patrickmurfin

Barack Obama was able to manage the suspense almost until the last moment.  The campaign’s famous self-discipline and tight control of message unraveled only a little as a relentless mainstream media, sniffing the wind for any clue, began to besiege the home of Joe Biden the senior senator from Delaware.  Helicopters circled the scene as if it were an L.A. freeway chase.  When the Secret Service showed up it was game over.  The word was out just hours before the candidate was prepared to make an official announcement.

All evening  Kathy Brady-Murfin kept checking her cell phone.  “I’m expecting a text from Barack!” The message did not come through before she had to turn in.  I’m sure the first thing she did this morning before heading off to work was checking that phone.

Kathy usually does not share my passionate involvement in politics.  In her jaundiced eye all politicians are suspect.  And she usually maintains that there’s not much difference between Democrats and Republicans.  When push comes to shove, she usually does vote Democratic, however.  Rumor has it she may have even voted for me upon occasion.  But Kathy is genuinely excited about Obama.  How excited?  She even signed up for a modest monthly automatic contribution to the campaign through the election, overcoming her usual anxiety over our precarious finances.

My wife is symbolic of all of the folks breathlessly awaiting word from Obama.  It is the passionate devotion of people like her the will give the Democratic ticket an edge that no horse race poll can take into account. 

Are those folks happy with the choice? Judging from the comments flooding into pro-Democratic sites like Huffington Post and the Daily Kos, a handful of curmudgeons and inevitable trolls aside, the pick is a grand slam home run.

The new team got its debut today in Springfield.  Returning to the picturesque and symbolic steps of the Old State Capital on a warm, sunny afternoon, Obama immediately invoked the memory of an equally sunny but much colder March afternoon 19 months ago where he launched his campaign of hope and change to an ecstatic, if frozen audience.  In rolled up shirtsleeves this time, Obama introduced his choice for running mate with genuine enthusiasm and affection.  He emphasized not only Biden’s extensive and widely admired foreign policy chops, but his working class Irish Catholic background, his struggles over tragedy, and his legendary devotion to the family to which he returned each night from Washington on an Amtrack train.  He made much of Biden sharing in an “improbable story,” but one which is intensely American.

Obama also contrasted Biden’s handling to the recent Russian invasion of Georgia to McCain’s bellicose attempt at policy making by press conference by pointing out that Biden “quietly” went to Georgia to meet that nation’s embattled president.  He pointedly said that Biden was “what many others pretend to be -- a statesman with sound judgment who doesn't have to hide behind bluster to keep America strong.’

Biden for his part sprinted confidently to the stage looking—silver hair plugs not withstanding--almost as youthful as Obama.  His speech made it clear why he will be not only an outstanding addition to the ticket, but a great vice president as well.  It is expected that a veep pick will laud the man who picked him.  But Biden was able to articulate how he had personally come to admire Obama as a leader, an agent of change, and as a statesman.  He immediately diffused the pitiful attempts of John McCain’s campaign to use his own presidential debate remarks to undercut Obama.

More importantly, in his characteristic blunt, plain spoken language, Biden immediately went to work on destroying the McCain campaign without personal rancor against a man he called his long time friend.  He invoked the kitchen table discussions “after the kids have gone to bed” repeated in millions of American families beset by soaring prices, stagnating or falling wages, and plummeting home values about how to make ends meet.  He included himself and his family—he is the least wealthy member of the U.S. Senate and reportedly had to take second mortgages on his home to finance his children’s college education—in those kitchen tables discussions.  He contrasted this to McCain who will "have to figure out which of the seven tables to sit at.” 

Then it was off to the races.  Biden lashed McCain to George W. Bush’s sinking and disastrous presidency with a ruthless precision that Obama has been loath to pursue.  He was not even shy about taking on McCain’s status as a war hero who increasingly invokes his P.O.W. experience every time he faces criticism-- "these times require more than a good soldier, they require a wise leader."  He could point out that his own son, the sitting Delaware Attorney General, will soon be deployed to Iraq as a member of the National Guard linking himself to the sacrifice of military families everywhere.  What a contrast to the neo-con war hawks, McCain aside, who avoided war service for themselves and their privileged children.

All in all it was a stellar performance all around.  The photo op with two tall, handsome men flanked by attractive wives, although noticeably shorter in duration than the turn taken by Barack and Michelle last February—probably at the insistence of a nervous Secret Service—made for a compelling pictures.

I didn’t check in with Fox News, where I expect that the usual sniping echoed the pitiful talking points from the McCain campaign, but commentators on both CNN and MSNBC effusive in their praise of Obama’s choice and the performance of both members of the ticket in Springfield.  The only misgivings I heard were that Biden, the fifth senior U.S. Senator, would not reinforce Obama’s message of change and that he does not bring strong economic policy credentials on the table in a year when the sagging economy is emerging as the big issue.

