Blogging meme post #2
May. 30th, 2009 10:41 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
next_to_normalI very rarely talk about politics on my LJ, for a few reasons. One, it's my job, and I don't like mixing business with pleasure. Two, it's probably not why you friended me, so I imagine few of you are really interested in my political thoughts. (I used to post regularly about politics on my RL blog, and my friends were all like *yawn* so now I mostly talk about what I watched on TV. Heh, irony.) And three, it's contentious. No reason to alienate half my flist when I have people I can rant to that I know I'm not gonna piss off. But ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
gabrielleabelle asked me to talk about Obama. I don't think she quite knew what she was getting into, but here goes. :)
The first time I ever heard of Barack Obama was his speech to the Democratic National Convention in 2004. I was living and working at college before the semester started, staying with a fellow liberal friend of mine. And the DNC was an EVENT in our house. (For the RNC, on the other hand, we hosted a drinking game and got wasted on "America" and "terrorism.") We were glued to the TV. This was our year. So, Obama comes on - and I loved that speech. The part about red states and blue states... ah, fuck it. I'm just gonna quote it:
"The pundits like to slice-and-dice our country into Red States and Blue States; Red States for Republicans, Blue States for Democrats. But I've got news for them, too. We worship an awesome God in the Blue States, and we don't like federal agents poking around our libraries in the Red States. We coach Little League in the Blue States and have gay friends in the Red States. There are patriots who opposed the war in Iraq and patriots who supported it. We are one people, all of us pledging allegiance to the stars and stripes, all of us defending the United States of America."
(Did I mention I'm kind of a dork? I love political oratory. I have a whole book of John F. Kennedy's speeches, and highlighted my favorite parts. I read annotated transcripts of the State of the Union every year. And as evidenced here, I have quotes and even the full text from various speeches given at the 2004 convention still saved on my hard drive. (I also have the hilarious on-air freak-out when the balloons didn't drop, but I'll save that for another post.))
And yet, I wasn't an Obama supporter until well into the campaign. Fast forward to the first rumblings of Presidential Race 2008 (which, incidentally, started around January 2007) when I heard that Hillary Clinton was running. I unabashedly love her. Aside from the fact that she was my first female role model in politics (and those are hard to find), I always admired her drive and her intelligence. I was so proud when she ran for Senate, because she basically gave the middle finger to all the people who criticized her for playing a substantive role in her husband's presidency, instead of baking cookies and hosting parties, and said, "I can do this, too." Also, I've met her, when I was working at a campaign event. It was a women's event, and I brought my mother and my grandmother, and there was the whole "three generations of women" and the potential for making history and... yeah. I was sold. (It's not quite as simple as that, but this isn't actually a post about Hillary.)
So when I heard rumors that Obama was considering running, I won't say my reaction was entirely unbiased, but I definitely thought, "No way. It's not his time yet." He'd only been in the Senate for about five minutes. During the eons of campaigning during the primary, I found myself impressed by both candidates at some point, but I couldn't help feeling that Obama impressed me with flash and rhetoric (though I never felt quite as enamored with him as I did the first time I saw him, giving that speech), whereas Hillary impressed me by being intelligent, engaging, and well-prepared for the job.
And I think the real issue for me had nothing to do with the issues. I just didn't connect with the "hope" message Obama was touting. By this point, I'd been working in politics for a few years, and I'll admit - I wasn't quite as naive as I was in 2004, and definitely more cynical. Here's a quote from my blog from during the campaign: "Obama knows all the right things to say to warm the cockles of our middle-class hearts. He's about hope and change, and it's all lovely to hear, but completely unrealistic. Why does he think that he's going to get into office and the Republicans will suddenly be willing to hold hands and work together with him, that he won't get the same vitriolic welcome that Bill Clinton did?"
In retrospect, it was unrealistic (bipartisanship on the economic stimulus bill turned out to be Arlen Specter - who's now a Democrat - and the two ladies from Maine, but who needs bipartisanship when you've got a majority?) but I guess it doesn't really matter. People like me were going to vote for him anyway, because we're die-hard party loyalists. (When it looked like Clinton was done, one of my friends who'd worked on her campaign said, "Okay. I'm giving myself one week to mourn, and then I'll be back out there for Obama.") I don't know if the regular folks out there are disappointed at the lack of "bi" in Obama's "bipartisanship" idea, but they were on board in November, and that's what counted.
