Casting Stones

Wow! How creepy is that? Not an endorsement that Obama needs right now, I bet.

What do you think he means by messiah? Do you think he's referring to a political or religious figure or both? Is there a messianic figure in the Nation of Islam?

I had the honor and privilege of attending last night's second presidential debate at Belmont University in Nashville, Tenn. Some commentators and reporters have described the debate as subdued and uneventful. I can assure you, as someone who was actually in the audience, it was anything but.

The town hall format reminded me of the town hall meetings which so dominated the early history of our settlement of this continent. Not surprisingly, McCain supporters thought McCain won and Obama supporters thought Obama won. My guess is that those who were undecided are still undecided.

I must confess that I was unprepared (This was my first presidential election debate to attend.) for the palpable excitement and energy in the room. Everyone from young people to senior citizens seemed caught up in the spirit of the evening. I suspect that most of them had some point during the evening thought to themselves, as I did, "What an incredible privilege it is to live in and be a citizen of this great and wonderful country."

I am fearful that too often our familiarity with our great freedoms, although it doesn't breed contempt, does breed familiarity. We are among the most privileged people on earth to have our common citizens have the opportunity to decide the great policies of our nation. "Government of the people, by the people and for the people" was alive and well in Nashville last night. No matter which presidential candidate you support in this election, we are all winners in that we have these wonderful freedoms, this open process, and this great republic as a birthright. I have never felt more grateful to be an American, and I've never been more proud of my country.

Obama and Jeremiah Wright, McCain and Charles Keating, Palin and Pastor Muthee. Should we judge these candidates by the company that they keep? Is that unfair guilt by asscociation? I think that candidates should be judged by both the company they keep and why they keep them.

Having personally stood with many people on account of whom I have been called a "bad Jew", a "betrayer of my people" and a "potential enemy of my country", I am particularly sensitive to this issue. But if we only stand with the people of whom we already approve, how do we build the bridges which improve things with those of whom we do not? Or as the late Ytizhak Rabin responded when asked how he could sit down with Yassir Arafat, "you can only make peace with your enemies." That doesn't mean that we can sit down with everyone always, and how we choose makes all the difference in the world.

It matters who candidates decide to spend time with, as it does for all of us. And it also matters why they are with them. The mere fact that a person, whether me with King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia or our candidates for the Presidency, spends time with someone is not synonymous with an endorsement of that person and everything for which they stand. And the ability to make that distinction marks the difference between the sickening gotcha politics being played by both sides in this race, and making an honest accounting of the people with whom we hang out and whether or not it is really worth it.

For example, I am far more concerned about Barack Obama's twenty year relationship with Jeremiah Wright than I am about his episodic and tangential connection to Bill Ayers even though the latter actually committed very serious crimes. Why? For three reasons: because Wright remains entirely unrepentant about the venomous hate speech which has defined a significant piece of his ministry, because Obama did not repudiate that speech until political expediency forced him to do so and because calling someone your pastor, makes a powerful claim about the esteem in which you hold them.

I've been getting bored with and haven't bothered to read the many articles on why feminists hate Palin. Why bother reading them when the answer is so obvious. They hate her because she doesn't bow to their abortion altar. But Paglia is a different kind of feminist, a smart one, that's why I read what she says and listen to here assertions (I don't usually agree with her but at least she's makes an interesting case for her position, she almost convinces me that Obama wouldn't totally blow it with Iran -- almost). She understands that in the Palin vs the MSM, that it's the MSM who have suffered.

Although nothing will sway my vote for Obama, I continue to enjoy Sarah Palin's performance on the national stage. During her vice-presidential debate last week with Joe Biden (whose conspiratorial smiles with moderator Gwen Ifill were outrageous and condescending toward his opponent), I laughed heartily at Palin's digs and slams and marveled at the way she slowly took over the entire event. I was sorry when it ended! But Biden wasn't -- judging by his Gore-like sighs and his slow sinking like a punctured blimp. Of course Biden won on points, but TV (a visual medium) never cares about that.

The mountain of rubbish poured out about Palin over the past month would rival Everest. What a disgrace for our jabbering army of liberal journalists and commentators, too many of whom behaved like snippy jackasses. The bourgeois conventionalism and rank snobbery of these alleged humanitarians stank up the place. As for Palin's brutally edited interviews with Charlie Gibson and that viper, Katie Couric, don't we all know that the best bits ended up on the cutting-room floor? Something has gone seriously wrong with Democratic ideology, which seems to have become a candied set of holier-than-thou bromides attached like tutti-frutti to a quivering green Jell-O mold of adolescent sentimentality.

And then there's this:

The next phase of feminism must circle back and reappropriate the ancient persona of the mother -- without losing career ambition or power of assertion. Betty Friedan, who had first attacked the cult of postwar domesticity, had long warned second-wave feminists such as Gloria Steinem about the damaging exclusion of homemakers from their value system. The animus of liberal feminists toward religion must also end (I am speaking as an atheist). Feminism must reexamine all of its assumptions, including its death grip on abortion, if it wishes to survive.

Careful readers of this blog know that I've been making a similar point. I'm glad to see that there are feminists who agree that conservative women deserve a place at the table and that the survival of feminism depends on it.

I cannot believe that this country is in the critical condition that it's in, and these are the politicians we're asked to choose from as our next leader. Neither McCain nor Obama spoke with any credibility or seriousness about our situation. When asked what sacrifices they would ask the American people to make in light of the crisis and its likely fallout, they punted. It made me so angry! I have no use for either of those pandering mannequins.

McCain is the conservative in the race, though, and he gave no reason at all to give conservative ideas a hearing. He was at times not quite coherent, while Obama came across as smooth, warm and reassuring (even when he was talking shite). Obama won this dull, worthless "debate," for what that's worth, and he's going to win the election. Nothing McCain did tonight changed a thing. He's done. This race is now the 2008 version of Clinton vs. Dole. And you know how well that turned out for the Republicans.

The silver lining: Obama and the Democrats are going to own this godawful mess. And the conservative movement can clear the deadwood out of the way, and start to rebuild itself into a credible force.

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