Maverick Tribe

Watch till you can't stand it anymore.  I got suicidal around the two-minute mark.

The majority Republican California Supreme Court has just ruled that the state's ban on same-sex marriages is unconstiutional.  A backlash constitutional amendment is in the works for this November.  Six months away - a long six months.

Editor's Note:  This is the first in a series of elitist condescensions toward all you regular Americans, working-class Americans, hard-working, regular class Americans, all things Heartland, and anyone who lives in a flyover state.  Just to be explicit:  yes, I do think I'm better than you.  -- MT

Yes that's right, I think they're rubes, at least the 25 percent of whites who voted for Clinton in the primary yesterday and said that race was a factor in their vote.  That's right, 25 percent of Clinton voters virtually admitted they were racist.  How many more are but didn't admit it?  So yes, if you're going to vote for a white woman over a black man and say that race was a factor in your vote, then this San Francisco latte-sipping elitist thinks that you're a dumbass yokel.

Looking at how Obama gets crushed in West Virginia's primary, everyone likes to ask:  "What is the matter with Barack Obama?  Why can't he appeal to working class whites?"  But the real question is, What is the matter with West Virginia?

"Well, the contest didn't work out so well for Mitt Romney. I think he was making those same arguments against John McCain, suggesting that John McCain, as a senator, hadn't done what Mitt Romney had done. And, yet, here we are, and there Mitt Romney is."

- Barack Obama, responding to Romney's criticism that Obama had "not accomplished anything during his life"

It now appears the news media are ready to anoint Obama as the Democratic nominee.  I'm glad the clock is running out... I'm tired of beating up on Hillary Clinton.  I'm ready to start beating up on John McCain.

In a way I feel bad for Hillary.  She obviously has had designs on the presidency for quite some time.  She has worked tirelessly since 2000 to position herself for this campaign.  She is as smart as a whip and extremely capable.

But she and her husband are increasingly poisonous to our politics.  And I think it's fitting that they are spending their final days wallowing in a cesspool of spin, that is of their own making, and that is populated by every bacterial species of cynicism known to political scientists:  hypocrisy (the most powerful Democratic family to be immersed in Washington for the past fifteen years accusing Obama of being elitist and out of touch), pandering (promoting a pathetic gas tax holiday thought to be sound policy by no known neutral observer), racialized politics (touting her electability based on the strength of support from "hard working Americans, white Americans"), and, of course, good old bald-faced lying (Bosnia).

Obama has fended off the all-things-to-all-people Hillary Clinton.  McCain has fended off the cyborg Mitt Romney.  This election so far has been a triumph of principle over politics as usual, as cliched as that may sound.

Ok, cheesy and biased, yes.  But I found this pretty entertaining.  (My favorite part is when Darth Hillary uses the force to strangle Howard Dean.)

I'm dying to write more extensively about the campaign, but I'm taking two interior design classes and I'm under a heap of project work at the moment.  Here are some random thoughts in brief (a "brain dump" as it's called in the information technology world):

• Clinton and McCain are advocating a gas tax holiday this summer.  Economists of every stripe think this is a stupid idea.  In fact, I imagine this proposal will appear in future political science textbooks as a case study in clever politics but abysmal policy.  Props to Obama for resisting this empty populist pander.

• Hillary Clinton is looking very strong.  I think once she got her slobby strategist Mark Penn out of the picture, her campaign has found its footing.  She made the right move by appearing on Bill O'Reilly's show.  Her appearance will bring some Obama independents over to her side.  I think Obama should go on his show as well.  I know, I know, O'Reilly is a posturing, right-wing blowhard, and Lord knows I have my issues with Fox News.  But I've never been one of these liberals who wants to marginalize Fox News by boycotting and eschewing them.  It doesn't work - they have the largest audience in cable news.  Both candidates need to speak directly to that audience.

• Obama is, obviously, looking weak.  I've always thought the Wright matter was a legitimate issue for the media to explore, but enough already.

• That said, I think there is an opportunity here, albeit a risky one.  As much as he wants to get the Wright embarrassment behind him, Obama should consider engaging his former pastor in a public debate.  Recall that his remarkable speech in Philadelphia included this passage:

I suppose the politically safe thing to do would be to move on from [the Rev. Wright] episode and just hope that it fades into the woodwork. We can dismiss Reverend Wright as a crank or a demagogue, just as some have dismissed Geraldine Ferraro, in the aftermath of her recent statements, as harboring some deep-seated bias.

But race is an issue that I believe this nation cannot afford to ignore right now. We would be making the same mistake that Reverend Wright made in his offending sermons about America — to simplify and stereotype and amplify the negative to the point that it distorts reality.

The fact is that the comments that have been made and the issues that have surfaced over the last few weeks reflect the complexities of race in this country that we've never really worked through — a part of our union that we have not yet made perfect. And if we walk away now, if we simply retreat into our respective corners, we will never be able to come together and solve challenges like health care or education or the need to find good jobs for every American.

Ok, then.  Sen. Obama often advertises himself as a unifying figure, a leader who compels others to put aside their partisan differences and come together toward a common purpose.  And what we have in Rev. Wright is the embodiment of the most extreme, victim-wallowing, divisive elements of the black social justice movement.  Obama, by trying to change the subject, is doing the politically safe thing by his own definition.  Wouldn't it be a powerful demonstration of his supposedly reconcilating politics if he were to forge some common ground on race, between Wright and his defenders and the Geraldine Ferraro Democratic mainstream?

A tall order, I know.  And we can't blame Obama for refusing to have a private matter - the dissolution of what was a spiritually transformative relationship - detailed in the national media.  But this is America - we love a good, tawdry, political psychodrama.  And Obama himself has stressed the urgency of addressing the recalcitrant racial misunderstanding in this country.

You might say he needs to face up to "the fierce urgency of now".

Obama has just held a press conference essentially divorcing himself from his mocking, narcissistic, self-parody of a pastor.  This event is layered with relief and sadness for me.  Relief obviously, as there is no love lost between the vast majority of Obama supporters - including me - and Rev. Wright.  But sadness because, in terms of the personal relationship between Obama and Wright, there is obviously a lot of love lost.  The guy inspired the title of The Audacity of Hope, for crying out loud.

We now know that Wright does not take attacks on him lying down.  As such, Barack Obama is now running a presidential campaign against three direct opponents:  McCain, Hillary Clinton, and now Jeremiah Wright.

There, back on the saddle.  Boy, that felt good.

I've been away for the last week on the Yucatan Peninsula.  A much needed break from this increasingly depressing campaign.  I'll get back on the saddle soon.