Visual Style of The Wire

Finally, credit where credit is overdue. I've always thought of The Wire as having noir elements along with the social realism. It's not a documentary - it's exceptionally well-crafted and relevant fiction. Now someone has analyzed the show's visual style and, guess what, in its own way it's as brilliant as the writing:

Style in The Wire from Erlend Lavik on Vimeo.

Major kudos to Erlend Lavik. This one gets added to the canon.

The Brave One

I can't think of a more courageous politician in my lifetime than President Barack Obama. If the assassination of a doctor by a rightwing extremist goaded on by Bill O'Reilly and Operation Rescue wasn't warning enough, and this guy in Utah arrested for being on a mission to do ultimate harm to our President, there's the speech in Cairo today that speaks dangerous truths we've never heard before from an American President, truths that are common knowledge but that neocons would rather never be admitted to, Kabuki-style, truths that are not well-received by either al Qaida or the Israeli settler movement.

The whole hour:

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He called for all kinds of responsibility -- for Palestinians to accept Israel, for Israel to stop with the West Bank settlements, for corrupt regional governments to reform, for women to get equal education on the region, for understanding by America of the Muslim world and an end to stereotyping of American by Islamic peoples. Enough truth to offend a lot of partisans.

A sampling of those against it:

Hezbollah, Hamas, the Muslim Brotherhood, John Bolton, Hugh Hewitt, the Republican Jewish Coalition, and John Boehner all disliked the President's speech.

Okay, with enemies like that, we know he's doing something right.

As Al Giordano points out, Obama is the Anti-Politician:

Politicians, in general, are a reactive caste. They look at things as they are, and opportunistically seek out and study the cracks and weaknesses in society in order to put themselves at its helm. Most believe (and those that don’t believe, pretend) they are doing this in service of a higher ideal: right or left, liberal or conservative, progressive or religious, whatever, but because the great majority of them are essentially reacting to the same set of seemingly inexorable current events, the sum of their actions is that of constructing individual fiefdoms that look much the same no matter what ideology or flag flies over them.

And then there are the rare historical figures that appear now and then in human events to disregard those base reactive impulses with enough discipline to first develop their own idea of how things ought to be. And only after developing a detailed yet clear vision for society do they then enter the political fray. Probably the best example in the last century of such an anti-politician was Mohandas K. Gandhi, who returned home to India at the age of 46, after winning civil rights for immigrants in South Africa. He found a homeland thirsting for independence from the British Empire and its impositions. A media hero and cause celébre upon his return to Indian shores, the pro-independence advocates and parties sought Gandhi out to lead a revolution against the Crown.

Gandhi – conscious that after being away for 27 years in London and South Africa he did not know his native country well enough to lead it – instead imposed upon himself a moratorium against speaking to the press, and embarked upon a listening tour through the forgotten and impoverished regions of India in order to first understand what the real yearnings and realities of its people were. Only after he felt he had a comprehensive enough vision for what kind of better society was possible there did he enter the fray that, as history knows, won independence for the region, while showing the world a new way to fight for freedom.

Listening to the President’s remarks in Cairo this morning – billed as a speech to all the Muslims in the world – it is clear that in Barack Obama our moment in history has one such transcendent leader.

Here's ten key points from this, the biggest speech of his already remarkable career. A President who can finally talk to Palestinians. Speaking to the U.S. from Cairo as well. The first President to acknowledge that America, in 1953, sabotaged democracy in Iran when fairly elected Prime Minister Mossadegh had the temerity to nationalize the oil industry), starting the chain of blowback that led to radical Islamic revolution, U.S. hostages, today's nuclear threat.

Here's how Netanyahu watched the speech, Kabuki reactions. Here's the overwhelmingly favorable reaction from the world press, including the mainstream Islamic press.

Michael Scherer has the clearest sense of Obama's overriding international vision, this "Obama Doctrine", and how it played out with the powerful close of the speech:

This vision, as I have touched on before, does not elevate the United States as the protector of transcendent values, but rather lowers America into the great pool of nations and peoples, where everyone operates on the same level with a God-given set of responsibilities to understand each other and work together for collective improvement. The political leader who has spent a lifetime moving between cultures envisions a world where tribal differences are trumped by common humanity and practical necessity. In some ways, it is as idealistic a vision as the ones proposed by Bush senior and junior. Time will tell if it is more successful.

It is notable that Obama ended his speech with three quotes, one from the Koran, one from the Talmud, one from the New Testament, each describing God's instructions for all people to work together and get along. Of the three, the quote from the Koran is the most eloquent. “O mankind! We have created you male and a female; and we have made you into nations and tribes so that you may know one another.” It is, in a poetic verse, an apt encapsulation of Obama's radical idea--that despite our differences we are meant to find common purpose.

So can it be done? Well, Obama is saying to the world, look at me: the son of a Kenyan and a Kansan, the Christian man with a Muslim family, the black Hawaiian teenage stoner who rose through the traditionally white Northeastern Ivy League to lead the nation's most powerful country. I've already done it. You can too.

Yes we, the world, can.

But will we?

Baraq

Obama hits it out of the park today with what will come to be seen as the pivotal speech of his campaign. Bush tried to preempt him with a press avail in the morning. McCain attempted to counter afterwards.

