Category: Campaign 2008.12
Posted by: A Waco Farmer
I am not saying the pilot of the straight-talk express planned it this way, but now everybody in America is talking about a small-time local North Carolina campaign ad critical of Barack Obama, his Black Nationalist pastor, Jeremiah Wright, and the Democrats who enable them.
Here is what McCain said about the ad none of us had ever heard of before McCain told us not to watch it:
"We asked them not to run it. I'm sending them an e-mail as we speak, asking them to take it down."
"I don't know why they do it, and obviously I don't control them. But I'm making it very clear, as I have a couple of times in the past, that there's no place for that kind of campaigning -- and the American people don't want it, period," McCain said.
According to the LA Times, "McCain said he had not seen the North Carolina ad, which states that Obama is too extreme and shows footage of the Illinois senator's former pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah A. Wright Jr., shouting: 'Not God bless America, God damn America.'"
Is he using reverse-psychology on us? If not, I have no idea what McCain is talking about. If, like John McCain, you have not seen the ad (here on YouTube), you may be a bit disappointed, perhaps expecting something more severe.
Here is what McCain said about the ad none of us had ever heard of before McCain told us not to watch it:
"We asked them not to run it. I'm sending them an e-mail as we speak, asking them to take it down."
"I don't know why they do it, and obviously I don't control them. But I'm making it very clear, as I have a couple of times in the past, that there's no place for that kind of campaigning -- and the American people don't want it, period," McCain said.
According to the LA Times, "McCain said he had not seen the North Carolina ad, which states that Obama is too extreme and shows footage of the Illinois senator's former pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah A. Wright Jr., shouting: 'Not God bless America, God damn America.'"
Is he using reverse-psychology on us? If not, I have no idea what McCain is talking about. If, like John McCain, you have not seen the ad (here on YouTube), you may be a bit disappointed, perhaps expecting something more severe.
The upcoming May 6 Indiana primary is make or break, do or die, sudden death, but not just for Clinton—even more so FOR OBAMA!
For the first time in this long campaign, the pressure is finally on Barack Obama. If he does not win Indiana, his nomination chances plummet precipitously.
Why?
Since February 19th, the night of the Wisconsin primary (more than two months ago, and the last time Barack was in the news for something positive), Mrs. Clinton has accomplished every task on her seemingly impossible journey back to viability. In the meantime, Obama has struggled, stumbled, and stagnated.
A Review:
Understanding that her opponent was on a tremendous roll after Wisconsin, Mrs. Clinton needed to sweep Ohio, Texas, and Pennsylvania. She did.
Understanding that the superdelegates would eventually decide this nomination, and understanding that they clearly favored Obama at that moment, she also needed to raise serious doubts about the frontrunner's ability to govern and, more importantly, his ability to win in November. She did.
RIGHT NOW: Obama is bleeding profusely from two gaping holes: Jeremiah Wright (scary anti-American radicalism) and the "clinging to God and guns" comment (unseemly liberal elitism). Even worse, the spectacle of a six-week, highly visible contest in which he spent 30 million dollars to lose to Hillary Clinton by ten points torpedoed his image as a charismatic champion.
Now he is merely a wounded pol trying desperately to hold on to a slim lead and run out the clock.
Can he do it? What does he have left?
The Media and "the Math."
The remaining Obama "fairy tale" is currently powered almost entirely by friendly reporting, advocacy in editorial boards, and vituperative op-eds.
In a political contest, in which the perception is the reality, without question, the best thing to have is the fourth estate. Nevertheless, friendly media does not necessarily guarantee ultimate success (just ask Mike Huckabee).
Hype and hope can only propel a candidate so far. At some point, media darlings have to demonstrate their worthiness in the public arena. At some point, Barack Obama needed to throttle Mrs. Clinton at the ballot box in a momentous showdown state. Of course, the media has helped mightily toward that end by softening her defenses with negative press and templates advantageous to him--but, somewhere along the line, he needed to throw the knock-out punch himself. And he has not.
The clock is ticking. He has one last chance: Indiana. The pressure is on.
What about the Math?
In truth, the math is mostly spin and perception. Mrs. Clinton brilliantly announced yesterday that she was ahead in the popular vote.
Why not?
Who is keeping track of the popular vote anyhow?
Since the gross popular vote has nothing to do with the nomination process, why can't we count Michigan and Florida? People in Michigan and Florida voted. Who says we cannot include them in the official unofficial (and altogether meaningless) tabulation of national votes.
All of that is perception. This is a battle to control the perception.
Genius on the part of Mrs. Clinton, but she must make this assertion stick. Expect her to pound away at it every day in every speech in every venue, all the while aiming her message at a national audience.
Why is this key? What is meaningful about this meaningless statistic?
Once Mrs. Clinton convinces the Democratic Party leaders that she is the safer bet to win in the fall, she must also offer a "moral argument" that allows the superdelegates "cover" to deny the victory to Obama. The "popular vote majority" cancels out the "elected-delegate" plurality. This narrative of rightful Clinton victory empowers the party wise persons to award the nomination to Mrs. Clinton, if they are so inclined.
This is where the media and the math have to come together. She needs to break the wedge of friendly media running interference for Obama.
Can this happen? Surprisingly, yes it can.
Here is the other nagging problem for Obama in regard to his media firewall: his ostensibly trustworthy loyalists in the press corps are fair-weathered friends. The clock is ticking on them as well. They have been watching the same game we have. They too know what he needed to do over the past two months--and they fully understand that he failed miserably.
