Syndicate and Hague

To those of you who have pointed out to me lately that my blog is lacking in its previous copiousness…you’re right. I have been a bad blogger, which is partly due to a hectic life, partly due to a newfound sleep schedule (seriously, wow!), and to Twitter.

Twitter has served me well during this mess of a Democratic primary and it has also served to mute the flow of blog postings because quick hits that might have wound up in my blog before now sit in 140 character form on my twitter feed. I will consider pulling the feed into the blog here, but that’s not going to happen right away. If you’d like to keep tabs on my quick and dirty comments about random things, you can find me at http://twitter.com/saralovesyou.

I’ve been feeling a little social-networked/Web 2.0′d out lately, as well as a little politicked out, which has resulted in sluggish blogging on my part.

All that said…

It is time for you to stop now, Geraldine Ferraro.

It’s actually time for all Clinton supporters to take a step back, breathe, and realize that it is over. Game. Over. Obama won, fair and square. He out-campaigned, out-finessed, and just plain old out did the Clinton campaign.

But them’s just the numbers. While I’m irritated by the Clinton campaign’s Rovian fuzzy math, I’m downright angry at Ferraro and other feminists of her generation who are not temporarily being, but showing themselves as flat out racist in the course of this election.

I actually heard a few days ago, and I will not repeat my source because I personally would be embarrassed to have anyone know I’d said such a thing, from an older woman who said that “In my opinion, Obama is just another white man.”

And here is a problem among many…the intention of that remark was that Obama is just as sexist and mistreats Clinton based on her gender as any other man with power (read: white man) has. But the implications of that remark run a much more troubling path.

I will be the first to argue that all men–men of color included–have access to ways of power/privilege in ways that women do not. This does not mean that they have it any “easier” or “better,” but that there are avenues of communication that are shared between them as men.

However, it is tragic that the same women who recognize male privilege don’t see the ways white women have access to ways of power/privilege in ways that men of color do not.

I just can’t bring myself to go over all the intricacies of this argument because I am So. Tired. of all of it. And all over these here Interwebs, there are people making headway into the very basic nature of both of my statements. Try Jack and Jill Politics or Feministing for a sample. In posts and comments you’ll see problems. You’ll also see compelling arguments.

I’m firmly situated behind Obama as a candidate, but I see his flaws. There’s a certain “chivalry” to his dealings with Clinton that have struck feminists as being condescending (pulling out her chair for her at the debate, for instance). More troubling about how he deals with women was when he called a reporter “sweetie” when she kept annoying him as TV reporters tend to do.

The women who came before me in particular had to deal with men casting them aside professionally, dismissing them, muting their interactions with endearments, and downplaying their intelligence and decision-making skills. This isn’t relegated to the past: just as we don’t live in a post-racist society, we don’t live in a post-misogyny society.

However, there is no argument for the racism of the white feminists in response to Obama. There just isn’t. He’s a compelling candidate in his own right. A candidate whose speeches inspire and whose ideas are based in a solid liberal philosophy. He’s a candidate who established a community-based campaign fueled by small donations from a broad base. He showed himself to be the better candidate. If he can organize this well in the general election, we will be handing McCain his ass on a platter. It will be beautiful.

Nonetheless. Clinton lost. Obama won. We need to move on from that, but we’ll be dwelling in the racial/gender divide for some time now. I hope it becomes productive.

*Note: I’m not super happy with this post because I’d like to dissect everything more. As I said, however, I’m so freakin tired of all this.

Oh hell, I can’t even comment on this it’s so asinine. My goodwill for you, Hillary, is gone. Out the window. Adios.

Way to use fearmongering to try to get people to vote for you.

So there’s an open letter from Barack Obama to the LGBT community that he released today. You can see the letter in its entirety on Wonkette. I’m going to post it here too, but I’m going to interrupt it with commentary.

I’m running for President to build an America that lives up to our founding promise of equality for all - a promise that extends to our gay brothers and sisters. It’s wrong to have millions of Americans living as second-class citizens in this nation. And I ask for your support in this election so that together we can bring about real change for all LGBT Americans.

