On Race, Gender and Reconciliation

It was a brilliant summer day in Atlanta, and the lumescent, blue sky lifted my already risen spirits as I was planning my wedding. A coworker and I were shopping for wedding dresses in an upscale suburb, both of us dressed in the standard uniform for such an event: sweats and sneakers. My coworker carried the look off with much more chic than I, with her tall frame, warm brown eyes and rich, espresso colored skin giving her the natural grace of a woman for whom sweats is a weekend indulgence.

Me? I just looked a little dumpy.

We had just hit our first shop, a cozy, new business run by a mother/daughter team. The dresses, and brides, and bridesmaids, and friends, and female relatives filled the tiny store with a joyous, bustling excitement. My coworker found The Dress, and insisted to me it just had to be The Dress, and after I tried it on still was talking about The Dress when we hit our second shop.

The second shop was a bigger establishment, with large windows, and floor to ceiling mirrors, teaming with mostly blonde-haired, mostly blue-eyed, uniformly petite, white, female staff. As we walked in we saw the demographics of the clientele matched those of the store assistants, like separate socks of an identical pair.

We proceeded toward the racks of dresses, placed in the middle of the expansive space, when we were met by a store clerk.

"May I help you?" She asked, suspiciously eyeing my coworker.

"Yes." I said. "We just want to try on some dresses."

The clerk, never taking her eyes off my coworker, exhaled deeply, her voice trembling with annoyance and a touch of fear.

"Our brides," she said, "make an appointment."

"Um...okay." I said. "Can we make one later on today?"

"No." She said, barely looking at me.

"Well, can we make one next weekend?" I asked.

"No." She said. "The only day we have available for appointments is Wednesday. And the store closes at six."

"Oh." I said, unsure of what to say next. "Well, we both work so, I guess we'll just go somewhere else then."

"Yes, I think you should." And with that the store clerk glanced toward the door, willing us toward it with all the body language she could muster.

It was outside, heading toward the car that my coworker looked at me, a small, white woman, her eyes still stinging with disbelief.

"Was that..." She hesitated. "Was that what I think it was?"

I looked up at her, my blue eyes meeting hers.

"Yes." I answered.

We silently drove back to the cozy, cramped store, not knowing what to say about what had just happened.

The problem with racism is it strikes regardless of whether you're prepared for it or not. Like a cold slap it hits you in the face, unprepared, and leaves you reeling as you try to search for answers. What just happened? Was this really real? Why did it happen to me?

And then it leaves a small wound in your soul, that heals slowly until the scab is ripped off by the next event that takes you just as much by surprise. It leaves you with a small kernel of pain deep inside.

Sexism does the same thing. I remember the frustration, sitting in front of my corpulent boss after getting up the nerve to ask him to be considered for a promotion from secretary to one of two sales jobs that had just opened up, when he told me in no uncertain terms that because I was a young woman all I was going to do was go have babies so why would he give me one of these jobs just to have me leave. My education, my experience with the company meant nothing. I was young, and female, and somehow that meant "unpromotable".

And sometimes events like this, across a person's life, just serve to grow that kernel of pain until it lashes out at the society that nurtured it. It can happen when delivering a sermon, in the heat of cheering crowds. It can happen when writing an op-ed in the New York Times, telling women they just have to vote for a female candidate in order to be "true" feminists.

The one strength we have as progressives is empathy. We aren't progressives because we're rich, or because we love free markets and small government. We're progressives because, at some point in time, all of us have felt or seen others feel that kernel of pain, either because of race, or gender, or sexual orientation, or economic status. We have seen injustice in people being denied health care, and we question a foreign policy that pursues death and destruction over peace and diplomacy.

We have empathy. We put ourselves in someone else's shoes and understand injustice from that person's perspective.

But somehow in this presidential race, good progressives have lost that empathy. We have allowed ourselves to be so co-opted by winning, and strategy, and what's-worse-sexism-or-racism that we have lost our empathy. We have turned our back on the very thing that made us progressives in the first place. We have failed to understand each other, and instead hurl insult and invective at each other as fast as our fingers can fly over our keyboards.

This is no longer about Barack Obama. It is no longer about Hillary Clinton. Forget the "50 state strategy", or coat-tails, or turning red states into blue states. Partisans on both sides have now become the rigid idealogues we have decried on the right for so many years.

We have lost our empathy, and in doing so we have lost our way.

So, this weekend, try for a moment to walk away from the keyboard, shut your eyes and put yourself into that other person's place. Understand where they are coming from. Put aside the anger, and frustration, and outrage.

It is time to reconcile, and take back our strength again.