They are nervous and growing more skittish with each passing day. My sense is that a stampede away from Obama is imminent. If the ladies and gentlemen (mostly gentleman) of the fourth estate take a notion that their fair-haired pal is about to make them look ridiculous, they will abandon him with head-spinning alacrity.
In the blink of an eye, this beloved philosopher king will find himself a reviled and unworthy pretender.
Bottom Line: Indiana may very well prove to be the one and only winner-take-all contest in the Democratic race for nomination.
For the first time in this long campaign, the pressure is finally on Barack Obama. If he does not win Indiana, his nomination chances plummet precipitously.
Why?
Since February 19th, the night of the Wisconsin primary (more than two months ago, and the last time Barack was in the news for something positive), Mrs. Clinton has accomplished every task on her seemingly impossible journey back to viability. In the meantime, Obama has struggled, stumbled, and stagnated.
A Review:
Understanding that her opponent was on a tremendous roll after Wisconsin, Mrs. Clinton needed to sweep Ohio, Texas, and Pennsylvania. She did.
Understanding that the superdelegates would eventually decide this nomination, and understanding that they clearly favored Obama at that moment, she also needed to raise serious doubts about the frontrunner's ability to govern and, more importantly, his ability to win in November. She did.
RIGHT NOW: Obama is bleeding profusely from two gaping holes: Jeremiah Wright (scary anti-American radicalism) and the "clinging to God and guns" comment (unseemly liberal elitism). Even worse, the spectacle of a six-week, highly visible contest in which he spent 30 million dollars to lose to Hillary Clinton by ten points torpedoed his image as a charismatic champion.
Now he is merely a wounded pol trying desperately to hold on to a slim lead and run out the clock.
Can he do it? What does he have left?
The Media and "the Math."
The remaining Obama "fairy tale" is currently powered almost entirely by friendly reporting, advocacy in editorial boards, and vituperative op-eds.
In a political contest, in which the perception is the reality, without question, the best thing to have is the fourth estate. Nevertheless, friendly media does not necessarily guarantee ultimate success (just ask Mike Huckabee).
Hype and hope can only propel a candidate so far. At some point, media darlings have to demonstrate their worthiness in the public arena. At some point, Barack Obama needed to throttle Mrs. Clinton at the ballot box in a momentous showdown state. Of course, the media has helped mightily toward that end by softening her defenses with negative press and templates advantageous to him--but, somewhere along the line, he needed to throw the knock-out punch himself. And he has not.
The clock is ticking. He has one last chance: Indiana. The pressure is on.
What about the Math?
In truth, the math is mostly spin and perception. Mrs. Clinton brilliantly announced yesterday that she was ahead in the popular vote.
Why not?
Who is keeping track of the popular vote anyhow?
Since the gross popular vote has nothing to do with the nomination process, why can't we count Michigan and Florida? People in Michigan and Florida voted. Who says we cannot include them in the official unofficial (and altogether meaningless) tabulation of national votes.
All of that is perception. This is a battle to control the perception.
Genius on the part of Mrs. Clinton, but she must make this assertion stick. Expect her to pound away at it every day in every speech in every venue, all the while aiming her message at a national audience.
Why is this key? What is meaningful about this meaningless statistic?
Once Mrs. Clinton convinces the Democratic Party leaders that she is the safer bet to win in the fall, she must also offer a "moral argument" that allows the superdelegates "cover" to deny the victory to Obama. The "popular vote majority" cancels out the "elected-delegate" plurality. This narrative of rightful Clinton victory empowers the party wise persons to award the nomination to Mrs. Clinton, if they are so inclined.
This is where the media and the math have to come together. She needs to break the wedge of friendly media running interference for Obama.
Can this happen? Surprisingly, yes it can.
Here is the other nagging problem for Obama in regard to his media firewall: his ostensibly trustworthy loyalists in the press corps are fair-weathered friends. The clock is ticking on them as well. They have been watching the same game we have. They too know what he needed to do over the past two months--and they fully understand that he failed miserably.
They are nervous and growing more skittish with each passing day. My sense is that a stampede away from Obama is imminent. If the ladies and gentlemen (mostly gentleman) of the fourth estate take a notion that their fair-haired pal is about to make them look ridiculous, they will abandon him with head-spinning alacrity.
In the blink of an eye, this beloved philosopher king will find himself a reviled and unworthy pretender.
Bottom Line: Indiana may very well prove to be the one and only winner-take-all contest in the Democratic race for nomination.
A while back I accomplished one of my New Year's Resolutions: reading a Cormac McCarthy novel. Post here.
The Road by Cormac McCarthy is one of the bleakest novels I've read. The book pulls you into an ashy-grey dead world with crumbling dead vegetation and only the memory of animals. But somehow part of the human race has survived the abominable desolating horror that killed all other life on earth. A horror apparently visited by humanity itself.
The reader journeys with a man and a boy, his son. They are heading for the coast where perhaps things may be better, though the man has no real hope. They scavange for food in abandoned houses, occasionally finding items overlooked by previous travelers. And they hide from other humans, since many have turned to canniblism, even forming gangs that hunt down others on the road. A few people they meet are harmless, mostly through weakness, but no one can be trusted.
The man sometimes wonders about God, not really believing. He tells the boy there may be good people somewhere--they'll be known by the fact that they do not eat their children. But mostly the man just chooses every day to keep the boy alive and move forward, without real hope.
