Friday, August 29, 2008

I blogged too soon

Seriously, Sarah Palin? Is he kidding?

This really cracks me up. Oh, right, we of the womenfolk were only voting for Hillary Clinton because she was a card carrying member of the uterus party. And since her uterus is out, we'll just vote for the nearest one. This is hysterical. No really, it's hard to write with this pain in my side. I've snorted so many times my brains are scrambled. Seriously?

Anyone else want to share my Kool-Aid?

Months ago, when I knew that Hillary would not be the Presidential nominee, I made a decision that I would support Barack Obama. I didn't really like the decision, it wasn't the decision I wanted to make, wasn't the decision I was ready to make, but I made it anyway because at the end of the day, it is always about the issues. For each of us, it is about the issues that mean the most to us. For me, it is gun control, choice, the economy, unionization, equality for all regardless of race, creed or color, believing there is a better way, empathy, and hope. Qualities and issues that I have never found were best represented by Republican candidates.

So, I must give credit where credit is due. And credit is due to Senator Obama for the glorious speech he made last night.

They can pick on him for many things, but for his oratory skills, they dare not. And for his ability to truly make people believe in the audacity of hope, there can be no doubt that last night, on the anniversary of Dr. King's "I Have a Dream" speech, we all stood a little taller, felt a little better that when change comes, not if change comes, a brighter day will dawn. Yes, it is mostly cliche, but like stereotypes, they get that way because there is something behind them. As an American, I want to be an optimist, I want to believe that our status and relationship with the world can be repaired. I want to believe that we can turn the economy around and help the middle class remain the middle class. I want to believe that we can end hunger not only around the world, but on our own doorsteps. I want to believe that someone will finally reach out to the broken educational system in so many parts of our country and say, we can't let this continue.

We are a people of hope. Every day, across our country, we get back up, dust ourselves off and keep going. After the Great Depression, after two World Wars, after assassinations and failed conflicts, scandals and disappointments, terrorism and natural disaster, we Americans got back up. We got moving. But, to do that, we had to believe and must continue to believe that from the top of our nation, there is someone there who understands, like Senator Obama said last night, and I paraphrase, you can't pull yourself up by your bootstraps, when you don't have bootstraps. There has to be a sense that empathy flows downstream.

And so, I urge you, if you haven't yet gotten on the bus, it's time to buy a ticket. Because we can't live another four years of the last eight. And anyone who says different has lost their sense of hope. It's understandable, but it's not acceptable.

Wednesday, August 27, 2008

Orange. The new color of power.

It's taken me all day to blog about Hillary. I've been pretty torn about where to begin because I feel, well, a lot of sad.

I watched my Presidential candidate last night give what will probably go down as the best speech of the convention, potentially the best speech of her life to date and yet, it won't get us what we want.

Before I begin, I would like to point out that knowing what I know now about Bill Clinton, I would vote for him again. And again. And twice on Sunday. I don't care a whit about his dalliances in reference to how he ran the country. Good Lord, if we could have gotten Bush a Lewinsky, maybe the country wouldn't be heading toward the toilet. If it offends your delicate sensibilities that I would still vote for him, I'm not sorry. I'm just not.

And part of the reason I would vote for him, a large part of it is, Hillary. You know without her, he's still a Rhodes Scholar and all that jazz, but she is part of what makes him great. I'm sure that can be a burden for him at times knowing that she is the reason, but damn it all she is. And the proof was in the pudding last night.

Anyone catch Michelle Obama's face as she watched the speech? Pure speculation on my part, but at first she looked really nervous and then I almost think there might have been something else. Was she thinking, we should have gone with her for VP? Was she thinking, damn, that woman really is a President in the making? Was she thinking, Barack better have a better speech?

Is it me, or is it ironic that at the end of the day, Hillary is the kingmaker? Everyone said she had to go out there and make it nice and unified for Obama because he really needs her supporters to get on the bus. Gee, isn't that just dandy. She loses the nomination and she has to go out and make him the next POTUS.

Hillary was dynamic. She was magnanimous. She was Al Gore saying, yes Mr. Bush, you are the President and I'm not and that's fine because history is going to judge you as an idiot after time passes and well, I'll still be holding the Nobel Prize. In fact, she was so fantastic, I'm just waiting for the media, or the Republicans or any number of the morons out to get her to say, "She was too good." Because she almost might have been.

Hillary was beyond compare and in that moment when the speech was over and the applause were still going, I thought, she was always the one I wanted to vote for and I should have done more to make that happen. I think when Chelsea called her "her hero" it wasn't a cute little soundbite, it was the truth because in that moment that was the campaign and everything since and last night, she was heroic.

One of the stations interviewed an African American delegate who talked about how much Senator Clinton was her candidate and how this woman is the one in her family on election day to call people to remind them to get out the vote. And you know what she followed that up with? "This year, they are going to have to call me. I'm just not sure I can vote for Obama."

Not to mention all the hidden bigots who tell the pollsters they will vote for him and then tell their families they won't, or won't pull the lever when it comes down to it. I have those dear folks in my own family. I'll never understand how they live with themselves, but at least I don't have to BE them.

How is he going to get elected ? Lifelong Democrats saying they can't vote for him? People who never stray from party lines? They can't bring themselves to vote for McCain, but they will stay home. In this great country of ours where it is an honor and a privilege to vote, they will choose to stay home. What then?

I urge you, search your heart on the issues. As Senator Clinton said last night, why were you in the campaign, for her or for the issue? At the end of the day it is the issue. But, it certainly would have been nice to have her experience, her connections, her poise and all that she brought to the table. God forbid he isn't elected, I know what I'll be doing in 2011-2012.