Paul Krugman's Latest Pin Prick Of The Obama Bubble

Paul Krugman's piece today is already being derided by some vocal Obama supporters, as it makes the real world argument that any Democratic President will be attacked by the GOP. Although that may sound like a given to those of us here in the grown-up wing of the Democratic Party, to the post-partisan hopedacious crowd this is new to them.

What a hoot.

Krugman, being the realist that he is, feels that the best way to weather these attacks is through a well-formulated platform of detailed policies (and not half-baked compromises right out of the box):

"...I have colleagues who tell me that Mr. Obama's rejection of health insurance mandates -- which are an essential element of any workable plan for universal coverage -- doesn't really matter, because by the time health care reform gets through Congress it will be very different from the president's initial proposal anyway. But this misses the lesson of the Clinton failure: if the next president doesn't arrive with a plan that is broadly workable in outline, by the time the thing gets fixed the window of opportunity may well have passed..."

link: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/28/opinio n/28krugman.html?_r=1&ref=opinion&am p;oref=slogin

And although Krugman observes that this primary season has gotten "terribly off track" due to the politics of personalities and celebrity, he does have kind words for the one candidate who has tried to make his campaign about the things that actually affect all of our bottom lines:

"...What the Democrats should do is get back to talking about issues -- a focus on issues has been the great contribution of John Edwards to this campaign -- and about who is best prepared to push their agenda forward..."

Will Americans wake up in enough time to realize that the politics of personality does nothing to help themselves or their families?

I don't know. But I have Hope.

Why Edwards Needs To Stay In

Okay, let me just objection-handle for a couple of moments. From all appearances Edwards is over 15% in South Carolina, meaning he will earn delegates from this thing when everything's said and done.

Now, before the punditry and the Clinton campaign start spinning all of the various reasons why John should drop out, let me address these concerns now.

*Objection One: The Sore Loser*

To reiterate talking points from a "senior Clinton advisor" this week:

The former first lady's allies say the longer Edwards stays in the race, the more problems his candidacy will cause the party down the road.

One senior adviser to the Clinton campaign said Edwards was "angry" because the primary race isn't turning out the way he had hoped. Now, Edwards just wants to make life miserable for everyone else.

Some think Edwards is playing the role of a spoiler, prolonging the day of reckoning between Clinton and U.S. Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois, the Democratic front-runners. They fear the longer the Clinton-Obama battle goes on, the harder it will be to heal the inevitable wounds in the Democratic Party. It's time for Edwards to drop out of the race, they say.

link: http://www.mercurynews.com/opinion/ci_8052139

*Why this is a false meme*

1. As seen by what is widely being acknowledged as a retaliatory vote by African Americans *against* the Clinton campaign tactics in South Carolina, it's pretty damn clear who in this race has already "caused more problems for the party down the road"...and that ain't John Edwards. By playing a cynical race game to try to downplay a defeat in South Carolina, the Clintons have thrown the fragile and often abused relationship between the Democratic Party and African Americans under the bus to achieve their own political aspirations. And they have the temerity to suggest that it's John Edwards who is causing the party problems?

Hillary, puh-leeze. Talk to the hand, girlfriend, cuz we ain't listenin'.

2. "Prolonging the day of reckoning between Clinton and Obama". Cute. As if we're spectators at some type of live computer game where Hillary and Barack are both Death Ninjas.

Uh-huh.

John Edwards being in this race is the tether to Hillary's attacks. She can't go too far out on that limb for fear of alienating folks and sending them his way. An all out flame-war between the Clinton campaign and the Obama campaign does nothing but give the GOP fodder for the general election. *This* is not in the best interests of the party. Edwards has consistently made his campaign about this issues, and his staying in this race is the best hope we have for the primaries to continue to *be about the issues*. Hate the flame wars? Keep Edwards in this thing.

3. John Edwards is "angry" and a "sore loser". Sigh...well at least we know how the Clintons are going to attack *his* character. No, John Edwards is not "angry". Edwards supporters are not "angry". We just want this election to be *about the issues*. And yes, we're in this to pull the debate to the left.

'Nuf said.

*Objection Two: If Edwards Pulled Out Obama Would Win This Thing*

This is the culmination of arguments I've read in threads, and diaries, and all over the place.

*Why this is a false meme*

1. There is no evidence that *all* or *most* of Edwards's supporters would vote for Obama.

2. If Edwards pulls votes from Hillary this only helps Obama in a brokered convention. Edwards has already made several declarations that he and Obama are closer on the issues to each other than they are to Hillary. He has already very publicly called her the "status quo candidate". Therefore, one could reasonably assume that if Edwards were to support anyone in a brokered convention that person would be Barack Obama. Edwards's support may be the deciding factor in such a scenario, and breaking toward Obama would give him the win.

