Monday, January 28, 2008

Charlie Pierce Gets It Right...Again

Every so often I stop reading Altercation because I disagree with some boneheaded thing Eric Alterman has written. But I can't help myself from coming back to read Charlie Pierce on Slacker Friday. He has really got the candidates for POTUS pegged. His astute criticism of Barack Obama is especially refreshing to read in the current climate of nonstop Obamarama.
As I was watching the debate the other night -- the Democratic one where Anderson Cooper came on afterwards and got to pretend to be Angelo Dundee -- I was struck by Senator Obama's resolute assertion that he was the candidate that can come to Washington and work with "independents and Republicans" to get things done. (One of his new ads has him sitting next to Dick Lugar, a Republican senator only slightly more relevant today than is Arthur Vandenberg.) I was struck even harder by it as I watched the Democratic Senate go supine, selling out poor Chris Dodd and the Constitution, and concocting retroactive alibis for the Telecom giants in a week where we finally got the empirical count of prewar Iraq lies. Here's my deal with His Barackosity. Take the list of Republican congresscritters, House and Senate. Make me a list of 10 of them with whom you think you can work to achieve anything close to the progressive goals you have said you want to achieve. Give me an honest run, and I guarantee you that you can't do it. You may get "something done" but it's not going to have anything to do with anything resembling the values of the party you seek to represent. This is a party that has to be forcibly disenthralled from its lunatic base.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

I have to say that what is lost within your blog and your assessment of Barack Obama is the location of where you are writing from. I am in a state that has voted once for a Democrat since the beginning of the Cold War (Lyndon Johnson), and yet we have converted Republicans and have them doing volunteering efforts.

Obama is also a figure that could get us by the errors and horrors of 1968. That year is the real reason for Reagan's dominance of the 1980's. Farmers supported Barack Obama in 2004 and farmers here support him in 2008. He bridges a gap that has been far to wide.

I am liberal, but living and studying in Kansas has given me a new post 9/11 perspective that an older generation, a generation that has experienced the 60's won't get. I try to get a since of where you come from, I read Mike Roykos Boss, I listen to Creedence Clearwater Revival and the great Bohemian influence of Bob Dylan, and I listen to my 56 year old mother and 60 year old father speak about Woodstock and issues of their time and of that era. I believe we need a President that is at sharp contrast of Neo-Con style politics. Kennedy had his deep and very troubling political wrongs, but was a moving figure through history. He will be remembered as a young man who gave the country a new path. Barack Obama has the same ability to do that. How many Republicans do you know that are willing to Caucus for that? How can you, when you remain one sided and single minded? You can't because being too liberal is as bad as being too conservative, stubborn and single minded. You will probably dismiss what I am saying, but I don't mind. I will read it and take it and use it to grow. As of right now I am voting for Barack Obama, and if he does lose I am voting for Michael Bloomberg. Two men who are far more willing to move past the tiresome politics of the past than any candidate that exist now.

I truly believe Bloomberg will run, that is if Obama and McCain loses. and If I am wrong, it wouldn't be the first time and especially not the last time.

red rabbit said...

Interesting that you place yourself in Kansas when you are truly all over the map. Send up a flare.

Also interesting that you have fallen hook, line and sinker for, not one, but two egomaniacs. Barack Obama and Michael Bloomberg, who can't get past their own reflections in the mirror long enough to come up with a real policy. If you can point me to anything of substance from either of them I'll be only too happy to take back all the mean things I say about them.

Re: Bloomberg. Are you aware that Mayor Bloomberg relaxed requirements governing police surveillance so that the NYPD could conduct surveillance of nonviolent anti-Bush activists and protesters prior to the 2004 Republican National Convention?

What is the new path you speak of? We've been down all of them except maybe the path to true democracy.