The Big Show

I don’t normally watch conventions – they can be frightfully staged and boring. But I’ve been following the Democrats, watching on MSNBC. Keith Olbermann and Chris Mathews have been gaga over the speakers. Last night we were also treated to the ‘A Team’ – Brian Williams and Tom Brokaw, a professional suckup who seems to be perpetually drunk. Not much insight from any of them, but Olbermann and Williams mixed it up a little but – I could see that Williams is no one to mess with while on camera. He is quick on his feet.

Michelle Obama is a neat lady – it’s too bad the Democrats have to tone her down, take away her spontaneity. She’s refreshing, smart, and real. But now they’ve got her saying all the right things, so she’s not so much fun anymore. Is there anything more dehumanizing than being a prominent Democrat?

What is the big deal about the Clinton’s? I was a little pissed as I listened to Hillary – her followers are so intent on inflicting her on us that they would punish us with McCain before voting for the black dude. She’s nothing special – doesn’t care about ordinary people they way Democrats are supposed to care. Her voice is shrill, inflections staged. She’s a little bit robotic as she reads her lines, her punches anticipated and poorly delivered. And don’t talk about Hillary and health care – she’s taken more money from the insurance companies than any other candidate. C’mon folks – just as in 1992, she was the one whose job it was to turn our health care system over the the insurance corporations. She didn’t set out to help us or fix anything. She’s not one of us.

Get over this woman, please and soon. She’s poison.

Then there’s Bill – a half million Iraqi kids would have refused to applaud for him last night if they were alive to not applaud. This is the USA – we can’t say certain things, and one thing we are not allowed to talk about is how Bill Clinton enforced murderous sanctions on Iraq for eight years, and how all those kids perished as he looked on and blamed Saddam. What a butcher, what a phony, what a Machivellian manipulator. No – he would not personally kill a child. That’s not how it works. When powerful people like Clinton kill people, they wear tailored suits and attend lavish parties and make decisions in the abstract. They don’t have to personally witness the deaths. That’s why Bill to this day thinks he’s not responsible for all that suffering. But he is.

And don’t tell me he’s not still chasing other women. I can forgive him that – look who he is married to. But not the kids. Now they talk about him like he was some sort of compassionate liberal while he was in office, how he “put people first” – good grief. I’ll grant that he was a liberal if the Democratic Party will take responsibility for all the liberals who got us into Vietnam. Bill follows in their foot path. He’s that kind of liberal.

Bill Clinton’s speech sounded genuinely insincere to me. He’s lost his touch – he’s not faking sincerity like he once did. Maybe he’s been out of the circuit too long.

Brian Schweitzer could have given his speech at the Republican convention and pulled it off. He’s a right-leaning centrist, but these Democrats – they aren’t exactly policy wonks. They just want to be in power, and will make any philosophical concession to get those D’s elected. Schweitzer is genuine and folksy and likable, though.

Joe Biden was pretty good – I mean, I want to see Obama elected for one reason only – I think he’ll give us better judges. There’s not much else in the pipeline from these Democrats. I thought Obama really helped himself when he nominated Joe, who comes across as human and fallible, a guy who might cry a real tear instead of a politically staged one. And he has fire in his belly – he gives good speech. But I was wondering last night why he didn’t go after Dick Cheney or mention wiretapping. The Vice President is, as Rachel Maddow said, “low hanging fruit”. He chimes in at around 18% popularity, but Biden tippy-toed around him, not even mentioning him by name, and for sure didn’t talk about all of the laws that have been openly violated these last eight years.

If Obama is elected, he will very quickly close the book on the Bush/Cheney years – there’ll be no punishment for all the wrongs that have been done. That’s a shame – many of them belong in prison, and Bush and Cheney need to be twitching at the end of a rope. They are that bad.

I get the impression that Cheney has been in charge during the Bush presidency and that he runs an enforcement racket. He’s been tapping all the phones, and extracts his pound of flesh. People are genuinely afraid of him. That would explain why a man so despised is so untouchable, why even firebrands like Biden won’t cross him. He knows what’s in all the closets.

Anyway, that’s Democrats for you – our ‘alternative’ party. There’s not much to get excited about. Republicans make change, Democrats adapt. Amy Goodman did a good piece on the so-called “Blue Dogs” – they were at a party staged by AT&T, who wanted to thank them for FISA, letting them off the hook for wiretapping us since February of 2001. Goodman stood outside the door while maybe 25 of the dogs walked by – each one refused to talk or even look at her. These are arrogant pricks. But they’re Democrats.

By the way, I think the sheen has worn off Obama. He’s not new or exciting anymore, his charisma is waning. That might have something to do with his sagging popularity – that, and the fact that Democrats don’t know how to work the media. McCain’s people have been pummeling them and they don’t know how to respond, and they sure don’t know how to dish it out themselves. They’re all about respect and talking up McCain’s good points, afraid to mess with the phony war hero. It doesn’t hurt that the media will take these 15 second McCain spots and run them for free ad nauseum, but the Obama campaign desperately needs some creative force behind it. Bob Schrum – where are you?