So, Hillary folks: "Edwards is a loser and is hurting the party" won't fly. Obama folks: "Edwards pulling out would give Obama the win" isn't actually the case.

Y'all chill. Edwards is - and should - stay in this thing to the convention.

Peace.

Why Obama's Comment Stings My Soul

...Or, Fear And Loathing in the 1980's.

I don't mean this to be a hit diary, or a pile on. But in reading the discussions around the blogs today on Obama's growingly-infamous comment about Reagan's legacy, I feel like some folks just don't get it, they truly do not empathize with those of us on the left who hear the word "Reagan" and see red. I think a lot of this is due to not sharing a common history.

So, briefly, these are some recollections that jump into my brain when I hear "Reagan"...

It was 1980. There was no internet. There was no cable (or at least none in my neck of the woods in small town Nebraska). We got our news from the local paper, the Lincoln paper and four broadcast network stations. I was a bored thirteen-year-old, walking the school hallways with her head stuck in a book and glasses perched on my nose, trying to grow through these years as quickly as possible so I could Get Out. Escape To The Great World Beyond.

In 1980 a lot of stores in our small town still closed on Sunday...and they were still huddled around the town square, encasing the county courthouse. If you wanted something you had to either get it Saturday or drive into Lincoln. We had a local movie theatre that was still open (although the local businesses stopped giving out "movie money" coupons a few years back).

The big news of the day was the Iranian hostage crisis. On the radio in the car, on the TV news at night, in the schools during our discussions of current events, everyone would get updated on "Day Number ____ ", a macabre notation of how many days the hostages had been held. This would be followed up with blurry film footage and photographs of men and women, blindfolded, surrounded by young men with guns. We were treated to reports of what happens when one is being taken hostage. What that feels like. Whether they let you go to the bathroom.

Analysts would discuss the Carter administration's action - or lack thereof. Carter refused to negotiate with terrorists. Eventually we heard news of a downed plane and a failed rescue attempt. People were frustrated and scared. It felt like the one battle in the Cold War that we were losing (regardless of the reality of things - trust me, this *is* what it felt like)...and we all collectively understood the threat that loomed if we let that happen.

It is this environment that elected tough-talking Ronald Reagan. The Man of Action. The choice of "Other" on your ballot. It was hardly the masses yearning for "...a return to that sense of dynamism and entrepreneurship that had been missing." After Reagan was elected and the hostages were freed the country breathed a sigh of relief, patting itself on the back for making the right choice. It was only later on that we would learn it was secret negotiations with these terrorists before we even cast our votes - and not all that tough talk - that freed these hostages.

But with the hostages freed we were still under a threat even more dire, that of total nuclear holocaust. Mutually Assured Destruction had been our policy since Kennedy, and - because we couldn't figure out any other way of going about things - it remained our policy since that time. We watched The Day After on the TV, and talked about that woman's hair falling out after being poisoned by radiation. In Nebraska we had a special network news treat: seeing a model of downtown Omaha being blown to bits in a nuclear blast. Unlike the rest of the country, Omaha would be ground zero in a nuclear war as it was the home of the Strategic Air Command.

We drove down gravel roads that suddenly became paved - roads with no names, only the ones that the locals gave them: "missle base roads". Because, well, they were built to lead to a missle base.

And in the middle of all of this the economy boomed, I went to high school and then college and I have to say, even for the eighties I had *really big hair*. And skin tight jeans. (Ah, to have my pre-mommy body back again).

But I digress.

I went to an Ivy League school "back east", where the campus was buzzing about who got the latest job on Wall Street, where the best place to go shopping was and where everyone wore the standard uniform of leather bomber jackets. And in the middle of all of this we learned, and studied, and discussed the Russian threat, the Eastern Block Countries, the history of La Belle Epoch, and, yes, Mutually Assured Deterence. Professors openly questioned the government's assessments of the Soviet threat, the number of missles they had and the numbers we needed to defend ourselves (as opposed to launching a first strike).

I was fortunate enough to go to Russia.

I hung out with engineering students there who openly questioned *their* government's allocation of resources to build these nuclear warheads. Their lack of testing them, and their dictates to just swap components when there were shortage issues. I saw people carrying briefcases and bookbags, to stock up on certain items that hit the store shelves and then disappeared just as quickly. I saw the cheaply made shoes, smoked the cheaply made local cigarettes and walked the streets where small three cylander vehicles - "put put cars" my friend called them - cruised the streets looking for the impossible to find parking spot.