Tuesday, August 26, 2008

No big surprise

Saturday night, I walked in on DH watching Fox News. This doesn't bother me that much because I just start smack talking the TV until he changes it. That and I also subscribe to the notion that you keep your friends close and your enemies closer. And God knows, Fox News is the enemy of all that is holy.

So Mike Huckleberry was on there talking about how sad it was that Obama didn't even vet Hilary blah, blah, blah. And I turned to the husband and said, "Oh here it comes. The Republicans are now going to use this as a wedge to spur on the Clinton supporters who are angry she wasn't chosen, vetted, etc." Not that it takes a rocket scientist to figure out just how underhanded they can be, but by Sunday morning the attack ad was out and about using Hilary's image for their own ends.

I believe I have mentioned it in the blog before, but as my grandfather says, "They're just mean. And by that I mean they are not nice people." If that isn't just the best way to put it, I don't know what is.

Listen, I'm working my way to Obama. I'm still having a hard time conceiving of him as something other than a marketing figment. But, like the pundit said on NBC prior to Mrs. Obama's speech last night, women don't exactly have a lot of places to go besides Obama. It's not like my uterus is suddenly going to stand up and say. "You know what, I know we've been in charge of your reproductive system for a while, but hey that McCain sure is a funny-looking little elf, let's let him run the show now for us and for all the other uterii in this country." uh, yeah, not so much.

I also though it interesting that Mrs. Obama chose to focus her speech around the work American. I agree that when she made the comment about being finally proud to be an American it was taken out of context; I also agree that there is still not a white person alive in this country who would sign up to switch to be an African-American tomorrow (seriously, if you think there aren't many thousands of biggots left in this country, you need to take the rose-colored glasses off and fast) and so she is justified in not being proud of our deeply ingrained racist heritage, I think making a speech in which she repeatedly uses the word American is a little risky because it just recalls what a mistake it was to make that comment to "white" America.

And please, everyone, stop saying that Hilary cracked the glass ceiling. See my previous post as until a woman's hiney is sitting in the oval office, I am tired of hearing about incremental success. Liz Dole ran for President too (and wow, she must have handed over her ovaries prior to running), but no one elected her either. And winning primaries and yet not coming up with the nomination is a hollow victory at best.

I look forward to hearing Senator Clinton this evening and I'm sure my big mouth will have something to say about it tomorrow.

Saturday, August 23, 2008

1984, no really

It's been almost a year since I have written. I realize that is the equivalent of death to a blog and so I recognize that I may be writing to crickets this morning. But, it's really getting to be an interesting election season and I'm having a hard time keeping my mouth shut (shock!).

There seem to be quite a few Democrats upset this morning that Obama picked Joe Biden. Sorry folks, but have you seen Obama? He needs Biden desperately. The race is tight. And it will continue to be so. I'm no McCain fan (he would make a great dinner guest but I don't want him running my uterus, er,, country), however all this discussion about "change" is completely irrelevant in light of the way DC is set-up. Hilary was right, she was the candidate of change because she has affected change for years. You can't effect change if you don't know how DC works and Joe Biden knows how DC works.

Obama really needed Hillary. But, since his people were unwilling to even vet her (for what stupid reason I cannot fathom), they have to go with Joe. You don't have to be a pundit to say that he raises the credibility of Obama on foreign policy, on reaching across the aisle, on knowing how DC works and importantly to me, on energizing the base, most specifically the unions whom Obama has apparently forgotten are part of the backbone of the Democratic Party. I can't figure out if his people think the unions are irrelevant or antiquated, but he needs to get a grip on the base. Because if the youth and the African American voters do not turn out in record numbers, we Democrats are in deep doo-doo come November.

Notice I keep saying Obama's people, because he's a babe in the woods on a lot of this. It isn't that he isn't an incredibly intelligent guy, but at this stage of the game, sadly, intelligent isn't enough. We the People complain about career politicians out of touch with reality. Bad news folks, it takes a professional politician to get elected. That's the game. And he isn't quite as professional as you need to be.

Don't get me wrong, I'm so repulsed after the last eight years, I'd vote for any burro they run (though I still mourn the loss of Hillary; and BTW, stop saying she has made such a difference and opened all these doors for women, I don't see her sitting in the White House, do you? Because that's the only way the mysogeny in this country would be seen as beginning to go away.

And one more thing before I go, ladies we all need to wake up and fast because our reproductive rights are going straight out the window. This isn't about Supreme Court picks, it's about these uber conservative civil servants writing laws that are putting their hands all over our bodies. Saying that birth control = abortion? This statement may shock you, but the first time I heard it was my senior year of high school 15 years ago. We had a crazy assembly with some nut trying to teach natural family planning while she nursed her four-year-old on the stage in front of 17 and 18 year old young men and women (I don't object AT ALL to public breastfeeding, but I think for a Catholic High School this was a bit much, especially to a generation where probably 90% of us had not been breastfed). She said if you took the birth control pill you were having an abortion every month. Imagine what I thought as I sat there having taken the pill that morning--actually I gave her a bunch of crap because I was on the pill for ovarian cysts and couldn't believe anyone could be as ignorant as this woman was. Couldn't figure out how she could get the entire premise of the science behind the pill wrong. And here we are, 15 years later and they are writing this insanity into law. Health and Human Services is losing their mind. And they're worried about protecting health care professionals who don't want to prescribe or dispense the pill from discrimination? 1984 calling, the state wants you.