Chesler Chronicles

August 29th, 2008 10:29 am

Barack and Joe vs. John and Sarah: Whatta Fight!

Marshall McLuhan was right when he said “The medium is the message.” Obama’s masterfully choreographed extravaganza, a combination rock festival/revival meeting/political anointing was, what can I say, both underwhelming and overwhelming. The fireworks and confetti were a bit much (not to mention the Greek Temple motif), and I ultimately missed the balloons which I used to think were pretty silly.

Hurtling into the future makes me feel a bit nostalgic. Yes, I miss the whistle-stop tours of old and the spontaneity of some of the candidates’ speeches, before everything was so carefully scripted and rehearsed. And when I was so much younger…

Obama’s speech was good, not great, but his oratorical skills are clearly as good as Bill Clinton’s, maybe even better. One can’t help “liking” him as he speaks. His charm is overwhelming. He moves like Denzel Washington, slowly but athletically, enjoying that fact that his every move is being followed by adoring admirers.

I honestly don’t understand how he will find enough money to pay for every single social justice program he mentioned (and he mentioned them all) simply by seriously taxing the rich. Years ago, Gertrude Stein famously said, (and here I am paraphrasing), that if you get rid of the rich and re-distribute their wealth among the masses that you will then end up with even more poor people than you had before.

Obama’s determination to penalize corporate entities for outsourcing jobs that Americans need is a good idea. Let’s hope that they don’t relocate offshore entirely. Going through the federal budget line by line–well, why not? But I’m not sure that Obama will be able to find enough there to preserve social security, guarantee health insurance and quality health care, send every American child to college, pay women equally to men, get America back on its feet economically, educate girls and women so that they do not have unwanted pregnancies that lead to abortion–and on and on.

Ending America’s addiction to Middle Eastern oil within a decade–I’m absolutely with him on this. Funding the search for alternative sources of energy–I’m with him too. Equipping our soldiers adequately when we send them “in harm’s way”–he is right about this. Defeating al-Qaeda, but not in Iraq, (why not? they are there in droves), but rather, only in the “80 countries” where they have terror cells and in Afghanistan–of course. Yes. But does Obama have any idea how much this will cost? And keep on costing? Because the Islamic fundamentalist terrorists are not going to go away anytime soon.

What frightened me about the evening was this: Each of the average American citizens who spoke, including two former Republicans who are now voting for Obama, had clearly been rehearsed in the Saul Alinsky-style of Method Acting. They spoke as if they were at a left political rally on a soapbox or in the street, gesturing largely, speaking loudly, grandstanding, repeating slogans and gestures over and over again. “Yes we Can.” None spoke “naturally,” or from the heart.

This canned performance coupled with one other reported fact troubled me. Several newscasters said that people openly wept when Obama began to speak. And kept on weeping. I myself saw some weeping faces: Young girls, older African-American men, middle aged white women, the Hollywood celebrities. Even Oprah was quoted as saying that “Nothing compares” (to this evening). The tears, plus the largeness of the choreographed event (85,000 people were in Invesco Field) brought to mind other large political rallies where leaders have held their people spellbound, often for hours.

No, I am not going to compare Obama to Hitler, Castro or Khomeini; that would simply not be true or fair. And yet, these are very dangerous times. People need to keep their heads about them, not lose them in a swoon. A Cult of Personality will not save America.

McCain’s paid advertisement congratulating Obama on the fact that his acceptance speech took place 45 years later and on the very same date that the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. delivered his “I’ve Got a Dream” speech was pretty classy. But McCain’s decision to announce his Vice-Presidential running mate the day after Obama’s speech was politically canny because it is pre-empting Obama’s next day air-time.

McCain’s record on women’s reproductive rights and on equal pay for equal work is beyond worrisome. Thus, his choice of a woman who is a self-identified feminist, Governor Sarah Palin, as his Vice Presidential running mate is very smart. I am not yet sure what this will mean other than that a woman will be one heart-beat away from the Presidency and the first in line to run for the Presidency. McCain’s campaign understood that they would have to reach out for the votes of women, progressives, feminists, and to all those feminists who are furious with the Democratic Party’s treatment of Hillary.

Palin is reportedly a feminist for “Life” and not for “Choice.” Yes, I think one can be both and yet and yet…oy vey! Abortion is too key an issue for women’s rights to sacrifice just in order to have a woman living in Number One Observatory Circle. But the fight against jihad and Islamic gender and religious apartheid are too important to sacrifice to ideals about diplomacy.