I have to disagree with both assessments.  Biden, although a senior senator, was always something of an outsider just by virtue of his daily commutes back to Delaware and his intense devotion to his family.  Secondly, Obama can argue that the personal esteem in which Biden is held by both sides of the aisle will make him the perfect choice to help steer a program of change through congress.

On the economy, Biden is a great choice because, as Barack repeated in his introduction, “he gets it.”  He understands what working and middle class Americans are going through.  He has been there himself.  And he has a legislative history of not only fighting for, but often spearheading economic initiatives critical to those kitchen table voters.  And he is the antidote to the class cluelessness of the likely ticket of McCain-Romney.

Now it’s on to Denver and sharpening the message of the Obama-Biden campaign even more.

Carolyn Quinn

Right now our Congress is once again discussing a bill that would provide President Bush

with additional funds to continue the War in Iraq.

 
I wring my hands knowing that the discussion most likely focuses how to supply the military

operations and operatives rather than how to bring our operations and operatives home- and

how we will fund their care for decades to come.  But the climate in the world this time is a

little bit different while our congress deliberates. 

Last year, Tony Blair, who had been the most popular Prime Minister in Great Britain’s

istory, also became the least popular - because of his close alliance with George W. Bush

and the Iraq War Fiasco. Tony Blair resigned and was succeeded by Gordon Brown.

Last November, John Howard in Australia was unseated by their new Prime Minister,

Kevin Rudd.  Rudd’s campaign promise was to end Australia’s participation in the Iraq

War and bring their 550 combat troops home by the middle of 2008.

Last Sunday, Australia ended combat operations in Iraq, and the first troops actually arrived

at their mainland.  In the course of the next few weeks the rest of the Australian combat troops

will go home.  No grand chaos erupted, just grand homecomings for those 550 military families. 

Defense Minister Joel Fitzgibbon declared the mission a success, saying it had allowed Iraq’s

own security forces to successfully take control.

Last Monday, Prime Minister  Rudd publicly told his Parliament that his predecessor, John

Howard, had abused intelligence to lead his country into a war that has only served to

increase global terrorism. Rudd has said the Iraq deployment made Australia more of a

target for terrorism.

Last Tuesday, the Canadian House of Commons passed a non-binding resolution in

response to widespread opposition to the war in Iraq throughout their country.  It calls on

their government to stop the deportation of Iraq war resisters who came to Canada seeking

refuge from participating in a war not sanctioned by the United Nations and recognized that

those resisters view the war as illegal and immoral.

Also last Tuesday, Barack Obama clinched the delegate count for a Democratic nomination

and became our presumptive nominee.  His campaign promise has been to end the war in Iraq

altogether and bring our troops home in an orderly manner.

This has been a big week.

Thursday, our own Senate Intelligence Committee declared that the Bush administration “led

the nation to war on false premises.”  The committee chairman is John Rockefeller of West

Virginia.  Rockefeller has now personally declared his support for Barack Obama.  Some

Republicans on the committee voted to support its conclusions, some Republicans immediately

published a dissent document calling it partisan gamesmanship.  Hello?  That, my friends, is

why we elected a Democratic majority.

The media tells us that the results of this fall’s election is likely to be the result of economic woes

and issues.  I don’t think so. 

I continue to wring my hands, but within their clasp is a glimmer of hope.  Here is my prediction

of what CHANGE is going to look like. THIS is the change I believe in:

Next November we elect Barack president and celebrate a historic record in terms of citizen

participation across the country.  Before New Years’ Day, President Obama announces an end

to U.S. combat operations in Iraq and our flag is calmly and respectably taken down from

combat camps there.  “The focus of our military operations is now finding bin Laden in

Afghanistan.”

The Democratic Secretary of Defense can officially claim that Iraqi Freedom was a success. 

Fine. Whatever. The March issue of Time Magazine has a cover picture of grand homecomings. 

Pride of service and valor is all the wave.  Patriotism surges beyond the levels of September 12,

2001.

Next June, President Obama publicly tells Congress that his predecessor had abused intelligence

to lead our country into a war that has resulted in less Iraqi freedom, not more.  Less security in

America, not more.  If anybody can deliver a speech that validates the servicemen and women,

and validates theirservice while at the same time denouncing the decisions to both begin and

maintain war in Iraq… (well, Kevin Rudd did it in Australia this week.) If anybody can deliver

that speech here in the U.S. and pull it off with style and grace, that would be Barack Obama. 

I am looking forward to the day. 

Back to current events in Australia:

Rudd's predecessor, former Prime Minister John Howard, said he was "baffled" by the decision

to withdraw the troops. The Sydney Morning Herald quoted Howard in an interview published

Monday,"If I had been returned at the last election we would not have been bringing (troops)

home, we would

have been looking at transitioning them from their soon-to-be terminated role to a training role."