And after all of this I thought to myself: *this* is the Evil Empire? It seemed like a surreal joke, knowing the trillions we had spent in "defending" ourselves against these folks.

It was then I understood I had been lied to. By Reagan. And that the trillions of dollars of debt we incurred at the expense of mentally retarded people being forced into the streets and government programs being stripped to the bone wasn't about protecting us. It was about something else, a more sinister remake of society that was being enabled by a combination of fear and consumption, forcing us to become a more "me" oriented society and less of a "thou" oriented society.

This is why, today, I was deeply saddened listening to Senator Obama's remarks on Reagan. It just took me right back there to that moment in time when, for me, the lie began.

Again, this isn't a hit diary. Just an explanation of where I'm coming from.

Peace.

UPDATE: I was originally just trying to keep this as an expression of what Reagan was really like and what that election was like, but maybe that was a little too subtle. Sorry about that.

To answer everyone, here is Obama's quote, with the part that I take umbrage at highlighted:

I don't want to present myself as some sort of singular figure. I think part of what's different are the times. I do think that for example the 1980 was different. I think Ronald Reagan changed the trajectory of America in a way that Richard Nixon did not and in a way that Bill Clinton did not. He put us on a fundamentally different path because the country was ready for it. I think they felt like with all the excesses of the 1960s and 1970s and government had grown and grown but there wasn't much sense of accountability in terms of how it was operating. I think people, he just tapped into what people were already feeling, which was we want clarity we want optimism, we want a return to that sense of dynamism and entrepreneurship that had been missing.

If you notice, people actually *weren't* feeling that they wanted clarity, optimism and a return to that sense of dynamism and entrepreneurship that had been missing.

People were *in fear*. The 1980 election was about *fear*. It was not about *hope*. The GOP has been attempting to spread the message of Reagan the Great Optimist/Hopemonger/etc. in an effort to cannonize him. This spin is far from reality.

I hope this explains my feelings on the subject a little more directly.

This is a crosspost of a blog entry originally posted on Daily Kos: http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/1/16/202428/519/291/438030

Edwards Wins Nevada Debate By Staying On Message

Here's what you need to know from the Nevada debate tonight: if you want a great, wonkish policy hound, vote for Hillary. If you want a professor who can literally see (and sometimes take) all sides of every issue, vote for Obama.

But if you want a strong leader who will fight for you, your neighbors and the rest of the working folks that you know and love, vote for John Edwards.

With question after question tonight, John stayed on message. The civil rights movement? It was about ordinary folks - just like you and me - who stood up and fought to correct a gross injustice. The economy? The core problem is that there are large, monied interests who are subverting our economic stability, making it harder and harder for working folks to get ahead. Health care? All of us (and I can testify to this from my own personal life) are paying more and more and getting less and less, and we are all one catastrophic illness away from financial ruin.

While Hillary was framing the debate around "black and brown issues" (yes, her words, not mine) and Obama had moments of brilliance tarnished by a tenacious verbosity, John Edwards was short, sweet and to the relevant point: we need to change this country. We need to fix the system to make it work for working people. And we need to do that now.

Anyone who's reading this - the netroots are having a historic drive to raise $7 million dollars for John Edwards this Friday, January 18th. This is unaffiliated with the campaign. It is a people powered push.

If you can, please help us. Whatever you do is greatly appreciated. Visit this link for more details: http://www.johnedwards.com/action/contribute/mygrassroots/?page_id=Mjc2MDc

Together, all of us working folks fighting strong, we can win this thing and take our country back.

On King, Gandhi, Edwards And Why We Need To Fight

Nonviolence is not a cover for cowardice, but it is the supreme virtue of the brave. Exercise of nonviolence requires far greater bravery than that of swordsmanship. Cowardice is wholly inconsistent with nonviolence. Translation from swordsmanship to nonviolence is possible and, at times, even an easy stage. Nonviolence, therefore, presupposes ability to strike. It is a conscious deliberate restraint put upon one's desire for vengeance. But vengeance is any day superior to passive, effeminate and helpless submission.--Mohandas Gandhi

And I am sorry to say this morning that I am absolutely convinced that the forces of ill will in our nation, the extreme rightists of our nation—the people on the wrong side—have used time much more effectively than the forces of goodwill. And it may well be that we will have to repent in this generation. Not merely for the vitriolic words and the violent actions of the bad people, but for the appalling silence and indifference of the good people who sit around and say, "Wait on time."--Martin Luther King, Jr.

