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Monday, November 03, 2008

Obama Is Smarter Than I Was, Thank Heavens!

Longtime readers of Amor Mundi will recall that our household, for all our Obama signs in the windows and Obama tee-shirts slung over the chair and Obama campaign donations whittling down our paychecks, has not always been an Obama house. Eric and I both began supporting John Edwards (boy wouldn't that have gone well), and when Edwards dropped before the California Primary Eric and I split very amicably between his support of Clinton and mine of Obama. I was more persuaded at that point by the conviction of my best students than through my own analysis, I must admit, and I agreed with Eric in many of his reasons for preferring Clinton. In truth, we both wildly underestimated the consummate professionalism and peerless timing and unparalleled discipline of Obama's campaign. Over the last couple of months we have had many rueful head shaking conversations about just how wrong we were to find Obama more hope-inspiring than confidence-inspiring early on in the campaign. This piece by Chris Weigant over at HuffPo reminds me of some of our self-criticism sessions here at home.

Barack Obama Is Smarter Than Us
The Obama campaign did not leak, and they did not squabble amongst themselves in public… two astounding feats that no other candidate in the race could manage. Should Obama… run his White House the way he has run his campaign; then we are about to see some professionalism and basic competence in Washington once again, instead of the pure partisan rancor and dysfunction we've (sadly) become accustomed to….

[I]t has to be said -- Barack Obama is where he is today because he is smarter than us. Now, by "us" I am not referring to you, dear reader (perish the thought!), but rather the collective "us" out here blogging in the progressive trenches on the left. We (and I certainly include myself in this) have been second-guessing Obama's political tactics and strategy for over a year now. Obama has had us tearing our hair out at times with frustration, and each time he wound up proving us wrong….

Even when Obama started his final rise in the polls, after the economic meltdown, we still couldn't entirely make the core fear of losing go away. This led to ever-more heartfelt pleas for Obama to do something differently. But Barack Obama was smarter than us all. He has shown us how it should be done. His success is due in part to not listening to our hysterics, and doing what he thought he should in order to win.

[T]he bloggy left is a growing Democratic force, and it fulfills an important function -- to raise issues the mainstream media ignores, to police said mainstream media, and to push our own pet issues to the fore (most especially when Democratic politicians are content to ignore them). Our liberal voice is strong, and growing louder…. We force things to get done, and get done right. There's no denying our growing influence.

But I have to say, once again, that Barack Obama was right not to always listen to me, and others of my ilk. He knew through it all that the perfect is the enemy of the good, and that a purist lefty candidate would not win the White House. So I have to stand up and admit it. Obama was right. We were wrong. And he has shown he knew what he was doing all along, which makes me even more comfortable casting my vote for him tomorrow.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Hey Dale,

I'm sitting in my office in New Mexico and actually reflecting back on what got me started on this campaign in the first place. After months of prolonged sleep deprivation and serious malnutrition I had forgottenw why it was that I had actually joined this campaign. Tonight reminded that it wasn't so much all the hype around the hope but rather the concerted discipline, as you mentioned, of the ground efforts of the campaign to build a genuine Arendtian style movement.

After building that grassroot network here in New Mexico and seeing it pay off, I'm reminded of our conversations in your office. I suppose I'm just getting a bit nostalgic but I just wanted to thank you for all your help and guidance.

I certainly wouldn't have joined this campaign if it weren't for you.

Thanks,

Eugene