Can’t you just picture McCain being interviewed in the wings next year saying he was “baffled”

by the decision to withdraw troops?

“The Arizona Daily Star will quote Senator McCain’s response to President Obama’s latest

speech,  ‘If I had been elected president last November, we would not be bringing troops home

or sending them to Afghanistan, we would have been looking at transitioning them from their

soon-to-be terminated roles in Iraq to training roles.  And what about Iran?’ – AP.”

Carolyn Quinn

June 6, 2008

Right

Regular readers of this blog (if any) may have wondered at the absence of regular commentary on the Democratic Presidential Race of late.  As a matter of fact I have not posted a detailed article on the contest since “The Tonya Harding Option—Will Clinton Take it?” way back on March 26th and touched on it tangentially in only three or four other posts.

This is not because the campaign has not been heated—it has raged at blast furnace intensity—or because it is uninteresting—it has had all of the high drama, intricate plot twists, a cast of vivid characters of the most sizzling blockbuster.  Nor has it been because my candidate, Barack Obama has taken some lumps and ridden out some rough patches as the Hillary Clinton, channeling the Bozo Bop Bag has kept on popping back up.  I stand by Obama and I have a grudging admiration for Clinton’s amazing resilience.

While I have not posted here, I have added comments here and there across the blog-o-sphere.  What those comments have consistently said is basically this:  “Look, like it or not Barack Obama is the likely nominee of the party.  Great form me.  Painful for Clinton’s staunch and adoring supporters.  But no matter what happens—even if deus ex machina Hillary is magically delivered the nomination—the stakes are far too high for the people of this nation and the peace and security of the world for Democrats to fail to rally enthusiasitycally around our candidate.  I personally pledge to do so if Hillary becomes the nominee.  Nothing is more worisome to me than polling data that indicates that very significant numbers of each candidates supporters will vote for John McCain or sit on their hands in Novemeber if their favorite looses the nomination.  We must recognize that beyond personal bitterness, far more unites us a Democrats and Americans than divides us.  Pick your favorite hobby horse issues—the war, the ecconomy, the envirornment, women’s rights, civil liberties, health care, education—and either Democrat outshines the tarnished and disgraced re-tread of the Bush maladministration offered by the Republicans.”

One of the big reasons I have not posted here is to keep from falling into the temptation of joining the tit-for-tat bashing, name calling, and whining that has for the last several weeks been the hallmark of the struggle, at least as it is played out with passion in pundit columns, cable trash talk, and endless blogs.  I choose not to help bitterness fester.  As for me, I may take issue with Clinton and her campaign about how and what they have done since realizing that the pre-ordained nomination was slipping from their her hands.  But I love and admire those who love her.  I would hope in the reverse circumstances they would love and admire me.  We need each other.  Honestly.  We have to go beyond mouthing vague platitudes to each other all the while muttering under our breaths.  We must not now make empty gestures of reconciliation based on convenience, but must reconcile out of principle and respect.

Wednesday the five year anniversary of the War in Iraq slipped by before I had an opportunity to comment.  Believe me, it was not because it does not weigh heavy on my mind and soul.  But I had work to do and I had a lot on my plate getting ready for the McHenry County Democratic Party meeting and preparing press materials (see the post below.)

About mid-afternoon I got a call from Tom Musick, a reporter for the Northwest Herald.   He was working on one of those “round-up” stories in which local folks with strong opinions share their views.  We had a nice conversation for about ten minutes or so.   This is how my portion of the story came out in the paper.  (click here for the full article.)

Patrick Murfin

McHenry County Peace Group members gather every Thursday evening near Route 14 and Main Street in Crystal Lake for a vigil.

The group’s size varies, but its mission stays the same: To call for an end to the U.S. war in Iraq and to prevent a future war with Iran from happening.

“Early on, we’d get mixed reviews,” said Patrick Murfin, a member of the group. “The longer this war has passed, the number of supportive honks and waves and peace signs has mounted. It’s really remarkable.”

Yet Murfin worries whether the Bush administration notices such changes.

“I’ve been giving this some considerable thought,” said Murfin, who watched the president’s speech Wednesday, a speech that urged patience and determination in Iraq. “It’s both astounding to me and totally wearisome that we find ourselves in this position after five years.

“To hear the Bush administration talk about no end in sight within a decade or longer ... the American public has long since made it clear that they regard the war as a mistake to begin with and want us to get out now.”