King and Gandhi understood the importance of addressing injustice at the moment injustice is occurring. Both advocates of nonviolence, moved by the forces of Satyagraha and Agape Love, they were fighters to the end. Their weapon of choice was nonviolence, but not a passive, meek, "work within the system" nonviolence. King and Gandhi wielded nonviolence as a precise instrument of war for systemic change. All wars - violent and nonviolent - end at the negotiating table. What King and Gandhi understood was that nonviolence allowed someone to approach the negotiating table from a position of strength, and that the use of nonviolence would pave the way for a true peace, a lasting cessation of tensions that could be built on over time because the goal of nonviolence was to redeem both the oppressed and the oppressor.

Some folks like to think of Gandhi as a grandfatherly figure in traditional homespun garb. Some folks like to remember King saying "I have a dream" one day out of the year.

For me, I remember these men as fighters, warriors dedicated to the cause of justice.

I'm not going to put John Edwards - or indeed any presidential candidate - on the level of these two men. But my point is that when Edwards is talking about fighting insurance companies to address the massive injustice of millions of Americans going without healthcare, or making decisions between food and medicine, he's approaching that same path that was trailblazed by these two men years before.

Watch this interview - King was also criticized for his "aggressive" tactics, for not "biding his time, taking it step by step as it goes":



King's response? Privileged classes do not give up their privileges voluntarily. They do not give them up without strong resistance. All of the gains received in civil rights were because folks stood up aggressively in the cause of civil rights. There is an initial response of bitterness, but in the end there is redemption and reconciliation because justice has been achieved.

Now listen to what Edwards is saying about fighting to fix our broken system:



Regardless of who actually gets the Democratic nomination, or indeed who ends up being elected President, Edwards has one thing right: these folks are not going to give up their power voluntarily. It will be an epic battle to get our country back on track. With John Edwards in the White House those of us who want systemic change to fix our country will have a powerful ally.

This isn't about just electing one guy or gal to the job, packing up our stuff and watching American Idol re-runs for the next four years. This election is just one of many salvos in the fight for justice.

For me, a part of that fight is supporting John Edwards for President. Obviously, I'd like anyone reading this to consider supporting him as well.

But regardless of who you support, let's just be clear: after the elections we will have a fight on our hands, and let's joyfully join that cause.

The Shining City Upon A Hill Is A Gated Community

It isn't class warfare to talk about this - this is the truth. --John Edwards, DNC Winter Meeting Speech

But story, or legend, he described the atmosphere, the strain, the debate, and that as men for the first time faced the consequences of such an irretrievable act, the walls resounded with the dread word of treason and its price -- the gallows and the headman's axe. As the day wore on the issue hung in the balance, and then, according to the story, a man rose in the small gallery. He was not a young man and was obviously calling on all the energy he could muster. Citing the grievances that had brought them to this moment he said, “Sign that parchment. They may turn every tree into a gallows, every home into a grave and yet the words of that parchment can never die. For the mechanic in his workshop, they will be words of hope, to the slave in the mines -- freedom.”--Ronald Reagan, The Shining City Upon A Hill

John Edwards is delivering the long-overdue Democratic response to Reagan's speech, The Shining City Upon A Hill. Long lauded by conservatives as one of Reagan's seminal speeches, it interlaces an American nostaglia steeped in mysticism with concepts now foreign to the GOP, things like "even a land as rich as ours can't go on forever borrowing against the future", and a reverence for the Constitution as "probably the most unique document ever drawn in the long history of man's relation to man", and "never again will young Americans be asked to fight and possibly die for a cause unless that cause is so meaningful that we, as a nation, pledge our full resources to achieve victory as quickly as possible." Talk about the party of flip-flops!

But I digress.

Reagan also presents in this speech the case for trickle-down economics being in the best interest *of working men and women*:

Standardization means production for the masses and the assembly line means more leisure for the worker -- freedom from backbreaking and mind-dulling drudgery that man had known for centuries past. Karl Marx did not abolish child labor or free the women from working in the coal mines in England – the steam engine and modern machinery did that.

snip

One-half of all the economic activity in the entire history of man has taken place in this republic. We have distributed our wealth more widely among our people than any society known to man. Americans work less hours for a higher standard of living than any other people. Ninety-five percent of all our families have an adequate daily intake of nutrients -- and a part of the five percent that don't are trying to lose weight! Ninety-nine percent have gas or electric refrigeration, 92 percent have televisions, and an equal number have telephones. There are 120 million cars on our streets and highways -- and all of them are on the street at once when you are trying to get home at night. But isn't this just proof of our materialism -- the very thing that we are charged with? Well, we also have more churches, more libraries, we support voluntarily more symphony orchestras, and opera companies, non-profit theaters, and publish more books than all the other nations of the world put together.