He had had a wife, the boy's mother. But sometime after delivering the baby into the dead world she had killed herself, telling her husband she could not face a certain future of rape, death, and being eaten.
The boy feels pity for others, at least for those others who are not hunting a living meal. He even has qualms about stealing from empty houses. He hopes to meet some of the good people.
How do you live in a God-forsaken world? That seems to be McCarthy's question. Would you turn cannibal, hunting your own kind? Would you become prey? Would you kill yourself, unable to face a future without hope? Would you devote yourself to protecting your own, even without real hope? Would you maintain a kind of innocence, worrying that an old man along the road might starve if you did not share some of your meagre supplies?
(more below)
The Road by Cormac McCarthy is one of the bleakest novels I've read. The book pulls you into an ashy-grey dead world with crumbling dead vegetation and only the memory of animals. But somehow part of the human race has survived the abominable desolating horror that killed all other life on earth. A horror apparently visited by humanity itself.
The reader journeys with a man and a boy, his son. They are heading for the coast where perhaps things may be better, though the man has no real hope. They scavange for food in abandoned houses, occasionally finding items overlooked by previous travelers. And they hide from other humans, since many have turned to canniblism, even forming gangs that hunt down others on the road. A few people they meet are harmless, mostly through weakness, but no one can be trusted.
The man sometimes wonders about God, not really believing. He tells the boy there may be good people somewhere--they'll be known by the fact that they do not eat their children. But mostly the man just chooses every day to keep the boy alive and move forward, without real hope.
He had had a wife, the boy's mother. But sometime after delivering the baby into the dead world she had killed herself, telling her husband she could not face a certain future of rape, death, and being eaten.
The boy feels pity for others, at least for those others who are not hunting a living meal. He even has qualms about stealing from empty houses. He hopes to meet some of the good people.
How do you live in a God-forsaken world? That seems to be McCarthy's question. Would you turn cannibal, hunting your own kind? Would you become prey? Would you kill yourself, unable to face a future without hope? Would you devote yourself to protecting your own, even without real hope? Would you maintain a kind of innocence, worrying that an old man along the road might starve if you did not share some of your meagre supplies?
(more below)
23/04: Yes She Will
Category: Campaign 2008.12
Posted by: A Waco Farmer
Hillary Holds!
With 84 percent of the vote counted (10:23 p.m. CDT), Hillary fluctuates between an eight- and ten-point victory in Pennsylvania. Eight is enough--but ten is especially satisfying.
UPDATED: It’s official. Hillary by Ten.
For some reason the talking heads arbitrarily proclaimed a ten-point margin in the Quaker State as the threshold for viability for Mrs. Clinton—patently ridiculous on its face. Why the underdog must give a ten point handicap to the favorite is beyond me; regardless, overcoming the capricious spread makes the triumph all the more savory.
Hillary is still on the job. She will be back in the office tomorrow relentlessly slogging away, sniffing at the heels of the front runner, dedicated to the proposition that she must win by any means necessary.
Will it matter?
Who knows? The leadership of the Democratic Party seems strangely committed to Obama--regardless of the increasingly apparent perils ahead.
As we know so well, “the math” is still on his side. Awarding the nomination to Hillary Clinton still requires some uncomfortable gymnastics--even as Hillary seems to emerge as the smarter move and safer play.
We said more than two months ago:
The nomination is coming down to the super delegates. If they voted today, they would vote for Obama because he seems unstoppable. The good news for Clinton: they are not voting today. She has time to punch a hole in his balloon.
How?
It will be very tough, but Clinton must sweep the upcoming final big three states [Ohio, Texas, and Pennsylvania] (very difficult but not impossible). For all that has gone sour in her campaign, Hillary has consistently excelled in these upscale high-stakes contests. Then, most importantly, she must somehow break the "spell" of Obama by casting doubt on him in some way between now and the day of decision.
I have always seen Obama as a big gamble: he could prevail in a huge way ("painting the map blue" as he says). Or we could wake up from our trance midway through the coming fall election season and suddenly look at this guy and say: "what in the hell are we doing?"
Between now and this summer, I can certainly envision a moment in which strategically minded Democratic Party bigwigs entertain grave doubts about Obama's electability. In that scenario, three for the price of one (Obama as VP) may emerge as a much safer bet.
TODAY: Mission So Nearly Accomplished On All Fronts.
The Two Remaining Substantial Obstacles?
1. The Intractable media support for Obama.
2. Even more problematic, the thoroughly unappealing task of telling African-American Democrats and fresh-faced "millennials" that their candidate, who won the pledged-delegate race fair and square, will not be the nominee of their party.
As many have pointed out, the Clintons have only themselves to blame on this count. In actual fact, Obama’s delegate lead is fairly misleading and mostly the result of Team Clinton’s decision not to sweat the small stuff. If the campaign had waged even a half-hearted effort to organize for the presumably small-potatoes out-of-the-way caucuses, all of this would be academic. Hillary would be pivoting for Labor Day and printing up her new business cards for 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue right now. Of course, hindsight is 20/20. Who knew all those little contests would add up to the deciding factor?
There have been pleasant surprises for Hillary, however. Although I thought her speech last night was flat and rushed and oddly strained, in general, she has proved infinitely more appealing and more energetic on the campaign trail than anyone could have imagined. She found her identity (the indomitable scrapper) somewhere along the way and, indisputably, emerged as the star of her own show.
As for Bill, he has not been nearly as bad as advertised. He had difficulty adapting to second fiddle--but he has transitioned pretty darn well, all things considered. For the most part, anyone would have been hard-pressed to foresee the curious treatment Clinton-42 would receive from the Obama-worshiping press corps. Imagine a superstar athlete who, accustomed to enjoying favorable calls from the refs throughout his career, faced a series in which the refs suddenly were calling him for fouls he never knew existed. Pretty frustrating. Just desserts we might say--but, hear this, rest assured, if the Clintons make it to the next round, all the old rules will re-apply and the old galloping and slashing Bill will be back in vogue.
One last prediction and/or suggestion: look for Hillary to defend Bill against the next wave of media criticism—whenever that next dustup arrives (perhaps sooner than later). It is time to defend the husband. She has been careful not to wade into his imbroglios with the press and other Democratic gray hairs--but it is time to go on record in support of the old warhorse. My hunch is that the voters are to the point where they think Bill has suffered enough comeuppance and stand ready to forgive and embrace him once again.
This thing is not over—not yet.
With 84 percent of the vote counted (10:23 p.m. CDT), Hillary fluctuates between an eight- and ten-point victory in Pennsylvania. Eight is enough--but ten is especially satisfying.
UPDATED: It’s official. Hillary by Ten.
For some reason the talking heads arbitrarily proclaimed a ten-point margin in the Quaker State as the threshold for viability for Mrs. Clinton—patently ridiculous on its face. Why the underdog must give a ten point handicap to the favorite is beyond me; regardless, overcoming the capricious spread makes the triumph all the more savory.
Hillary is still on the job. She will be back in the office tomorrow relentlessly slogging away, sniffing at the heels of the front runner, dedicated to the proposition that she must win by any means necessary.
Will it matter?
Who knows? The leadership of the Democratic Party seems strangely committed to Obama--regardless of the increasingly apparent perils ahead.
As we know so well, “the math” is still on his side. Awarding the nomination to Hillary Clinton still requires some uncomfortable gymnastics--even as Hillary seems to emerge as the smarter move and safer play.
We said more than two months ago:
The nomination is coming down to the super delegates. If they voted today, they would vote for Obama because he seems unstoppable. The good news for Clinton: they are not voting today. She has time to punch a hole in his balloon.
How?
It will be very tough, but Clinton must sweep the upcoming final big three states [Ohio, Texas, and Pennsylvania] (very difficult but not impossible). For all that has gone sour in her campaign, Hillary has consistently excelled in these upscale high-stakes contests. Then, most importantly, she must somehow break the "spell" of Obama by casting doubt on him in some way between now and the day of decision.
I have always seen Obama as a big gamble: he could prevail in a huge way ("painting the map blue" as he says). Or we could wake up from our trance midway through the coming fall election season and suddenly look at this guy and say: "what in the hell are we doing?"
Between now and this summer, I can certainly envision a moment in which strategically minded Democratic Party bigwigs entertain grave doubts about Obama's electability. In that scenario, three for the price of one (Obama as VP) may emerge as a much safer bet.
TODAY: Mission So Nearly Accomplished On All Fronts.
The Two Remaining Substantial Obstacles?
1. The Intractable media support for Obama.
2. Even more problematic, the thoroughly unappealing task of telling African-American Democrats and fresh-faced "millennials" that their candidate, who won the pledged-delegate race fair and square, will not be the nominee of their party.
As many have pointed out, the Clintons have only themselves to blame on this count. In actual fact, Obama’s delegate lead is fairly misleading and mostly the result of Team Clinton’s decision not to sweat the small stuff. If the campaign had waged even a half-hearted effort to organize for the presumably small-potatoes out-of-the-way caucuses, all of this would be academic. Hillary would be pivoting for Labor Day and printing up her new business cards for 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue right now. Of course, hindsight is 20/20. Who knew all those little contests would add up to the deciding factor?
There have been pleasant surprises for Hillary, however. Although I thought her speech last night was flat and rushed and oddly strained, in general, she has proved infinitely more appealing and more energetic on the campaign trail than anyone could have imagined. She found her identity (the indomitable scrapper) somewhere along the way and, indisputably, emerged as the star of her own show.
As for Bill, he has not been nearly as bad as advertised. He had difficulty adapting to second fiddle--but he has transitioned pretty darn well, all things considered. For the most part, anyone would have been hard-pressed to foresee the curious treatment Clinton-42 would receive from the Obama-worshiping press corps. Imagine a superstar athlete who, accustomed to enjoying favorable calls from the refs throughout his career, faced a series in which the refs suddenly were calling him for fouls he never knew existed. Pretty frustrating. Just desserts we might say--but, hear this, rest assured, if the Clintons make it to the next round, all the old rules will re-apply and the old galloping and slashing Bill will be back in vogue.
One last prediction and/or suggestion: look for Hillary to defend Bill against the next wave of media criticism—whenever that next dustup arrives (perhaps sooner than later). It is time to defend the husband. She has been careful not to wade into his imbroglios with the press and other Democratic gray hairs--but it is time to go on record in support of the old warhorse. My hunch is that the voters are to the point where they think Bill has suffered enough comeuppance and stand ready to forgive and embrace him once again.
This thing is not over—not yet.
22/04: The False Dawn of Globalism
I am the pessimist in this group. So I can't help but think that Patrick Deneen is definitely on to something when he makes the following observation:
"Every day, in one way or another, the leaders of my educational institution - like that of many others - tell us that we are driven by the imperative to prepare our students for a world of globalized commerce, a world in which they will need the skills of a vagabond or an itinerant vandal. In the throes of a dogma, they are unable to see the evidence before their eyes that suggests that their belief in historical inevitability may be at least slightly out of touch."
