Greetings,

A few quick thoughts about the unending soi-disant political campaign state-side.

First, if you have the time, please listen to the March 14, 2008, interview that Amy Goodman of Democracynow.org did with Gore Vidal: http://www.democracynow.org/2008/5/14/legendary_author_gore_vidal_on_the

Vidal provides such a delightfully critical, frank and insightful analysis about why and how the US has plummeted in the global market-place. His thoughts are a nice compendium to what Chomsky has been saying for decades. 

About the election:

• is it surprizing that there is a torment of backlash against Obama and euphoria for Pallin?
• the media has locked the democratic (don`t walk on those) egg-shells into a real horse race, and who does not like a horse-race
• she's a fighter alright, and she's also a Christian alright, and she's a Conservative, no doubt about that, and she's a tax-cutter, a self-described pit-bull, and a proverbial Washington outsider, which are all very interesting qualities, to say the least, but, first and foremost, she is....... White (not sure if that should be bolded).

Like a powder-keg, her introduction onto the never-ending campaign saga has awakened society. It has also put Oprah on her guard, watching her back, and clamouring to hold onto her decades-old vice-grip on the White, suburban, middle-class, soccer-mom crowd (I might also add the now infamous "hockey-mom" crew as well).

But the question remains: IS THIS DEMOCRACY?

Obama is clearly the most desirable out of this it takes two to tango democracy but what will he change. He has no movement.

For the most part, people are not clamouring or are organized, despite his organization skills, to overthrow neo-liberalism, the stock market, the military-industrial-military complex and the predmominant features of the American landscape that have enshrined poverty and disenfranchisement in the US at higher levels than elsewhere in the Western world.

Obama has backed down on so many issues and concerns that it is unlikely that he will make any significant impact, if he were to be elected, and the presence of White candidates makes that very unlikely.

If Whites were for a significant and transformative racial rapprochement, why would they tolerate and generally ignore racialized inner cities throughout the country?

Similarly, why does Obama play into the same dying and tired traditional political model (fundraising, reacting to rumor and innuendo, private interests, the campaign team, teaming with pollsters, pols, advisors and advertisements, many of which are simply rancid and poisoned, cow-towing to the mainstream media, etc.)?

So, Obama is the better man, he is a decent person as well but does his campaign does not inspire one to think that there would be change under his leadership? There is an important nuance between what it is and what it should be. 

That is, he will be the man if White voters vote for a non-White.

Am I placing too much emphasis on the racial variable within American society OR is the media placing too little?

Obama, and virturally every other US politician in ear-shot repeat the same mantra, which diminishes the real hope for change: that ONLY the US is a society that allows for change, for hope, for decency, for integrity, for growth, for love, for just about everything. I`m not sure if Canadians, Swedes, Norwegians, Finns, Danes, the French, Brits, Spaniards, Germans, Italians, Greeks, the Dutch, the Swiss, Austrians, Australians, the Japanese, etc., etc., would agree.

This isn`t about patriotism but it is about humility (Please listen to Gore Vidal`s interview if you can, as he addresses why the world no longer favors the US, but you would never get a sense of this from the present electoral campaign).

CNN, FOX, MCNBC, CBS, NBC and ABC are working in lock-step to make this campaign something that it is not. The campaign obfuscates from the meaning of democracy.

Best regards, and peace!

Paul