Reaganomics was always framed in terms of the benefit to the *common man*. Reagan himself pitched people on its acceptance as choosing "freedom over security".

Recent history has proven him wrong. In all aspects of the abject failure of "small government", ranging from the failure to rebuild Iraq, the still-muddled response to Katrina, the mortgage crisis, the almost-weekly announcement of another toxic substance in your toddler's apple juice or lead paint on his beloved toy, history has shown us the problem of pursuing Reagan's myth-filled vision to its logical conclusion.

Now is the time to deliver the Democratic response to Reagan's flawed policies. This past week, John Edwards did exactly that, both at the DNC Winter Meeting and at the Heartland Presidential Forum:



Edwards is answering nostaglia with reality. The Shining City Upon A Hill has become a gated community, excluding most Americans from its promise:

There's a wall outside Washington and we need to take it down. The American people are on the outside. And on the other side, on the inside, are the powerful, the well-connected and the very wealthy. That wall didn't build itself or appear overnight. For decades politicians without conviction and powerful interests gathered their bricks and their stones and their motar, and they went to work. They went to work to protect their interests, to block the voice of the American people, and to stop our country's progress. They went to work to protect, and defend, and maintain the status quo.

snip

Every single day, working men and women see that wall when they have to split their bills into two piles, pay now and pay later; when they watch the factory door shut for the last time; when they see the disappointment on their son or daughter's face when there's no money to pay for college. Every single day they see that wall when they have to use the emergency room as a doctor's office for their son because they can't afford to pay for healthcare.

And the Republicans, the party of Reagan who once at least at one time connected with working men and women? Where are they now?

In denial. They've been living inside that gated community for so long they've forgotten there's a world that exists outside its walls:



Now isn't the time to only ask ourselves, "who can beat the Republicans". Don't get me wrong, I would like to see a win for the Democrats in 2008 just as much as many other people in our party.

There's a deeper, more fundamental question that we have to confront: who can undo the harm that the Republicans have left us with? Who can reverse the extremist philosophies that have eroded the promise of America for so many of its citizens?

John Edwards is showing a clear, competing vision to extremist neocon doctrines that have ruled the GOP and our country:

We have a choice in this election. We can keep trying to shout over that wall. We can keep trying to knock out a chink here and there, to punch little holes in it and hope to get our voices through. We can settle for baby-steps, or half measures and incremental change, and try and inch our way over that wall or toward a better future.

Or we can knock it down.

Let's knock that wall down, together.

Edwards: 1, Republicans: 0

What does a candidate who takes strong positions, tells folks he won't back down and whose campaign is fueled by a progressive populist agenda get?

Votes.

He also wins over Republicans after they watch *their own party's* debate:





Someone like Jim Geraghty at National Review may whine, saying "where do they find these people?" ( http://campaignspot.nationalreview.com/post/?q=YTM4Y2ZiY2MyMTZjMTI5OGM3NWE1OTRjNThhMjY0YzE= ) but it's clear that even older Republicans are ready for someone to stand up and finally lead this country.

I'm an Edwards supporter. I've written my fare share of diaries praising him when he's given great speeches or hit home runs at Democratic debates.

But I've never been given the opportunity to do some candidate cheerleading after a debate where the candidate didn't even show up.

This is sweet.

Why We Can Do Better Than Hillary

I've been cruising the blogs for some time now, and I've always been intrigued at the ardent Hillary Clinton supporters I've found on the web. I'm intrigued because, frankly, they're some of the angriest people out there.

My purely anecdotal experience in talking with some of these folks is their number one, big, huge, over-riding reason for supporting Hillary Clinton is not that she will push for the changes necessary to address things like Iraq, health care and global warming. It is not that she will address the gross economic inequities that have lead to working folks barely able to get by. It isn't that she'll even do anything about our outrageous gas prices or halt the spread of the Iraq war to neighboring states like Iran.

It's that...she'll rub the Rethuglican's noses in it. Yes, I am using the term "Rethuglican" because more often than not this is how these folks refer to our fellow human beings who register themselves with the GOP. While Hillary Clinton herself speaks of the wonders of compromise, and incremental change, and How Lobbyists Are People, Too, her most ardent supporters are pinning their hopes and dreams on the day that they can turn to their conservative coworkers at the water cooler and give them the glare that says "we beat you, stuff it!"

Forget issue oriented politics. Forget the fact that you might actually need the support of some of these folks in order to govern.

Forget the fact that it is our system that is the problem: the lobbyists who corrupt it; the corporate media who acquiesces to it and the politcians who have a vested interest in business as usual.