"If so, we are preparing our students for a future that has no future."
....
"Our elite institutions continue - in the words of Jeremy Beer - to stripmine our brightest students away from their homes to prepare them for lives as itinerant meritocrats, giving them skills that will allow them to do anything but to be prepared to live in one place and contribute to a particular community. Yet, there is growing evidence that this may be the future for which we should be preparing them, not the one that we imagine. The inability of our "leaders" to acknowledge these facts, much less to begin reconsidering our perilous course, is yet further evidence of the abject failure of education in our time. Education is doing the opposite of what it should be doing - preparing the young for a future of responsibility and gratitude in which we take in what those before us have given us as inheritance and in which we prepare to leave behind so generous a legacy."
Read the whole thing here.
"Every day, in one way or another, the leaders of my educational institution - like that of many others - tell us that we are driven by the imperative to prepare our students for a world of globalized commerce, a world in which they will need the skills of a vagabond or an itinerant vandal. In the throes of a dogma, they are unable to see the evidence before their eyes that suggests that their belief in historical inevitability may be at least slightly out of touch."
"If so, we are preparing our students for a future that has no future."
....
"Our elite institutions continue - in the words of Jeremy Beer - to stripmine our brightest students away from their homes to prepare them for lives as itinerant meritocrats, giving them skills that will allow them to do anything but to be prepared to live in one place and contribute to a particular community. Yet, there is growing evidence that this may be the future for which we should be preparing them, not the one that we imagine. The inability of our "leaders" to acknowledge these facts, much less to begin reconsidering our perilous course, is yet further evidence of the abject failure of education in our time. Education is doing the opposite of what it should be doing - preparing the young for a future of responsibility and gratitude in which we take in what those before us have given us as inheritance and in which we prepare to leave behind so generous a legacy."
Read the whole thing here.
21/04: Where Would You Go?
I'm going to begin my participation in this fine blog with a question. I know I got the idea from somewhere else, and I'm really hoping it wasn't here...
The new President, whoever he/she is, will have many opportunities in the first months of office to set the precedent for his/her tenure. One of the most important of these, at least symbolically, will be the selection of the country for the first international visit as head of state. So...
Where would you go?
I'll start.
I'd head to India. It's the world's largest democracy and has the second largest Muslim population of any country. It's one of a handful of countries poised to join the ranks of the top-tier economies (along with Brazil, China, and Russia.) Due in part to a lack of domestic natural resources (as well as being somewhat shut out regionally by China), it's become a global leader in alternative energy, primarily wind power. A visit by a newly-elected President to India would show the world that the U.S. is willing to adapt to the changing global power structure, but that the U.S. will have a very decisive say in the direction of that change. A visit to a democracy, even one that struggles at times, would show that the U.S. is not ethno- or Euro-centric, but IS opposed to political oppression (read: China.)
I had considered France, to shore up what should be a strong alliance, or to Canada, to throw a bone to our number one trade partner. But I decided that these were too "global North", and that a Presidential visit in 2009 should reflect the direction of the 21st century, which seems to be heading toward the rapidly growing (in numbers, economy, and power) global South.
What do you think?
The new President, whoever he/she is, will have many opportunities in the first months of office to set the precedent for his/her tenure. One of the most important of these, at least symbolically, will be the selection of the country for the first international visit as head of state. So...
Where would you go?
I'll start.
I'd head to India. It's the world's largest democracy and has the second largest Muslim population of any country. It's one of a handful of countries poised to join the ranks of the top-tier economies (along with Brazil, China, and Russia.) Due in part to a lack of domestic natural resources (as well as being somewhat shut out regionally by China), it's become a global leader in alternative energy, primarily wind power. A visit by a newly-elected President to India would show the world that the U.S. is willing to adapt to the changing global power structure, but that the U.S. will have a very decisive say in the direction of that change. A visit to a democracy, even one that struggles at times, would show that the U.S. is not ethno- or Euro-centric, but IS opposed to political oppression (read: China.)
I had considered France, to shore up what should be a strong alliance, or to Canada, to throw a bone to our number one trade partner. But I decided that these were too "global North", and that a Presidential visit in 2009 should reflect the direction of the 21st century, which seems to be heading toward the rapidly growing (in numbers, economy, and power) global South.
What do you think?
I held my first live rattlesnake this past Friday afternoon. And also my second. I was not demonstrating my faith, just working the "Get Your Picture Taken with a Live Rattlesnake" table at the annual town Rattlesnake Festival.
We have lots and lots of rattlesnakes in the hills west of town (known locally as the Slick Hills). Lacking much else to build an annual festival around, we go with the snakes. You can watch the presentations from the snake pit, where "Fangmaster" Ronnie Orf stands amid a writhing mass of rattlesnakes wearing tall snake boots, picks up the occasional snake to show it better to the crowd, and explains how these creatures are an important part of God's creation here in Oklahoma. He has only been bitten three times in as many decades. You can watch snakes being butchered, then buy the meat and skin, or purchase fried snake meat (very bland and bony). If you are brave enough, you can join in a guided snake hunt in the hills. Thousands of people fill the town for three days for snakes, yard sales, vendors, and carnival rides.
The Rattlesnake Association is the largest philanthropic organization in town, giving away lots of money to good local causes, money raised from vendor fees, snake meat, and the picture table.
