The "it" being the Democratic party in the 2008 election. This will be short, not sweet.
My last post was the beginning of an examination of the proposal that the establishment of a "public orthodoxy" would be a good thing. I opposed it.
That said, it must be admitted that we already have a public orthodoxy of sorts in effect. This unformulated, but universally recognized, public orthodoxy regularly raises its ugly head above the surface of the mud in which it wiggles during political campaigns. Its bite is lethal, and Barack Obama has been bitten--big time.
Obama does not survive this Rev. Jeremiah Wright flap. The reason for this is that he has, at least to the perception of any reasonable person--lied about it. That is a violation of the public orthodoxy, which states that the cover-up is worse than the crime. Obama's assertion that he is only now hearing Wright's anti-White rhetoric for the first time just doesn't pass the sniff test. I don't believe him when he says that, and I've been supporting him ever since the Clintons started using his race against him.
The implication of this is that the Democratic party is now moribund. Unless Hillary Clinton can catch Obama in the both the delegate count and the popular vote prior to the convention, the Democrats, if they want to win the general election, will have to dump Obama -- ostensibly the People's Choice -- through the actions of the Super Delegates. But it won't work. McCain will win either way; either because Obama has discredited himself by lying about what he knew about Wright and when he knew it, or because the Democratic party has split itself right down the middle and Democratic voters stay home on election day.
It's over. Get used to the idea of another inarticulate, uninformed, jingoistic, war-mongering, Republican sitting in the Oval Office. Gear up for the war with Iran. And don't be trying to unload your house any time in the near future.
UPDATE: Tuesday, 3/18/08
Barack Obama gave a major speech on race today, in an attempt to rectify the situation on the basis of which I pronounced the eulogy for his campaign above. It was a great speech; so say at least 90% of the pundits and talking heads on cable TV. It is being praised by both the left and the right. In my opinion, its greatness resides primarily in its uniqueness. Who else--ever--in American politics could have given it? No-body. Case closed. It was a speech we haven't heard before. I think that he probably recouped his losses among voters on the left, like myself, who may have been prepared either to switch (too late!) to Hillary, or just sit it out in despair. But voters like me are not going to be the issue in the national election, should Obama win the nomination, as it seems all but certain that he will. The voter Obama most needs to win over is the same voter who will have been most put off by the down-home, nitty-gritty, tell-it-like-it-is, filled-with-the-Spirit, over-the-top, rhetoric of the Rev. Wright. Did his speech today do anything at all to mollify the guy who lives in that vast Albania West that lies between Philadelphia and Pittsburgh? I'm talkin' about the guy who believes Budweiser to be good beer. The guy who thinks a man is gay if he smokes anything but Marlboros. I mean the dude who thinks pro wrestling is for real; the guy who is intellectually challenged by watching souped-up stock cars go in circles hour-on-end. I don't think so.
It is said that black people know all about white people. After all, they've been washing our sheets for a few hundred years. We have no secrets from them. But most white people know almost nothing about black people that they haven't learned from the media. Oh, they know that black guy at work. The thing is, they think that the white guy in the next cubicle to their right is a fool because he's stupid. But they think the fool in the next cubicle to their left is stupid because he's black. That's the truth of it.
Obama probably retrieved the intelligensia. Nobody since Mary Lou Retten has nailed a dismount like Obama nailed his today. But Joe Sixpack ain't a gymnastics fan.