Well, Palin is reportedly for “gay rights.” (But, I have just been told, only because a decision about gay domestic partnerships benefitted the state of Alaska financially.) And, I have just received information that the disaffected Hillary supporters are starting a “new” Democratic Party; planning to press Obama’s feet to the fire on women’s rights; planning to write in Hillary’s name–or to vote outright for McCain.

Folks: As Bette Davis famously said: “Fasten your seat belts. It’s going to be a bumpy night.”

17 Comments

1. Pajamas Media » It’s Palin!:

[...] Barack and Joe vs. John and Sarah: What a Fight! (Phyllis Chesler) [...]

Aug 29, 2008 - 10:44 am 2. Jeremayakovka:

In times like these, Phyllis, your passionate but methodical, critical but concerned commentary is worth more than ever.

Palin seems from her personal history to be an ideal candidate to constructively intensify national political dialogue on many many issues between feminism and conservatism, and within both feminism and conservatism. (Neither “-ism” being singular or definitive or even mutually exclusive.)

August 28 and 29, 2008 are probably the two most momentous days yet of this presidential election.

Aug 29, 2008 - 11:11 am 3. J.J. Sefton:

Barak moves like Denzel Washington. That would make him, let’s see, what’s the word? Oh yes - anti-semite. That’s it.

There are many more women that live in middle America than in Park Slope or the Upper West Side. The ones that wanted Hillary. Palin is a lot closer to their beliefs than Hillary.

A bumpy night indeed. We’ll see when morning breaks who was the bumper and who was the bumpee.

Aug 29, 2008 - 11:24 am 4. George Jochnowitz:

Gertrude Stein said that a rose is a rose, and she was right. Although a rose is a rose, a tax is not communism. An income tax is not the same thing as getting rid of the rich and redistributing their money. In the early days of the income tax, there were fewer loopholes. Nevertheless, the United States did not become poor. Our wealth has continued to soar during all the decades that we have had income tax, even when the taxes were much higher than they are now.

Because of oil prices and various other problems, we need more public transportation in the United States. Nothing can build it except federal money.

I am a New Yorker, a city that is great because it has the biggest and best subway system in the world, built with tax dollars, and because it has massive parks, like Central Park, built with tax dollars.

Aug 29, 2008 - 11:38 am 5. ex-democrat:

george - NYC had a subway system and large parks pre Giuliani when it was nightmare.
if it’s a great city now, it’s not for those reasons.

Aug 29, 2008 - 12:27 pm 6. JERRY BORIS:

SPEAKING OF FEMINISM, JOHN MCCAIN JUST OUTSMARTED BARACK OBAMA BY CHOOSING A LADY GOV, ALASKA, FOR HIS RUNNING PARTNER.
WOW! THERE GOES THE ELECTION GUESS OBAMA IS SICK ABOUT NOW. DISAFFECTED HILLARY FOLKS ARE MOVING OVER, NO DOUBT.
JERRY BORIS PHILA

Aug 29, 2008 - 12:42 pm 7. Marion L:

If consistent feminists (that is, pro-choice feminists) keep their heads, then choosing Palin will do very little to help McCain. In addition to her so-called “pro-life” stance, her life membership in the NRA is very troublesome. Too many parents (mothers included) have gone through the unendurable grief of losing a child to gun violence. Gun control is very much a women’s issue, and an issue for any citizen who is concerned about reducing the level of violent crime in this country.

Moreover, Obama scored an excellent point on the foreign policy front when he pointed to McCain’s reluctance to scope out Osama Bin Laden in his cave in Pakistan (where he actually is) instead of diverting attention to an unnecessary war in Iraq. In overall disposition, Obama shows himself to be a much more thoughtful and deliberative choice than McCain; who makes reckless comments about bombing Iran and staying in Iraq for 100 years.

Aug 29, 2008 - 1:54 pm 8. Lorelei:

I must say that Obama moved me last night. For the first time I wavered as a discontented Hillary supporter who was resigned to voting for McCain in protest. I think, despite the theatrical trappings
of the evening, Obama showed gravitas. McCain really screwed up in
his choice of Palin. I’m agape. As of now, the Obama ticket has my\
vote. You don’t have to be a woman or gay to support both.