And all of that is fine, as far as it goes.  But understandably this snippet left a lot out.  Also—and I don’t mean to bite the hand the fed me—I was the only person of  those interviewed who was an outright opponent of the war.  The others were a recently returned solder; Rep. Don Manzullo whose own account shows that he gladly drank the Bush Kool-Aid about the war; the father of a soldier who was killed who now regards the war as a “mistake” but doesn’t take a position on getting out; and an Army recruiter.  That left the burden of speaking for the majority of Americans who oppose the war and want a way out sooner than later on my own inadequate shoulders.

This is what I wish I had the time and space to say.

It’s hard, very hard to match the unrelenting drum beat of war and more war propounded by a maladministration that will not allow itself to be fettered by Congress, Courts, or the People and which feels it has a divine right to do what ever it damn well pleases.  In five long years ever mounting casualties are compounded by daily atrocities (committed freely by all sides);  the very soul of the nation is stricken by a cynical embrace of torture;  our civil liberties are silently stripped from us;  our national reputation is sullied beyond repair;  unimaginable debt is saddled on our children, grandchildren, and their progeny;  we are plunged into a “war of civilization” without end;  our very democracy is threatened by an uncrowned king who brooks no limits on his power.  And we in the anti-war movement get tired, bone tired.

We have marched, vigiled, petitioned, organized, written and ranted.  Our ranks have swelled.  But year after year nothing we have done has saved one 19 year old Marine or one Iraqi child.  Small wonder that the spirit sometimes flags, that we get tired, that we are tempted to slip into simple resignation.

Worse, evidence mounts daily the Resident and the Dark Sith Lord Cheney will not rest until the launch another war, this time against Iran.  The recent resignation and retirement of Admiral William Fallon, top commander of American forces in the Mid East and the only high level commander to dare publicly warn about the danger of launching another war, may have been the clearest signal yet that the Neo-Con junta is determined to have another war.  Add the domestic political calculation that launching a war before the election will rally the public “be hind the troops” and put John McCain in the White House.

Peace activists a worn out trying to get us out of one war and now have to keep us out of another.

Regular readers of this blog may have noticed that there has been a fall-off of coverage and commentary about the War and the movement to stop it in recent months.  Instead, it has been increasingly concerned with electoral politics, support for Barack Obama for President, and for Democrats in general.  Some might take this as evidence that I have given in to war weariness and like a bored two year old turned my attention to some other toy.

Nothing could be further from the truth. In point of fact my immersion in politics and my support of the Obama campaign in general now represents the most effective way I can work to end one bloodbath and prevent another.

I know there are folks in the Peace Movement who believe that this abandons the demand for immediate withdrawal, and trims sail in against the gale of adversity.  The taunts of “sell out” to others like MoveOn.org, who have advocated the same approach have been loud and raucous on the part of many in the purer-than-thou left.

But like it or not we cannot “Bring Them Home Now!” or throw our bodies in front of Naval launched cruise missiles or snatch possibly nuclear armed B-1 Bombers from the sky to stop an attack on Iran.  There are no prospects, despite our most ardent fantasies, that we can mobilize a Peoples Revolution to surround the White House with pots and pans clanking and bring down this regime as others fell in Moscow, Manila, Kiev, or Beirut.  There will be no General Strike to stop the war cold like the hands of a clock.  Richly deserved impeachment will not happen.

Our only real chance to bring the war to an end is—like it or not—to elect a Democrat President of the United State and large enough Democratic margins in the House and the Senate to prevent disciplined Republicans from ruling in the minority.  And I obviously believe that Senator Obama, a consistent opponent of the war, is our best chance to achieve such a victory.  But make no mistake about it, I will, even if it pains me, support Hillary Clinton if that is the hand we are dealt and then hold her to her promises to end the war.

The inevitable result, even with victory, will be for a phased withdrawal that insures the safety of American troops.  It’s not fast enough for many, but the war will finally end.

Even more critically, there will not be, if one has not already been launched, a war with Iran and the inevitable region-wide conflict that would ensue.

Is there any guarantee that this strategy will work?  Of course not.  Right now we see how cynically race is being used to divide the American people from their own best interests.  McCain, for the first time, is now polling better nationally than either Clinton or Obama—a direct result of the political strategy of the Clinton campaign, in my opinion.  But there is plenty of time to reverse those numbers and Obama has the persuasive skills to come back strong.

A plausible causa bellum can always be dug up like Hitler’s Polish raid on a border radio instillation post or LBJ’s phantom attack in the Gulf of Tonkin to justify an attack on Iran just before the election.

And there are the twin dangers that if faced with loss the election the Oligarchy will simply and boldly be steal it again or—more drastically—that a “national emergency” might occur that would “force the government to suspend the election.”  Feel free to conjure in you mind your most paranoid fantasies of what that emergency might be and it has probably already been gamed in some dark recess of the Pentagon or the Vice-President’s old secret bunker.

So, no, the electoral strategy is not perfect.  It’s just the last, bet hope we have.

                                                      
                                                     

 One of these things is not like the others.  Can you guess which one, boys and girls?