Late Friday afternoon, as I sat in my chair trying to calm down the snake by holding him in my lap (one hand behind his head, the other gently near his middle), and not having a lot of luck (he would have bitten me if he could have but his mouth was held shut) I watched the people amble up and down the main street: All shapes and sizes, very few models, a broad cross section of "Okie Redneck", Indian, and soldiers and their families from nearby Ft. Sill. Eating funnel cake, buying geegaws, coming closer to touch the snake, or retreating to a safer distance.
This is America. This is small town America. We like our guns. We believe in God, though many are very informal about it. We are not really bitter--except toward those elites who just do not get us. Then, when we feel looked down on, we rattle our tails. Just show us some respect.
(more below)
We have lots and lots of rattlesnakes in the hills west of town (known locally as the Slick Hills). Lacking much else to build an annual festival around, we go with the snakes. You can watch the presentations from the snake pit, where "Fangmaster" Ronnie Orf stands amid a writhing mass of rattlesnakes wearing tall snake boots, picks up the occasional snake to show it better to the crowd, and explains how these creatures are an important part of God's creation here in Oklahoma. He has only been bitten three times in as many decades. You can watch snakes being butchered, then buy the meat and skin, or purchase fried snake meat (very bland and bony). If you are brave enough, you can join in a guided snake hunt in the hills. Thousands of people fill the town for three days for snakes, yard sales, vendors, and carnival rides.
The Rattlesnake Association is the largest philanthropic organization in town, giving away lots of money to good local causes, money raised from vendor fees, snake meat, and the picture table.
Late Friday afternoon, as I sat in my chair trying to calm down the snake by holding him in my lap (one hand behind his head, the other gently near his middle), and not having a lot of luck (he would have bitten me if he could have but his mouth was held shut) I watched the people amble up and down the main street: All shapes and sizes, very few models, a broad cross section of "Okie Redneck", Indian, and soldiers and their families from nearby Ft. Sill. Eating funnel cake, buying geegaws, coming closer to touch the snake, or retreating to a safer distance.
This is America. This is small town America. We like our guns. We believe in God, though many are very informal about it. We are not really bitter--except toward those elites who just do not get us. Then, when we feel looked down on, we rattle our tails. Just show us some respect.
(more below)
21/04: A Classic History Read
My three all-time favorite novels are Forever and Ever, written by father, Wayne Cruseturner, Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry, and Mario Puzo's The Godfather. I have read all three of those works numerous times—and all three delivered profound imprints on my inner life. But The Godfather merits special mention, as I have read the story of the Corleones at least twenty times (although only twice since I turned thirty).
I read The Godfather for the first time in fourth grade; it was the first novel I ever completed. From there, I read nearly the complete works of Harold Robbins before I graduated elementary school. During junior high I branched out a bit, reading most of Steinbeck and a generous smattering of fairly good contemporary fiction from the 1970s—but I continued to come back to The Godfather. During my college years I read a generous helping of Hemingway and also discovered Larry McMurtry--but I continued to come back to The Godfather.
A few days ago, while re-reading David M. Potter's Impending Crisis, I realized that this work of history had become The Godfather of my adulthood. The Impending Crisis is the exceedingly well written and immaculately comprehensive story of the coming of the Civil War from 1848 to 1861.
In fact, I know precious little about the life of Potter; histories of historians are uncommon. Potter died in 1971, an era before C-SPAN2's Book-TV began to offer scholars of his stature a modicum of limited celebrity and television face time.
Born in Augusta, Georgia, in 1910, Potter earned a B.A. from Emory, and took his Ph.D. at Yale in 1932 (where he studied under U.B. Phillips). Known as an important historian of the American South during his long career, he died while in the process of finishing the quintessential history monograph, his sublime contribution to the superb "New American Nation Series," The Impending Crisis. His friend and colleague at Stanford, Don Fehrenbacher, a truly marvelous historian in his own right, completed and edited the manuscript upon his death. Potter was awarded a posthumous Pulitzer Prize for his magnum opus in 1976.
The Impending Crisis tells the tragic tale of the coming conflict between North and South with honesty, integrity, and patience (it is nearly 600 pages of text). But Potter also exhibits an appropriately professional love for American traditions and sympathetically flawed statesman—and a humanity for his native Southland—without sacrificing objectivity.
Fairly often, Potter offers concise tutorial asides for budding historians and sophisticated consumers of the past. Consider this cautionary methodological vignette:
"Hindsight, the historians chief asset and his main liability, has enabled all historical writers to know that the decade of the [eighteen] fifties terminated in a great civil war. Knowing it, they have consistently treated the decade not as a segment in time with a character of its own, but as a prelude to something else. By the very term 'antebellum" they have diagnosed a whole period in the light of what came after. Even the titles of their books The Coming of the Civil War, The Irrepressible Conflict, Ordeal of the Union, The Eve of Conflict, Prologue to Conflict--are pregnant with the struggle which lay at the end."
"But for the sake of realism, it should be remembered that most human beings during these years went about their daily lives, preoccupied with their personal affairs, with no sense of impending disaster nor any fixation on the issue of slavery."
Ironically, I have always wondered if someone other than the author titled the work, as the naming of The Impending Crisis seems to slip into the tradition he warns against.
I have actually met only one individual in my life who knew Potter personally, Sir Robert Rhodes James, now deceased as well (and deserving of limitless encomiums himself). When Sir Robert learned of my admiration for Potter, he merely sighed and said wistfully: "now that was a true Southern gentleman."
