(derekbaker)

Yes, I Can

have no pretensions that anyone is going to bother reading my blog while this Thursday night of the Democratic National Convention is going on. But I want to do this for myself, as a sort of journal entry, because I want to be able to go back to remember what is a historic night. Not as historic as Obama's inauguration will be, obviously -- yes, there's a huge assumption I just slid right past -- but still historic, nonetheless.

And I've never done this before, and there's little likelihood I'll get myself too far from the TV while it's going on, so I might as record what I'm thinking while I'm thinking it. Natalie Goldberg, author of "Wild Mind," call your office.

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The Mile High Stadium looks less like the Lincoln Memorial than I expected, hearing there would be "columns" -- marking the 45th anniversary of Dr. Martin Luther King's "I Have a Dream" speech. Instead, it looks more like Caesar's Palace in Las Vegas. Really. (And someone will no doubt make an Albert Speer reference to all this, if they haven't already, but seriously: it's the Shops at the Forum, not the Nuremburg Rally.)

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Al Gore is currently speaking. Very quickly. Someone obviously told him they were running over time, to speed it up. Or else he's not used to speaking to 75,000 people. I don't know. But this is the old Al Gore, the same one who didn't get a (large enough) majority of votes to win the 2000 election. He's now making an analogy between Barack Obama with Abraham Lincoln. I like it, but half the people hearing this will find it presumptuous, as they find anything Obama does (or is done on his behalf) to make the case that he's qualified to be president. It's a damned if you do, damned if you don't situation for him, annoying half the people with what you do, and half the people with what you don't.

Overall, a very lame speech by Al. I'm sure a lot of people hearing that are saying, "Oh, yeah: maybe it's not so bad he decided not to run this time around after all."

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I'm flipping mostly between C-SPAN and PBS tonight. I've mostly watched C-SPAN and MSNBC all week, but MSNBC has become such a train wreck over the course of the week (as evidenced by this, this, this and especially this, which were cited on Salon for the same reason), I decided I wanted the sober demeanor of Jim Lehrer, the professorial frumpiness of Mark Shields, and even the innocuous David Brooks -- who's a pompous tool, but I have to give him credit for the public Biden plug, it even makes me wonder if he had an inside track.

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Following Al Gore was the musician (not my friend by the same name) Michael McDonald, reprising (not nearly as well) Ray Charles's performance of "America the Beautiful" at the 1984 Republican (yes, Republican) convention. They should have gone with Keb' Mo's version.

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Susan Eisenhower (Ike's granddaughter) also rushed through her speech -- but she's definitely not used to speaking to a stadium of people. I can't tell if the stiffness so far tonight of the speakers is a factor of the time they're trying for, to get Obama's own "segment" teed up for right at 10pm, or if the venue is intimidating (and how could it not be?) or...what.

Actually, Joe Biden just came out to speak, and this wasn't in the original schedule, so maybe that's why they rushed people through, to make room for him.

He just made a Floyd Little (Denver Broncos) reference. Why do I suspect Democrats between now and November are going to be saying several times, "Good ol' Joe"?

He needs to find a fresh formulation of "the cops and the firefighters, the teachers and the assembly line workers." Twice, exactly like that, is okay, but after three times, it's going to start to sound like interest groups, not careers of regular Americans.

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These speeches by the "American Voices" are classic fare: members of the other party who are voting for the other party's candidate, hard-luck tales (from Democrats) or success stories (from Republicans). For the partisans, like the conventions overall, they give you a lift -- "yes, we can!" -- but then afterward you read the distanced, jaundiced commentary and the cynical, sophisticated tone of the pundits (even from your own side, usually, if you're a Democrat), and learn that it didn't earn the candidate that big of a bump in the polls, and you wonder if you were watching the same convention as everyone else, or maybe you're just more gullible than other people.

That's okay. I'll have the gullibility hangover tomorrow. Tonight, I'm enjoying the spectacle and, just as I did four years ago, I'm hoping Americans have moved enough beyond cynicism and really would like to believe in something other than the dark vision of the Republican Party that's been the prevailing message these past 7+ years.