It is Presidents Day.  Bear with me, dear reader, and try to sustain the warm glow of that holiday as you peruse my rambling thoughts.

To begin with, it’s a bastard holiday, born of merchant greed on one hand and the despair of parents stuck with small children at home twice in February.

The old Federalists made sure that the nation celebrated Washington’s Birthday.  It was to be a patriotic celebration emphasizing dignity, decorum and authority.  In short, it was to celebrate a Founder demigod, an old revolutionary stripped of rabble and insurrection.  The old Republicans—the Jeffersonians—not  be confused with the current squatters on than honorable appellation—despised the celebration as monarchal and preferred to swarm the streets carrying  Liberty Caps on poles—French style—on other occasions.

But Washington deserved the honor.  He invented being President.  He served honestly and honorably, and if he preferred the council of his Secretary of the Treasury, Alexander Hamilton to that of his fellow Virginian Thomas Jefferson, at least he resisted all of the former’s blandishments toward aristocracy and his desire to advance himself as Grand Vizier to the President’s Caliph.  Most importantly Washington earned every accolade he has received by the simple act of voluntarily leaving the job and allowing his successor to peacefully follow him into office.  This precedent setting feat has seldom been matched in post-revolutionary nations.  That Americans take it for granted is astonishing.

Meanwhile, most Northern states added Lincoln’s Birthday to their calendars following the Civil War..  It began amid the hagiography of the fallen leader and his elevation to martyr status and continued as a way for the Grand Army of the Republic and the new Republican Party to Wave the Bloody Shirt at home while sticking their collective thumbs in the eye of their vanquished foes.  Across the old Confederacy Lincoln was reviled as a murderous tyrant.  They preferred to celebrate Jefferson Davis, or better yet the unblemished knight of the Lost Cause, Robert E. Lee.

When Harry S. Truman finally proclaimed Lincoln’s Birthday a Federal holiday, his very Confederate mother, residing with him and Bess at the White House, cursed her son and never forgave him.

So the nation ended up with two holidays in inconvenient February.  If only they had managed to get born at a decently separated interval of months, both might have been able to retain their own holiday.

But, alas, they did not.  And the days often fell either inconveniently mid-week or on a weekend.  The former disrupted the work week for employers.  The latter cheated workers of a paid holiday.  Educators hated the disruption to their pedagogy of two holidays.  Parents despaired of rug rats at home.  Merchants yearned for an extended week-end of sales.  So Congress, in its infinite wisdom, decreed Presidents Day, conveniently set down on a Monday between the actual natal anniversaries of the original honorees.  Whoopee! Three Day Weekend!

Better yet none of the rest of the denizen’s of the White House need feel slighted—this was going to be their holiday too.  Like a first grade T-ball player spared the sting of loosing by playing a “fun game where no one keeps score,” Rutherford B. Hayes could rest easy in the comforting knowledge that he was the peer of the Founder and of the Emancipator.  It also silenced the partisans of Franklin D. Roosevelt on one hand and Ronald Reagan on the other, who dreamed of raising their respective heroes to a loftier pantheon and a place on the national calendar.

In the Declaration of Independence, Thomas Jefferson posited that “All men are created equal…”  Unitarian Universalists treasure our First Principle—“Respect for the inherit worth and dignity of every person.”  Neither of these are assertions of blanket uniformity of talent, capacity, or wisdom.   Nor has there been equality of ability, opportunity and circumstance among the occupants of the Presidential chair.  There have been great presidents and there have been failures.  There have been, however, no saints and no pure knaves.

The befuddled current occupant of the White House gets to be included in the celebration as well.  Not that many of us feel much like heaping honor on his head.  Even his staunchest supporters have pretty much given up the campaign of a couple of years ago to paint George W. as a misunderstood Lincolnesque figure, boldly pursuing a noble cause when the ignoble people doubted.  It was simply too ludicrous to be maintained.

The consensus today is the Shrub will go down in history as among the nations worst—if not the worst—presidents.  That puts him in the company of such luminaries as Franklin Pierce, John Tyler, Millard Fillmore, James Buchanan, Ulysses S. Grant, and Warren G. Harding.  But it may be unfair to those gentlemen to be lumped in with the current Resident.  Most got on the list not for doing  bad, but for being lazy, incompetent, drunk and not doing anything at all to stave off the long slide to Civil War.  Grant and Harding presided over notoriously corrupt administrations, but neither did lasting harm to the nation or Democracy.