That is how I like to think of him.
For my money, The Impending Crisis is the best history text of all time. If you have never read this work, I recommend it wholeheartedly.
I read The Godfather for the first time in fourth grade; it was the first novel I ever completed. From there, I read nearly the complete works of Harold Robbins before I graduated elementary school. During junior high I branched out a bit, reading most of Steinbeck and a generous smattering of fairly good contemporary fiction from the 1970s—but I continued to come back to The Godfather. During my college years I read a generous helping of Hemingway and also discovered Larry McMurtry--but I continued to come back to The Godfather.
A few days ago, while re-reading David M. Potter's Impending Crisis, I realized that this work of history had become The Godfather of my adulthood. The Impending Crisis is the exceedingly well written and immaculately comprehensive story of the coming of the Civil War from 1848 to 1861.
In fact, I know precious little about the life of Potter; histories of historians are uncommon. Potter died in 1971, an era before C-SPAN2's Book-TV began to offer scholars of his stature a modicum of limited celebrity and television face time.
Born in Augusta, Georgia, in 1910, Potter earned a B.A. from Emory, and took his Ph.D. at Yale in 1932 (where he studied under U.B. Phillips). Known as an important historian of the American South during his long career, he died while in the process of finishing the quintessential history monograph, his sublime contribution to the superb "New American Nation Series," The Impending Crisis. His friend and colleague at Stanford, Don Fehrenbacher, a truly marvelous historian in his own right, completed and edited the manuscript upon his death. Potter was awarded a posthumous Pulitzer Prize for his magnum opus in 1976.
The Impending Crisis tells the tragic tale of the coming conflict between North and South with honesty, integrity, and patience (it is nearly 600 pages of text). But Potter also exhibits an appropriately professional love for American traditions and sympathetically flawed statesman—and a humanity for his native Southland—without sacrificing objectivity.
Fairly often, Potter offers concise tutorial asides for budding historians and sophisticated consumers of the past. Consider this cautionary methodological vignette:
"Hindsight, the historians chief asset and his main liability, has enabled all historical writers to know that the decade of the [eighteen] fifties terminated in a great civil war. Knowing it, they have consistently treated the decade not as a segment in time with a character of its own, but as a prelude to something else. By the very term 'antebellum" they have diagnosed a whole period in the light of what came after. Even the titles of their books The Coming of the Civil War, The Irrepressible Conflict, Ordeal of the Union, The Eve of Conflict, Prologue to Conflict--are pregnant with the struggle which lay at the end."
"But for the sake of realism, it should be remembered that most human beings during these years went about their daily lives, preoccupied with their personal affairs, with no sense of impending disaster nor any fixation on the issue of slavery."
Ironically, I have always wondered if someone other than the author titled the work, as the naming of The Impending Crisis seems to slip into the tradition he warns against.
I have actually met only one individual in my life who knew Potter personally, Sir Robert Rhodes James, now deceased as well (and deserving of limitless encomiums himself). When Sir Robert learned of my admiration for Potter, he merely sighed and said wistfully: "now that was a true Southern gentleman."
That is how I like to think of him.
For my money, The Impending Crisis is the best history text of all time. If you have never read this work, I recommend it wholeheartedly.
Category: American History and Politics
Posted by: A Waco Farmer
In the midst of the Pope's visit to Washington last week, we missed a less publicized ceremony in the East Room in which President and Mrs. Bush invited Professor Wilfred McClay to offer a commemoration of Thomas Jefferson in honor of his 265th birthday.
As our good friend is much too modest in his accomplishments, we admit sheepishly that we learned of this event via Powerline. Nevertheless, we offer our belated kudos to the President for his good taste in historians, and kudos to Professor McClay for his insightful and provocative remarks.
With a big hat tip to Powerline, we offer the lecture in full below:
Thank you, Mr. President and Mrs. Bush, for your warm welcome, and for the great honor of taking part in this celebration of Thomas Jefferson’s life.
Usually, when a greatly revered figure turns a year older, we feel older too, and the world feels a little colder and more fragile. But it’s a little different when a man turns 265. Remembering Thomas Jefferson makes us feel young. And not just by comparison. It’s because Thomas Jefferson embodies so much of the promise of American life. It’s because there is so much about him that is still vibrantly alive.
And living not only in America. Thomas Jefferson deserves to be remembered and revered as a man of worldwide influence, whose name is known and loved and invoked by men and women from Beijing to Lhasa to Kiev to Prague. His belief in the dignity and unrealized potential in the minds and hearts of ordinary people is at the core of what is greatest in the American experiment. It is in this sense that James Parton, his early biographer, was right in making the following proclamation: "If Jefferson is wrong, America is wrong. If America is right, Jefferson was right.” But the cause of Jefferson was always more than just that of America. It is the cause of all humankind.
As our good friend is much too modest in his accomplishments, we admit sheepishly that we learned of this event via Powerline. Nevertheless, we offer our belated kudos to the President for his good taste in historians, and kudos to Professor McClay for his insightful and provocative remarks.
With a big hat tip to Powerline, we offer the lecture in full below:
Thank you, Mr. President and Mrs. Bush, for your warm welcome, and for the great honor of taking part in this celebration of Thomas Jefferson’s life.
Usually, when a greatly revered figure turns a year older, we feel older too, and the world feels a little colder and more fragile. But it’s a little different when a man turns 265. Remembering Thomas Jefferson makes us feel young. And not just by comparison. It’s because Thomas Jefferson embodies so much of the promise of American life. It’s because there is so much about him that is still vibrantly alive.
And living not only in America. Thomas Jefferson deserves to be remembered and revered as a man of worldwide influence, whose name is known and loved and invoked by men and women from Beijing to Lhasa to Kiev to Prague. His belief in the dignity and unrealized potential in the minds and hearts of ordinary people is at the core of what is greatest in the American experiment. It is in this sense that James Parton, his early biographer, was right in making the following proclamation: "If Jefferson is wrong, America is wrong. If America is right, Jefferson was right.” But the cause of Jefferson was always more than just that of America. It is the cause of all humankind.
20/04: Sunday Politics: in brief
Category: Campaign 2008.12
Posted by: A Waco Farmer
After hearing a few snippets from FOX News Sunday and Meet the Press in between other activities, here are a few quick thoughts concerning what I saw and heard:
1. On Meet the Press, "Obama's Chief Strategist David Axelrod squared off against Hillary Clinton's new chief strategist Geoff Garin." I know nearly nothing of Geoff Garin (other than he is a career pollster and Harvard grad, 1975). Evidently, he is a well-liked and knowledgeable political insider, but he was embarrassingly lame in his advocacy of his candidate today. Hillary needed this last-minute shuffle like a hole in the head. I felt sorry for her--and him. I kept wincing and dreading the inevitable post-appearance phone call, hoping that Hillary wouldn't blow her top and erupt all over him once the excruciating exchange finally concluded.
The one bright spot for Garin? He was so inept that Russert took on the role of devil's advocate--but that was small consolation.
All in all, another poor tactical choice on the part of Team Clinton.
2. On FOX News Sunday, Chris Wallace interviewed regular Obama/Clinton surrogates, Dick Durbin and Charles Schumer.
Ordinarily, Schumer wins this match-up on "sound and fury..." alone--but not today. Schumer (and this was true of Garin as well) was too busy denying obvious truths to ever get off the defensive.
"Hillary actually loves the lunatic left-wing activist base of the Democratic Party, regardless of what she might have said when she thought no one was listening at a private fund raiser."
Why shouldn't she be happy with the "nutroots" loonies who have rejected her moderate approach, elevated a half-term senator whom we barely know to one rung from the Democratic nomination, and forced her into advocating policies that would probably doom her candidacy--even if she were to find some way to somehow throw an ultra-miraculous "Hail Mary" to pull this thing out?
What's not to love?
By the way, these nutroots Daily Kos/Huffington Posters overplayed their hand in Connecticut in 2006, losing the election and chasing Joe Lieberman out of the Democratic Party. Do any of the adults in the Party of Jackson worry about recent history repeating itself?
Of course, Hillary meant everything she said about the left-wing nuts--and she is absolutely right. Not only did they ruin her glide-path to the nomination, they have also roiled up a Democratic Party General Election slam dunk.
Good for us. I don't know if all that is enough--but it helps. From a purely strategic point of view, we would much rather face an anti-NAFTA, anti-war Democratic Party than the mid-2007 Hillary Clinton version crafted to assure the heartland on defense and woo hardhats with promises of domestic competence.
The only problem--what if the Moveon.org rendering actually wins?
1. On Meet the Press, "Obama's Chief Strategist David Axelrod squared off against Hillary Clinton's new chief strategist Geoff Garin." I know nearly nothing of Geoff Garin (other than he is a career pollster and Harvard grad, 1975). Evidently, he is a well-liked and knowledgeable political insider, but he was embarrassingly lame in his advocacy of his candidate today. Hillary needed this last-minute shuffle like a hole in the head. I felt sorry for her--and him. I kept wincing and dreading the inevitable post-appearance phone call, hoping that Hillary wouldn't blow her top and erupt all over him once the excruciating exchange finally concluded.
The one bright spot for Garin? He was so inept that Russert took on the role of devil's advocate--but that was small consolation.
All in all, another poor tactical choice on the part of Team Clinton.
2. On FOX News Sunday, Chris Wallace interviewed regular Obama/Clinton surrogates, Dick Durbin and Charles Schumer.
Ordinarily, Schumer wins this match-up on "sound and fury..." alone--but not today. Schumer (and this was true of Garin as well) was too busy denying obvious truths to ever get off the defensive.
"Hillary actually loves the lunatic left-wing activist base of the Democratic Party, regardless of what she might have said when she thought no one was listening at a private fund raiser."
Why shouldn't she be happy with the "nutroots" loonies who have rejected her moderate approach, elevated a half-term senator whom we barely know to one rung from the Democratic nomination, and forced her into advocating policies that would probably doom her candidacy--even if she were to find some way to somehow throw an ultra-miraculous "Hail Mary" to pull this thing out?
What's not to love?
By the way, these nutroots Daily Kos/Huffington Posters overplayed their hand in Connecticut in 2006, losing the election and chasing Joe Lieberman out of the Democratic Party. Do any of the adults in the Party of Jackson worry about recent history repeating itself?
Of course, Hillary meant everything she said about the left-wing nuts--and she is absolutely right. Not only did they ruin her glide-path to the nomination, they have also roiled up a Democratic Party General Election slam dunk.
Good for us. I don't know if all that is enough--but it helps. From a purely strategic point of view, we would much rather face an anti-NAFTA, anti-war Democratic Party than the mid-2007 Hillary Clinton version crafted to assure the heartland on defense and woo hardhats with promises of domestic competence.
The only problem--what if the Moveon.org rendering actually wins?
