Tuesday: Fear of Foolishness

Doubters, awake!  Yes, I know who you are.  You’re the ones who say, “I consider myself a PUMA for lots of reasons but I’m not crazy enough to think she can actually get the nomination.”

‘Fess up.  You guys are all over the place.  You hang out here and Corrente and Alegre’s Corner and TalkLeft, of all places, where BTD has actually called us “nuts” and “Wrongheaded”.

Ok, let’s examine this for a minute: We have a candidate that nobody much likes, who lacks the weightiness of a substantial resume and the ability to speak in coherent sentences, going up against a man with more intestinal fortitude and clarity in his piggy toe than Obama has in his long, skinny body.  OUR candidate has a new campaign technique where he attempts to win votes by systematically insulting every voting bloc he will eventually need in the mistaken belief that we enjoy dancing to the masochism tango.  Barack Obama has spent his entire life climbing that ladder of success by not doing much of anything but schmoozing.

Large swaths of people out there are not warming up to him.  He has been unable to break the 50% mark in the polls.  In fact, his numbers are declining while McCain, who hasn’t really started to campaign with the GOP big guns, is holding his own or increasing slightly.  And in this chaotic landscape and ominous omens for the fall (he’s going to LOSE, DNC, LOSE!  BIG time!), we have a number of bloggy solons tsk-tsking and patting us on the head with a knowing smile and telling us we’re out of our minds.  We’re wrongheaded, like little children who need to be schooled.  Oh, they ackowledge that everything we say is true.  Obama really *is* acting like an arrogant ass who can’t debate, who whines if he loses, who has all the experience and gravitas of a butterfly and whose campaign organization with its strong armed tactics in the caucuses and deep pockets for the superdelegates are primarily responsible for his success thus far.  They too are both fascinated and horrified at what is about to happen in the fall.  But THEY are not foolish.

No, it is much safer from a social standpoint to just watch the house of cards collapse and say, “I told you so” to the DNC in mid-November.  They don’t want McCain to win but running around with their hair on fire yelling, “They must be stopped!” is making a scene and they don’t want to be thought of as hysterical.  They know, now, that Hillary was the better candidate and more electable and would give John McCain a run for his money and would neutralize the effect of the media because, after all, what could they *possibly* throw at her now that we haven’t already seen?  But even as they acknowledge their stupidity during the primary season for letting themselves be swept away by the Obama spring fling instead of sticking with the earnest and faithful guy, they can’t quite muster the courage to say that they would prefer she were in the driver’s seat headed into the fall.

I guess it has something to do with the fact that the Obama campaign has created an image of his inevitabilty.  He has the convention nailed down to the very last jot and tittle (er, until last week, when he didn’t).  He has all of the superdelegates lined up, except for the ones that he doesn’t.  He’s been to Europe to give a series of well attended public soirees, that went over like a lead balloon.  He has rented Invesco Field for his investiture and sent out the invitations.  Wouldn’t it just be embarrassing for him if we made him cancel his plans?

Damn right it’s embarrassing.  But considerably less so than losing the election in the fall, the third in a row, in a year when Democrats had every possible advantage going for them.  We could not lose, we told ourselves.  And now, we’re looking like the biggest losers on the planet.  Who will take us seriously after this?  Hey, if those older, wiser bloggers want to spare Obama embarrassment, what else are they going to overlook in Obama when he puts himself in a compromising situation?  And what about the old saying about not counting your chickens before they hatch?  Why aren’t we calling Obama and the DNC fools for putting the cart before the donkey?  Like, shouldn’t Obama be required to pass some kind of test demonstrating that he has earned the confidence of a majority of the Democrats before we give him the car keys?  Shouldn’t we expect him to compete on a level playing field with his closest rival who won more of the bigger and more significant states?  Isn’t that fair to US?

Princess Wears Prada reminded us of something the other day.  She says you don’t get something you want if you don’t ask.  I want Hillary to be my nominee.  I have a zillion reasons why she would be a better nominee and president than Barack Obama or John McCain. At this point in time, not only is it logical and rational to ask for this but it is very possible for it to happen.  All we need is for the Credentials Committee to restore Florida and Michigan to full strength and strip Obama of unearned delegates.  Then we need a nomination and roll call for Hillary with a majority of pledged and superdelegates voting for her and voile!  It’s done.  We’re back on track for winning the White House.  If necessary, we offer Obama the VP spot so he actually has a full time job for once in his life and we can assess whether he’s up to the demands of the job.  It’s so perfectly logical, straigtforward and sane that I have every expectation that it will happen.

In any case, I am not going to sit around caustically complaining about how stupidly Obama has behaved and then resign myself to his nomination.  That is another form of learned helplessness and I’m just so not into that.  The Obama camp has been very good at pushing learned helplessness and “we must not embarrass the precious, he’s been waiting all year for that pony.”  But Obama is applying for President of the United States.  In the next four years, embarrassment is the least of his worries.

Nope, I want to win.  The only shot we have of actually winning is with Hillary in the top spot.  So, that’s what I am asking for.  To do anything less is just nuts.