RE:Lessons for Barack Obama

Counterpunch has an interesting article in regards to the delegates and super-delegates that are now haunting the Democratic Party. The general consensus is that Obama may get "Jacksoned" when the count is done. I think there is a real problem with this analysis. There are some big changes in the electorate now as compared to when Jackson was running. Firstly you have a large TV/Internet generation that is all but clueless. I know I work with them daily. They, unlike their parents regularly see black celebrities on TV including a popular "24" which had a black president. They. the white ones, believe that racism is ended by ignoring race or as recently done by Diversity Inc, attempt to make it disappear through pseudo-science. In this pop culture in which young and old voters alike are drawn to reality TV re-enforce in which they "reality" in question are auditions, dances, and film crews following erstwhile "stranded survivors," being cool is the way to victory and Obama is cool. This is not about policy. Policy bores people. It's not sexy or easy to grasp. Nor does policy lend itself to slogans like "Yes we can." In fact often policy requires "No we can't." This isn't anything new. T.A. Frank of the Washington Monthly wrote about Bob Herbert

This bothers me. Bob Herbert is the only national columnist at a major newspaper who consistently writes about the issues in our country that matter most yet seem to be covered least.



...But anyone who wants to advance these crucial issues must figure out the answer to this question: Why is Bob Herbert boring?

Boring? See my point? Let me re-enforce this point. I spoke with a professor about education. She said that students need to have technology and stuff in order to hold their attention. In other words they needed to be entertaining. I'm old school, so forgive me for not agreeing with this at all. Learning my times tables, something I never really did quite down, was not fun but it was necessary. homework was not "fun" per-se but it was expected to be done. You want to learn how to play the piano? Drills and practice. Boring. Necessary but boring. In other words, I expect that when it comes to mastering certain things there is going to be an element of "boring" to it. It's the price you pay to be successful at what you are doing. It's a right of passage if you will. It's the difference between bloggers who write a single paragraph that is mostly a link and linked text, and a blogger who writes the equivalent of a term paper for a post. The former is easy to do and doesn't require much thought. The latter requires sacrifice, research and extensive use of a spell checker. You'll also find the former to be more popular than the latter. But the point is, unlike 1984 and 1988, we have a society with a shorter attention span and despite the availability of near instantaneous access to nearly any piece of information known to humanity, this is perhaps the least informed electorate in history.

Those supporting Obama have a penchant to not even consider policy, outside of the fact that Obama got the Iraq war vote right. But then again, so did Dennis Kucinich and Ron Paul. It is also not helping much that many of the so-called "progressive" organizations have not been vocal in regards to Kucinich which, in my opinion has exposed them as mere appendages of the Democratic Party rather than organizations with actual independent principles. This lack of policy consideration was partially on display in South Carolina. Black voters, previously lukewarm for Obama went for him in large numbers because they were pissed off at Bill and Hillary Clinton for having the gall to discuss King Jr. in policy terms. You'll note that regardless of how anyone actually felt about the commentary, no one could say that the comment was actually incorrect. It did in fact take a president and a twisted arm congress to pass Civil Rights legislation. King could not have done that at all as a political outsider and non-elected individual. The mistake the Clinton's made was to forget how black folk in general and especially in the south treat their preachers. But that is one example. Another, on the white side of town was discussed in another counterpunch article by Heather Gray entitled "Candidates Issues Don't Resonate":

A retired white psychologist I met the other day while drinking coffee at Starbucks close to Emory University shared her thoughts about the candidates. She and her husband, a retired scientist from the Center for Disease Control, were reading the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times. "I am thrilled about Barack Obama," she said. "I like his presence, the way he hugs his wife, the way he talks using 'we' instead of 'I'. He's inclusive. On the other hand I don't see Hillary hugging Bill or touching people enough and she says 'I' too much. I don't think she's sexy enough."

Now one would think that the age of the quoted individual is damaging to my analysis. I do not believe so. If you talk to most younger people they will tell you that they cannot imagine their parents or even grandparents scouring the web for information. Even my mother who I consider moderately computer literate, does not do the scouring I do. She gets most of her information they way most Americans get their information, from TV and Cable entities that are either owned by corporations with Defense contracts with the government, owned by persons with links to one or both political parties or are Mickey Mouse outfits. And I mean that literally. In other words the same media juggernaughts who have dumbed down the processing power of the up and coming generation, also constrict the available news to that which suites these entities. Those who are determined to be fully informed vote very different than those who are not. They are voting Ron Paul on the right, and Kucinich on the left. What is perhaps most puzzling is the complete lack of turnout for Kucinich on the left. I haven't yet wrapped my head around that one yet except to think that those people may have gone either Obama or Paul. Obama if they are wedded to the Democratic Party and Paul if they are not.

So this gets us back to the Delegate lesson for Obama. After last weekends streak Obama has the momentum to get the nomination. I have said before that if it came up to the convention and Obama has enough votes and he does not get at least the VP position, the Democratic Party will have serious problems retaining the black vote in the future. Correction, retaining the same level of black support in the future. Also they will have crushed a new generation of voters who are riding the Obama wagon and they too may fall off to the Republicans or at least not be consistent Democratic voters. Now is there a possibility that the delegates could Jackson Obama? Yes, but I think that the national mood among Democrats will make that very hard to do.

Technorati Tags: 2008 US Elections