the speech
This gets long and is not in the same tone as the typical UTD post. Apologies (sort of).
Maybe some of you watched it. Maybe you didn’t. Maybe you’re waiting for it to be dissected, spliced and reduced to ten second clips to be commented on out of context by ignorant buffoons. (Following news is hard, watch Fox! Fair and Balanced coverage guaranteed to be racist and idiotic.) I don’t care. I watched it.
It was the second most historic thing I’ve seen on cable news since I can remember. Depending on your perspective, it may be the most. A black man accepted the nomination as candidate for the President of the United States, a uniquely racist and diverse country built on the no-cost labor of African slaves and thriving on the oppression of the poor.
He was eloquent, poised and gracious. Above all else, he was aggressive. For most of the seventeen years of this campaign, he’s been defensively reacting to the absurd rhetoric of the right. His tone was much different. He bridged commonalities (“the reality of gun ownership may be different for hunters in rural Ohio than they are for those plagued by gang violence in Cleveland, but don’t tell me we can’t uphold the Second Amendment while keeping AK-47s out of the hands of criminals”) while clearly defining his opposition to the current failing policies.
He spent a lot of time discussing his goals, his plan. He’s been criticized for lofty aspirations with no basis in reality. He’s been criticized for not outlining his plans for all the policies he’s aiming for. In the speech, he addressed those concerns impressively.
Do I know how he’ll find the money? Fucks no. I’m fiscally-retarded with fuzzy skills in any math beyond counting. However, he made strong statements for a withdrawal from Iraq (“you don’t defeat a terrorist network that operates in 80 countries by occupying Iraq”) and filling the holes in our corporate finance structure.
He antagonized his opponent (“Now, I don’t believe that Senator McCain doesn’t care what’s going on in the lives of Americans; I just think he doesn’t know.”) but was affable, more than is expected in return. He showed respect and only made glancing blows at his opponent’s character, something the right does more forcefully almost exclusively. (“If you don’t have a record to run on, then you paint your opponent as someone people should run from. You make a big election about small things.”)
He recognized a lack of faith in the government. (“…because it feeds into the cynicism we all have about government. When Washington doesn’t work, all its promises seem empty.”) He was thankful. He recognized how fitting it was to accept his nomination on the forty-fifth anniversary of Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I have a dream” speech. (“And it is that promise that, 45 years ago today, brought Americans from every corner of this land to stand together on a Mall in Washington, before Lincoln’s Memorial, and hear a young preacher from Georgia speak of his dream.”)
For everything the speech was there are many things it was not. It was not hate speech directed at other countries with different beliefs. It was not a bold misstatement, a call to stay the course with vacuous claims of issues resolving themselves. It was not an attack on the opposition. It was not an ambiguous call for undefined change.
There are still issues to deal with. He needs to be held accountable for what he’s said. We have to be vigilant and keep him on course before the corporate interests can soften his resolve. We have to realize there are many things he simply can’t do. Our conservative Media, with its reflexive, vitriolic attacks and short-sighted, out-of-context sound clips and gossip, make the grandiose shifts he calls for nearly impossible.
He may not be able to make the lofty changes he mentioned last night and in the last seventy months of his campaign. He may soften his rhetoric and lose momentum on some of the issues. He may be stalled the corporate influences he disdains or the lobbyists he tries to hold accountable. He may become a victim of our racist undercurrent, reversed pledges of support while isolated in the booth. He may do a lot of things wrong. But, from his speech last night and the myth that is growing around him, he is a symbol of change.
His policies will be scanned over and picked apart in “special reports” with expensive graphics. By the day of the election ten percent of the country may still think he’s Muslim. Still, his policies defy the current momentum.
Change is coming. The “liberal” majority has found a symbol of the change they’ve been hoping for and the “conservative” ultra-capitalists have their first real opponent since Reagan spewed lies about a pyramid of champagne glasses. He may not be able to get any of his policies through but he stands as a voice for change among a sea of mumbled dissent.
He calls for personal responsibility rather than blame-shifting. He aims for an open campaign, symbolized by moving his speech to an outdoor stadium. Most importantly, he’s riding a wave of support. He packed that stadium with 75,000 people and another twenty-some million watched on television.
Our country is nowhere near as conservative or liberal as the Media want us to believe. Their sporting analogies and lust for conflict exaggerate the extremes, leaving the parties to cater to the fringe. The speech last night was a pledge to the middle. A call to the other 85% of the country not represented in Media that a new direction is recognized.
America, our work will not be easy. The challenges we face require tough choices. And Democrats, as well as Republicans, will need to cast off the worn-out ideas and politics of the past, for part of what has been lost these past eight years can’t just be measured by lost wages or bigger trade deficits. What has also been lost is our sense of common purpose, and that’s what we have to restore.
It was historic and somewhat inspirational. Now I’m off to read the different commentaries from the established media. I’m excited to see how quickly, brazenly and completely they’ve fucked up.