The State of 2008

Well the biggest two shoes have now dropped on the Democratic side of the 2008 Presidential race. Hilary and Obama both announced last week that they were going to make a run at the White House. I’d love to sit here and write about how exciting it is to have a woman and a minority both with a realistic chance of taking the nomination. I’d love to write about how these are two candidates that will reinvigorate the left wing of the Democratic Party. I’d love to write about how these two make me passionately want to get out and support them from day one. Unfortunately I just can’t bring myself to do that. After the 2004 election I was determined that I would work on a ’08 campaign from the ground floor up. Now I see the two most likely front runners and I’m just left discouraged.

If you had told me in 1999, that Hilary Clinton was not only going to run for President in the next decade and that she’d actually have a chance to win I would have kissed you. At the time I loved the Clintons . Even though I was already beginning to realize that Bill had really not made any long term fixes to America , Hilary was still golden in my eyes. She seemed like the real liberal in the family. Unfortunately that changed when she joined the senate in 2000. She has become even more conservative then her husband and her hawkish attitude on Iraq is inexcusable. I’m not stupid enough to believe we’ll actually get a candidate that shoots straight with us in 08 but I was hoping we could avoid having a Democratic front runner who comes off as phony as she does now. In the other corner you Obama. A young inexperienced Senator who’s got enough charisma to make you forget he’s being phony. Problem is except for Iraq I don’t know where he stands on anything. I know he’s hopeful for America and that he believes we as a nation we can do anything but there doesn’t seem to be much substance behind his pretty face.

The biggest problem I have with the two is that they are already off and running and playing to the middle. Did the Republicans win the last two presidential elections by playing to the middle? Hell no, they fired up their gun toting, immigrant hating, Jesus loving base. Why can’t the Democrats do that? Appeal to people who support universal health care, true environmental reform, tax increases on the rich (for the last time if you make over $100,000 as an individual you are rich), social equality (which includes but is not limited to gay marriage) and the right to choose. Every poll shows that the majority of Americans are "liberal" when it comes to 2 or more of those issues. If that's true then it should be enough to carry an election. I want to be fired up. I think there is a huge group of people out there just like me who are waiting to be energized and approached and no, Dennis Kucinich does not count. But no, instead we’re stuck with more of the same old, same old and we’ve still got 21 months of this crap to go.