BEHIND BEHIND THE CURTAIN
c$ in email.
Because it took even less time than usual (45
minutes from post to email) for one of my anti-Obama screeds to elicit howls of
protest from the fans of Senator Breath of Fresh Air, because the first one came
from an old DeSantis campaign pal -- we'll call him C$ -- and because the
subsequent exchanges provide both counters to my punches and expansions on my
points, I thought it would be interesting to reproduce here the key passages
from a pair of email exchanges that, if nothing else, find some understanding
and some common ground in the end.
(Maybe Obama really is a uniter...)
Are you serious, dude? Obama was trying to be funny - can't you see him holding back the laugh? It was a good moment and people are making a big deal out of it... Oh, and as to the free pass. I guess Meet the Press with Tim Russert doesn't count as the media? Obama was on the hot seat there several weeks back and he answered some tough questions. Sure, he hasn't had it as tough as Romney, Guliani, or Clinton, and I agree with you that the media swooning over him has been pathetic. But what does that have to do with the character of the candidate?
Of course I'm serious. I don’t think that was a playful laugh. I think it was a dismissive smirk. Just like the answer.
And don’t give me that crap about Meet the Press. Of course that counts. And, yes, he answered some tough questions on there. But not nearly as tough as the other candidates. One sit-down on Meet the Press is not exactly a grueling campaign of scrutiny. Read the profiles — all those endless cover stories in all those endless magazines. They’re puff pieces, drooling over him at every turn.
You admit the swooning has been pathetic. And it has been. Ever see anyone react like that to any of the other candidates? Ever see a Newsweek cover like that? Ever see Executive Editors of major urban newspapers come out and say they’re rooting for a candidate because he’s a good story? Ever?
This stuff is unprecedented. It has nothing to do with character and everything to do with the stinking media.
As for his character, well — I’ve made that case many times. “Politics is gummed up by money” -- but I’m gonna spend more of it than anyone but Giuliani. “Politics is too negative” -- but I’m gonna take shots at Cheney and Bush and Hillary (all of whom deserve it, by the way, but that’s beside the point when you say you aren’t gonna do it). Born and raised in Hawaii, lives in Chicago, then shows up on the stump in late 2007 sounding like Martin Luther King Jr. on a march in Selma. (Where were those preacherly cadences your whole career, you pandering phony?)
It’s an act, man. He and Lady McBama are playing it -- and enjoying the adoration -- to the hilt. If they're not careful, they're gonna turn into Bill & Hillary.
You can like him. You can support him. You can vote for him. But he’s as much of a phony as the rest of them. And if you or anyone in the media is really honest and critical about it, you’ll see that.
(After that exchange, about fifteen minutes later, came another...)
So, what about when he was making $10,000 a year as a community organizer on the South Side of Chicago? It's not like he went right from college on to Harvard and then onto the Senate.
I don't discount that, nor do I hold it against him. But it doesn't make me want to vote for him. Nor does it make his affectations on the stump any less phony.
It's not like he is Ja Rule or P.Diddy who grew up in wealthy suburban neighborhoods and are now rapping about the hood.
He grew up in Hawaii, and he's rapping about the civil rights movement like he was there. It's the same thing.
Well, not quite as bad. But, come on -- is that really what you want on a campaign poster? Or in a candidate? Hey, he's not as bad as P. Diddy!
Well, hell, sign me up.
For as much shit that has been thrown at Obama from both the Clintons and the right wingers he has remained overwhelmingly positive. Come on now. I'm actuallly annoyed that he let's them get away with as much shit as they do.
But you see, C$, that's part of my point. He has to.
He's boxed himself in with that "anti-divisiveness" utopian horseshit, and now he has nowhere to go. That's precisely the point I made at the end of today's post. He's done a George H.W. Bush at the end of Desert Storm: when you say you're gonna liberate Kuwait and that's it, then you can't go all the way to Baghdad, and you have to let Saddam go. You have no other choice. You have to live by the rules you've already defined.
So when you say you're the can't-we-all-get-along candidate and someone punches you in the teeth, you have to take it. Wipe away the blood, smile, and keep on going. And let's face it: his opponents are hardly doing anything now. If he gets into the general election, and that Republican smear-machine gets going, he's toast. He's worse than toast. He's John Kerry.
Unless he fights back. Which you kinda sorta seem to want him to do. And I don't blame you. Except...
...if he does, and I think he will, then there goes all that Most Blessed Holy Uniter crap. Which will disaffect lots of the people now swooning over him.
You see, unless there's a sea change in the way people respond to Republican presidential campaign tactics -- and I seriously doubt there will be, if only because there has not been a sea change in the critical or intellectual faculties of the great mass of the electorate in the last four years -- he's put himself in a no-win situation. He's betting everything on the Kumbaya strategy. And that's a hell of a long shot for any candidate, much less a black guy with a terrorist-sounding name, in this or any year.
I have been objective. I didn't like how Obama pandered to the people in Southern Illinois (coal country) when he came out in support of liquified coal. He has since changed his position to state he would only support liquifid coal if the CO2 emissions were reduced from current levels that are from Gasoline, after being beaten up by Sierra Club and us green bloggers, so, yes, he panders too. They all do -- because it's a fucking game.
Exactly.
Which is why I have particular disdain for someone who likes to pretend he doesn't play it. Or that he's above it. Or both. That, for my taste, is the worst kind of hypocrisy: the kind that screws around on the side while loudly proclaiming its chastity.
So, there is some objectivity for ya.
It becomes you, C$. And also makes you sound, by now, a hell of a lot closer to what I've been saying all along.
