We need a teacher, a political organizer, and a reflective leader who is good and big enough to change for the better. Talk about your historical and political negation of President G. W. Bush!
Politicians try to make history. They all try to win elections. Those who are elected frequently use the power of their offices to change our laws and, so, surely change history. In this era of Gotcha politics, losing politicians can also make history by sullying the image of their opponents in the media and, by extension, in the mind of the electorate. In so doing they can make history in different way, or even retard its progress.
I believe there is still another way for politicians to make history. This change is hard, requiring an engaged, reflective not reflexive electorate and an articulate, deep-thinking politician... with plenty of good faith between the two.
Things are bad. We want change. We fault President Bush and Congress. We think our country is on the wrong track.
But will we change if change means changing the way we judge who's going to get our vote for President or, even harder, change ourselves to meet the challenges facing America once we elect a new leader?
It'll be hard to learn how talk to Clinton Democrats again, without fighting this Pyrrhic primary all over. It'll be harder still to learn how to work with Republicans, in a meaningful, large-scale, and yes, national way. It is somewhat easier to accommodate Independents. They overwhelmingly despise partisan mud fights and negative campaigning.
Labeling then having the MSM reiterate negative images and labels 24x7 is faster and a whole lot easier for some politicians as they strive to write history. They fight yesterday's war and have yesterday's knee-jerk responses.
We need solutions, not positions, today.
We will have to meet our opposition, Clinton supporters first, and together decide not to re-fight the Democratic primary. Only then will we transcend it and arrive at a new category, in this case common ground on issues important to all progressive voters.
Later, with the Republicans, we'll share opposing points of view, decide not to engage in what will then be obsolete red-vs.-blue state sticking points, and transcend political polarization for the good of the only category common to both Parties—moving America and Americans forward.
Barack Obama is a politician, but he’s also a political organizer and a teacher. Look at the pattern of challenges Senator Obama has given us to think about change with.
In an early debate, Senator Obama said he'd talk to the leaders of Iran and Syria. How high-level discussions are set up, with all the advance work done by diplomatic and protocol professionals, was never the point. Nevertheless, Senator Clinton successfully re-framed that which Senator Obama was trying to make us consider anew. For a while, she successfully convinced us to embrace the failed chestnut of 'not talking to our enemies.'
Eventually, the press and a majority of Democrats came around, rejected failed absolutism, and agreed that we could talk with our enemies in such a way as to attempt diplomacy first and, well, possibly not enter into another preemptive war with a half-baked exit strategy.
At a bare minimum, attempting diplomacy with our enemies helps America garner consensus among other nations through our reasonableness, leaving the politics of intransigence even less tenable for our enemies. Whether diplomacy ultimately succeeds or fails, it rallies our allies to us, treating our enemies to a second sweat.
Then there was Senator Obama's praise of former President Reagan for being a thought leader, rare among Presidents. Senator Clinton bit and said Reagan's ideas were bad. She proved most of Obama's point with her obtuse attempt at negatively re-framing Obama's insight. This insight eventually prevailed with the MSM and voters: Reagan did change our political dialogue and the way we talked about America. I think a lot of that was for the worse—I'm a liberal Democrat—but would never argue that Reagan did not change our national discourse and the way we framed our political discourse.
Then Senator Clinton confirmed what Republicans had long been telling us about her and her red-faced husband, former President Clinton. She pushed for a victory over Senator Obama at any cost to her Party and country, announcing she would throw everything at Senator Obama, including the "kitchen sink."
If we had a model of a politician who could enable us to prove helpful not harmful things to the American people during campaigns, we might have begun to suspect Senator Obama's rare ability to engage America in a constructive dialogue before he ever got the job he's campaigning for. I believe Obama's at least as smart as Bill Clinton, but Obama has retained his integrity. That's why former President Clinton hates Senator Obama. It's Faustian.
Then we got the Reverend Wright show. The current cant coming from the MSM reduces it to a no-win question: Why would Candidate Obama not denounce his Pastor in the beginning of his campaign, say a year or two ago, knowing that Wright could say racist, delusional, or divisive things?
Just imagine if Senator Obama had done that. What candidate from either political party could survive separating himself from his Church to run for national office? Why did Senator Obama join in the first place? I don't know, but then, I'm still a Catholic.
Clergymen fumble when they do politics. Dolphins fumble when they do carpentry. Maybe we should render religion unto clergymen and politics unto politicians.
Perhaps Senator Obama wanted to give Reverend Wright enough rope to prove how loopy Wright was in front of the cameras. For most of us the take-away was to question Reverend Wright's narcissism or sanity.
But there was more here. What does it tell us about Senator Obama? Asking ourselves this question might Americans stop clinging to our clerics for political perfection and direction. Maybe we'll just render religion unto clergymen and evaluate politicians on their policies and, if we consider any of their associates, consider those politicians who have affected our candidates.
When Barack Obama said yesterday’s politicians have exploited religion or guns or other wedge issues to get Americans voters to lose sight of their own economic interests, the MSM never asked the right question, in its 24x7 bloviating on the issue. Someone, somewhere should have asked, "Senator Obama, do you cling to religion or guns or another wedge issue over your offer of a new page of even-handed American problem solving?"
What we have learned is that Barack Obama did so cling to Reverend Wright. Senator Obama loathes his pastor's divisive and poisonous statements. When Obama threw off Wright's bitter, hurtful politics--difficult because Senator Obama loves his Church and Christian religion--he showed us how tough some of this "turning the page" and "change" can be.
We all may have to make similarly hard changes before we can come together, Americans all, and get our country moving forward again.
To hear Senator Obama speak, we know President Reagan affected him, if only as a historical change agent. To hear Senator Obama speak, we know, for the echoes, how much John and Bobby Kennedy, and Franklin Roosevelt affected him.
Change is going to be hard, for each of us, during the general election campaign and in restoring America after it. If Senator Obama can change—in midst of the awful, poisonous arena that is our national politics today—then so can I in the comfort of my own home and community.
One of these days, a state is going to make a leap of faith and give the example and challenges Senator Obama's leadership offers a try. Connecticut made the leap; Texas—sadly for this Texan—fell short.
Indiana could raise this country to its feet... up again on its feet.
Then we will have a political debate to transcend our internecine blue-state-red-state feud that has left us so dissatisfied, divided, and vulnerable to corporate rapacity and the usurpation of our liberties. The general election of 2008 will determine if Americans are strong enough to change as a nation.
We need a teacher, a political organizer, and a reflective leader who is good and big enough to change for the better. Talk about your historical and political negation of President G. W. Bush!