Month: April 2008

If you watched the debate last night (or, like me, read transcripts, watched internet video and related articles about it today), the choice in this election has become pretty stark:

ABC News had a conservative (Gibson) and a former Clinton employee (Stephanopolis) “moderate” a debate –which they filled with questions about Rev. Wright, the flag pin, patriotism, “bitter-gate”…even Obama’s connection to William Ayers, a member of the 1970s Weather Underground (in a question, unbelievably, given to Stephanopolis by FOX news’ Sean Hannity during an interview earlier in the day). Barely any substantive issues questions at all. It was a pure hatchet-job of “gotcha” politics — exactly the sort of thing that Obama has been saying, time and time again, that we need to move past.

Obama represents a new kind of politics — issues rather than bread-and-circuses distraction. It terrifies Clinton (because that’s not a field she can compete in, being a politician of the old school, tempered in the culture wars), and it confounds the mainstream media (who have made their money by sensationalism and distraction).

Last night was a stark example of what we’re all fighting against. Hopefully, it was SO disgusting and blatant that people will respond.

(EDIT: Just saw Andrew Sullivan’s thoughts on the same topic, posted ten minutes after I posted this. Worth a read.)

While the national media would much rather talk about “Bitter”-gate, a journalist for the Philadelphia Daily News amazingly has asked Barack Obama an actual question of critical importance: Whether an Obama administration would seek to prosecute Bush administration officials on the revelations that they greenlighted torture, or for other potential crimes that took place in the White House.

The response (full article linked above):

Obama said that as president he would indeed ask his new Attorney General and his deputies to “immediately review the information that’s already there” and determine if an inquiry is warranted — but he also tread carefully on the issue, in line with his reputation for seeking to bridge the partisan divide. He worried that such a probe could be spun as “a partisan witch hunt.” However, he said that equation changes if there was willful criminality, because “nobody is above the law.”

Again, a reasonable, intelligent, principled response: No partisan witch-hunt– but if crimes were committed, all bets are off.

Expect to see many more efforts by Republicans to get Hillary as the nominee.

“Hillary Clinton is a fantastically wealthy, union-busting, condescending corporate board member with a privileged background who’s trying to convince you that she’s more “in touch” than a guy whose relatives live in huts.”

(From a Huffington Post editorial.)