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Barack the Vote

November 11th, 2007

Last night, the Democratic nominees gave speeches at the annual Jefferson Jackson Dinner in Des Moines, emceed by Nancy Pelosi. Pelosi, of course, is noted for being the first robot woman elected as Speaker. Anyway, every Iowa Party bigwig was in attendance, along with thousands of supporters. To quote Ron Burgundy, the JJ Dinner is “kind of a big deal”. Coming off a bad news week and a poor performance last debate, along with the revelation that her campaign was planting questions at her rallies, H-Dog needed to not suck. But oh did she ever. Edwards was pretty good. Obama gave his best speech of the year.

Edwards’ is currently trying to sell the narrative that while he was one of the more conservative candidates in 2004; losing to Bush, and subsequently seeing what Bush did to the country, has provided a catharsis for him, and now he’s seen the light. Now he wants to take the gloves off and fight for big change. Oh, and his wife got cancer and that makes him connect with suffering Americans and whatnot. Did he mention his pops worked in a mill? And he thinks about the life his parents fought for him to have, every time he takes a gander at his hedge fund profits. Well, my cynical heart only has room for one catharsis-after-agonizing-defeat story, and Al Gore snatched that up long ago.

Obama, on the other hand, has a unique, almost old-fashioned campaign style. While sometimes this appears indistinguishable from your average timid Dem, there is a principled pattern to how he goes about his business that, while not wear-white-to-the-wedding pure, to me is more stubbornly sincere than either Hillary or Johnny Ed. I could write a whole post on it, but I’ll spare you for today.

Of course, even truly selfless candidates have to deal with the mindfuck of thinking about appearing presidential and sincere 100 percent of the time. Many folks struggle to be themselves in normal situations, how do you show you are genuine through such a long, spotlighted, farcical campaign process? As the newest addition to the national stage, I think this adjustment has been the most difficult for that eloquent bookworm, Obama (as evidenced by his shaky performances in the debates and sometimes on the campaign trail). Fortunately, he seems to be getting more comfortable and more aggressive. With Edwards continuing to take the necessary stabs at Clinton and Obama finally on the rise again, it’s actually possible that we’ll keep a Bush or Clinton out of the White House for the first time since 1980. At least we’re mixing it up.

Entry Filed under: Politics