So, how do I think he's doing now? Well, honestly, despite the huge media spectacle that was "Obama's first 100 days," I don't know if that's really enough time to judge. I mean, if you can get legislation through Congress in that time without totally fucking it up, you're doing all right. As for that stimulus package, I'm a pretty big fan, if only because I got $2.7 billion out of it. Okay, technically, it's not my $2.7 billion, it belongs to the state and we're supposed to use it to improve education, but that's... kinda my job, so yay! (I'll be honest, even though I pretty much lived and breathed the education parts of the bill during the debate and passage, I'm still kinda vague on what else was in it, lol. Sometimes I have a tendency to develop tunnel vision when it comes to work issues, especially when we're really busy.)
So far, I'm happy with Arne Duncan, and I'm excited about the Sotomayor nomination. I'll love Obama forever if he manages to pull us out of this economic slump soon enough for me to get a new job and not screw up my graduate school plans. I'll love him even more if he hires me (yes, I applied to work at the White House). And, in general, I don't get that feeling of dread every time I look at a newspaper (or, rather, nytimes.com or washingtonpost.com, since I don't actually read newspapers anymore) that I did for the past eight years, so I guess that's a good sign. :)
gabrielleabelle asked me to talk about Obama. I don't think she quite knew what she was getting into, but here goes. :)The first time I ever heard of Barack Obama was his speech to the Democratic National Convention in 2004. I was living and working at college before the semester started, staying with a fellow liberal friend of mine. And the DNC was an EVENT in our house. (For the RNC, on the other hand, we hosted a drinking game and got wasted on "America" and "terrorism.") We were glued to the TV. This was our year. So, Obama comes on - and I loved that speech. The part about red states and blue states... ah, fuck it. I'm just gonna quote it:
"The pundits like to slice-and-dice our country into Red States and Blue States; Red States for Republicans, Blue States for Democrats. But I've got news for them, too. We worship an awesome God in the Blue States, and we don't like federal agents poking around our libraries in the Red States. We coach Little League in the Blue States and have gay friends in the Red States. There are patriots who opposed the war in Iraq and patriots who supported it. We are one people, all of us pledging allegiance to the stars and stripes, all of us defending the United States of America."
(Did I mention I'm kind of a dork? I love political oratory. I have a whole book of John F. Kennedy's speeches, and highlighted my favorite parts. I read annotated transcripts of the State of the Union every year. And as evidenced here, I have quotes and even the full text from various speeches given at the 2004 convention still saved on my hard drive. (I also have the hilarious on-air freak-out when the balloons didn't drop, but I'll save that for another post.))
And yet, I wasn't an Obama supporter until well into the campaign. Fast forward to the first rumblings of Presidential Race 2008 (which, incidentally, started around January 2007) when I heard that Hillary Clinton was running. I unabashedly love her. Aside from the fact that she was my first female role model in politics (and those are hard to find), I always admired her drive and her intelligence. I was so proud when she ran for Senate, because she basically gave the middle finger to all the people who criticized her for playing a substantive role in her husband's presidency, instead of baking cookies and hosting parties, and said, "I can do this, too." Also, I've met her, when I was working at a campaign event. It was a women's event, and I brought my mother and my grandmother, and there was the whole "three generations of women" and the potential for making history and... yeah. I was sold. (It's not quite as simple as that, but this isn't actually a post about Hillary.)
So when I heard rumors that Obama was considering running, I won't say my reaction was entirely unbiased, but I definitely thought, "No way. It's not his time yet." He'd only been in the Senate for about five minutes. During the eons of campaigning during the primary, I found myself impressed by both candidates at some point, but I couldn't help feeling that Obama impressed me with flash and rhetoric (though I never felt quite as enamored with him as I did the first time I saw him, giving that speech), whereas Hillary impressed me by being intelligent, engaging, and well-prepared for the job.
And I think the real issue for me had nothing to do with the issues. I just didn't connect with the "hope" message Obama was touting. By this point, I'd been working in politics for a few years, and I'll admit - I wasn't quite as naive as I was in 2004, and definitely more cynical. Here's a quote from my blog from during the campaign: "Obama knows all the right things to say to warm the cockles of our middle-class hearts. He's about hope and change, and it's all lovely to hear, but completely unrealistic. Why does he think that he's going to get into office and the Republicans will suddenly be willing to hold hands and work together with him, that he won't get the same vitriolic welcome that Bill Clinton did?"
In retrospect, it was unrealistic (bipartisanship on the economic stimulus bill turned out to be Arlen Specter - who's now a Democrat - and the two ladies from Maine, but who needs bipartisanship when you've got a majority?) but I guess it doesn't really matter. People like me were going to vote for him anyway, because we're die-hard party loyalists. (When it looked like Clinton was done, one of my friends who'd worked on her campaign said, "Okay. I'm giving myself one week to mourn, and then I'll be back out there for Obama.") I don't know if the regular folks out there are disappointed at the lack of "bi" in Obama's "bipartisanship" idea, but they were on board in November, and that's what counted.