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9:56pm: With Dick Durbin up now, this is where it really begins. It's turning 7pm on the West Coast. The East Coast is still up. This is the moment they built this whole week up to. Man, I love political theater!

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Obama's bio video was pretty understated, as these things go. And now he's getting ready to speak. Of course, this would be when my laundry needs to come out of the dryer...

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The second round of applause I've heard this week from the Democratic convention for John McCain's service. Remains to be seen if there's any applause for Obama's achievement as the first African-American presidential nominee at the GOP convention.

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Michelle Obama: that is one fantabulous dress!

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Okay, I loved that speech. Apparently, the AP already has a story out there that says, basically, "ho hum." But I think it was a pretty great speech. Who knows how far these move people along in making up their mind? It's telling that Barack Obama had something like 80,000 people in attendance (not counting the millions like me, by television), whereas John McCain is apparently having problems giving away tickets to tomorrow's announcement of his running mate.

And now to bed -- and tomorrow, to Dallas for a few days of interconvention vacation with friends. Happy Labor Day!

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Despite Her Age

great speech by Hillary Clinton — and exactly the response she deserved and in the best venue for her, which is a large crowd of raucous partisans of whatever stripe — that should put to bed the PUMA misallocation of principles or goals.

How can anyone who supported her as president — and as the anointed standard bearer of the Democratic Party — ignore what she's had to say since June 7, if they actually take her and her candidacy seriously? How can they continue to pretend that they support their own goals or hers by supporting John McCain or sitting out this election? They can say it — but they immediately indicate that they really didn't care about Hillary Clinton's views all along but only about what they felt she stood for.

Fair enough. It's intellectually dishonest, and disrespectful to Hillary Clinton herself, but if you're more interested in retaining generational power in the Democratic Party than in what's good for the country, then of course you'll discount her words since June 7 and still work and argue against Barack Obama as president.

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Speaking of "generational power," how to say this? I guess by eliminating first the things I'm not saying.

Race is definitely an issue in this campaign. Bill Clinton's all bent out of shape that he got portrayed as a racist, when in truth he's always treated black political aspirations the same as Obama portrayed his wife's: as worthy and beneficial, especially for the group they/she represented. (He probably discounts Geraldine Ferraro's racist observations; I know I did.) But I don't think race it the primary demographic issue.

Gender was (and maybe still is) a major issue in the campaign. Hillary was the brunt of a whole load of misogyny from the media and, in a few instances, even from Obama surrogates -- let alone the misogynist expressions from Obama supporters posting on discussion boards and blogs. But I also don't think gender is the primary issue in this campaign.

Increasingly, I'm thinking Obama's problem with voters has less to do with race or gender, and everything to do with age.

Hillary Clinton is 60 years old. Her husband is 62. Oft reported, John McCain turns 72 -- the outer side of mandatory retirement for a lot of Americans -- on Friday.

Barack Obama just recently turned 47 a few weeks ago. And I'm starting to think, he's too young for too many voters.

Race, at least in marketing, is often used as a proxy for generation. Show a dreadlocked guy and you've checked off the youth vote in your ad campaign. (Yes, he'll also be youngish, but a white guy fraternity boy in a bow tie -- and there's probably a picture of me somewhere that shows exactly that -- hardly says "youth" to marketers.)

Gender is often marketed in the same way, and is a proxy for youth or generational openness to shared power.

Here's what I'm getting at: I think the fault line -- among both Democrats and Republicans -- may be age. Republican Baby Boomers have no problem voting for someone older, because they've always fetishized the past. But more importantly, I think Democrats over the age of 50 are having a tough time supporting a candidate younger than they are.

Of these Democrats, they were overly enthusiastic about Bill Clinton, despite his failings. And, I think, they're overly confident in Hillary Clinton or, even, John McCain. What they can't seem to do is get past the idea of a president who's, finally, younger than they are.