No, let's all turn our hatred and ire on our brothers and sisters who are struggling to make ends meet, who also have a vested interest in fixing global warming and who also want us to get out of Iraq like it was yesterday. Let's engage in the same politics of division that we've been doing for the past eight years, but this time let's put a Democrat in office. That'll show 'em.

And while we're so busy "showing 'em", the artic ice cap will continue to melt, soldiers and civilians will continue to die in Iraq and possibly Iran, millions of families will not be able to get the health care we need and our corrupted system will still let in lead-enhanced toddler toys and toxic apple juice in the name of unfettered, unregulated free trade.

Democrats: we are better than this. Yes, it is right to be outraged at the state of our nation right now. But let's direct the outrage at the folks who deserve it: the corporate lobbyists who have corrupted our democractic system and the politicians that have let them do it. Don't be horn-swaggled into thinking that one-upping Bob at the office will make your life any better. Bob ain't your problem.

The problem lies with politicians who excuse the corrupt system, who think that small, incremental change and protecting the status quo is the way to make our country better.

We are better than this. We can elect politicians that are better than this. We can elect folks like John Edwards, who understand that you can't accept big money and expect big change.

Let's take our country back. Now.

Diamonds and Pearls and Corporations O My!

What a difference some pre-planning makes. During the last debate the last five minutes were actually pretty darn interesting, filled with discussions on issues...or at least trying to sort out exactly where the front runner stood on the issues.

And tonight? What was The Final, Great Question of the Evening, the One On Everyone's Minds? Why, it was...

Does Hillary Clinton favor diamonds or pearls?

Oh, my!

I have a nasty internal cynic. It jumps out at me from time to time, regardless of how well I try to squelch its gleeful moroseness. Tonight it was in full force.

Before listening to the debates I heard an interesting rumor floating around the blogosphere that John Edwards was going to participate in the Writer's Guild of America strike tomorrow. Wow, I thought to myself, that's really walking your talk. How great to have a Presidential candidate walk off of a debate and onto a picket line.

And then...the debate started. Edwards shoved to the far corner of the floor. Hillary and Obama front and center. The thunderous applause for Senator Clinton as she walked in the room.

My internal cynic pounced:

"Look!" It cried, mouth agape. "He's supporting the writer's strike, and CNN is owned by Time Warner. The fix is in!"

"No." I reasoned with it, stroking its forehead. "That's just random. Bad luck of the draw. There's nothing untoward happening."

And then the debate went on. And on. And on. No real interaction between the candidates. Edwards using the brief time he was allotted to make stunningly transcendent statements about the need to make this debate about something greater than who got whom, and focus on the folks out there who need our help. To finally get some backbone and fight for what's right.

As the minutes dripped away my internal cynic groused around, kicking the cobwebs in my head as it complained about the lack of time given to Edwards, and Wolf Blitzer's failure to follow up to get clarity on anything from the Democratic frontrunner.

Finally, my internal cynic and I sat and listened with rapt attenion as Barack Obama was able to corner Hillary Clinton on an upstate-New York, Westchester County elitism that holds that someone making over $90,000 is "middle class", when that defines only 6% of the folks living in this country. Hillary started to try to say that this was really about her constituents and then -

We cut to commercial. A commercial about a hedge fund protecting the wealth of a fictional woman who owns multiple luxury properties in multiple countries.

"But wait just a little while longer." I insisted, as my internal cynic writhed in the painful irony of it all. "The really important part of the last debate was in the last few minutes. There's still time."

And then, in the last few minutes, a young girl in the audience asked...if Hillary Clinton Preferred Diamonds or Pearls.

Don't you hate it when your internal cynic is right?

A Short Rant About Health Care And The Media

Millions of people have no health care insurance in our country right now. Millions more have "junk insurance", that doesn't cover what they need to have covered when they get sick. Millions more are holding off on retiring because they can't afford the health care coverage on their own.

And then there's working folks like my husband and myself who are seeing our net pay decrease, even after cost of living raises, due to ever increasing health care costs.

That's the problem. Here's John Edwards's solution:



"...When I'm president I'm going to say to members of Congress and members of my administration, including my Cabinet: I'm glad that you have health care coverage and your family has health care coverage. But if you don't pass universal health care by July of 2009, in six months, I'm going to use my power as president to take your health care away from you. There's no excuse for politicians in Washington having health care when you don't have health care."

And here's Big Media's Retreat From Our Health Care Debate:

"...While a President Edwards could mount public pressure based on the 47 million Americans who lack health insurance, Congress is, to put it mildly, unlikely to relinquish its own coverage. In fact, some experts argue that such a law would violate the 27th Amendment's ban on "varying the compensation" of members of Congress without an intervening election. Schultz said Edwards would ask senior administration officials to voluntarily give up their health coverage if he fails to pass universal coverage..."

