After Labor Day: Still Wanting To Believe In Obama ; What He Should Say Now

I've blogged recently about abandoning Obama for Hillary because we gotta win in '08 and my Nader days are over and if it has to be the profoundly compromised Clintons so be it.

That would at least be sane. As compared to, say--RUDY.

But tonite, lounging on my couch, I catch Obama on Cspan in Manchester NH on Labor Day. He showed signs of dropping the professorial detachment thing he's been doing and letting passion loose, which I have been theorizing he's been holding back for tactical reasons, but was beginning to doubt it.

But he did it. He got emotional. And the way he worked the rope line afterwards--it was beautiful. Every hand he touched was his forever.

So just assuming--hoping, praying--that he's been keeping the big guns of emotion out of action until now for tactical reasons and he's about to switch to inspiration, here's my advice:

Hillary can do tough. She can do smart. She can make us feel, in the absence of the lift of a driving dream, that she is the one who can win. But she can't do inspiration. If Obama can, and is going to, here is what he should say:

"I don't have a well-oiled political machine. I don't have a history at the top of the Washington power pyramid with all the advantages that come with that. So if I am going to win this thing it will be because you and you and you turn out in your towns and neighborhoods and work for something more than just beating the Republicans. It will be because you and you and you are willing to work for a whole new beginning in our political life.... etc...."

But then he has to say:

"If, at the end of the day, Hillary wins than so be it. I will gladly turn on a dime and support her in the general election. Her machine can deploy me as they will. There will not be one ounce of resentment. Her heart is in the right place and I trust it. Our country will be infinitely better off with any Democrat as president... etc..."

He has to say both those things all the time. For one thing, it counters her "I'm above all our squabbles ploy." But most important: it's true.

Comments

[Pyrum]

I wish all you democrats would relax. There's no way a republican can win against any of the democratic candidates in 2008 unless they run Ron Paul, who would actually make a great president.

Get ready for Queen Hillary and Prince Barack, and those of you who think Obama has too much integrity to accept Clinton's offer to be VP on her ticket are only fooling yourselves. He doesn't care about what you think, and how else is he going to get the experience everyone says he lacks?

[TheOtherMaven]

I say we should abolish ALL primaries and go back to the system of picking the party nominee AT - not before - the national convention. We got some pretty good people that way - and we've had some downright horrid ones via the primacy of primaries.

[ikebona]

And BTW Thomas, let me just say, I can gurantee and even put money that if Obama loses the nomination, HE WILL NOT SUPPORT HILLARY. And neither will I. I will vote for a Republican if their nominee is someone like Huckabee. Or vote for the Independent candidate.

Supporting a candidate is a huge deal. Look at the endorsements. People endorse candidates whose political path is simiar to theirs or whom they believe in. Obama is still very young and cannot afford to taint his political future by backing a mean-spirited politician like Hillary Clinton.

But fact of the matter is, this time in 2009, we'll be blogging about US President Barack Obama.

[Plowboy]

Well, I see that my post was rejected. Ha! Maybe this will fly: why should any of us get excited about the Bush imitation contest the Democrats are putting on?
Not one is willing to confront the sources of our problems. Well, Kucinich tries but he isn't considered worthy of a hearing by the party machine.

[dunlow]

I switched to the Democratic party to vote for
Edwards. If the Republicans had any real mud to fling, they
would have hurled it with all their might during the last election to. Fag, hypocrite in
a big house, Breck girl. The Republicans gas
bags embarrass themselves. Obama is not electable
and that is just us at our worst perhaps. Clinton
doesn't deserve the office and that is us at our
most discerning. If you don't want to commit a nader again, vote for Edwards. Do it for all of
us.

[ikebona]

Wishful thinking, dunlow, isn't reality.

Ask Democrats, which of the Republican candidate they would vote for as President. That's how you determine the electability of a Republican candidate. As much as Democrats Love a candidate, they cannot determine his/her electability. Because it will take defectors to get elected.

When you say a Democratic candidate who's pulling the largest crowd, raising the most money and most donors from people in both parties and came third among Republicans choice for President ahead of McCain, Brownback and Huckabee is not electable, is like starting a new business that you want to very successful, but at the same time ignoring the research data.

[MPeter]

No, No, No No. The kind of America and worldview Senator Obama presents is the exact opposite of what Senator HRC offers. No. If the old Guard DEMS impose HRC, Obama should not support her. Walk away and retain his integrity. HRC is for status quo in Foreign Policy, she will not engage leaders we do not agree with, she wants us to stay the course in Iraq, she supports bombing Iran and she will not take nukes off the table when it comes to dealing with terrorists. She will not adjust a failed 50-year policy on Cuba and, she has told us nothing about Healthcare or the Middle Class which the outsourcing she supports has caused.
Mr. Zengotita I read your stuff regularly but on this one, you are so wrong. If you like HRC and all she stands for, you do not like change and have no clue as to what a fresh start for America looks like. It is that simple.
HRC is old school, too divisve, too hawkish, too set in Washington conventional ways. The Clintons are too tainted. If Senator Obama buys into this HRC and DLC crap about supporting the Clintons, he is finished. I know, pray and hope that he is too smart a man to bow to this nonsense. It is Obama 08 or nothing. It is that simple.

[B2]

It escapes me how, at one point, you actually considered abandoning Obama for Clinton. Not when there is a substantive candidate who already inspires others. Edwards IS the most electable candidate! Check out Rasmussen. If you want change, change your mind.

[LizM]

I'm sorry to say that neither Clinton nor Obama have the necessary foreign policy or national security credentials to beat ANY of the Republican candidates on "their" issue.

And, make no mistake...foreign policy and national security will remain "their" issue unless the Democrats choose a nominee who has impeccable and unimpeachable credentials on both of these top issues.

Any guesses as to who that may be?

[ikebona]

None of the Republican candidates has the foreign policy or national securiy credentials of Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld.

So are you still interested in credentials? I didn't think so.

Judgment, LizM is one thing that only Huckabee and probably Ron Paul have. But the bad or good news is that Republicans will not nominate either of them.

[LizM]

Did I ever say that Republicans have any credentials on foreign policy or national security? EVER?

I guess I've been making myself about as clear as mud!!!

When I say that foreign policy and national security are "Republican issues" I mean that according to almost every poll you see on this says that the American people - in all their infinite...ahem...wisdon - believe that foreign policy and national security are "Republican issues". Got it!?

The only candidate running for President, in either party, who has impeccable and umimpeachable foreign policy and national security credentials that are wholly unmatched by any of his rivals is none other than Senator Joseph R. Biden, Jr.

'Make Hope and History Rhyme'...Biden/Hagel 2008 It's written in the stars