There are all sorts of holes in my theory, not the least of which is that 70-somethings also supported Hillary over Barack, unless you consider that she was less young than he is.

But all intraparty criticism I hear about him regards his "inexperience." Even though Hillary doesn't have a whole lot more. "But she's got Bill.' Sure. And now he's got Joe Biden, who's got more national experience than any of them. So your point is... ?

Striking further, I think the Baby Boom isn't ready to go out on George W. Bush. I don't blame them. Despite the Clinton fatigue that may have made enough people (at least five on the Supreme Court) ready for a change in 2000, and despite what Bush has done to the country for the past 8 years, there are still enough of them who want another chance to make it right.

Strictly speaking, Obama is a Baby Boomer too -- as I am, if only by six weeks. But the bulk of the Baby Boom is now 50 or older, and most of the anger I hear and see is from Democrats over 50. And I think there's an objection -- not based on race, not even based on gender -- but based on age. Baby Boomers have had to accommodate themselves to doctors younger than they are, even CEOs (and managers) younger than they -- but where they've got a choice, in a voting booth, they have a real problem voting for a president younger than they are.

It's ageism in reverse. I still hope they come around to supporting Obama in November. But now that I've realized this, it changes the way I view their opposition to an Obama presidency -- less with incredulity and more with empathy and, yes, pity.

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Best Speech by a Political Spouse Ever?

n listening to The Brian Lehrer Show this morning, a caller just said that she hated Michelle Obama's speech, that it was "too yearning, too sing-song." She wanted a harder edge; in fact, she admitted, she wanted Hillary Clinton.

Now, as I've said before, I like Hillary, I'll continue to vote for her as senator as long as she chooses to serve, and if she'd been the nominee, I'd be voting for her in November. But Hillary isn't a great speechmaker. She's got like two notes, and nowadays she uses them to pretty good effect, depending on the audience (she didn't use to), but otherwise, she generally gives a speech the way John McLaughlin sings lullabies.

I thought Michelle Obama's speech was superb. I thought Ted Kennedy's appearance was superb. It was great television, it was great political theater. If I could have had anything from the first night of the Democratic National Convention, it would have been a little more on pointing out Republican hypocrisy on the issues. That, I think, is the best way to make the intellectual case against that party and its nominee -- much as I appreciate the need for the gut-level, too-many-houses-to-remember charactizations, too. Campaigning that McCain would be four more years of Bush only goes so far; I don't think most McCain leaners think that, for the simple reason that he isn't Bush. But he's been a hypocrite in all his flip-flopping on issues. And the Republican positions overall are hypocritcal. (Tax cuts for the elite; support the troops, until they come home; compete globally by gutting education, etc. etc. etc.)

And I'm sensitive to the criticism that an "all Obama, all the time" convention only lends credibility to the charges of arrogance and that this is a coronation. So, if I were planning this schedule, now that "family night" is over, where it was all about the personal anyway, I'd make Tuesday and Wednesday night far more substantive. Which, given the speakers, I imagine it will be.

Speaking of Hillary and her speech tonight: she has a high bar to hit here, partly through no fault of her own, partly from her own fault. Why John McCain decided to run a number of ads (at least two so far) that use her statements from the primary race about Obama BEFORE she has a national audience to rebut them (and McCain) -- and same with Biden -- is beyond me. Seems kind of stupid. And as everyone points out, there's a whole bunch of Republicans on video that are going to make great ads for Obama after the GOP convention.

But it has also occurred to me and others: if Hillary had won the nomination, what statements from Obama's own mouth would McCain be using in advertising against her? I can't think of anything, but then I didn't get too much up in arms about either of their statements about each other, chalking it up to electioneering. So maybe there were a few and I didn't notice. But I'd still like to know the answer.

Labels: politics

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Change Isn't Just "Who." It's Also "How."

