I find something to like in all of the Democratic candidates, and will vote for any of them over any of the Republican candidates, all of whom I find odious and repellent, with the exception of the very honest and (although I disagree with so many of his Libertarian positions) Rep. Ron Paul (R-TX), someone I agree with wholeheartedly on the egregious folly of this Iraq War and all of the Patriot Act type civil liberty usurpations they snuck through with it.
While he continues to place #3 in the national polls, John Edwards has an edge in the early Iowa caucus. There are a number of things I like about Edwards. He's the only candidate consistently talking about poverty and what it's doing to our nationhood. As a thinking, acting individual, there is no doubt that he has grown these past four years, and I think he's still growing. And he's got the best wife of all the candidates, long may she live.
So what are his actual odds? Who knows -- Hillary has the national poll numbers, Obama has the star power. As to Edwards' strategy, The New York Times piece from Monday morning is a pretty good picture as far as I've come to understand it:
Mr. Edwards has shown a new eagerness to draw contrasts with his opponents on issues like the war in Iraq and health care, in no small part motivated by his struggle not to get lost in a field of big names. And he has gone from the boyish, easygoing one-time senator from North Carolina to a candidate displaying an urgently engaging manner as likely to seize as to charm an audience, an approach that appears to be particularly effective in the close-quarter meetings that fill his days here.
I don't find it a valid criticism that Sen. Edwards made his money as a trial lawyer. Even Republicans call up a trial lawyer the minute they feel they've been wronged by a major corporation. We've had an actor President, a profession where the main task is to make people believe the story being told, and a whole lot of people hold him in high esteem.
(Personally, I commend President Ronald Reagan for having ignored Rep. Richard Cheney and his band of moron ideologues and chosen to deal with Russian Premier Gorbachev during those fragile early days of glasnost and perestroika. Actual statesmanship.)
Edwards in his positions is fighting the power for national health insurance and impressing regular folks with his live appearances, going to small towns usually ignored by Democrats. He's not some trumped up phony, although he certainly will be selling between now and either his eventual win or elimination. I don't begrudge him that, either.
Then there's the rock star:
Mr. Gore is scheduled to address the Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival as part of the windup leading to the Live Earth concerts on July 7, which are intended to raise awareness of the issue of climate change.
You might think that Mr. Gore and his campaign against global warming would find few friends in Cannes. The production, transport, sale and consumption of goods and services add a few sizes to anyone’s carbon footprint.
Yet Mr. Gore is being accorded rock star status at the festival, an event that in the past has been headlined by industry insiders. The embrace of Mr. Gore shows how “green” advertising has galvanized the marketing community.
It turns out the ultimate salesman is the former Vice President and 2000 Presidential popular vote winner, wildly successful in selling the very real threat of global warming to the populace of the world. It's all consumer driven sentiment -- we do want to save our world! -- so advertisers are responding. Of course, we'll see if they're really serious about being good corporate citizens in the long run, but there is no one but Al who made this happen.
Per England's The Guardian, "It has got to be Al Gore":
Other politicians and nations can pressure and preach - but top-down decision-making starts in the Oval Office.
Is that possible when climate change is just one "normal" issue among many, to be ceremonially weighed against US jobs or gas prices or Chinese imports? It's not. But that, with inevitable shades of emphasis, is where every extant presidential candidate stands. Too timid, too slow. Global warming is an utterly abnormal issue that needs a leader all of its own. Gore has fashioned himself as that leader. He can't just sit there and pontificate. He has to run. And, when he does, the rest of us have to put inconvenient illusions aside and listen.
The bloke's got a point.
And when I look at this, I get happy chills of projection...
2 comments:
Yeah, Ron Paul is something. Such a nice, old-fashioned breath of stale air (as opposed to the mustard gas we've been breathing). If it came down to Paul and Hilary (which I realize it won't), it would be a tough choice...
As for Gore, I'm starting to resent him for not running. If he doesn't enter the race - then he's gonna lose my vote!
Seriously, why won't he give up the goods, already? He knows we want it so bad.
I was thinking the same thing about Gore recently, and now have started to come through to the other side. I kinda think that's what he needs to do -- keep us waiting long enough that we eventually sicken and give up, then longer enough that we come back, at a new level of wanting. Something like why Stanley Kubrick made his actors do dozens of takes; to get through all of the possible stock approaches and come out the other side with something true, fresh, and lasting.
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