Change! Actually, I rather like this opening statement. It’s not subtle. He comes right out and says that we’re second-class citizens. It’s great–but I’m not so easily impressed. I mean, we’ve been teased with hope before…

Equality is a moral imperative. That’s why throughout my career, I have fought to eliminate discrimination against LGBT Americans. In Illinois, I co-sponsored a fully inclusive bill that prohibited discrimination on the basis of both sexual orientation and gender identity, extending protection to the workplace, housing, and places of public accommodation.

Moral imperative. I like it. Actually, I think this section addresses part of that “he doesn’t have enough experience kind of thing.” He talks about the work he did for us in the Illinois senate. That he also addressed gender identity in this older bill is of interesting.

In the U.S. Senate, I have co-sponsored bills that would equalize tax treatment for same-sex couples and provide benefits to domestic partners of federal employees.

YES! Taxes! You know, this might not seem to be such an exciting thing…but let me tell you…as I’ve started trying to figure out economic issues for the future it has become brutally apparent that our economic lives is vastly more complicated and punished because all the tax structures of married folks are denied us. Throw in survivor pensions/benefits and I’ll be in a pool at your feet.

And as president, I will place the weight of my administration behind the enactment of the Matthew Shepard Act to outlaw hate crimes and a fully inclusive Employment Non-Discrimination Act to outlaw workplace discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity.

Well. Sounds good to me.

As your President, I will use the bully pulpit to urge states to treat same-sex couples with full equality in their family and adoption laws. I personally believe that civil unions represent the best way to secure that equal treatment. But I also believe that the federal government should not stand in the way of states that want to decide on their own how best to pursue equality for gay and lesbian couples — whether that means a domestic partnership, a civil union, or a civil marriage.

This is a line that many on the blogs claim is him saying to the conservative states “I’ll ask you to do this, but I don’t really care–do whatever you want to them.” And I can’t blame them–anything “states rights”-like immediately rankles me because it’s often anti-woman, anti-gay, etc. However, I think he’s saying something else in this. He’s saying that the rights are the baseline. Equal treatment includes the things he’s spoken of–tax benefits and such–but that he’s not going to force the word “marriage.” Domestic partnership, civil union, civil marriage–states, call it what you would like. That’s just my interpretation. I don’t see this line as undercutting his argument.

Unlike Senator Clinton, I support the complete repeal of the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) - a position I have held since before arriving in the U.S. Senate.

Reminder: Bill Clinton signed DOMA. Just refreshing your memory about who put that in place.

While some say we should repeal only part of the law, I believe we should get rid of that statute altogether. Federal law should not discriminate in any way against gay and lesbian couples, which is precisely what DOMA does.

Thanks, Bill.

I have also called for us to repeal Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, and I have worked to improve the Uniting American Families Act so we can afford same-sex couples the same rights and obligations as married couples in our immigration system.

Again, hey, thanks Bill Clinton for DADT. Rockin.

The next president must also address the HIV/AIDS epidemic. When it comes to prevention, we do not have to choose between values and science. While abstinence education should be part of any strategy, we also need to use common sense. We should have age-appropriate sex education that includes information about contraception. We should pass the JUSTICE Act to combat infection within our prison population. And we should lift the federal ban on needle exchange, which could dramatically reduce rates of infection among drug users. In addition, local governments can protect public health by distributing contraceptives.

The abstinence line rankles me–but I see what he’s doing here…when I see an action plan for what it means, I’ll have more to say. It could be good (develop body positivity and develop conscious choice-making) or bad (here’s how you use a condom IF YOU’RE A WHOREDEVILHELLBOUNDSLUT!)