But the legacy of George W. Bush will be far more damaging and longer lasting.  He has sponsored and presided over unnecessary war, prosecuted that war with stunning incompetence, nearly destroyed the ground forces of the U.S. military, proclaimed a doctrine of pre-emptive war that has left the nation nearly friendless in the world, embrace a policy of torture, systematically attacked the civil liberties of American citizens, subverted the Constitution by asserting  a new doctrine of the unitary executive, turned a budget surplus into a staggering Federal Debt, pursued a policy of showering the rich with tax breaks and relief from regulation that has compounded the class divide in the nation to 19th Century levels, allowed an American city to be virtually destroyed and abandoned it citizens, has attacked the “bright line” separating Church and State, has ignored science whenever it drew conclusions that threatened his ideological preconceptions, and has ignored Global Warming as a tipping point crisis nears.  That’s a pretty impressive list, and I am sure I have forgotten some equally outrageous acts of malfeasance.

So happy Presidents Day to 42 former Commanders-in-Chief. 

And a Bronx Cheer and Single Digit Salute to the Pretender.

In previous years I have blogged, at great length, I might add, on the predictable outrages of GeorgeW. Bush’s various State of the Union Addresses.  It seems to be required duty if one dare to enter fray of competitive political blogging.  And I meant to do it.  I really did.  I sat in front of my TV—and promptly dozed of minutes into the stultifying performance.  Some how I don’t think I was the only one.

Even the talking heads on network and cable coverage (for which I did wake up in time to monitor) seemed bored by and dismissive of the product delivered by the lamest duck of all Presidents in recent memory—public approval ratings of about 30%, the House and Senate in opposition hands, his own party in disarray and its coalition dissolving, the next president widely assumed to be a Democrat.  The delivery was lack luster and most of the content re-cycled from earlier SOA, including a saber-rattling claim that an evil rogue state—this time Iran—may be developing weapons of mass destruction.

As far as I can tell the only tidbits of “news” came out of the speech.  First was an almost missed aside that after troop levels in Iraq are brought down on account of “victory,” American armed forces will remain on the ground in a new  “protective overwatch mission”—Orwellian code for the long cherished NeoCon dream of maintaining vast military bases in Iraq from which to dominate the entire region.

Second was a somewhat garbled threat to veto funding bills that do not include a 50% reduction in “Congressional ear-marks” and to order cabinet departments not to act on earmarks “not voted on by Congress”—those noted only in memoranda of agreements in the committee stage.  But like many other Bush initatives, he comes to the table week and soft on the issue.  He used complicity with earmarks to buy support of many of his unpopular positions through the years, or allowed his congressional allies to do it for him.  These pay offs contributed to the soaring deficit, albeit not more than Bush’s own out of controle spending on the war.   And the new executive order is of questionable Constitutional legality because final language in most bill includes blanket adoption of off committee agreements on earmarks inseperable from the rest of the legeislation.

But I am slipping into an analysis of the speech, something I swore I would not do.

Instead, like just about everyone else, I was stunned by another development yesterday that seemed to darf the SOU and the shrinking midget who delivered it.  Of course I am refering to the “pass the torch” endorsement of Barack Obama by Senator Edward Kennedy, Caroline Kennedy, and Representative Patrick Kennedy.

As usual, the media, always aware of the drawing power of the Kennedy name and legacy, were in hyperbolic overdrive.  Over on MSNBC Chris Mathews was so over the top he needed to be hosed down.  Yet it is almost possible to forgive the over reaction.  This was not just another political endorsement.  It was both a vicious slap at Bill Clinton (pointedly not at Hillary) and an anointment, for the first time, of an heir to Camalot outside the Kennedy family.  Now, by any strech of the immagination, that’s news.

Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi told aids that she was “tranfixed”and “stunned” by the development.  Other heavy weight endorsements have followed and will increase in the days aheard stripping Clinton of her mantle as choice of both “real Democrats” and the party establishment.  The affects of the endorsement are already being seen in Massechusets and California, where Clinton was confident of big leads.  She may still win those states, but Obama will carve deeply into the alotment of Convention delegates from them.

The Clinton camp is said to be in dismay and a bit of disarray over the endorsements.  They are also seething with anger.  Look for Clinton surroates to begin to attack Ted Kennedy—a dangerous game given the Senator’s popularity in the party.  In an early sign of of this New York National Organization for Women (NOW) leader Marcia Pappas unleashed a scathing atack on Kennedy for “betraying women.”  Look for semi-anonymous and/or untraceble reminders of Chapaquidick and the Senator’s marital and love life woes to begin perculating on the web and in this season’s favorite tactic, forwarded e-mails.  No Kennedy foible will be left unturned.  My guess is that the Clintons will accept the risk of blow back—particulary in veiw of Bill’s own past—if they can personaly distance themselves from it.  Even Caroline, the beloved Princes, might find herself under an unflattering microscope.

There is a well oiled “hate the Kennedys” machine out there.  Fueled by generations of conspiracy theorists and a fervant right-wing base, it is always ready to gin up.  The only problem is that most of these same people hate the Clintons even more than the Kennedys.  What is a wing-nut to do?

