The times they are a changin'

On Amazon's list of top ten selling books on politics, only one is written by a conservative, and that's an autobiography by Bill O'Reilly. Everything else is written from a center-left perspective, or else is an attempt at "evenhanded" pop scholarship. It's the first time I can remember when at least one of those "Liberals are spineless fascist bully-cowards who want to raise your taxes, sodomize your children, turn your wives into lesbians, and socialize the country"-type books wasn't on the list. Could be just chance, but I suspect it reflects at least some disillusionment on the behalf of and with the Limbaughite faithful. That movement has had a deathgrip on the national discourse for almost twenty years; it's way more than time for a change.

The horror.

Short term treasury yields at .21%. That's negative 5.2% inflation adjusted. In other words, people distrust banks so much they are paying the federal government for the right to loan it money, as long as the government promises to keep it safe. With Congress fucking this bill up, it means The U.S. government, in effect, has decided to become the most profitable armoured car operation in history. Who said the government can't do anything right?

1 1/2 weeks ago,

Obama was trailing in the polls. This week, he's nearing mortal lock territory to win, and now he's running the greatest campaign in history, is a once in a lifetime candidate, and all the rest of the 'bot chants. The reality is, of course, that Obama has run an at best mediocre campaign that was rescued by the financial collapse. I think he would have won anyway, much like Reagan did against Carter in '80 -- with a big break of independents for him near election day -- just in a race closer than that one. But this notion that he's run some kind of brilliant campaign -- the phrase I see again and again is "He's playing chess and everyone else is playing checkers" -- is absurd.

Chess is a closed system -- the rules, the pieces on the board and their properties, are known to both players and can't change. In response to any one move, there are a finite number of rational replies: you can calculate in chess with a large degree of certainty. Politics, now, is an open system: the rules can and do change overnight (could anyone have foreseen that McCain, after 10 years of press adulation, would suddenly become their demon?), and you can't calculate anything with certainty (Sarah Palin's selection as VP, for example). Playing a "game" like that, you have to do everything you can to grab the initiative, and maintain every bit of control you can get your grubby paws on, because the rules will change, your opponent will do things that surprise you, and it's much easier for things to get away from you the more tenuous grip on things you start out with (McCain, looking at the ruinous effects the financial meltdown had on his campaign, can attest to that).

Obama, starting from the day the primary was decided, was letting the initiative slip away. He was up by several points in the polls, but he behaved passively, allowing McCain to begin dictating the pace of things. He failed to see the importance of the women's vote, failed to see how key the economy was (this, after Clinton's "It's the economy, stupid" in '92), failed to have a plan to deal with the inevitable Republican attacks, failed to have some good anti-McCain ads in the can: he just wasn't on top of things, the way a professional campaign would have been. And McCain took advantage, narrowed Obama's lead, then took a lead of his own. Had a break gone the other way -- had there been a big terrorist attack, for example, or had the economy started a rebound a month or two ago -- Obama would be where McCain is now, and he started out with enough advantages that that shouldn't be. A "brilliant" campaign would not have been so dependent on circumstances. "Brilliant" campaigns dictate, as much as possible, circumstances, and build up cushion to help you out when those circumstances bounce against you, as they usually do, at least once or twice. Obama had no cushion.

It's possible that Obama's campaign this year will set some sort of standard, that people will see Obama's passivity as "quiet strength and confidence," and demand that Dems in the future behave the same way -- this after years spent angrily demanding Dem candidates who will be pugnacious and in-your-face (Obama has, amusingly enough, been the absolute antithesis of the "Fighting Dem" so beloved by the liberal internets). That probably won't work in the long run. Obama has had every break imaginable, and he's probably going to win a fairly close race -- a race that shouldn't be this close given the circumstances. I don't see how anyone could look at that and conclude his campaign style is the model for future campaigns, any more than someone playing a game of chess who starts out a piece ahead and barely eeks out a win should be considered a good player.

What can you say?

One by one, all the old legends are dying off. It's unfortunate that Hollywood people are demonized to the extent that they are, given that so many of them have done so much for society. Over and over again, Hollywood has been ahead of the curve, but because the well-known ones are wealthy and do something "superficial" like acting, they are convenient targets for the forces of regression. I'm not a huge fan of Newman's early work, but the stuff that he did as he aged was very nice; he brought an intelligence and wisdom to the parts he played, a humanity tempered by worldly realism, that not too many people ever know themselves, let alone have the ability to express onscreen. It was as if he needed age to strip away the pretty boyness of his image and let the man shine through, which it did -- brightly.

Who's left? Kirk Douglas, Sidney Portier, Redford is a tweener, but you can throw him in there, and I really can't think of anyone else. And then there's a big gap until you reach the present day, where guys like Clooney are doing some of the things that pretty much all of Hollywood's big stars did in Newman's glory days. Maybe the obscene money changed everything, or maybe the 70s - 90s just didn't need social activism. We sure need it now.

Quick study

I'm a "quick study." I can, working from a superficial base of knowledge, read through pages of new material, and go out and give a presentation on it the next day as if I were an expert, and fool pretty much everyone who isn't an expert. I've done this many times, and I think lots of people can do it, given the proper training, practice, and motivation. What I can't do is learn a bunch of new material on several different subjects, subjects which are largely alien to me, then go out and give a presentation on it and work my way through a hostile Q&A session, all while making sure my words conform to a worldview that I either don't understand, or disagree with. Nobody's that quick a study, at least not that I've ever seen. I imagine if I tried to do that, I would look pretty damn foolish as I tripped over talking points, repeated myself, and tried to think my way through questions that an expert, even a near-expert, would answer off the cuff.

Of course, that's exactly the point of all this, isn't it? That Palin either doesn't have the base of knowledge that anyone in her position should have, or lacks the intellectual juice to learn quickly enough to fake it (maybe it's both??) has got to be frightening to everyone at this point, or at least everyone who would put "country first."

Uh oh.

It looks like polls say Obama won the debate, and there's little chance the media will doctor the post-debate spin in McCain's favor, as they've done for Republicans in the past. It looks like McCain is trailing in the real polls already. It looks like Palin is unpopular with independents and the press corps. It looks like that same Palin is not ready for her debate with Biden next week; it's probably her last chance to turn her image around. It looks like there are less that 40 days until the votes are cast. It looks like there is going to be one hell of a lot of shit being thrown by the Rep creatures in the next few weeks.

More wingnuttery

My suspicion is even the wingnuts are afraid McCain isn't up to the job of fixing the economy, at least the ones I interact with. They have access to some of the same data I do, they know this shit is serious, and somehow chortling along with Rush to the strains of "Barack The Magic Negro" isn't as satisfying as it would have been a month ago. They've gone back to shutting up about politics, after a brief burst of enthusiasm, but the tone of their silence has changed. They used to shut up about politics with a look of annoyance; now it's with a look of fear and confusion. I showed clips of Palin's Couric interview to a select few, and got not one bit of feedback. They just watched it with this look of fearful despair. It's frightening that this -- an economic meltdown and candidates who are not up to the job of running the country -- is what it takes to get some people out of the mental gutter, and a sign of what we have waiting for us when the crisis passes. Because once that fear is gone, Rush, and "Barack The Magic Negro", will be waiting, like the streetcorner pusher for his junkies on payday.