Aug 29, 2008 - 3:32 pm 9. Marion L:

Dear Dr. Chesler and others:

Obama made a point of saying yesterday that the election was not about him, but about “you” - you being all of his supporters in Mile High Stadium and beyond.

That is quite the opposite of encouraging “a cult of personality.”

Of course, some people will be infatuated with him, as is common with well-known, charismatic personalities.

However, I feel confident that the majority of Obama supporters will vote for him because they agree with his positions and with the overall direction in which he would like to take this country after 8 years of corruption and malfeasance by Bush/Cheney.

In addition, one of the many reasons that I’m voting for Obama is that I’m a Zionist (of the Yossi Beilin/Meretz USA variety) and I’m concerned that McCain’s reckless approach to foreign policy would be dangerous for Israel.

Aug 29, 2008 - 3:40 pm 10. BBloom:

I began to contemplate voting for McCain when Hillary’s 3am ad came out. I lived in Northern Israel during the rocket showers. My knee-jerk reaction was that I would want McCain to answer the phone. I have never voted Republican, but his VP choice clinched it. Islam is in the process of destroying Western Civilization! If we don’t cut the warm fuzzy crap, we will quickly find ourselves with far greater problems then pro-lifers…

Aug 29, 2008 - 6:26 pm 11. heather:

Did you see the Dayton speech? McCain introduced her, and at first, was ‘protective’, even every so slightly condescending. And then, SHE TOOK IT AWAY.

Sarah Palin is totally great. And she has a hott husband, a quarter Yupiq Eskimo, who is an actual working fisherman, a member of a labour union, an oil patch worker AND now, looks after the kids; and hunts for moose. And cute kids (the oldest toting around Trig, the next older one toting the baby bottle) The oldest is in the Army, and going to Iraq this September 11th.

And is she tough? She took on one of America’s most inbred corrupt political machines, headed by the very powerful Stevens and Young… and WON.

As to foreign policy: Alaska is next door neighbours to both Russia and to America’s biggest trading partner (Canada!); and has signed a bill to put through a gas pipeline through Alaska, Yukon, and down to the lower 48.

Aug 29, 2008 - 6:42 pm 12. Tina Trent:

Even when I worked in it, I never understood the pro-choice movement’s presumption that feminism and a pro-life stance are mutually incompatible. In fact, that organization’s emphasis on what I call the seven words that would end abortion — “You’re pregnant? Let’s have the baby together” — that is, male responsibility for offspring, is far more feminist than most positions out there. Palin doesn’t seem like an ideologue, just a religious woman (the one troubling thing to me is the Creationism, which doesn’t even hinge with her religious faith, so it’s confusing). But if anything drives me even further away from the toxic mess of Obama’s particular political pedigree, it’s the unleashing of raw misogyny in the lefty blogsphere last night. Slate, Salon, Newsweek — slurs were flying (b****, c***), contempt expressed for “being stupid enough to have a retarded baby,” accusations of racism and slams on the stupidity of women run rampant. In several instances (see Joe Conason), women weren’t even referred to as women, only bodies: “gender characteristics” in one case, “XX chromosomes” in another. It was frankly chilling. Not surprising, though. I spent twenty years in the Left. I’ve seen this type of rage towards women plenty of times before (and then there was the elitism, with Eleanor Clift sneering about “Entertainment Tonight Candidates” and “Movie of the Week” women). Ugly stuff, and it shouldn’t be forgotten.

Aug 30, 2008 - 6:50 am 13. Marion L.:

Dear Mr. Boris:

McCain did not “outsmart” Obama by choosing Palin. Instead, McCain demonstrated his profound contempt for Hillary Clinton supporters (and anyone living in the 21st Century) by choosing a reactionary creationist who wants to put junk science into public schools by forcing science teachers to teach creationism.

Morevor, the majority of Hillary supporters are pro-choice and Palin would force pregnant rape and incest victims to go through with their pregnancies.

She is also anti-environmentalist, which is especially disturbing coming from a governor of Alaska as Alaska has so many natural environmental sites worthy of preservation.

Aug 30, 2008 - 9:58 am 14. Marion L.:

Dear Ms. Trent:

I believe you when you say that some (but certainly not all) Obama supporters have posted uncivil comments about Palin. It is certainly improper to make disparaging remarks about her gender.

However, I and the majority of Obama supporters who are critical of Palin are basing our criticisms on our disagreement with her far right political positions; which I and others responding to this post have outlined in detail.