But of course the bigest drawback to this annointment, remains largely unspoken, but hangs as a dread in the hearts of many.  Just a few days ago Obama spoke at Martin Luther King’s Atlanta church and was pictured as the fruit of Dr. King’s Dream.  Now he lays in the line of John F. and Robert Kennedy.  Can he survive and ascend to the presidency without becoming a new verse to “Abraham, Martin and John”?  Is America—or unseen forces in its elite—ready for either change or hope?

I am trying not to get overwhelmed by all of this.  To keep my persepective.   To recognize that endorsements or no, a long struggle lies ahead for Obama in a grining state-by-state ground game that will play out largely base on local concerns and on the relative strength of two organizations.  Yet I am a baby boomer.  I recall the thrill of John Kennedy’s works on a cold January in 1961.  They inspired me, as they inspired a generation.  I also know the pit of the stomach dispair of shots ringing out in Dallas, Los Angeles, and Memphis.  These are the foundation events of my life.

I, too, am moved.  And once again dare to hope.

It’s been an awfully long time since I touched on Democratic Presidential race.  Now in the afterglow of a stunning victory for my guy, Barack Obama in the Iowa Caucus, I guess it’s time to add my two cents to what will surely be an avalanche of coverage.

The depth of Obama’s victory literally awed the commentators I checked out on the tube.  With 97% of the caucuses reporting when last I heard Obama led with 39% with John Edwards edging out Hillary Clinton for second place 30% to 29%.

Obama’s win was impressive not only for its size, but for its depth.  He won women, Clinton’s supposed ace in the hole, 35% to 30% and out polled Edwards among union members.  He was the overwhelming favorite of voters 17 to 29 and more impressively got this notoriously disaffected voter pool to actually trudge to precinct caucuses and participate in record numbers.

Obama reaped most of the new caucusers who flocked to polls.  This group included many “sunshine Democrats”, independents, and even disillusioned Republicans.  The Clinton camp tried to paint this as a weakness among party loyalists.  But it also showed promise for real strength in the General Election for Democrats frustrated by stinging losses.  Every one knows that Clinton is the boogey woman of Republicans who would positively never vote for her.  She’s not much more popular with the Democratic anti-war left, many of who have sworn to stay home rather than vote for her.  But even among previous Democratic Caucus voters Obama edged out a one point victory over Clinton.  Obama made winning or strong showings in category after category  and in every corner of the state, rural and urban in entrance polls.

The acceptance speech was classic Obama, a reminder of the unparallel skills as a political orator that vaulted him onto the national stage at the Democratic Convention just three and a half years ago.  An MSNBC panel I was watching were unanimously in awe of the performance—even crotchety, crypto-fascist Pat Buchanan.  Chris Mathews was nearly in tears.  Rachel Maddow proclaimed Obama’s win a victory for “…the America I want to live in.”  Of course the press is subject to both herd mentality and stampedes.  And Chris Mathews has been choked up over others. 

But the real story of the night was the enormous victory for the Democratic Party.  212,000 Iowans caucused as Democrats, up 77% from 2004.  Meanwhile participation in a hotly contested Republican straw poll was down dramatically, indicative of both despair among Republicans and an appalling list of Candidates.  This in a state that was reliably red for George W. Bush.   This was not just a contest for a Democratic favorite, it was a repudiation of Bush and Republicanism in general.  This same repudiation is playing out in state after state and promises to remake the nation’s political map.

Clinton, in her remarkably gracious speech made the same point. 

In the end Republicans chose  maverick Mike Huckabee, over a rich Easterner of no firm convictions, anointing as a front runner a candidate who probably can’t win five states in a General Election.

The instant conventional wisdom was the Clinton, once the “inevitable candidate” with deep, deep pockets and a wide lead in most national polls, was dealt a stinging defeat.  With the New Hampshire Primary only five days away she could be vulnerable in another state that appreciates the personal style of politics at which Obama excels  and whose Democratic voters are strongly anti-war.  Down the road in North Carolina Clinton was doing very well among Black voters devoted to her husband and fearful that no Black could actually win the presidency.  But many could swing to Obama after he proves that he can win broad support among white voters.  That could compel Clinton to run, not as the consensus party favorite, but as the “Anti-Obama” in southern and boarder states, a risky, racially charged strategy that could backfire in the North and West.

