My answer is, I guess I'm a hypocrite. But I won't get to the question until the end.
Obama has made religion a centerpiece of his campaign. His speeches are couched in religious imagery. He's reaching out to evangelicals. He's set up a faith section on his website. And just as lefties have happily embraced Sufjan Steven's crooning about how much he loves God, we have no qualms about Barack openly trying to bring religion into the public sphere. Brother man is so charismatic, he's winning over atheists, despite being the most pious of the candidates.
This isn't necessarily an anti-Obama post, though. My view on religion comports with his, so it's a no-brainer for me to support him. In the interest of challenging my beliefs, however, I can't figure out an appropriate response to this article. Money quote:
"A liberal Democrat who advances a political agenda on the basis of claiming to be doing "the Lord's work" is no better than a conservative Republican doing the same thing."
It's pretty much true. The reason I give Barack a free pass on religion, yet condemn Bush for the same thing, is because Barack's on my side and Bush is on the other side. It's a nasty us vs. them, and I've chosen my side. I'm a blind partisan, willing to overlook the log in my own eye.
I suppose the fair answer is that, if I accept faith-based politics on my side, I need to excuse it in the other side. I can't condemn evangelical Christians for using religion to justify their abhorrent policies. I have to accept that it's OK for people to demonize homosexuality based on obscure readings of the Bible. It's OK to have a foreign policy based on getting a country nuked just to trigger the end times. I may disagree with the conclusions, but then it just becomes the classic argument of "my god is better than yours".
If I can't learn to accept the right's faith-based politics, then what does that make me?
If it's a crime to have 2 much fun on Thursday night, then book yourself a paddywagon to your local hoosegow.
Tomorrow night, Ao2 live2logs the Democratic presidential debate. Of course, this will be incredibly repetitive, seeing as we're all Obamaniacs (except Ben, who's a closeted neocon). But, the more people chanting skinny-boy's praises, the better. So load up your browsers and hit refresh a couple hundred times.
As a connoisseur of evil, watching the Clinton campaign adroitly crush their opponents is like watching a chessmaster who's five steps ahead of her opponent.
Let's break down the latest tempest in a teapot, concerning dullard Bob Novak's allegation that the Clinton camp has some secret evidence on Obama but has opted against using it. Obama's camp quickly said don't swift boat me. Clinton quickly hammered back. Now, as a quick aside, let's look at paragraph 4:
"Clinton, a senator from New York and the wife of former President Bill Clinton, has been the target of frequent attacks by Obama..."
Notice something? Last week's talking point, her odd assertion that her rivals have been unfairly ganging up on her, has found its way into the neutral account of the story. Seemingly objective reports have now integrated the campaign's talking point that Clinton is being unfairly bullied. Just an interesting aside, as well as relevant context. Obama states:
"She of all people, having complained so often about 'the politics of personal destruction,' should move quickly to either stand by or renounce these tactics," Obama said in his initial statement.
He called the column "a shameless item" aimed at smearing him through "innuendo and insinuation."
OK. Seems smart, right? Go on the attack, look strong. What could go wrong? Clinton's statement:
"A Republican-leaning journalist runs a blind item designed to set Democrats against one another. Experienced Democrats see this for what it is. Others get distracted and thrown off their games."
Ouch. She's made clear that you debate on her terms and her terms alone. The consistent campaign theme of Hillary's camp is that Obama is too inexperienced. Had Obama said nothing, Clinton's campaign would have said "Look at how easily he let's himself get swiftboated." He stands up and says he's not going to get swiftboated, and he gets flagged as inexperienced. Either way, he's on the defensive.
The funy thing about the "Obama's too inexperienced line" is that it doesn't make any sense. He's got plenty of experience, having been elected to the Senate without the benefit of being married to a former President. But if Hillary beats Obama, it makes her campaign look prescient and experienced, while if she loses it's a moot point. It continues:
"We have no idea what Mr. Novak's item is about and reject it totally."
Wow. Brilliant. After delivering a jab at Obama, she steps back and reclaims the moral high ground. She's essentially waving her hand and saying "I don't have time for this immature nonsense." She's given in to Obama's demand that she renounce these tactics without ever giving an inch. She slapping Barack across the face while simultaneously appearing like she rejects the notion of petty infighting.
Best of all, for the Hillary haters who reflexively think everything she says is a lie are now geniunely convinced that she has some shocking secret about Obama that is capable of destroying his capaign.
Super-interesting day of news in my humble estimation.
First, George W. Bush claims that the credit for today's exciting stem-cell research announcement should go to him. He, after all, is the one who vetoed stem cell research. Also, if you needed another reason not to vote for Hillary Clinton, here's a good one: W. thinks she'd be a good candidate.
Speaking of reasons not to vote for Hillary Clinton, some genuinely galvanizing news for main man Obama and his faithful:
At least one poll shows the national polls tightening significantly, and has Obama leading by a wide margin among black voters.
He's closing the gap in New Hampshire, and is just ahead or statistically tied in Iowa (depending on how you crunch the numbers)
Finally, perhaps you've seen that Mike Huckabee is on the rise as well, both nationally and in Iowa in particular. Much is being made of this ad, prompting some to wonder if he should be getting a bit more serious...
Here's what I want to know: why is nobody making fun of him for stealing the jokes in the video from chucknorrisfacts.com? We did that first! Mike Huckabee is no better than Audience of Two, and would you vote for us?
Since it's all going to become a flurry of spin, polls, and theorizing by tonight, I hope any fellow Obamaniacs wanting to bask a little bit in the eye of the storm will take a moment to listen to this song, recorded by a co-worker of mine, singer Maddy Wyatt. She, the song, and Barack, are all awesome.
So okay, so obviously everyone's watching the results of the New Hampshire primary pretty closely, and even the casual reader of the 2log is no doubt aware that we're hoping to keep tapping our toes to some Baracknroll.
But in all the non-stop chatter about momentum, the meaning of the word "change," and the politics of tears, Time's Joe Klein reminds us that Obama isn't all talk when he touts his international life experience as a foreign policy advantage. He reports here that throughout the pre-Iowa rush and the post-Iowa explosion of interest in his campaign, Obama has been on the phone to Kenya almost daily in an attempt to help quell the violence that's been raging there. That fits my definition of a president any day.
I didn't realize this, but apparently the origins of Bill Clinton's reputation as our "first black president" come from a 1998 New Yorker column by Toni Morrison (who's Song of Solomon should, in my opinion, be read by everyone, regardless of race or intelligence level). It's interesting to read for the context it provides on Clinton's current reputation as a fighter in favor of the black community. Morrison is not arguing in favor of Clinton as an advocate for African-American interests, but rather aptly noting that he is one of the first white men to be unfairly bullied and harassed in a manner similar to the ways in which blacks have been treated for years.
Given Morrison's endorsement of Barack Obama today, it's interesting to compare Morrison's substantive statements about both Clinton in Obama in the respective pieces. The 1998 column is more of a reflection on what the Lewinsky scandal means for our national identity than any sort of referendum on Clinton as an individual, but she does tuck this clever observation into her piece:
"Whatever the media promote and the chorus chants, whatever dapples dinner tables, this is not a mundane story of sex, lies, and videotape. The real story is none of these. Not adultery, or high crimes. Nor is it even the story of a brilliant President naive enough to believe, along with the rest of the citizenry, that there were lines one's enemies would not cross, lengths to which they would not go--a profound, perhaps irrevocable, error in judgment."
When she goes on to characterize Clinton as the nation's "first black president," she does not do so in terms of adulation or hopes that Clinton will rally any sort of wave of sympathy for the plight of African-Americans. This excerpt, wherein she finds him guilty of "a profound, perhaps irrevocable, error in judgement" is her only observation about Clinton as leader.
Compare that with her endorsement of Obama:
"In thinking carefully about the strengths of the candidates, I stunned myself when I came to the following conclusion: that in addition to keen intelligence, integrity and a rare authenticity, you exhibit something that has nothing to do with age, experience, race or gender and something I don't see in other candidates. That something is a creative imagination which coupled with brilliance equals wisdom.
"Our future is ripe, outrageously rich in its possibilities. Yet unleashing the glory of that future will require a difficult labor, and some may be so frightened of its birth they will refuse to abandon their nostalgia for the womb.
"There have been a few prescient leaders in our past, but you are the man for this time."
Given all the tumult regarding race in recent weeks, I bring this up because it sheds some light on the actual context in which the Clintons are supposedly risking their "race cred." The Morrison column is obviously not the only example of the Clinton legacy intertwining with issues of race, but it's easy to assume that Clinton's reputation as a standard-bearer for relations between the White House and the black community is better earned than it would seem to be. And here is the arguable culprit in creating this flawed impression, declaring race to be far from the deciding factor in her choice.
As usual, the story is much more complicated upon closer examination.
