TeamBrooks

Keep Scrolling Down for Nola Laughing Video!

Unless you're one of those people who keep asking me how I could possibly have voted for Clinton in the Primary, and isn't it true now I that support Obama that I was just being delusional. I'm going to try to make this the last thing I write about this. I feel like Paul Krugman or something!

Hillary had a plausible -- and for many, compelling -- argument earlier in the primary season that Obama had yet to show that his calls for change and recoalescence were substantive or could gain sufficient following among non-elites and independents. He and his campaign have since obviously proven her wrong. She also had a plausible -- and for many, compelling -- argument that, owing to his celebrity status and easy U.S. Senate race, Obama had not been sufficiently vetted publicly in a way that could compete against the Republican ground operation and attack machine in the General. He and his campaign have proven her wrong by so far beating the second most effective ground operation and (far less pernicious) attack machine around, the Clintons and their backing.  The only remaining argument of Hillary's that Obama hasn't, and cannot, prove wrong solely through the primary process is her claim that her experience to date is more relevant and more important than his on the question of who is better prepared to govern. Though reasonable people can disagree on this issue, for me, she still wins that argument. But no longer by a degree that makes her more attractive than Obama given the potential that he has demonstrated in this campaign.   

The 2008 Democratic primary season so far has worked for me. To be sure there have been flaws -- including the process's marginalization of strong candidates like Joe Biden, and the process's failure to inspire confidence in Al Gore that his campaign potential could match his leadership potential, even in otherwise ideal circumstances. But I would not be as comfortable in my current backing of Obama had his main opposition been, for instance, Alan Keyes, rather than Hillary Clinton.

Unfortunately, there's still plenty of time for the primary process to break down given the developing delegate problem. Too bad Obama wasn't able to put a nail in the coffin in Ohio or Texas. But if he wins by any margin in Pennsylvania, there will again be an opportunity to make a very strong case for Hillary's exit outright. I hope this happens. As to the Clinton campaign's claim that "winning the big states" in primary contests is a greater display of strength than winning red states and small purple states in the general, I don't agree. Obama would keep enough of Hillary's people on his side, on top of the huge following he has already generated. Even if he would lose some older latinos, "security women," and working class folks to McCain. By contrast, Hillary would lose a lot more former Obama supporters to McCain, and would even attract McCain haters who hate Hillary more.  As far as negative campaigning is concerned, at the end of the day you either trust a candidate's integrity or you don't, and your interpretations of the candidate's statements, motivations, and campaign tactics -- as well as the degree which the statements, motivations and tactics of others may be attributed to them -- follow.  But I absolutely agree that it's time to pass the mantle to Barack Obama.

Clinton's Only Unlikely Shot

Ever since the Obama streak of decisive primary victories I've been thinking that Clinton's only shot at winning the nomination is for her to win the popular vote.  Here's someone who agrees: http://medianation.blogspot.com/2008/03/heres-how-clinton-could-win.html.  In view of the Bush v. Gore debacle in 2000, the superdelegates would be hard pressed to reject a candidate who won the popular vote -- regardless of the intricacies of the primary and caucus processes, which not enough people pay attention to.  But in the still unlikely event that Clinton does manage to win the popular vote, it may be that the only way to unify the party would be for Obama to be her running mate.  So Hillary's people better think twice before going too negative on Obama...

Team Brooks United for Barack!

So, now it is safe to say that the three members of Team Brooks, myself Dina and Nola are united in our support of Barack Obama for the office of POTUS.  Though admittedly Nola, without ability to discern among real choices or, for that matter, vote on her own, is a victim of adaptive preferences (good luck in your new endeavors Prof. Sunstein, who undoubtedly follows our blog as studiously as I attended his classes).

Now, my vote for Hillary in the New York Primary drew a good deal of controversy.  Though technically it very likely wasn't counted because I voted by paper ballot due to address confusion, a fact for the annalls of Brooks family history.  I'll not now comment on that vote other than to say that my preference for Hillary was not accompanied by a *rejection* of Barack, I just -- happily and rarely -- had to make a choice among two compelling options and elected to vote for the one who, as it turns out, it seems won't be elected. 

As I wrote on my now ridiculously active Facebook page: Setting aside for a moment the relative merits of a Hillary versus Barack presidency and General Election candidacy in the abstract, the turnout generated by Obama's candidacy, when coupled with his likely victory in the General Election to follow, can bring a new legitimacy to the U.S. electoral system that was lost in 2000 and 2004 (and not quite rehabilitated in 2006), among other positive repercussions. Requires the superdelegates to follow the (likely) popular vote, though, unless Hillary drops out. 

I've also come to believe, with some prodding by my skilled political junkie and advocate of a wife, that Barack is more likely to beat McCain in the General than is Hillary.  McCain's strongest card, other than the possibility of a October foreign-policy crisis surprise that could scare voters into falling in line behind the patriot-warrior-seniority icon, is his demonstrated ability to appeal to independents and folks in the center.  But Obama and his team figured out a way to steal that thunder -- brilliantly if not entirely coherently.  Also unfortunate for McCain is that lots of Republicans seem to hate him so much that they might not even turn out to vote, unless the evil socialist Hillary is nominated so that they can vote against her.

I just want the Democratic Convention to be over already.  But that won't stop me from watching the debate tonight...  Dina has truly made me a junkie again after years of voter apathy and disgust!

Glass Ceilings and the Iowa Caucus

First, it goes without saying that I can speak for Dina when I say we're both thrilled and awestruck at the promise and the historic significance of Barack's victory last night at the Iowa Caucus.  Beyond that, you'll have to speak with her (and Nola is still figuring out her politics).

Indeed it is a stunning achievement for a black man to have won decisively in an electoral contest held in a U.S. state that is 95% white and more red than purple.  No doubt Barack's is the bigger story (I mean, he won the thing), but what about the fact that, also remarkably and for the first time, a woman is within a few steps of the oval office?  It's almost as if folks have forgotten that, her Clinton namesake notwithstanding, Hillary is in fact a woman who has confronted much of the same adversity that every woman faces.  Though it's not at all clear that Hillary herself should be emphasizing the significance of her gender more than she has been.  Undoubtedly, Hillary's gender has long raised similar conundrums to those Obama's blackness has raised for him:

Embody it and be labeled a factionalist:

Obama as race-man vs. Hillary as feminist

Don't embody it and be labeled self-loathing and out of touch with your own kind:

Obama as Uncle Tom or insufficiently black vs. Hillary as "cold" and masculine

But while Obama has counfounded folks who thought the day would never come when a black man could become president by appearing to transcend race, Hillary has confounded folks who thought people might likewise be moved by the prospect of a woman becoming president by failing to appear be a coherent woman.  This is in part because gender cannot be transcended.  Seems that if you're a strong and fierce woman in a position of power you're are either loved or hated, with few in-betweens and little room for nuance.  True whether you're Oprah, Hillary, Kaye Bailey Hutchinson, Condi, Nancy Pelosi, Elizabeth Dole, or Madonna.  The force of a strong woman's personality might be too much of a distraction from the underlying facts and merits for her to be viewed as more than a polemicist, or a blunt instrument.  Something like this has long been true about race as well, but looks like Obama is busting up that glass ceiling that used to stifle black folks any time we said something original.  Whereas men don't come across as aliens when they're badass so people actually pay more attention to what they say, than how they say it.  This is how someone like McCain and even the operatic Giuliani can be viewed as moderates. 

This is an interesting moment -- I've been tentatively supporting Hillary's candidacy mostly because I agree with Bill when he says that, of the Democratic candidates, she's best prepared to govern.  With the caveat that I believe Biden was even better prepared, and I'm leaving Dodd out because he's not a foreign policy guy.  I also view myself as a pragmatist and, accordingly, in the center's direction in circumstances where I believe compromise will lead to the best outcome, or where I believe a policy viewed for whatever reason as right-leaning is more sound on the merits than its alternatives.  But it's looking more and more like Obama might be my pragmatic, diplomatic centrist after all, with big bonus points for being electable, new, and Creole (and my former law prof).  Dina also knows that I am firmly behind Obama's apparent strategy of coopting the powerful by appealing to common interests over Edwards' and the bloggers' preference for the David and Goliath approach.  And the very prepared Biden would be on my short list for VP, Sec. of Defense or Sec. of State in an Obama administration.

(OK time to post more pics of Nola)

Al Gore's Inconvenient Truth

We saw "An Inconvenient Truth" last night.  Well done, Al.  Mrs. B-B and I agree that the film does a great job of condensing an enormity of complex information into a digestible and widely accessible package.  Disturbingly, Gore's prognostication of imminent global disaster is pretty convincing.  Check out the film website . Might we all have the good fortune of it being exaggerated?

I'm skeptical, but here's an interesting, sort-of empirical, critique of the film by New Republic editor Gregg Easterbrook, which does point to some evidence that Gore is presenting a worst-case-scenario.  But many of Easterbrook's conclusions are unconvincing.  For instance, that Gore opted to travel via jetplane to disseminate his message overseas says more about our failure to develop vehicles that could travel such distances using alternative energy sources than any hypocrisy on Gore's part regarding energy overindulgence.  And it's odd that the title of the piece highlights Easterbrook's "moral flaws" argument -- his weakest, relegated to a parting shot at the end. The fact that technology has benefited humankind to date takes nothing away from the moral claim that we must now act in recognition of the fact that those benefits have since become outweighed by the havoc this same technology, over time, has reaped on the environment.  Gore 2008 anyone?

Moorea honeymoon pictures to come.

Letterman Takes on Guest Bill O'Reilly

These are strange times.  One by one, former non-partisan icons have been going public with their opposition to the Bush Administration, the war in Iraq, and the current right-wing hegemony.  First the New Yorker, which in 2004 endorsed a presidential candidate (Kerry) for the first time in its 80-year history, next purported anarchists and nihilsts Green Day with their unambiguously anti-war song “Life During Wartime,” and then Bruce Springsteen, working-class hero whose loyalty lies with a fan base that is both largely socially conservative and inclined to vote against their economic interests.  Among others.

Now comes David Letterman's skewering of Fox News megalomaniac Bill O-Reilly on Late Night this past Tuesday (Jan. 3). Check out the Video

And, Happy New Year to all, both from my beautiful fiancee, who as you've seen happens also to be a camera junkie, and from me.

Doublespeak Revealed

Take a look at a little trick on George Bush...

Compare his new site ( www.strengtheningsocialsecurity.gov ) to www.strengtheningsocialsecurity.com
(and try clicking on one of the links).

Keyes Karma

So the daughter of Alan 'Gays are Selfish Hedonists' Keyes is a lesbian (click here for full story). My heart goes out to her, and anyone else whose parents reject a fundamental part of who they are.

I've gotta say, however, that it seems to be poetic justice that all these hate-spewing homophobes end up confronting their own intolerance in their own homes.

Suicide Voters

But things in Iraq are going just fine. Yeah. Ok.

All Is Not Lost

There has been a lot of handwringing about the domination of voters who are seeing red around our country. Thought these maps might make those of us who are blue feel a little better:

http://www-personal.umich.edu/~mejn/election/