So, how do I think he's doing now? Well, honestly, despite the huge media spectacle that was "Obama's first 100 days," I don't know if that's really enough time to judge. I mean, if you can get legislation through Congress in that time without totally fucking it up, you're doing all right. As for that stimulus package, I'm a pretty big fan, if only because I got $2.7 billion out of it. Okay, technically, it's not my $2.7 billion, it belongs to the state and we're supposed to use it to improve education, but that's... kinda my job, so yay! (I'll be honest, even though I pretty much lived and breathed the education parts of the bill during the debate and passage, I'm still kinda vague on what else was in it, lol. Sometimes I have a tendency to develop tunnel vision when it comes to work issues, especially when we're really busy.)
So far, I'm happy with Arne Duncan, and I'm excited about the Sotomayor nomination. I'll love Obama forever if he manages to pull us out of this economic slump soon enough for me to get a new job and not screw up my graduate school plans. I'll love him even more if he hires me (yes, I applied to work at the White House). And, in general, I don't get that feeling of dread every time I look at a newspaper (or, rather, nytimes.com or washingtonpost.com, since I don't actually read newspapers anymore) that I did for the past eight years, so I guess that's a good sign. :)
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Date: May. 30th, 2009 04:01 pm (UTC)So all in all, even if Obama isn't doing everything my way, I'm happy with most of what he's done and continues to do. And he seems able to think rings around the Republicans.
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Date: May. 30th, 2009 05:42 pm (UTC)Hee! True. Whenever I think about the presidency, I'm always inspired by this West Wing quote, which I think would have fit both Clinton and Obama very well:
"If our job teaches us anything, it's that we don't know what the next President's gonna face. And if we choose someone with vision, someone with guts, someone with gravitas, who's connected to other people's lives and cares about making them better, if we choose someone to inspire us, then we'll be able to face what comes our way and achieve things we can't imagine yet." - Toby Ziegler, "20 Hours in America"
I could never have voted for McCain, even to retaliate against Obama for beating Hillary.
I remember hearing about a lot of people who intended to do that, and it just completely did not make sense to me. If you liked Hillary so much, why on earth would you vote for the other party out of spite when you could vote for someone who agrees with Hillary on almost every issue?
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Date: May. 31st, 2009 04:25 am (UTC)Hear, hear! :-)
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Date: May. 31st, 2009 03:33 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: Jun. 1st, 2009 06:46 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: Jun. 1st, 2009 07:03 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: Jun. 1st, 2009 08:33 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: Jun. 1st, 2009 09:04 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: Jun. 4th, 2009 03:09 am (UTC)Heh. This was my feeling during the primaries. As far as issues go, Clinton and Obama were almost identical (Though Obama was a bit more conservative). The difference was in their demeanor and attitude. And I preferred Clinton's no-nonsense, analytical, detail-oriented approach to Obama's more generalized, style-over-substance approach. I even voted for Clinton in the primaries.
I have a whole issue with the subtle (and sometimes overt) sexism that went on in the primaries. The racism was largely called out and condemned, but the rampant sexism against Clinton went unchecked. Very unfair and discouraging.
Once it was clear that Obama had the nomination, though, I switched over to his team, and took up his campaign whole-heartedly. My views on him do mirror yours. I'm excited to finally have a Democrat in the White House again. I'm excited to have the first black president in office. And I've grown to like Obama's approach more than I did during the primaries.
I think there's a lot of hyperbolic rhetoric that follows him around, and I imagine there's lots of unrealistic expectations for his presidency. I'm optimistic that he'll do well, though, despite his lack of experience. He's got a good head on his shoulders, and he's surrounded himself with capable, experienced people.
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Date: Jun. 4th, 2009 01:59 pm (UTC)And WORD on the rampant sexism. I ranted about it on my blog because it drove me so crazy. People would never have stood for those kinds of remarks being made in a racial context against Obama, but it's totally fine when it's sexist? The other thing that drove me batty during the campaign was that, because of her gender, she would always be labeled "bitchy" instead of "strong-willed," "opportunistic" instead of "determined," "cold and calculated" instead of "rational and thoughtful." It's an unfair double standard.
Obama has definitely gotten this Messiah reputation, which hopefully won't work against him when he turns out to be only human, but I think he'll be okay.