Hillary’s moment?
Posted inPolitics: National

Hillary’s moment?

Hillary_Clinton_March_2016Imagine how social media, cable "news," and talk radio in a misinformed nation would have portrayed some candidates in the past.

A failed one-term congressman, wishy-washy on his party's most important moral issue, no executive experience, too homely for television — and despite the media campaign to make him out as a simple, honest frontiersman, in reality he was a highly successful lawyer for the nation's most powerful industry. His own law partner noted, "his ambition was a little engine that knew no rest." You know him as Abraham Lincoln.

An elitist intellectual, hotheaded, jingoist warmonger, impetuous and too young to be even vice president. Otherwise known as Theodore Roosevelt. The white privilege dandy who concealed his crushing disability and constant pain, running on a balanced-budget promise but in reality holding no fixed ideology and depending on a coalition that included Southern segregationists. That was TR's cousin, Franklin Roosevelt.

On the other hand, there was "the great engineer," a self-made man, the rightly lionized savior of refugees in World War I — the only man who came out of the Paris peace conference of 1919 with his reputation enhanced, according to John Maynard Keynes. This progressive and pragmatic man seemed ideally cut for his time. Yet Herbert Hoover as president was overwhelmed by catastrophe.

You see how it goes. How the digital age distorts. How contingency and crisis reveal character. Now, with the republic facing its greatest danger since the eve of the Civil War, Hillary Diane Rodham Clinton steps forward to claim the presidential nomination of the Democratic Party.

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Posted inPolitics: National

On the convention: Will Obama be FDR or Bryan?

Let me begin my convention observations by saying: I don’t trust the media. Whatever the Democrats and Obama do, it will be "the wrong thing" per the corporate media narrative. He still hasn’t "sealed the deal" and "closed the sale." He "lacks specifics" — a lie — and if he provided more, they would be instant red meat. If 75,000 people in the stadium hear one of the great speeches of our time — as happened in Philadelphia on the race issue — it will be swept away by the coiffed broomheads of television pundits.

As Michelle’s speech confirmed, the Obama’s have done everything the "conservatives" demand of black folks — and they’re still "foreign." He’s a celebrity — that’s bad. Americans "don’t know who he is" — as if they know who the hell John McCain is. He’s "not one of us" — as if that has any meaning in an America of diverse life paths, or that a former POW, longtime right-wing capo and rich consort of a beer heiress is "one of us." "One of us" is a stupid person, as the media would have it — because, after all, education and the ability to speak in complete sentences = elitism.

The best way to watch the convention is on CSPAN, so you hear all the speeches, not merely the prime-time ones that are filtered and "interpreted" by the bubbleheads. Of course, most Americans don’t do this. So they watch the prime-time spectacle as the Democrats try, again, to figure out how to beat the Republicans. Somehow eight years of misgovernment on an unprecedented scale isn’t enough. Nor is the obvious failure/scam that is "conservative ideas" in action. The right has wrecked the country and yet the presidential polls, if they are to be believed, show Obama struggling to stay even.

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Posted inPhoenix

How Denver beat the odds and saved itself

As the Democratic National Convention begins in Denver, the world will see the First City of the Intermountain West. It’s not Phoenix (population 1.5 million; metro 4.1 million), which sits in its desert frying pan like an overweight couch potato. It is Denver (pop. 567,000; metro 2.9 million). It’s another reminder that population alone is more likely to mean problems than strength. Let me tell you about one of my adopted hometowns.

Delegates will see a sparkling downtown and central city that have made a remarkable comeback from their fading 1980s. It’s genuine live-work-play. They can ride one of the best light-rail systems in the country, soon to be muscled up with commuter and light rail reaching more than 100 additional miles; the hub will be historic Union Station. Lovely old neighborhoods close to the core have been preserved and revived. Miles of bike and walking paths, including along Cherry Creek, flow seamlessly into a walkable, dense downtown. Nearby, the Cherry Creek district is a delightful walkable shopping area.

This city that sits at the edge of the arid Great Plains (it was the Queen City of the Plains before the Mile High City) is blessed with shady streets and gorgeous parks. It’s rich in culture, with a superb performing arts center and art museum, and edge, with many galleries, coffee houses and warehouse spaces. Chain stores and local stores, historic architecture and avant-garde, sit side by side along 16th Street and in lively Lower Downtown. Four pro sports teams play in downtown stadiums, which only enhanced the move to preserve historic buildings full of real businesses, and add to the downtown population. Where the old Stapleton Airport once stood is one of the nation’s top New Urbanist developments.

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