February 16, 2008 archive

Hard positions have been staked out regarding what the Democratic superdelegates should do if they are mathematically able to determine who wins the nomination for President.  Obama supporters argue that if the popular will — presumably such a will that supports Obama, and putting aside for now the question of how clearly it can be ascertained — is overturned by superdelegates, they will leave the party forever.  More credibly and more importantly, they argue that the large number of new voters who appear to be energized by the Obama candidacy — young Democrats, independents, etc. — will not come out for Hillary.  Clinton supporters argue — here, if not as regards Florida and Michigan — that rules is rules, and that the superdelegates’ untrammeled right to choose the President they prefer cannot be taken away at this late date.

Full disclosure: I’ve been an Obama supporter since shortly after Edwards was held to 5% in Nevada.  I try to be fair about it when it comes to superdelegate voting ethics, though, and I think that there is some room for agreement between these sides.  While many argue that it simply won’t come to this, that superdelegates will not overturn the popular will, it certainly seems possible to me that it might.  I expect Clinton to pull back ahead in the delegate count, with the help of Ohio even without the help of Texas, by the time Pennsylvania’s votes are counted on April 22.  While I believe that Obama should do well enough in the primaries in May and June to finish with a delegate lead, it’s possible that it won’t happen, or certainly possible that that lead will be slight.

By considering what the different possibilities are, I think that we can at least narrow the debate.  We won’t find completely common ground, but we should find more than one would expect after watching this week’s news.  More below.

Barack Obama quotes Dr. Martin Luther King Jr a lot on the campaign trail. Particularly he says a lot about how he is running because of what Dr. King called the “the fierce urgency of now.”

We are now faced with the fact, my friends, that tomorrow is today. We are confronted with the fierce urgency of now. In this unfolding conundrum of life and history, there is such a thing as being too late. Procrastination is still the thief of time. Life often leaves us standing bare, naked, and dejected with a lost opportunity. The tide in the affairs of men does not remain at flood-it ebbs. We may cry out desperately for time to pause in her passage, but time is adamant to every plea and rushes on. Over the bleached bones and jumbled residues of numerous civilizations are written the pathetic words, “Too late.” There is an invisible book of life that faithfully records our vigilance or our neglect. Omar Khayyam is right: “The moving finger writes, and having writ moves on.”

Those were the words that Dr. King spoke in his address delivered at Riverside Church in NYC on the 4th of April, 1967. The speech was entitled  “Beyond Vietnam.“

The topic below was originally posted February 14th, on my blog the Intrepid Liberal Journal and crossposted today at The Wild Wild Left, Independent Bloggers Alliance, The Peace Tree and Worldwide Sawdust.

American politics typically reflects our cultural ethos of the moment. Just consider these questions:

1. Has our culture promoted community or celebrated greed?
2. Is our foreign policy based upon cooperation with the community of nations or the imperatives of empire?
3. Can individuals live in dignity regardless of their profession, economic class, ethnicity, gender, religion and sexual orientation or is gentrified wealth valued above character?
   

If it isn’t sex, it’s women in trouble, honest!

I get frustrated at work sometimes … my fellow secretaries, although quite intelligent and good women, are not interested in politics and when they do take time from their busy lives, they are more interested in reading about sex, relationships, Brittney Spears, Paris Hilton, and for a while there Whitney Houston was a big topic.  Oh … and now we also have Amy Winehouse.

What’s so compelling about these conversations?  What is so fascinating about reading and then talking about celebrity women in trouble?

This isn’t a new phenomenon, of course.  But our lamestream media (h/t lasthorseman) has market tested these kinds of stories to a fine edge … and thus we will see a Brittney Spears story take precedence over the fact that America commits torture.

Read a book once by Norman Spinrad called Little Heroes about, among other things. the music industry.

In Spinrad’s not too distant future, a Los Angeles based monolithic music corporation called MUZAK has pretty much taken control of commercial music.

Muzak’s employee pool is made up of creative music-and-visual tech wizards coopted into the corporation so they won’t be competition –“voxbox” players who can reproduce any kind of sound or voice, image engineers, etc.

They also have hired masses of market testers.

The corporate heads (or “the pinheads upstairs” as Spinrad’s character, Gloriana O’Toole, calls ’em) decided with glee that they should create a completely artificial rock star and thus rid themselves of their pain in the ass human ones who cost so much money and are so ill behaved and arrogant.

It’s a great book, and I recommend it to anyone.