Something Requisitely Witty and Urbane: February 2008

Ann Althouse says this, today:

Throughout the rally, supporters waved Hillary signs, wore shirts with logos such as, "Got experience?," and chanted, "Yes she can."My emailer snarks:
[It] kind of sums up the difference between their two candidacies (hers is about her, his is about us). That's funny, but in fact we are electing a President. "We" are not going to be doing the job, that one individual is. The only thing we are going to do is pick the person who will take over the immense job of running the country.

This is in discussion of this video that I'm sure most everyone has seen by now.

I'm really struck by this video not just because of it's production value and quality but because so many people, including me, are buying into Barack Obama to the point that we can watch something like this and be moved completely and without irony.

The above comment on Althouse is true in practice, but I think it illustrates the difference in philosophies, not of the candidates, but of the people who are voting for the candidates. For the first time in a long, long time, the Obama supporters feel like THEY are the important ones in this election.

I've been struck over the past few weeks by the feeling that I'll be really, really disappointed if Obama DOESN'T get the nomination. I was pretty much undecided between the two for the longest time but now find myself becoming emotionally invested in Obama's candidacy.

I think it's because, as a 28-year-old American, I've longed for a President that inspires. I've heard tale of people who felt inspired by leaders but I had really begun to believe that it was either no longer possible or that, like so much of the 60's, the idea was something that has been exaggerated over time and sold back to us. A willful deception by our parents generation who merely wanted to make themselves feel superior to our generation just as their parents did to them.

But Obama makes us "feel" like it's possible to have inspiring leadership. That it's possible to have a leader who we are proud of. As sappy as that may sound, it's the first time most in our generation have dared to feel this way.

But we, The Gen-X/Y-ers desperately WANT to feel like we are part of something. We WANT that story that we can tell our kids about. "I was at home, watching when the first Black candidate to win a primary moved me to tears."

And, yet, I find myself almost unwilling to believe that it will actually happen. That I will be disappointed. That my party, as it so often has and that my country, as it so often does, will let me down.

However, for the first time in my lifetime I'm beginning to believe that it's possible. I'm beginning to believe, unironically, in "Hope", in "Movement".

I'm beginning to believe unironically that yes we, in fact, can.

UPDATE: I've closed the comments for the first time in the history of this blog because we can't keep it constructive and because, given the fact that I've been blogging so little over the past few months that I can't imagine HOW a little post would engender this much response naturally. The only explanation is that something else is influencing the commenting, so I'm closing them on this post.

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