One thing that occurs to me about Biden as VP is that this really would be a very different administration than what we've seen for 8 years, which is really what Barack Obama is arguing for. Sure, Joe Biden has more seniority in the Senate than all but four of his colleagues there (since he's been in the Senate since he was 30). More important, however, is that Biden has always spoken his mind about what's right for his constituents or for America, and he's notoriously not a favorite of the K Street lobbyists for this very reason. In fact, he's listed as the "poorest" Senator in the Senate, despite his years of service and opportunities for, shall we say, "financial self-aggrandizement" (whereas John McCain is the "richest" -- because he married money).

But it's not whether Obama represents change -- he obviously does, unless you haven't seen our currency -- or whether Biden doesn't. The change comes in "how" the government operates, and the first step of that is nominating a VP who will argue forcefully within an administration for his point of view but not insist upon it, and maybe even speak out publicly when he is of a different mind. That's the way our early Republic worked, and if an Obama-Biden administration have some public dust-ups over policy proposals in the next four years, but can continue to respect each other and work together, that's one sign of a change in Washington, no doubt about it.

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The charge that, by responding in tone and content to McCain's low-road attacks, Obama is going back on some pledge not to "attack" his opponent, here's what he actually said on November 10, 2007 (emphasis added):

"Our moment is now. I don't want to spend the next year or the next four years re-fighting the same fights we had in the 1990s. I don't want to pit Red America against Blue America. I want to be President of the United States of America.

"And if those Republicans come at me with the same fear-mongering and swift-boating that they usually do, then I will take them head on. Because I believe the American people are tired of fear and tired of distractions and tired of diversions. We can make this election not about fear, but about the future. And that won't just be a Democratic victory; that will be an American victory."

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Finally, and probably most importantly, in July McCain claimed, "I have a perfect voting record from organizations like the Veterans of Foreign Wars, the American Legion and all the other veterans service organizations." One problem with that: the VFW and American Legion don't compile congressional voting records.

Even more seriously, among those that do, McCain has a dismal record for veterans. According to the Disabled American Veterans, he has supported their issues only 34% of the time. Obama, on the other hand, has voted with disabled vets 89% of the time -- almost as much as McCain has voted with George W. Bush.

Another veterans group that tracks voting records, the Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America, gives McCain a "D" -- since he voted to support their issues only 58% of the time. Obama supported this group's favored legislation 89% time, earning a B-plus.

More information (and from which I culled this information) is here, from the Central Shenandoah Valley News Leader.

Labels: politics

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McCain Doesn't Speak for the McCain Campaign

o it's Joe Biden. I'm fine with that. Actually, pretty pleased. He's had his own gaffes, will have others, but nothing compared to McCain's outright lies, flip-flops, evasions, gaffes and misstatements. More on one of the latest ones in a minute.

Since ABC and other networks broke the news sometime after midnight that Obama had picked Biden, I'm wondering if the text message that went out around 3 a.m. was trying to get out in front of early morning reports or a subtle reference to the phone call that comes in at 3 a.m. Probably the former — but it's interesting to think of Mark Penn's cellphone beeping at 3 a.m. with the news that the U.S. senator with the most actual experience in foreign affairs was joining the Obama ticket.

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he fact that McCain can't remember how many houses he owns — whether to live in, for investment purposes, or whatever — is a hilarious turn of events. It'll die down during the conventions, I expect, although several of the speakers at this next week's Democratic National Convention should build on that point further.

Did McCain & Co. really think no one was ever going to ask this question, if only for background purposes? And is it that hard to figure out — even if the answer is "We have one home we live in, one we use for my work in Virginia, two vacation homes, and then we have some investment properties" as some pundits have suggested as a possible answer. (That's still not exactly the right tone to set if labeling your opponent an out-of-touch elitist is your gameplan, but at least you don't look like Ritchie Rich or Scrooge McDuck.)

What I thought was even more inept, however, was the statement put out by the McCain campaign after Obama and surrogates made note of McCain's too-rich-to-know-how-rich statements. "Does a guy who made more than $4 million last year, just got back from vacation on a private beach in Hawaii and bought his own million-dollar mansion with the help of a convicted felon really want to get into a debate about houses? Does a guy who worries about the price of arugula and thinks regular people "cling" to guns and religion in the face of economic hardship really want to have a debate about who's in touch with regular Americans?"

