Obama Bashing?

A friend of mine wrote me this morning to tell me his sister read Robert J. Samuelson's op-ed in the Washington Post this morning, and that it "crystallized" her hesitation to support Barack Obama.

The Post is a fine paper, and Samuelson's as bright as they come, but with all due respect to both institutions of American journalism -- as well as any individual's right to vote for whomever -- Samuelson is wrong. (It's also not exactly "objective journalism" to be writing such columns, dressed up as OpEd's, but there's always more to write about, isn't there?)

Without taking a stance on Obama one way or the other, it's American politics that's at stake in this next election, and it's been increasingly taken away from the American people since someone realized that what the Nixon-Kennedy debates really represented were advertising dollars, and the media got on board besides (besides the aforementioned instance, see Network for as good an example as any). And so here is my response to him:

It's seems as if there's nothing "radical" about ANY of this years candidates. Maybe Ron Paul, who's not on the table.

So what if Obama's platform is similar to Hilary's?! (Oh yeah, except she voted for the war, and hasn't apologized.)

The politicians have fooled us all for so long that we'd indeed be foolish not to be more cynical. Any candidate that's going to be nominated is only so free to say what s/he really thinks. If America really wanted a progressive platform, John Edwards would still be in the hunt, and Bush wouldn't have been re-elected in 2004.

Obama will like do much the same as Hilary once he gets into office; he's not likely to be "bad" for America. How much experience did George Washington have before becoming president? (Ok, not much of an argument, but still.)

Besides that, what this country needs is inspiration!

Look at JFK: If he'd been an older guy with dyed hair and a plain wife who lived through two terms we'd probably be comparing him to Nixon. Not much more experience than Obama when he was elected; rich, entitled, anti-semitic family; friend to Joseph McCarthy; Bay of Pigs; Cuban Missile crisis; got us in to Vietnam; not really that much of a stellar record; perhaps didn't even write his most famous, Pulitzer Prize-winning book - but people still have his picture on the wall 45 years later because he brought hope to America. (No, that's not Kennedy bashing.)

If GWB can bring the national mood down, what's wrong with qualifying a candidate that can bring the mood up? What's true of Obama that wasn't true of Bill Clinton in '92? (Ok, Bill was a two-term governor, but still.)

Two more points: 1) There are a lot of Clinton haters out there -- even on the Left -- and Hillary might not beat McCain; and 2) If there's one thing that's been true of journalism since Henry Blodgett, if not before, it's that some pundit always wants to be the one that says he was the first to say boo -- and it's certainly no skin off his nose to do so. For instance: David Brooks wrote the exact same column yesterday.