We also need a president who’s willing to confront the stigma - too often tied to homophobia - that continues to surround HIV/AIDS. I confronted this stigma directly in a speech to evangelicals at Rick Warren’s Saddleback Church, and will continue to speak out as president. That is where I stand on the major issues of the day. But having the right positions on the issues is only half the battle. The other half is to win broad support for those positions. And winning broad support will require stepping outside our comfort zone. If we want to repeal DOMA, repeal Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, and implement fully inclusive laws outlawing hate crimes and discrimination in the workplace, we need to bring the message of LGBT equality to skeptical audiences as well as friendly ones - and that’s what I’ve done throughout my career. I brought this message of inclusiveness to all of America in my keynote address at the 2004 Democratic convention. I talked about the need to fight homophobia when I announced my candidacy for President, and I have been talking about LGBT equality to a number of groups during this campaign - from local LGBT activists to rural farmers to parishioners at Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta, where Dr. Martin Luther King once preached.

I’ve seen video of this. It’s impressive. I blogged about it before. Really impressive, bringing a sore topic up in a room that is not only skeptical, but largely hostile to our struggle. It’s, as I said, impressive.

Just as important, I have been listening to what all Americans have to say. I will never compromise on my commitment to equal rights for all LGBT Americans. But neither will I close my ears to the voices of those who still need to be convinced. That is the work we must do to move forward together. It is difficult. It is challenging. And it is necessary.

Again, some in the blogosphere are saying “What? Listen to the bigots?” Well…you never know what arguments will work with people if you don’t talk to them. Just sayin.

Americans are yearning for leadership that can empower us to reach for what we know is possible. I believe that we can achieve the goal of full equality for the millions of LGBT people in this country. To do that, we need leadership that can appeal to the best parts of the human spirit. Join with me, and I will provide that leadership. Together, we will achieve real equality for all Americans, gay and straight alike.

Damn straight, Obama.

You know, I wonder how many people really believe that Obama is Muslim and wants to take the oath of office on the Koran. It’s a pretty easy disinformation campaign, I suppose, preying on peoples’ inherent xenophobia and racism. Whatever.

I so didn’t grow up on the same planet as these people.

John Edwards is going to pull out of the presidential race.

Well, that made my decision for me. Barack Obama for prez…

But I’m serious about the title of this post. Edwards should endorse Obama now for the AG slot come January. I want that man prosecuting the bejeezus out of people.

I have to tell you, I still don’t know who I want for president. I’m still irritated with Obama over the Reagan comment.

However, you really should watch this speech. The religious thing makes me a little uncomfortable, but that’s not entirely relevant to the message. It’s worth the 34 minutes of your time.

WTF Obama? Reagan? Seriously? Optimism? What? Government grown and grown and no responsibility? Clarity? A return to the dynamism and entrepreneurship of the Reagan era?

Good god, I’m in shock. I’m. Yeah. Shock.

I’m not saying you have to put devil horns on Reagan, but the guy was one of the worst things to happen to labor in the last fifty years AND he did nothing about the AIDS epidemic because it was a gay disease. He was the kind of guy who if you wrote him individually, maybe he’d write you a personal check to help you (it happened), but he never looked beyond an individual towards the big picture of how to help those who need it in our society.

Best comment pulled from Wonkette is below the video.

So, just to be clear here, unprecedented budget deficits + giving weapons to dictatorships + sitting on your ass for eight years and not doing anything productive = government accountability.

(psst Obama, Republicans aren’t allowed to vote in the Democratic primaries)

Tonight when I got home, I was perusing these here interwebs taking in the results of Iowa (don’t despair/congratulate any of yourselves yet, folks) and I came across an article published in The Nation that discusses Obama, Race and the Presidency in a way that lays things out better than I could in my previous post that touched on Ron Paul’s racist ass. All of the quotes below are from Ari Melber’s piece that I linked to above.

By the way, I highly recommend reading the entire article.

So I don’t really know who I’m going to vote for when it comes to be Minnesota’s turn. Obama is on my short list, so I was pleased to see him win over Clinton in Iowa. Though I’d love to have a woman in the Oval Office, she’s too economically conservative for me. I digress, however.

Win or lose, he is arguably the first black American to be treated by the political and media establishment as a fully viable presidential contender…We should not gloss over this development. It is a meaningful step towards addressing a resilient, uncomfortable American fact: our national power structure has always been, and stubbornly remains, overwhelmingly white, from all forty-three Presidents across history to ninety-five of the one hundred senators serving today.

When I was listening to Olbermann tonight as I read through the news, I heard either him or Tim Russert say that Republicans don’t think about electability as much as Democrats do when they’re voting. Whoever said it has a point. The higher the profile, the more we Dems are sooo self-conscious. And in politics, as in life, the hesitant are often trampled. The Republicans aren’t any less processed or polled, but even when they contradict themselves or make no sense or are just being complete assholes, they do it with aplomb.

Obama is popular, intelligent, and completely viable as a candidate. If he chooses a running mate with foreign policy experience, he would have a pretty sweet ticket. And despite the fact that he has made history as a candidate because of the sheer amount of money his campaign has brought in (which leads to its viability), despite the fact that I think we should be talking about race, if I hear one more blowhard Dem worrying about Obama’s “electability” as shorthand for “we’re wringing our hands because what if people won’t vote for the black guy?” I’m going to start throwing things at my TV like dear old Grandpa Dan used to when Reagan was on.

Know what? We’re not going to know if America will vote for the black guy or the woman or the white guy or the other white guy or the other white guy or the latino guy or anyone until it happens.

When I was going through my grandfather’s things after my grandma died in 2002, I found a letter that was sent before the 1959 Democratic Convention. From one Irish pol to another. The awe and anticipation in that letter have similarities to what’s going on with Obama now. I’ll look for the letter sometime soon to see if I can find the actual text, but in essence it said: “Do you really think America would vote for a Catholic? Is it really possible? An Irish Catholic!”

It was full of hope. And some fear–that maybe America wouldn’t elect Kennedy. You never can tell before it happens.

Melber goes on:

That segregated power structure was reinforced by the Supreme Court’s sharply divided June decision to ban integration programs in public schools. Most educational policies that consider a student’s race for the purposes of integration are now illegal. Like the original Brown opinion, this year’s decision is not neatly confined to K-12 schools, either. Brown consecrated a new national ambition for racial equality in the public sphere, delegitimizing both explicit and implicit racism in government, and laying a foundation for remedial measures to equalize many other facets of our society. Many critics contend that this case, Parents Involved In Community Schools v. Seattle School District No. 1, augurs a disturbing slide backwards. It bans integration programs, sharply restricts race-based government remedies and sets the stage for future bans on other remedial programs, such as affirmative action, as Justice Stephen Breyer warned.

Melber’s argument is that this thinking extends to our treatment of candidates. A reinforcement of “they don’t belong” or “they’re trying to take something away.” You know. Fear-mongering.

Hostility towards affirmative action runs so deep, in fact, it is a staple of attacks against black political candidates. Senator Jesse Helms perfected coded campaign racism in 1990, with an infamous attack ad darkly juxtaposing his black opponent’s face with the text “For RACIAL QUOTAS.”

This next part brings us back to Obama.

Some commentators have latched onto Obama’s success as proof for the flawed claim that the United States has completely achieved equal opportunity for all, obviating remedial programs like affirmative action. “Obama embodies and preaches the true and vital message that in today’s America, the opportunities available to black people are unlimited if they work hard, play by the rules, and get a good education,” writes Stuart Taylor Jr., a columnist for The National Journal (emphasis added). Taylor presents one man’s unusual political arc as a universal lesson for all “black children”: “Obama’s soaring success should tell black children everywhere that they, too, can succeed, and they do not need handouts or reparations.”

Because, well, you know that racial inequality exists because people are lazy. /sarcasm

Thing is, that’s a pretty entrenched idea. I’m betting some people reading this believe that. I could extend this to class mobility as well, but that would just make this post positively book length and it’s already too long. Too bad.

I am going to cut this off though. Please read the article. It’s fantastic. Goes on to talk about Condoleezza Rice and Colin Powell and Bush’s Cabinet and the Supreme Court as it goes into the future. Such good stuff.

Good night, folks. Here’s to a long slog through election season.