Barack Obama Poetics

So now I’ve researched my eyeballs off and I STILL don’t quite see the specifics of Obama’s policies–how they will LITERALLY manifest. I read his website up one side and down the other.

But I also have a memory. At least so far (heh).

I remember how his rising star happened at the convention. And in case you DON’T REMEMBER the things he said round about 2002, here…let me refresh your memory…

In 2002 Barack spoke at an anti-war rally. Like Kerry, he only quibbled over the hows. The day before his speech, Obama told reporters, “On Iraq, on paper, there’s not as much difference, I think, between the Bush administration and a Kerry administration as there would have been a year ago.” He added, “There’s not that much difference between my position and George Bush’s position at this stage. The difference, in my mind, is who’s in a position to execute.”

The speech itself took Bush to task for lying about the reasons for war and for invading and occupying “without enough troops to win the war, secure the peace, and earn the respect of the world.” In other words, Obama, the great liberal hope, thinks that Bush should have sent more troops–and that the Democrats are more capable of seeing the war on Iraq through to victory.

Obama is a gifted politician. Like Bill Clinton, he knows how to encourage people of opposite political beliefs to see what they want to see in his speeches and policy prescriptions. Thus, even Rich Lowry, a right-wing booster of the Bush gang, praised Obama’s speech for its “hawkish attitude,” its “rallying cry of unity” and its “authentic, unashamed” embrace of “an awesome God.”

This method carries through on other issues. Obama finds a way to talk left–but makes it clear that he will never pose a threat to corporate interests or make a policy proposal that would carry a hefty price tag.

In Illinois, where it’s obvious that the death penalty system is too flawed to fix, Obama is celebrated by liberals as a crusader for death penalty reform–but he continues to support capital punishment for “punishing the most heinous crimes.”

Obama calls for tax breaks for American workers and government measures to create jobs. But he’s a supporter of Corporate America’s “free trade” agenda, and his convention speech praised Kerry because “instead of offering tax breaks to companies shipping jobs overseas, he’ll offer them to companies creating jobs here at home.”

Obama claims to be a defender of the public school system who will campaign to put more teachers in classrooms. But he also trumpets charter schools–with their record of union-busting and siphoning funds from public schools.

In his convention speech, Obama didn’t make the case for Democrats fighting for new government programs for poor and working people–or even defending existing ones. Instead, he echoed conservative themes attacking big government–but with a seductive liberal wrapper.

“[People] don’t expect government to solve all their problems,” Obama said. “They know they have to work hard to get ahead, and they want to. Go into the [suburban] collar counties around Chicago, and people will tell you they don’t want their tax money wasted by a welfare agency or the Pentagon. Go into any inner-city neighborhood, and folks will tell you that government alone can’t teach kids to learn.

http://www.counterpunch.org/ruder08032004.html

SO.

Let’s just keep our eyes open. Shall we? In the excitement of the next great liberal hope, let’s try not to be dazzled into believing he’s radically different from those around him.

Neither was Kennedy, by the way.