I think Andrew Sullivan’s writer is right, and not just about the netroots. So long as Obama supporters give more heart- and mind-space to the Republican ticket, and especially Sarah Palin, the less room there is to make a solid, thoughtful and reasoned case for the Obama-Biden ticket. And we don’t have those resources to give away.
The more space they fill in our consciousness, the more said about the Republican candidates the less they need to defend themselves, or even make their own case. We make our own fear by focusing on the Republican candidates, even if the intent is their deprecation. Jokes about McCain’s shrugging posture or — well — everything non-political about Palin is a missed opportunity to talk about the problems the nation has, and how a Democratic administration can help fix them. And it says less about Democrats in the process. I will not sink to the hooting, chanting, booing depths I saw at the Republican convention.
Or say you’re not keen on Obama or Biden. Let me suggest the “reality television” tack of the post-Convention campaign should make you desire a more dignified campaign. Months ago, when there were several candidates on both sides, a colleague asked me which race I would want to see. Obama v. McCain I said, because I thought it would be more dignified. It hasn’t been dignified. But both left and right, the indignity comes in response to the Republican ticket, leaving McCain and Palin rather above it all. And not answering substantive questions.
Enough.
For one, I’m glad the Obama-Biden campaign is going to toughen its tack. You get no points from me for losing nicely, at least not when the outcome is so crucial. But their supporters need to be tougher, too.
My response: to talk up the Democratic ticket. To respond to the Obama-Biden campaign. To ask tough question of the McCain-Palin ticket, even if the mainstream media is cowed into softball reporting.
I don’t my little blog to sway the hearts and minds of a nation, but
- it will keep me from needless despair and defeatism, and
- if enough of us — millions, I think — refuse to get caught in a warped sense of reality, and stay very cool and cagy, then we can participate in the election of a Democratic ticket in November.
Thanks for your thoughtful post. It’s going to be hard to get people to vote with their brain and not their gut. The Republicans have always appealed to the gut. They’re doing it again, as was expected, and may pull it off which would be a total tragedy for this country and the world. Racism is involved too. Just look at the difference in white and black preferences. Without the black vote, which the Republicans are doing their best to curtail by any means whatsoever, Obama will very likely lose. Yes, it’s a sad commentary on America.
I found your blog here by going to the UUpdates page — I think yours was the 4th or 5th one listed — and got intrigued by your post’s title.
Totally agreed, and the obsessiveness over Palin has completely backfired. Back to Obama and the economy.
McCain’s posture the outcome of torture. Who would joke about that?
@Bill. Yes, it’s in bad taste. But given McCain’s recent silence on America’s torture program, I think it gets classified under gallows humor.
But I’d just as soon cut the jokes and demand he denounce the whole Guantanamo circus and the rendition program. Otherwise, he just looks like a callous hypocrite.
Yet somehow I suspect the Golden Rule doesn’t apply to him any more the rule of law applies to the current administration.