I Got Chills (Obama's acceptance speech)

[Plaid Adder]

The other day I posted kind of a pissed-off thing about how disillusioned I am with the whole presidential politics game and how disappointed I have been by some of the positions Obama has taken since the shift from the primary to the general election. I watched the speech tonight. As far as my particular issues go--the end of torture and illegal detention, the restoration of basic respect for human rights, GBLT equality, and so on--that speech had nothing in it for me. Looked at in the cold hard light of reason, the token mention that 'my people' got--"we can all agree that our gay brothers and sisters should be able to visit a loved one in the hospital"--is, frankly, lame. It's not that much better than saying, "Well, we can all agree that our gay brothers and sisters shouldn't be rounded up in cattle cars."

I spend a lot of time around rhetoric, political and otherwise. I have put some time into learning how to wield it. It has made me cynical about that too, and given me an often quite distracting aptitude for recognizing the moves that are being made to manipulate me.

All the same. When he got to the end of that speech, I got chills. Literally. I had the experience I sometimes have at an opera or a play or a concert where all the little hairs start standing up and you just kind of sit there tingling and you don't try to analyze why it's happening because you know there is no rational explanation, that you're just responding to the mysterious power generated at the moment when performance inexplicably and irresistibly works.

You can look at that and say, well, it's all just a big show. Sure. And that's why we're going to finally win this fucking thing. Because most Americans don't vote for their presidents based on reason and logic. The past two election cycles would tell you that. They vote for the candidate who makes them feel what they want to feel. And this time, finally, that guy is our guy.

It's not that there's nothing behind the show. Obama's campaign clearly is doing things differently and that obviously does proceed from some new ideas about how both politics and government can be made to work. And I am 100% convinced that Obama's right when he says that we'll do better under his administration than under McCain's. Still, for someone where I am on the political spectrum, he doesn't offer a whole lot. And regardless, the magic worked on me. And that means--I hope--that it's going to work on a lot of other people who feel the same way about either him personally or his agenda. And that's what's going to put him over the top.

My guess is that next week in Minneapolis, we're not going to see anything that can be as affecting or as powerful as what's happened in Denver this week. McCain could not spark a reaction like that even with all the electrodes that have ever been taped to the skin of our "detainees." The RNC is setting the stage right now for what can only be a miserable and pathetic anticlimax.

Of course the media still have tremendous power in terms of how they frame these events and what they allow people to see. I doubt the networks carried the "ordinary citizen" speakers whose segment was, IMHO, critical to preparing the response I eventually had. Still. That thing, the thing that gives people chills, is capable of shattering the frame. And I'm starting to feel like maybe this time it actually will.

So, we're launched. Anything can happen, but I know this much: we have a better candidate now than we did four years ago, and he's got smarter, more creative, and more competent people behind him. So good luck to him and to all the rest of us who for better or for worse have to sail in his ship, and let's hope that this time, the fairy tale finally does have a happy ending.

C ya,

The Plaid Adder

[rasputin1952]

1. He did a fine job...hit all of the right points and came out ready

to go to battle for the country. I was duly impressed and I can see daylight come November...:hi: