Hope

It's not every night that you can say you witnessed American history being made. Tonight was such a night. Barack Obama is the first African-American to win a presidential nomination. It's pretty special. The remarkable thing is, after taking the stage in Minnesota to U2's "Beautiful Day," after waving to the 17,000 people who were there to cheer him on (and the 15,000 people who were watching outside the arena), after fist-bumping his wife Michelle as he prepared to speak, he didn't mention his historical achievement once. Not even once. What he did do was show extreme graciousness toward Hillary Clinton and even John McCain. A graciousness that most certainly was not reciprocated in the two speeches I saw tonight from his competitors.

Obama is not the most experienced U.S. Senator running for President. He's also not the most experienced politician. But "experience" is not solely defined by how many years you work in Washington and enjoy Senatorial perks. Obama has life experience, experience being raised by a single mother in a mixed-race family, living in foreign countries, adapting to new cultures, becoming the first African-American to serve as President of the Harvard Law Review, working for grass-roots change on the streets of Chicago, working for eight years in the Illinois State Senate, and two years in the United States Senate. To me, that is plenty enough experience to be President. Besides, who wants 20 years' Senate experience when you're looking for something new? Maybe that's one reason why he's so inspiring, so different, so new. Because he hasn't been tainted by 20 years of I.O.U.'s, backscratching, and lobbyist paybacks. Maybe that's how real change comes. When someone doesn't have so much fundraising money wedged up his ass that he's afraid to take on the establishment. See, I think the longer you're in Washington, the WORSE President you'll make. Look at Gore. He didn't grow a pair of balls until he left Washington. Washington breeds complacency. Obama doesn't have it (yet).

For her part, while no one expected Ms. Hillary to concede tonight, one did expect a bit more of an effort to unify the party. I actually like and respect her, baggage and all, but what keeps coming back to bite her in the ass is her self-promotion at all costs. In a campaign that realistically, she lost weeks ago, she kept on, kept fighting, kept contesting the nomination, not for the good of the country, as she says, but to promote herself. To gain political leverage, either for a Vice President slot, or to compete in the next presidential election in the event Obama loses to McCain. You can admire her ambition and willingness to fight, but in my view, it's grossly superseded by her win-at-all-costs approach. That's why, after the bullshit she pulled in South Carolina, I voted for Obama in the New York Primary.

Obviously I'm biased, but watching McCain's speech tonight, I was struck by how weak he appears in front of the camera. He depends on teleprompters and notes more than most politicians, and he's not a good speaker. He looks insecure and halting, like he doesn't have it together. Now of course, this is superficial stuff. What really matters is where the candidates stand on the issues, right? I mean, Bush can barely put a sentence together, and he won two elections against two pretty intelligent, articulate guys. Americans like "C" students in their presidents, not "A" students, right? Call me crazy, but I have feeling that intelligence and competence are going to matter more this time. That maybe, just maybe, after a senseless war, hundreds of thousands of people dead, billions of dollars wasted, a gazillion dollar deficit, a Social Security system that's headed for bankruptcy, a recession looming, record gas prices at $4.50 a gallon, and a health care system that leaves millions of Americans uninsured each year, maybe Americans are finally ready to elect someone with a brain in his head. Maybe Bubba Brubaker in Kentucky will overlook the fact that Obama sounds like Osama and that Obama is (gasp) black. Maybe Bubba will LISTEN and UNDERSTAND that Obama is a CHRISTIAN, not a Muslim (not that there's anything wrong with that). Maybe he'll vote for Obama because his economic and health care policies augur a better future for Bubba and his little bubbas than those of the Republicans he's voted for since Reagan. Then again, maybe not.

We all know what's coming. The Swift Boat, the Fear Factor, the Chewbacca Defense, the Silly Monkey, the Reverend Wrighting, et al. Expect it. It'll be here soon. Whether it'll work this time depends on how stupid the American people decide they want to be. I'd say it won't work again, but honestly, we elected Bush twice, so we're pretty damn stupid, ergo, I'm hedging my bets. If it works again this time, then we seriously deserve whatever we get, and I don't want to hear people complain about the Iraq War or how they can't afford health care. If you vote the same way election after election, you deserve what you get.

But I don't think it's going to be that close, I really don't. In this election, there is a clear-cut choice for the future. McCain and Obama have major differences on all the big issues: Iraq, health care, the economy, energy policy, and dealing with allies and adversaries around the world. Obama is hope, promise, change for the future. The next generation. McCain is yesterday. What once was. The Last of the Baby Boomers. There was a time when he was a maverick -- in 2000, when he should have beaten Bush for the Republican nomination (until he got swift boated himself by a Karl Rove-inspired "black baby" story) -- but now he's the Emperor's Apprentice. He's moved to the Dark Side so he could attract those evangelicals and pro-lifers. Last year, he voted with Bush 95% of the time. That's a stat that I found surprising, given McCain's previous go-it-alone approach. He stubbornly supports Bush's war, looking at it through unrealistic, rose-colored glasses. To his credit, he stayed the course on the war last August, when his fellow Republican candidates were bailing out, and he was short of money. But getting lucky on how the war has proceeded doesn't make the policy right. I think he's grown myopic on the war, and now he's a hostage to it, for better or worse. The chaotic world we live in requires fresh ideas. McCain doesn't have any.

Ironically, there hasn't been this clear a choice since the Reagan-Carter election in 1980. And we all know who won that election: Ronald Reagan, the Change Candidate. The Candidate of Hope. It's going to happen again this time. I think when you line these two up, night after night, during the last five months of this campaign, Obama is going to shine, and McCain is going to look as dowdy and dusty as he did tonight. Maybe it's wishful thinking, maybe it's blind optimism, but I really believe that the torch has been passed. I think we're going to make history in November. I think we're going to turn this country around. Finally.