Post-racial America: show, don’t tell

The New Neo Posted on by

Obama ran as the post-racial candidate. But he was not above using false accusations of racism to beat his opponents, and he emphasized the racially historic nature of an Obama win.

The first method is to be condemned. And although in a true post-racial world (which we most assuredly have not entered, nor have we reached nirvana when last I checked) the second would neither be necessary nor important, it is one of the best things about Obama’s victory.

For me, Obama’s negatives outweighed the great positive of electing the first black President. But that doesn’t mean that I don’t find some pleasure in the fact that we have done so. Continue reading →

Jules Crittenden…

The New Neo Posted on by

…has a lot to say, including something I meant to mention about George Bush:

Obama is in luck. George Bush ended that war in Iraq, and all Obama and the Dem Cong have to do is not screw up the peace….[T]he one thing I wanted most out of the second Bush administration has been accomplished.

The day after: post-election reflections

The New Neo Posted on by

A few minutes into the second Presidential debate, I realized McCain was almost certain to lose this election.

I had been thinking that a McCain defeat was the likely outcome ever since the financial crisis began. But that debate was very troubling. I wrote at the time that Obama looked better and sounded better, although both candidates were strangely lackluster. But although I did not write this, I felt that McCain had squandered an important—perhaps a vital—opportunity to reassure people that he was up to the task. His lack of energy and focus on that evening was a very bad sign.

Then it became crystal clear to me late on the night before the election, when the returns from the tiny New Hampshire town of Dixville Notch came in. Continue reading →

Election Eve open thread

The New Neo Posted on by

For discussion of the voting returns. Talk amongst yourselves!

I may come on to do a little liveblogging a bit later. Then again, I may not. Only the shadow knows for sure.

8:51: I’m baaack! Only a tiny bit high, just enough to take the edge off. I’ve decided it is a lot better to simply not watch TV, and instead to follow this thing through the comments section of various blogs. Continue reading →

Voting day

The New Neo Posted on by

When I was a child my grade school would close on Election Day because it was used as a polling place. A day or two earlier, the booths would arrive and were set up in the gym, so we got to see them. They were large and had somber brown curtains, exuding the unmistakable whiff of grownupness, serious and mysterious.

I seem to recall that they had mechanical voting machines in New York even back then (it turns out I’m correct about that), which looked like enormous typewriters or perhaps the innards of a grand piano, with a series of little levers and hammers. It was impressed on us just how important the whole process was, although for us kids it was first and foremost a cause for celebrating because of the day off. Continue reading →

Obama’s lump of coal

The New Neo Posted on by

Another blast from the Obama past has been dropped, a bombshell interview from last January with the San Francisco Chronicle in which Obama said that the environmental policies he proposes would cause builders of new coal plants to go bankrupt. And he didn’t sound the least bit sad about the prospect.

Republicans are pushing the quote, especially in swing states that figure heavily in the coal industry. Continue reading →

More from the Obama archives: waiting for the right moment to push the progressive agenda

The New Neo Posted on by

Many of the revelations about Obama that have come out in the past week have been excerpts from old interviews. I’ve even come across one myself—this piece that appeared in Harper’s two years ago, back when Obama wasn’t yet exercising such tight control of his mouth and his message.

It’s instructive to look at what Obama was saying when his every word wasn’t being scrutinized. Continue reading →

Here’s another golden oldie

The New Neo Posted on by

Norman Thomas—remember him? Socialist who ran for President about ten thousand times?

Here’s a prescient remark he made:

The American people will never knowingly adopt Socialism. But under the name of ‘liberalism’ they will adopt every fragment of the Socialist program, until one day America will be a Socialist nation, without knowing how it happened