take the effect
And make it the cause

I ain’t the reason that you gave me no reason to return your call
You built a house of cards and got shocked when you saw them fall
Well are you sayin’ I’m innocent?
In fact the reverse
But if you’re headin’ to the grave
You don’t blame the hearse
You’re like a little girl yellin’ at her brother
‘Cause you lost his ball

Well you keep blamin’ me for what you did
And that ain’t all
The way you clean up a wreck
Is enough to get one pause
You seem to forget
Just how this song started
I’m reactin’ to you because you left me broken-hearted
See, you just can’t take the effect
And make it the cause

Can’t take the effect
And make it the cause
I didn’t rob a bank
Because you made up a law
Blame people robbin’ Peter
Don’t you blame Paul
Can’t take the effect
And make it the cause