An American Tuesday

Today is a big day in American presidential politics, as partisan voters in 21 states choose their preferred candidates for their party’s presidential nomination.

The Republicans are running the reactionary tweedles against the Neanderthal tweedles.

In the race for the presidential nomination of the Democratic Party, meanwhile, it has been infuriating watching Hillary Clinton speechify about her extensive governmental experience, while letting her husband campaign on her behalf. Let’s remember that Hillary never held elected office before she became a senator eight years ago.

More importantly, if Bill had managed to keep his hands off the Monica Lewinskis, Al Gore would have won the presidential election in 2000. Dubya was only able to steal the election based on his brother’s gubernatorial connections because Bill’s sexual history was a concrete block around Al’s neck; without it he would have won the election, even given the Ralph Nader Ego Circus factor.

If Al had become the Big Guy, he wouldn’t have surrounded himself with warmongering, robber-baron neo-cons like Dick Cheney. Even with the provocation of 9/11 — Gore would not have bombed Afghanistan, or started the 100 Years’ War in Iraq.

Hillary and Bill’s experience has changed the world, all right; they have been a global natural disaster all on their own.

The idea that someone is running for president who has lived in and has family in other parts of the world is like cool water on a parched tongue. Barack Obama’s years of residence in Indonesia in his youth count as much, if not more, than his Kenyan patrimony. Of course, he believes deeply in the American way and capitalism and all that. He is no radical.

The only candidate who remotely resembled what the rest of the world would consider as a left social democrat was a crazy little guy from Ohio named Dennis Kucinich, and the best showing he made was 4% of the Democratic vote in one of the early primaries. And that’s about the most a left social democrat could hope for in the US. But when Obama gets up in the mornings, he at least knows that the sun does not rise in Maine and set in California. That puts him far out ahead of the pack.

Mainstream America will only accept political options within a very narrow spectrum. Nonetheless, when confronted with the massive social, economic, political and military catastrophes of the Bush era, Obama must bring a different history, voice and perspective, and a better experience to the table.