Leaving aside the Rezko reference — which, frankly, is really lame and a stretch as a scandal (see sidebar) — the libel against the 50th state as something exotic and elite, and the ridiculous jab at U.S. farmers who grow anything other than iceberg lettuce, what struck me most about this flailing was the first line about the Obama's income (which is mostly from book sales). Whoever wrote this (McCain spokesperson Brian Rogers) didn't watch his own candidate at Saddleback Church last weekend, apparently. According to McCain himself, the Obamas are middle-class — since he said himself "rich" doesn't kick-in as a description before you hit $5 million.

On the other hand, the McCain campaign has indicated several times that John McCain doesn't speak for the McCain campaign. This would apparently be the latest such example.

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I realize so many of my latest posts (the air conditioning issue aside, which has been resolved) have been about politics — it's an election year, after all. But I've also been reading some interesting scripture as part of the Daily Office of Morning and Evening Prayer in the Episcopal Church's Book of Common Prayer. So, the next time one of these strikes me as something worth thinking further about out loud (well, here), I probably will. You've been warned.

Labels: politics

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Air-Conditioning Hassles and John Edwards Get My Dander Up

hey say you're not supposed to call old significant others when you're drunk (or do a lot of other things, for that matter). I think for me, the rule would be you shouldn't blog when you're cranky. Unfortunately, no one took away the keys to the blog as I was getting crankier and crankier today. Let me walk you back through it...

Sometime last night, the window-unit air conditioner in my bedroom decided the compressor was optional. "We're cutting you off! We have to think of the rest of the us: the fan, the coils, the stupid timer that only goes up to 12 hours! It's every feature for him- or herself!" So now it only blows air, a slightly warmed variation of whatever is outside.

As anyone who has lived with me knows, I'm pretty much tied to air conditioning indoors in the summer. I'm okay being outside in the heat and humidity for awhile, but when I'm inside, I want it cool. I want it cold if I'm sleeping. I want condensation on windows, if possible.

So that started me off on the wrong foot today, and it isn't just the hassle of replacing a window-unit air conditioner. That would have been the case at one time, with my old windows. But in their collective wisdom, my co-op board decided every apartment in the co-op (all 500-and-something units, across five different buildings around a central garden) needed new windows, and they had to all be the same, and it didn't matter if your current windows were just fine, worth 2-3 times what the replacements would be (my case), or the drafty originals from 1939. We were all getting new windows.

I objected strenuously, but I also recognized that I live in a cooperative. Outside of New York, that maybe doesn't mean anything to anyone. And, in day-to-day practice, a "co-op" and a "condo" are practically interchangeable. But unlike in a condominium, I don't actually own my apartment, I own shares in the overall cooperative, and am assigned (or maybe I lease? not sure the legal definition) my individual apartment. Like a co-op, I pretty much own the apartment "from the paint in." Which means I don't own the windows, as they're structural and part of the outside of the building too -- and uniformity on the outside was an issue for the co-op board, even though my original windows matched the color scheme of the others very well, they were just far better quality, and I'm on a floor that has slightly different windows anyway from the other floors.

So I gave up the fight about the windows, and probably had the value of my apartment reduced by about 5K or more, I'm guessing. Whatever.

But when it came time to re-install the window-unit air conditioners -- the co-op's buildings are too old to have central air, unfortunately -- they kind of kluged together a solution that essentially involves soldering and sealing the cabinet of your window unit into the open window, using Plexiglass for the side panels, if needed, and lots of clear caulk.

