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Hillary Bawls and Breaks Even

In a stunning reality-check, Barack Obama's predicted New Hampshire primary victory by two digits was turned out to be Hillary Clinton's win...by two points. Exit poll statistics seem to indicate that Mrs. Clinton won on the votes of lesser-educated women and that many of the independents who helped fuel Senator Obama's Iowa landslide chose in New Hampshire to vote for the Republican primary victor, John McCain.

Having thoroughly embarrassed themselves by effectively declaring the primaries won on the strength of one contest out of fifty, the mainstream media is now constructing a narrative that attributes Clinton's "out-of-nowhere" two-point victory to winning sympathy on the basis of a moment that would've surely ended the candidacy of any male contestant for the presidency-- the moment when the woman who's tough enough to bomb Iran broke down and teared up over the prospect of perhaps not moving back into the White House after all.

If this narrative bears any relation to the truth, then we are doomed and rightly so. The fate of the nation lies in the hands of stay-at-home moms, Denny's waitresses, and the pudgy broads trudging into any given Walmart on any given weekend.

While it is certain that the Clinton candidacy will paint this squeaker as a landslide victory (it is, in fact a thinner margin that the one that delivered us into the hands of George W. Bush in the first place), it is an effective tie--Clinton and Obama each walk away with with nine more delegates in the only only contest the really matters.

Meanwhile, the race for the U.S. Presidency is once more a race--which is not a bad thing; the country is no better served by an Obama coronation than it was by the planned Clinton coronation that preceded it. If Obama truly justifies the high and inspired hopes his first win inspired, he'll prove it as this grueling process continues. If Hillary Clinton truly has any substantive claim on her husband's former office beyond having formerly slept in the same building, we'll get to see that as well. And let's not forget that there are a few other people in this race as well who deserve to be heard as well. Perhaps now that the media superstars are tied, perhaps the pundits might find time to talk to, or at least about, someone else for a change.

UrgencyTrumps Inevitability-- What Iowa Means To Me

Having been in Iowa four years ago as a volunteer for the Howard Dean campaign, I have some measure of insight into the events of the last few days. Then, as now, a small army of out of state volunteers had descended upon the hick Midwestern state that gets to play kingmaker every four years in America. Then, as now, an ardently anti-war Democratic candidate had managed to harness the power of the Internet to build a presidential campaign war chest from small-donor grassroots support. But four years ago, the insurgency campaign of Howard Dean ended in a beer hall.

The Mainstream Media may have put the shiv in Dean's back with the infamous (and entirely manufactured) "Dean Scream", but they were only finishing the job started by the coalition of corporate interests and Democratic Party power brokers who had decided that John Kerry was the "safe" choice. Whether or not he was the best choice to beat George W. Bush, Kerry was certainly the best choice (after Bush himself) to preserve status quo on behalf of the corporate ownership class that actually owns this country.....and, for the most part, gets to run it.

This time around, things may be a little different. While Barack Hussein Obama is by no means the most progressive candidate for the Democratic nomination nor in any way represents a revolutionary break with the current state of American politics or policy, he is certainly a figure of evolutionary change--and certainly not the anointed choice of the power brokers who did in Dean. His claim to Martin Luther King's "fierce urgency of now" stands in utter and stark contrast to Hillary Clinton's arrogant (and now discredited) claim to "inevitability."

A lot of things are different between now and four years ago. Dean's people may have figured out how to tap the 'Net for money, but they never turned it into the virtual ATM Obama's people have created. Dean was in exactly the same situation John Edwards is in now--facing a make or break scenario in New Hampshire before the money runs out. Four years ago, the outspoken agent of change was a former doctor and former New England governor with enormous appeal to what he himself calls "the Democratic wing of the Democratic Party"--the educated liberals and urban professionals who connect with their heads first and their hearts second. This time around, the principal proponent of change is a former community organizer and occasional law professor who clearly won his first presidential nomination contest on the ability to appeal beyond the largely white and upper-middle-class confines of the Democratic Party base.

But what is more different than anything is Barack Obama himself. In the aftermath of his caucus night victory speech, I was amazed to see the practiced "media professionals" covering it--people like Chris Matthews, Rachel Meadow, Howard Fineman (yes, I was watching MSNBC... big surprise there)-- with visible tears in their eyes. Yes, it was an inspiring speech. But to have a visible impact on people who pride themselves on their jadedness and cynicism took more than an inspiring speech.....it took an inspiring (and perhaps historic) moment. Perhaps not since the inception of America itself has anyone had quite the opportunity Barack Obama now has to become a living embodiment of the American Dream itself, much less possessed the necessary gifts to seize that moment.

Obama is not alone in his claim to the mantle of "change" or its use as a mantra. In their speeches that night, Hillary Clinton and John Edwards made the best cases they could that they were participants in Obama's victory. In Clinton's case, the words rang utterly hollow. Edwards, on the other hand, gave one of the best speeches of his life and continues to enjoy the support of traditional populists and progressives. But even when I was in Iowa four years ago, Edward's trial lawyer career, pandering self-reference as "the son of a mill worker" and studiously manufactured image were already the topics of endless jokes as workers from all the different campaigns gathered in downtown Des Moines hotel bars. There are significant questions about his substance and his sincerity.....even if he doesn't run out of money.

As we look beyond the nominating process and into the general election, the single biggest change is that four years ago enough Americans were still sufficiently hypnotized by the blood sacrifice of 9/11 to believe the fear-mongering mythology of the Republican Party--and believe that a swaggeringly vapid cowboy from Texas could defend them from the supposed threat. Now, in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina and a botched war that has dragged on longer than World War II, it is fairly obvious that the real threat to America's safety is Bush and his corporatist controllers--and that no one who enabled Bush legislatively to create this mess has any business claiming to be the reformer who is going to "change" anything.

My last and most vivid impression of the Obama victory in Iowa: that this is indeed the generational moment that Obama claims. I look at Hillary's supporters and I see old people, in either spirit or actual age. I look at Edward's supporters and I see people still fighting the class and culture wars that have racked this country for the last forty years. I look at Obama and his people....and I literally see hope. The results in New Hampshire could change everything, but right now the odds are better than ever that once again the future may belong to the young.... as it should.

Shills for Hill--The Spin Goes On

Is anyone else out there tired yet of the MSM's unflagging efforts to give the Presidency to Hillary Clinton? Even when the news ain't so good, the friends of Hill find a way to give this particular turd yet another coat of shellac and a nice shine--as witness yesterday's Newsweek piece on the results of their recent poll of voters in Iowa. The opening paragraph reads as follows:

"...Sen. Hillary Clinton holds a double-digit lead over her rivals for the Democratic presidential nomination in many national polls. But in Iowa, home to the January 2008 caucus that is the first major event of the electoral season, the Democratic race is much tighter, according to the latest NEWSWEEK Poll. Among all Iowa Democrats surveyed, Clinton enjoys a 6-point lead over her nearest rival, Illinois Sen. Barack Obama. But among likely Democratic caucus-goers, she is locked in a three-way race with Obama and former North Carolina senator John Edwards, with Obama enjoying a slight edge..."

All very well and good and true enough--but if you look at the poll numbers themselves, it's possible to come away with a slightly different interpretation. The total point spread of support for the top three democratic candidates among 'likely democratic caucus voters' is six points--28% Obama to 22% Edwards. The spread between Clinton (24%) and Obama is 4%--in others words, half the spread. A bookie would like those odds, and so does the Obama campaign. Another way of looking at it: 69% of polled Iowa democrats and 76% of likely caucus voters want anyone but Hillary. Considering the relentless campaign to make voters regard Mrs. Clinton as 'inevitable' over the last few months, her lack of solid support is pretty telling.

There are even signs within the Mainstream Media itself that the wheels may be coming off the Clinton steamroller. The NY Times Op-Ed page (no longer pay-per-view content--thanks, guys) leads off with Maureen Dowd and Frank Rich pieces entitled, respectively, 'The Nepotism Tango' and 'Is Hillary Clinton the New Old Al Gore?'