But it is too early to count anyone as shrewd and organized as Hillary Clinton out.  She remembers—and Bill will remind everyone—that Bill lost both Iowa and New Hampshire before going on to becoming “The Come Back Kid.”  In her speech tonight, she emphasized—and meant—that her campaign was in it for the long haul.  Look for Clintonistas in the media to start the hype about “The Come Back Gal” at the first sign of a turn around

Clinton’s ever nimble staff proved their resiliency when they decked the room with signs and posters with a new twist on her theme that she is “ready to be President.”  Exit polls revealed that the largest block of caucus voters—51% identified “change” as the most important characteristic for a candidate versus only 30 some odd per cent who identified “experience.”  And those change voters went overwhelmingly to Obama.  So the new signage proclaimed “Ready for Change” over Clinton’s name and the old “Ready to Lead” relegated to spot below.

Conventional wisdom is a little more confused by John Edwards.  Edwards has always been the itching powder in the briefs $600 suite punditry—his relentless economic populism makes them nervous.  His inability to compete with the Obama and Clinton fundraising jugernaughts, make it easy to dismiss him as unable to sustain a campaign for the long haul.  Before the votes were in most commentators were predicting a tight race with Edwards finishing third and therefore fatally crippled.  But he actually edged out Clinton.  The experts seemed divided as to whether that was enough to continue.

But a pugnacious Edwards stood his ground in his post caucus speech.  He refused to congratulate the winner or concede defeat.  Elizabeth Edwards, the ailing iron lady of the campaign, introduced her husband by proclaiming in the second place winner in Iowa.  Edwards himself called the whole caucus a “victory for change”—simultaneously a swipe a Clinton and an attempt assume some of Obama’s mantle as an agent of change.  In doing so he was speaking directly to voters around the country, implying that Clinton is irrelevant and the real contest is between him and Obama as the most effective agents of change.  If relations between the Obama and Edwards camps were tense and testy in Iowa, look for them to get downright nasty in the near future if Edwards pursues this track.

The bulk of Edward’s speech was an impassioned plea for justice for the common people.  It was derided as “his standard stump speech,” but no Democrat worth his/her salt could fail to be moved by the call for universal health care and a laundry list social causes at the heart of the progressive populist wing of the party.  What is more, it is refreshing to hear issues of class frankly discussed by a leading Democrat when much of the party leadership seems to have forgotten its New Deal roots.

My guess is that Edwards can’t sustain a campaign much beyond Feburary 5th.  He might do well in Nevada if he can translate his labor union backing to support from the state’s powerful hospitality industry unions.  But those unions might just as well decide to back Obama, who also has labor support, or Clinton if she has managed to restore a bit of shine to her halo.  At any rate, a win in Nevada, while a psychological boost, is not exactly delegate rich.  He had hoped to do well in South Carolina as a near neighbor, but that state is shaping up as a head-to-head for Clinton and Obama.  And Edwards will be hard pressed to seriously contend for some—maybe most—of the Feburary 5th races.  In the end I suspect Edwards will have to swallow hard, withdraw, and release his support.  Most of that support will go, however reluctantly, to Obama as a candidate more apt to pursue a populist agenda than Clinton, who is perceived to be mobbed up with corporate bigwigs.

Lesser candidates who once may have fantasized that some of that support might fall to them and that one of them might emerge from the back of the pack when the front runners pile up ahead of them.  But this isn’t a NASCAR race.  None of the others were able to crack 5% in Iowa.  Joe Biden and Christopher Dodd read the handwriting on the wall and announced their departure from the race almost as soon as the results were announced.  But both have hopes.  Even many Biden loyalists acknowledged that he sometimes seemed to be running for Secretary of State.  Since he never seriously insulted any of the front runners and succeed in elevating his national stature, he might very well get his wish no matter what Democrat wins the next election. And Chris Dodd, who only narrowly lost the post of Majority Leader in the Senate to Harry Ried, stands a good chance to win the job next year with a bolstered majority.

            Dennis Kucinich, always the darling of the kamikaze left, shocked many of his admirers when he released his supporters to Barack Obama as a second choice in Iowa.  Kucinich will probably remain officially in the race to use the forum to promote has agenda, but he has clearly indicated that he feels comfortable with Obama as the viable candidate of progressive Democrats.

That leaves Bill Richardson as the last plausible alternative to the front runners.  Indeed his web site is already hyping him as one of “The Final Four.”  Despite a varied and impressive resume that has won him a loyal cadre of devoted fans, his chances seem dim at best.  But like Biden, Richardson has often seemed to be running for a job in the next administration.  He also covets the Secretary of State job.  But I believe many mornings he wakes up and sees the next Vice President in the mirror.  He seems a better ticket balance for Clinton—strong anti-war credentials, minority (Latino), Western, and a governor—than for Obama, but I am sure there would be a prestigious portfolio for him in any administration.

Any way, it’s on to New Hampshire.  And I am sure the dust won’t have settled on Feburary 5th when Illinois joins other states in Tsunami Tuesday, the closest thing to a national primary.  Obama’s still my man.  I think he’ll take Illinois with numbers reminiscent of his Senate victory, Hillary fans not withstanding.