Highlights of the contenders, per TPM:



What strikes me most is that Obama defines success, and basis part of that on the answers Gen. Petraeus and Amb. Crocker gave to him in committee hearings a few months ago. McCain says the surge worked so trust me, "I know how to win wars." (???) but never defines success, certainly not in clear terms like Obama. Obama offers 16 months -- we can hold him to it. It takes guts for him to lay it out like this, defining victory and vanquishing surrender.

McCain is making the Humphrey/Carter/Mondale/Dukakis mistake, only the Republican way: he's running as best manager. Military manager, to be sure, but still just manager.

America does not vote for Best Manager for President. America votes for Vision. We'll even take substitutes when the pickings are slim, but we love the real thing, the one we share, the one who gives voice to what's been brewing all too long and shows us a path to reach better days.

Here's the rock solid argument at the heart of this masterpiece:

At some point, a judgment must be made. Iraq is not going to be a perfect place, and we don't have unlimited resources to try to make it one. We are not going to kill every al Qaeda sympathizer, eliminate every trace of Iranian influence, or stand up a flawless democracy before we leave - General Petraeus and Ambassador Crocker acknowledged this to me when they testified last April. That is why the accusation of surrender is false rhetoric used to justify a failed policy. In fact, true success in Iraq - victory in Iraq - will not take place in a surrender ceremony where an enemy lays down their arms. True success will take place when we leave Iraq to a government that is taking responsibility for its future - a government that prevents sectarian conflict, and ensures that the al Qaeda threat which has been beaten back by our troops does not reemerge. That is an achievable goal if we pursue a comprehensive plan to press the Iraqis stand up.

To achieve that success, I will give our military a new mission on my first day in office: ending this war. Let me be clear: we must be as careful getting out of Iraq as we were careless getting in. We can safely redeploy our combat brigades at a pace that would remove them in 16 months. That would be the summer of 2010 - one year after Iraqi Security Forces will be prepared to stand up; two years from now, and more than seven years after the war began. After this redeployment, we'll keep a residual force to perform specific missions in Iraq: targeting any remnants of al Qaeda; protecting our service members and diplomats; and training and supporting Iraq's Security Forces, so long as the Iraqis make political progress.

We will make tactical adjustments as we implement this strategy - that is what any responsible Commander-in-Chief must do. As I have consistently said, I will consult with commanders on the ground and the Iraqi government. We will redeploy from secure areas first and volatile areas later. We will commit $2 billion to a meaningful international effort to support the more than 4 million displaced Iraqis. We will forge a new coalition to support Iraq's future - one that includes all of Iraq's neighbors, and also the United Nations, the World Bank, and the European Union - because we all have a stake in stability. And we will make it clear that the United States seeks no permanent bases in Iraq.

This is the future that Iraqis want. This is the future that the American people want. And this is what our common interests demand.

It ties into his whole responsibility theme, the same one pissing off Jesse Jackson, the one that America agrees with wholeheartedly.

Here's the whole masterful thing.



If America doesn't give Barack Obama a landslide victory, America is on notice.

PS: I expect Obama to pop up in Iraq sooner than you think. This whole set-up and build is looking long in the works. Ready to move. Advancing over all of McCain's supposed territory.

Final Thoughts

I have no idea if tomorrow is going to break towards the candidate I support or the other, or if this will all end up in a brokered convention and maybe even leave the party El Presidente Bush united in pieces.

What I do know is that when I cast my absentee ballot last week for Barack Obama, for the first time in ages I wasn't voting for the lesser evil, I actually enjoyed my vote.

There is much to admire in Sen. Clinton but also much that isn't as vetted as she'd like us to believe. There's still no closure on control of her husband, the very notion a foreign one to, say, Michelle Obama. Sen. Clinton has yet to give any resonant overriding rationale for electing her, instead flitting back and forth from "experience" which evidently doesn't include her scandal-tinged years at the Rose Law Firm, to purloining Obama campaign memes, like "change."

In this campaign Hillary has never been a leader except in poll numbers. She followed Barack's announcement to enter the race with a suddenly bumped-up decision to enter as well. She's trailed him on boycotting Fox News. Just this weekend the Obama chant of "Yes we can" was mis-appropriated as "Yes she can." And the difference between those two phrases, in a nutshell, tells you everything you know about this contest.

Oh, and she didn't lead on the Iraq War vote. She followed. President Bush.

Hillary Clinton is running like it's a job interview, look at my resume, me me me. Trust me, go about your business.

Barack Obama is building a movement and empowering people, with a fresh, clear, timely vision of America.

I just saw this little list, not sure how accurate it is, but it does address the experience issue, the resume issue:

This entire idea that Obama is less experienced than Hillary is such a myth. And the truth is that "political" experience is almost never a good indicator of what kind of president a candidate will be. For the record, the most "experienced" candidates for president:

1)William McKinley
2)Lyndon Johnson
3)Richard Nixon
4)Gerald Ford
5)George H. W. Bush

The least "experienced" candidates:
1) Abraham Lincoln
2) Teddy Roosevelt
3) Woodrow Wilson,
4) Franklin Roosevelt

Or as Robert De Niro said when introducing Obama at the Meadowlands today:

"He wasn't experienced enough to authorize the invasion of Iraq."

Right on Day One.

See you tomorrow night.