The Dowd piece has particular entertainment value, quoting the Literary Editor of The New Republic (in reference to Senator Clinton):

... She’s like some hellish housewife who has seen something that she really, really wants and won’t stop nagging you about it until finally you say, fine, take it, be the damn president, just leave me alone.”

Frank Rich's column compares the Clinton campaign to that of another one-time "inevitable" shoo-in--former Vice President Al Gore. Gore played it safe in the primaries-- just as Clinton is doing-- and continued to do so in the general election.....which he won, sort of. If Gore's support had been truly impassioned, rather than a weary concession to 'inevitability'......might it have been a bit harder for Republicans to steal the election?

Hell--this time they might even actually win.

There Goes The Neighborhood...

Yesterday the missus and I were riding our bikes to her office in the Texas Medical Center when we noticed some new lawn signs bearing the message 'STOP THE ASHBY HIGHRISE'. After I got back to the house, I did a Google search and came up with the following URL:

http://www.stopashbyhighrise.org/

The site tells the entire story. A couple of real estate developers have acquired title to an old apartment complex in the 1700 block of Bissonnet, plan to demolish it, and replace it with a 23 story residential tower. This is so wrong in so many ways that I hardly know where to start. To begin with, the area in question is one of the most beautiful residential neighborhoods in Houston. It isn't some barren wasteland that will be 'improved' by the presence of a residential mid-rise. Furthermore, the only two 'major' thoroughfares providing access to this proposed monstrosity are Bissonnet and Dunlavy, which dead ends into Bissonnet at the proposed site. Both are two lane residential streets with no possibility of being widened. Traffic problems will be bad enough on Bissonnet after construction of the seemingly inevitable 'Rail on Richmond' commences. Throw in this stupid thing and count on gridlock from Westheimer to Rice Blvd.

In this morning's Houston Chronicle, I was relatively pleased to see a guest editorial speaking out against the development project, as well as a little bit surprised--usually the Chron is as reflexibly pro-development as the national MSM is pro-Hillary. It's a good piece, and it speaks well of the consequences of this latest piece of greedhead developer stupidity (read it for yourself at http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/editorial/outlook/5175002.html).

There is an on-line petition on the 'Stop the Ashby Highrise' site, and I strongly recommend signing it. Given the lack of zoning in this city, it will be virtually impossible to stop this profoundly bad idea......but at least we have to try.

The site in question is mere blocks, BTW, from another, more horizontal, implementation of the same thing at the corner of Dunlavy and Richmond. Not long ago, developers announced plans to raze the picturesque semi-ruins at the corner of Dunlavy and Alabama for.....you guessed it, a residential mid-rise with ground-level retail.

I've lived in Montrose for 30 years and loved it........oh, well. It was fun while it lasted.

"....a whisper from space..."

Courtesy of SlashDot, I ran across something truly inspiring today-- a newspaper piece published in Australia about the ongoing communications with the most distant man-made objects in creation--Voyager Probes 1 & 2.

These objects are now, respectively, 15.5 and 12.5 billion kilometers from earth. They've been in space for thirty years and have an anticipated life expectancy of at least another decade. The radio signals reach Earth with a strength of about a billionth of a watt, transmit data at roughly 32 bits per second, and must be decoded using computers that would've long since been decommissioned from any other purpose.

The fact that these tiny, distant objects still speak to us from the distant cold void where only comets have fared before.... it's just enormous to me. The image is powerful and poetic. Equally so, the thought of the scientists and technicians who keep faith with these tiny artifacts and their predecessors who made them. It's almost like monastic devotion--except for the fact that the faint voice these secular monastics hear from beyond the sky is, beyond question, real.

It will be a sad day, I think, when that faint whisper from space finally ceases. We will have lost a piece of ourselves--a tangible piece of the better aspect of human aspirations.....an aspect that has been, sadly, somewhat lacking here on Earth these last thirty years......I hope we get it back.

Before that small voice ceases.......before we lose ourselves.

no wonder the poor bastard's quititng.....

Tony Snow, then & now:


I'm sorry the man's sick, but cancer is an occupational risk for people who handle toxic substances. Wonder what perky little Dana Perrino will look like after a year and half of telling lies for Shrub and The Rifleman?