Final Countdown (on Prop 8)

Keith Olbermann can be annoying, abrasive, and bombastic. Don't get me wrong, I like him, and I think he is incredibly erudite and insightful. Those qualities set him apart from his ideological nemesis Bill O'Reilly. But in this commentary, he truly demonstrates why he is so much more than just the left's version of O'Reilly or Rush Limbaugh.

Slow Fade

I just read that India landed an unmanned spacecraft on the moon today. I don't know why, but this bothers me almost as much as the financial crisis that grips the U.S. I love the American space program, and I have always felt a sense of pride in it. But nowadays our education system can't even teach our children science without having to beat back church groups, and in mathematics our children lag behind other nations. And we have no money to address these educational issues - we are heavily leveraged by war and debt and the true cost of the so-called "free" market.

I'm sure Indians feel a great swell of pride in their country's accomplishment, as well they should. But I can't help feel that we Americans should be standing on Moon Base Alpha right now, chillin in a gigantic greenhouse, instead of drowning in ten trillion dollars of debt.

President-Elect Barack Obama

The harder-working candidate won. The smarter, more academic candidate won. The more charismatic speaker won. The more consistent, more even-tempered candidate won. The more hopeful, more inclusive candidate won. Dare I say it? The better community organizer won. Unlike the past two presidential elections, which made it seem like cynical demographic triangulations were the only path to victory in 21st century politics, yesterday I had the feeling that that the better candidate really did win, as opposed to the better strategy, which had triumphed in the past. That is truly a cause for hope.

However you voted, and in whatever way you care to parse the election results, I think it is clear that Barack Obama out-hustled John McCain at almost every step of the campaign, kept a steadier hand upon the direction of his candidacy, and ultimately prevailed at least in part because of these reasons. Obama cultivated a clear vision and (mostly) stayed with his message and his ideals throughout the entire epic campaign. No small feat in a two-year contest. Factor in that Obama is black, and his victory seems all the sweeter: here is finally proof that white privilege can be cast aside, at least for a moment, and that the better man can actually win the top elective office, regardless of race.

I think Obama is going to be a great president. He and his staff ran an incredibly disciplined, focused, intelligent campaign, and they sustained the effort for a very long time. If his administration is anything like his campaign, I think we really will see some positive changes in the next four years. I don't agree with Obama on every issue, and the nation and the world he inherits have monumental problems to face. But I am very excited at the prospect of Obama stepping in to heal the festering wounds that mar our body politic. Congratulations to him and all of his supporters.

* * *

A few words about race.

When I was a college student, over the course of two quarters I spent my lunch hour watching and discussing Eyes on the Prize, the seminal 14-hour documentary series about the civil rights movement. The stories of the movement and the power of the archival footage made simply watching that series and participating in the discussion groups a transformational event for me.

I saw in that series the totality of the American experience for the first time. The true arc of American history is woefully incomplete without a full appreciation of the civil rights movement. Colonial-era slavery culminated in the American Civil War. The Civil War begot the Reconstruction. The Reconstruction gave way to Jim Crow laws and segregation. This institutionalized racism led ultimately to the movement. And politicians and policy makers since then have alternatively tried to shore up, fight against, or co-opt the legacy of that movement. The Black experience isn't some minor part of American history; it is American history.

Fast forward to the primary season at the beginning of this year. To me, it seemed we were closer to a Black president in 1988 when Jesse Jackson made a run than we were in 2008. But on this stage an insurgency was already brewing in the person of Barack Obama.

Obama is not a preacher, a military man, an athlete, or a movie star, as one might have expected the first African-American president to be. In spite of noises to the contrary, he wasn't really a celebrity of any kind. Derided by Sarah Palin for being a "community organizer," it turned out that that was his fundamental strength: his feet-on-the ground, working knowledge of how to build and maintain a coalition propelled him to victory.

Watching Eyes on the Prize, I couldn't help but think that as a nation we had drifted away from the promise and focus and optimism of those bygone years. I can see that I was wrong. In Obama lives a deep knowledge of and respect for that history, and whose rhetoric is steeped in that tradition. I am thrilled by the knowledge that his election will energize the dialog on race in the United States. And I am deeply, deeply happy that the hopes and dreams of so many tireless participants in the civil rights movement, these community organizers, are partially fulfilled by Obama's ascendancy. They sacrificed so much, and some paid the ultimate price for their belief in a nation that could live up to its highest ideals. This victory is theirs.

If Only Issues Really Decided The Outcome

If this picture illustrated the actual candidates, would the polls in this presidential election be so close..? Sadly, I guess that the answer is no.

Don't forget to vote!