Imagine that.
[One final note: C$ just emailed yet again, liking the idea of posting these exchanges to TWM and asking me, in the interests of fair play and equal time, to plug his Western PA for Obama web site. Which is more than fair enough. So consider it plugged...]
(Maybe Obama really is a uniter...)
Are you serious, dude? Obama was trying to be funny - can't you see him holding back the laugh? It was a good moment and people are making a big deal out of it... Oh, and as to the free pass. I guess Meet the Press with Tim Russert doesn't count as the media? Obama was on the hot seat there several weeks back and he answered some tough questions. Sure, he hasn't had it as tough as Romney, Guliani, or Clinton, and I agree with you that the media swooning over him has been pathetic. But what does that have to do with the character of the candidate?
Of course I'm serious. I don’t think that was a playful laugh. I think it was a dismissive smirk. Just like the answer.
And don’t give me that crap about Meet the Press. Of course that counts. And, yes, he answered some tough questions on there. But not nearly as tough as the other candidates. One sit-down on Meet the Press is not exactly a grueling campaign of scrutiny. Read the profiles — all those endless cover stories in all those endless magazines. They’re puff pieces, drooling over him at every turn.
You admit the swooning has been pathetic. And it has been. Ever see anyone react like that to any of the other candidates? Ever see a Newsweek cover like that? Ever see Executive Editors of major urban newspapers come out and say they’re rooting for a candidate because he’s a good story? Ever?
This stuff is unprecedented. It has nothing to do with character and everything to do with the stinking media.
As for his character, well — I’ve made that case many times. “Politics is gummed up by money” -- but I’m gonna spend more of it than anyone but Giuliani. “Politics is too negative” -- but I’m gonna take shots at Cheney and Bush and Hillary (all of whom deserve it, by the way, but that’s beside the point when you say you aren’t gonna do it). Born and raised in Hawaii, lives in Chicago, then shows up on the stump in late 2007 sounding like Martin Luther King Jr. on a march in Selma. (Where were those preacherly cadences your whole career, you pandering phony?)
It’s an act, man. He and Lady McBama are playing it -- and enjoying the adoration -- to the hilt. If they're not careful, they're gonna turn into Bill & Hillary.
You can like him. You can support him. You can vote for him. But he’s as much of a phony as the rest of them. And if you or anyone in the media is really honest and critical about it, you’ll see that.
(After that exchange, about fifteen minutes later, came another...)
So, what about when he was making $10,000 a year as a community organizer on the South Side of Chicago? It's not like he went right from college on to Harvard and then onto the Senate.
I don't discount that, nor do I hold it against him. But it doesn't make me want to vote for him. Nor does it make his affectations on the stump any less phony.
It's not like he is Ja Rule or P.Diddy who grew up in wealthy suburban neighborhoods and are now rapping about the hood.
He grew up in Hawaii, and he's rapping about the civil rights movement like he was there. It's the same thing.
Well, not quite as bad. But, come on -- is that really what you want on a campaign poster? Or in a candidate? Hey, he's not as bad as P. Diddy!
Well, hell, sign me up.
For as much shit that has been thrown at Obama from both the Clintons and the right wingers he has remained overwhelmingly positive. Come on now. I'm actuallly annoyed that he let's them get away with as much shit as they do.
But you see, C$, that's part of my point. He has to.
He's boxed himself in with that "anti-divisiveness" utopian horseshit, and now he has nowhere to go. That's precisely the point I made at the end of today's post. He's done a George H.W. Bush at the end of Desert Storm: when you say you're gonna liberate Kuwait and that's it, then you can't go all the way to Baghdad, and you have to let Saddam go. You have no other choice. You have to live by the rules you've already defined.
So when you say you're the can't-we-all-get-along candidate and someone punches you in the teeth, you have to take it. Wipe away the blood, smile, and keep on going. And let's face it: his opponents are hardly doing anything now. If he gets into the general election, and that Republican smear-machine gets going, he's toast. He's worse than toast. He's John Kerry.
Unless he fights back. Which you kinda sorta seem to want him to do. And I don't blame you. Except...
...if he does, and I think he will, then there goes all that Most Blessed Holy Uniter crap. Which will disaffect lots of the people now swooning over him.
You see, unless there's a sea change in the way people respond to Republican presidential campaign tactics -- and I seriously doubt there will be, if only because there has not been a sea change in the critical or intellectual faculties of the great mass of the electorate in the last four years -- he's put himself in a no-win situation. He's betting everything on the Kumbaya strategy. And that's a hell of a long shot for any candidate, much less a black guy with a terrorist-sounding name, in this or any year.
I have been objective. I didn't like how Obama pandered to the people in Southern Illinois (coal country) when he came out in support of liquified coal. He has since changed his position to state he would only support liquifid coal if the CO2 emissions were reduced from current levels that are from Gasoline, after being beaten up by Sierra Club and us green bloggers, so, yes, he panders too. They all do -- because it's a fucking game.
Exactly.
Which is why I have particular disdain for someone who likes to pretend he doesn't play it. Or that he's above it. Or both. That, for my taste, is the worst kind of hypocrisy: the kind that screws around on the side while loudly proclaiming its chastity.
So, there is some objectivity for ya.
It becomes you, C$. And also makes you sound, by now, a hell of a lot closer to what I've been saying all along.
Imagine that.
[One final note: C$ just emailed yet again, liking the idea of posting these exchanges to TWM and asking me, in the interests of fair play and equal time, to plug his Western PA for Obama web site. Which is more than fair enough. So consider it plugged...]
Posted: Tue - January 15, 2008 at 04:29 PM
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