Which is what this means, now that one of those hermetically sealed air conditioners has died on me: I will probably need to schedule a time (and pay) for a window crew to come and take out the current AC unit, get delivery on a new unit from the people who sold me the last one (since it's still under extended warranty, and they'll replace it for the same value) and they take away the old unit, then get the window crew back to install the new unit. If I'm exceedingly lucky, I can get the current unit out, separate from the "cabinet" that houses it, and can get a new AC unit that will fit inside that same cabinet (i.e., the same model, if they still sell it), so the window crew doesn't need to be involved. That is the big question mark at present. All previous attempts to figure out how to remove the AC from the cabinet have failed -- as if it, too, had been sealed in when they sealed in the whole AC to the window -- but I have a newfound urgency to solving that problem, so in the depths of my frustration, there is some hope, somewhere. Meanwhile, I just want the evening temperatures in New York City to remain cool-ish here in August until I have a new air conditioner that can best the humidity.

So it is with all this as background that I started work today, from home (in the still-air-conditioned living room). A friend told me last night that he's decided he "doesn't suffer fools gladly"; he "makes fools suffer." That strikes me as a pretty harsh frame of mind to go through life with -- with more harm, ultimately, to the harm purveyor than the sufferer -- but I admit that became my mental frame of mind today, already annoyed by the air conditioning fiasco.

I have to say, however, that I work with very smart and yet still very real people, and in all the conversations I had today at work, I was struck by how decent and, well, human my colleagues can be. I don't often talk about work on this blog, for a variety of reasons, the primary one being that I've already got a professional platform, being in Communications there, but I don't want the two -- ibm.com and derekbaker.com -- ever confused. (As if.) But I have to say that the people I work with on a regular basis and the vast majority of people I connect with for ad hoc purposes are really decent and helpful folks, in spite of vacation schedules, family pressures, health issues, executives breathing down their necks, whatever it is. That alone helped me get some perspective on the day, but then came Big Annoyance Number Two: John Edwards.

Dude, what in the hell were you thinking? Seriously.

Let's leave aside the fact that you cheated on your ill wife. That would be bad enough, but the entire nation is already feeling sympathy for her, so you were just looking to be the asshole that made her life worse, weren't you? But let's put that aside for a moment, because politics is an ego game to some degree to begin with, and John McCain has done much worse. He cheated on his sick wife, too, but went ahead and divorced her to marry the blonde chick he'd cheated with. (That would be the present Mrs. McCain -- an admitted drug addict who stole prescriptions from poor kids to support her habit. But she's clean now. Whew.)

But, Senator Edwards, how stupid do you have to be to think that your affair isn't going to get discovered and reported on, especially if you're running for President of the United States?

You dolt. I supported you. I sent you money, which you apparently turned around to pay for "videos" (heh heh) produced by your paramour for your Web site -- despite her not having much background or talent to do such.

Infidelity has affectecd the lives of all the front runners' families other than the Obamas (as far as we know so far), from the McCains to the Clintons to now the Edwardses. So more importantly, it's the hypocrisy that makes me cranky. You said you couldn't support the right of gays and lesbians to marry because it conflicted with your personal religious beliefs about marriage. And, from what I've been able to determine, you were "undecided" on the Family Medical Leave Act or immigration rights applying to same-sex couples.

To your credit, you favored the repeal of "Don't Ask, Don't Tell." And you cosponsored the act that adds protections based on sexual orientation to hate crimes legislation. And I have to say, I even respected the way the you expressed your opposition to gay marriage (even if that was only to play both sides of the electorate) by explaining that you weren't there yourself, but your wife and kids had made it clear that they thought you were wrong. That was a much more honest answer than what I heard from Obama or Clinton, at least, who are still neanderthals on this issues.

But -- and I'm sorry, but I have to say it -- your saying that a gay relationship isn't worthy of the status of "marriage" under Federal law even while you're debasing your own heterosexual, government-endorsed marriage is the height of hypocrisy.

I'm mad at you for a number of reasons, John. (And, having sent you money, most recently the exact day before you pulled out of the race in fact, I feel we can speak on a first-name basis, at least.) But not least among them is that you chose to debase my relationship on the grounds that yours was somehow more sacred -- and then didn't even honor that.

So, all in all, a cranky day. Not without reason. Here's hoping tomorrow, for everyone, is a better one.

Labels: personal, politics

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