Moreover, I think it will be a disaster for this country if McCain wins, and an even larger disaster if Palin has to step in as president. She is inexperienced and unprepared to lead. McCain’s choice of Palin shows how hypocritical it is for him to accuse Obama of being too inexperienced for the presidency.

Aug 30, 2008 - 10:04 am 15. Fern Sidman:

To Marion L;

In regards to foreign policy issues, you say one of the many reasons that you’re supporting Obama is because you’re a Meretz/ Yossi Beilin style Zionist. (An oxymoron if there ever was one). I imagine that you fear that John McCain, with his solid 25 year pro-Israel voting record will actually be a president who will not coerce Israel to relinquish more territory to the Palestinians and might actually take a stronger stand against such Iranian terrorists proxies as Hamas and Hezbollah.

I imagine that you fear that McCain will not pressure Israel to divide its eternal capitol Jerusalem and will actually take concrete measures to move the US Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, thereby signifying a US committment to keeping Jerusalem as the undivded capitol of Israel. I imagine that you fear that McCain will stand strong against terrorist attacks against Israeli civilians and the kidnapping of Israeli soldiers and will persuade Israel NOT to keep releasing throngs of blood thirsty Arab prisoners who are murderers of women and children.

As a person who supports the extreme left political position in Israel, I certainly understand why you support Obama who is willing to reach out with a real live olive branch to such terrorist regimes as Iran; to sit down and negotiate with them, to recognize and acknowledge them as equal partners.

Of course, you must have realized that the one who scores the biggest victory here is Ahmadinejad, who smiles smugly and laughs with glee that his incendiary rhetoric and his unabated uranium enrichment program has brought the proverbial “Giant” to its kness. The “Western devil” now is so afraid of us that they are now cow-towing to us. “Our tactics have worked”, he exclaims with pride. There is no question that soon after President Obama’s first meetings with Iran, will the US consider removing Hamas and Hezbollah from the State Department list of Foreign Terrorist Organizations and soon after that, the US will also sit down and negotiate with those who murdered innocent Jews in Sderot and other such places.

Aug 30, 2008 - 6:39 pm 16. Marion L.:

Dear Ms. Sidman:

Yossi Beilin has a distinguished career of service to the State of Israel. He will easily survive your caricature of his views. Here is a link to the Meretz USA website: http://www.meretzusa.org/
If you read some of the posts, you will get to know what I really think about Israel, instead of making me up with a series of “I imagine that[s]” as you go along.

I think that McCain is unsuited for the presidency. He is intemperate, bellicose, dogmatic, rigid, reactionary (and recative) and extremely condescending towards women; as his recent vice presidential choice shows.

Moreover, why would I trust Sarah Palin, who has zero foreign policy experience, with the future safety and security of the state of Israel? McCain made this cynical choice and it shows very poor judgment.

As his reckless “joke” about attacking Iran shows, McCain has a “shoot first and ask questions later” approach to foreign policy.

By contrast, Barack Obama evokes the wise counsel of John F. Kennedy:

“We must never negotiate out of fear, but we must never fear to negotiate.”

That is the kind of thoughful approach to foreign policy that will protect the safety and security of the state of Isrel in a very complex world.

Aug 31, 2008 - 10:32 pm 17. Phyl:

Sarah Palin supported Pat Buchanan for President in 2000, the man in public life who most opposes US support for Israel and whose latest book, The Unnecessary War, argues that Churchill and Roosevelt were wrong in fighting World War II against Hitler. She also supports a ban on abortion even for a woman who has been raped, or in cases of incest, and regardless of the age or mental health status of the mother. This is the person you are considering for Vice President to a President who is age seventy-two and a cancer survivor? Why? Because she is a woman? I don’t begin to get it. Look at Biden who has been a strong pro-Israel voice and remember that’s who Obama picked, while McCain picked Palin.

PS Yes, people openly wept when Obama gave his speech. I teared up, I’ve got to admit. Why? Because of adoration for him? No. I’ll vote for him, but I don’t idolize politicians. My tears were for this reason only –that in this country with its history in regard to race we have achieved something–a moment for which many good people sacrificed. 45 years after the I Have a Dream Speech to a day! 40 years after Martin Luther King said he would might not reach the promised land but we as a people would. What other political event is more worthy of tears?

Sep 1, 2008 - 8:39 am