Obama's Kennedy Bid
Conniff, Ruth
Obama's Kennedy Bid Political Eye Ruth Conniff It was supposed to be a raucous event. Barack Obama's Wisconsin campaign kick-off at a sold-out theater in downtown Milwaukee started with a line of...
...As far as his specific stance on anything, nothing stands out...
...Sue Ross, a white customer service representative, was another fan of The Audacity of Hope...
...He's got an every-guy quality...
...Plus, they said, they like his wife, "an educated, professional woman-you can relate to that...
...The Virginia Tech massacre will prompt discussion, Obama said, about crime, violence, gun control, and campus security, among other topics...
...We've given up," he said...
...Watch out, Hillary Clinton...
...Third Way incrementalism is the lodestar for the two leading Democratic Party candidates...
...It sounds a little strained coming from a candidate whose rock-star appeal is his main asset...
...His invocations of the civil rights movement, "the arc of justice," the ugliness of the Bush era, and a better America, are moving...
...Tommy Molitor and Zach Hofeld, two white college students in homemade "Obama for President" T-shirts and sparkly blue "08" face paint, said Obama's solemn remarks were "the right tone at the right time" (never mind their own goofy attire), and that they liked him because "he's a young, energetic guy" who is drawing a lot of support from small donors...
...It's history in the making...
...By invoking Kennedy, Obama was clearly reaching for the same high ground...
...We are just thrilled to be here," said one of three well-dressed, middle-aged African American women who declined to give their names...
...Violence-and the callousness Americans have for the suffering of victims of violence, poverty, and oppression-is ultimately "rooted in our incapacity to recognize ourselves in each other, to not understand that we're all connected fundamentally as a people," Obama said...
...Instead, there was a moment of silence, then somber reflection on the shootings of thirty-two Virginia Tech students just hours before...
...I like that he says people should have higher expectations than they do of our government," she said...
...But maybe it's true...
...There was a sense of optimism that seemed to derive partly from the feeling that, as Obama put it, the diversity of his supporters "is a symbol of what I think America should be about...
...We haven't made much progress...
...In American culture] we glorify it, encourage it, ignore it . . . . It's heart-breaking...
...Please, have a seat," he told the cheering crowd...
...Right now I have no expectations...
...We look inward...
...Barack Obama's Wisconsin campaign kick-off at a sold-out theater in downtown Milwaukee started with a line of people wrapped around the block...
...Instead, he moved the audience to tears with his call for a rejection of violence and a better, inclusive America...
...As a Rorschach, Obama reflects Americans' best feelings about themselves-a sight better than what we have now...
...We haven't done enough to fight poverty and lack of opportunity, repair our broken health care and education systems, and oppose "a war that should never have been authorized and never been waged" (his biggest applause line...
...Obama threw away his prepared stump speech, and instead spoke about the day's tragic events...
...He made a pitch for overcoming cynicism and restoring "the idea that we have mutual responsibilities towards each other...
...He explained his reasons for changing the tone of the event...
...Then he quoted Bobby Kennedy's famous speech after Martin Luther King Jr.'s assassination, about how, with one act of violence, "the whole nation is degraded...
...But buyer beware...
...But the balloons, music, and crowd-pleasing speeches were canceled...
...He says he's pro-choice, but lauds some compromising restrictions on late-term abortion...
...His audience in Milwaukee, like many of his audiences around the country, was a remarkable mix of races and ages...
...He associates Rush Limbaugh with one and NPR with the other...
...RFK's handlers in 1968 were afraid he would be killed if he went forward with his planned speech to a mostly African American crowd...
...To the extent that he strikes a chord with his listeners, he helps foster the hope that we could, indeed, heal what's wrong with our angry, violent, and divided country...
...It fell to Kennedy to give those assembled the news of Martin Luther King Jr.'s assassination, and the police and press traveling with him feared that a riot would erupt...
...Part of the reason things are still as bad as they were forty years ago, Obama said, is that "we haven't been engaged the way we should...
...As with Clinton, it's easy to hear what you want to hear in Obama's speeches...
...It's not just about the country needing to make changes...
...Less inspiring, in his best-selling book, The Audacity of Hope, Obama stakes out the middle ground between political poles he describes as right and left "extremes...
...So was Obama's big foreign policy speech in Chicago in April...
...It's not just about race...
...Like Bobby Kennedy in 1968, Obama is talking to a racially divided nation about prospects for reconciliation and peace...
...Obama "lives in the world" and knows, from his community organizing work, what life is like for the poor, they added...
...He's against gay marriage, but for civil unions, and speaks respectfully about gay people...
...That was written in 1968, almost forty years ago," Obama said of Kennedy's remarks...
...Tony Epps, an African American construction laborer and a constituent of Obama's from Illinois, concurred...
...He's a good speaker...
...And it has to stop...
...He's instilled so much fear in the politicians who are lining their pockets...
...But I hope it causes us to reflect a little bit more broadly on the degree to which we accept violence in all its forms...
...The audience members sitting around me were drawn to Obama by The Audacity of Hope, his TV talk show appearances, and a sort of general feeling that he represents a more enlightened, happier future...
...An admirer of Bill Clinton's "Third Way" politics, Obama sends some very mixed signals...
...It's about the quality of life for all people...
...He claims to speak for, among others, "the middle-aged feminist who still mourns her abortion...
...Everywhere he goes, Obama says the campaign is not about him: "This campaign is a vehicle for you...
...And, Epps, said, "He's not tainted...
...America, Kennedy said, seems to tolerate violence, whether it is "civilian slaughter in far-off lands," our increasingly coarse entertainment culture, or the ready access to guns...
...This "truth is in the middle" canard, designed to appeal to apolitical swing voters, is depressing for progressives...
...He seems honest, intelligent," said Steve Koper, a young, white machinist...
...She's the brains of the family...
...That same disengagement allows us tolerate violence...
...Ruth Conniff is the political editor of The Progressive...
...In it, he refused to take "the military option off the table" to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons, and called for a "twenty-first century military" with almost 100,000 new troops...
...He's got a great legal mind, and so does his wife...
Vol. 71 • June 2007 • No. 6
