Like the buzz for the holiday season's upcoming penguin movie 'Happy Feet', people are hopeful. Who is keeping their hope alive? The better question is what, and the answer is desperation, but the who answer is Barack Obama. As closely as I have looked at the Jr. Senator, he is a policy reincarnation of Paul Simon, whose legacy he inherits in the Land of Lincoln. Already, wags are comparing him to JFK.
To all of that I say phooey.
Any serious criticism of George W. Bush must begin, although not end, with the fact that he runs the White House with no regard to the open way in which things get done in Washington DC. In short, if you want an outsider to run roughshod over the bureaucracy, then Obama is as likely to satisfy you as anyone.
I happen to be one of those people who believe that the best path to the presidency is trod by people with executive experience. In other words, governors. Especially governors who come from one party in states where the legislative majority is from another party, and they still manage to get things done. That's a tall order, but it is a very good predictor. I would add to that somebody who really knows the backdoors and tricks of Washington politics.. but I've said some of this before:
Second, he'd likely have to be a Governor or perhaps a Federal Judge but more likely a head of one of the large civilian agencies. They'd have to understand how to get things done in government.
Thirdly, he'd have to triangulate and say so up front. He would have to have a series.. a long and intense series of Sistah Souljah moments in which he made it clear that he had no place for creeping socialism or international unionism in his party. In fact, he'd have to infuriate the radical Left so much that groups like International ANSWER would feel like they have been kicked to the curb, that they'd seriously have to look at people like Leonora Fulani and the Greens in order to participate.
I'd consider voting for a Red White and Blue party of the non-college educated Second World, bootstraps, Budweiser drinking family man.
When I was a Democrat, the man I thought would be the great black hope in politics was Ron Brown. And behind him, I very much liked Mickey Leland. But somehow both of these gents died in plane crashes. Go figure. Still, there is nobody who remembers them who can honestly say that Barack Obama has nearly the political skill or depth of those men. We don't even have to mention Colin, or even Michael Powell.
A Senator is a different kind of politician, and in my book, the ideal Senator does best as a Senator. He's supposed to get to the bottom of things, way deep into the weeds. Think Senate confirmation hearings or investigative panels. Think legislative packages and working the talk shows, lobbyists and town hall meetings to get some substantial change to student loans or affordable housing grants. Obama has yet to prove that he can do this in the job he just started. He's going to have to show more integrity cookies than his sentimental upbringing and rhetorical aptitude to get any credit around here, much less political capital of a presidential candidate worthy of taking seriously. In that regard, even Schwartzeneggar has done more than Obama, and he's nowhere near presidential material.
As for all the diversity puffery that surrounds Obama. That's just window dressing and everybody knows it. There are ridiculous people who think Obama is worth assassinating, but I have faith that our political system will smack him down before he gets that undeservingly high.
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