Link: http://blog.washingtonpost.com/the-trail /2007/11/13/edwards_impossible_promise.h tml

So, let me get this straight. There's an injustice of epic proportions happening in this country, because millions of our citizens can't get the health care they need.

And we can't fix that because...proposing legislation to Congress to remove their own health care coverage until the rest of us poor schlubs have it is unconstitutional?

Run that past me again?

Didn't we have a little thing in this country called a revolution? Wasn't a part of that whole thing addressing the denial of basic rights and freedoms for everyone, not just protecting them for the very few in charge of the government?

Isn't access to health care a basic right? Shouldn't that be protected by our Constitution?

When our Constitution was unjust in the past, or failed to address an injustice, we changed it. And if you're telling me that the Constitution currently promotes an injustice - by allowing some folks to have access to a basic right that is simultaneously denied to others - isn't it time to change the Constitution?

When our country was comprised of small printing presses, folks like Thomas Paine used them to promote the radical ideas of freedom and liberty, and the idea that you don't have to be a member of the ruling class to have access to basic rights.

Now our country's media is run by megalith corporations who distribute their news and opinion pieces via broadcast, cable, satellite and the internet, in addition to the good, old fashioned printing press. And instead of using this power to argue for basic rights and freedoms, they are now arguing exactly the opposite: that those in charge of our government should have access to a basic right that ordinary citizens do not have guaranteed access to...because they are in the government.

My how times have changed.

John Edwards: Toward A New, Democratic Politics

The in-tuned blogosphere already knows a lot about John Edwards: the endorsements he's received by state SEIU chapters including the important states of Iowa and New Hampshire; the endorsement by Friends of the Earth and the most recent endorsement by Iowans for Sensible Priorities. Folks are also aware of his calls for an end to the corrupt system in Washington, D.C., a system he defines as being "rigged" against all of us people who work for a living.

At first blush, this may seem like smart politics. Appealing to the base. Riding the wave of middle class anger. But there's something a lot more profound going on here, something that is an anti-Bush, Rove-free approach to democratic politics.

Come follow me and I'll tell you what I mean...

If you're going to try to fix a problem or address an injustice, there's a few ways to go about it. You could, for instance, focus on the immediate problem at hand and do a lessons-learned analysis (for instance, not putting a well-connected but incompetent fellow in charge of FEMA, and just hope that disaster doesn't strike). You could also do some investigations to try and examine the immediate causes of the injustice (for instance, holding hearings on how billions of dollars were just misplaced in Iraq, never to be heard from again). Or, you could try to look at the whole mess holistically, peel away the layers and get to the core issue. You could also look at where we are, where we need to be and set out a roadmap for how to get there.

That's what Edwards is doing, and that's what makes him a truly unique candidate...especially if you want *change*.

Peruse the Edwards website and you'll come across the issues page: http://johnedwards.com/issues/ . On that issues page you'll see the following three main areas, with links to specific policy proposals:

1. Standing up for Regular Families, including links to policy proposals for universal healthcare, poverty, policies to improve the quality of life in rural America, strengthen food safety and other policies and programs that reach out to and improve the quality of life for the individual.

2. Restoring America's Leadership Role In The World. Here you'll find Edwards's foreign policy and proposals that shape how our nation is viewed across the world, including the areas of Iraq, Iran, terrorism, civil liberties and global poverty (for my own analysis of Edwards's foreign policy, including his firm stance against preventive war, please see this diary: http://www.dailykos.com/story/2007/11/6/17523/4824 ).

3. Investing In Our Future And Our Communities, an area which addresses policies and proposals that impact health and well-being of the community at large, including the areas of global warming, education, open media, veterans and civil rights.

All three of these main areas affect each other, and all of the policies inside of these three areas also impact other policies. Everything is inter-related. All of the pieces and parts of the proposals need to work together in harmony in order to create the systemic change we need to reclaim our country.

Finally, none of this can happen, none of this systemic change can take place unless we remove the influence of lobbyist money in politics. Bill Bradley outlines in this in this June, 2007 talk on how the influence of lobbyists can corrupt these policies through an "unstated connection" between the contribution and the result of that contribution:



Sure, John Edwards is a great orator, and there's wonderful speakers across the field of Democratic presidential candidates. But to get systemic change you need more than just speeches: you need well thought-out policies and proposals so you can hit the ground running and start creating that change as soon as you're elected. You need a roadmap, and Edwards provides an impressive one that shows us the steps we can take to fix our problems, take care of our citizens and become a respected member of the community of nations once again.