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• Tuesday, March 18, 2008 07:54 PM

  A very thought-provoking post, thank you

  I understand completely that halting sense of skepticism one can get when witnessing something so uncommonly genuine and intelligent in American presidential politics. Certainly, much evidence exists that the "average" American voter is often driven by tribal, anti-intellectual, strobing impulses. One need only look to Fox News and several other neoconservative media outlets to see the infamous "lizard brain" on horrid display, and this can indeed give even the most optimistic some pause.

  However, for many, many reasons, I think Obama's gambit will succeed. I believe it will succeed not only despite the reflexive and visceral tendencies of the common voter, but in part because of it. This dynamic starts with the cold and opaque machinery of the party leadership.

  This speech, as you point out, has resonated very strongly with the (non-right-wing) intelligentsia and the political class. It has people like Chris Matthews swooning. It has many DC professionals, including me, walking on the clouds of its pure, honest, and thoughtful brushstrokes. The babblings of approval from (most of) the media elite can be read like a diviner's casting bones to glimpse into the hearts and minds of the silently sought Superdelegates that hold the power to annoint Obama the nominee. A very telling canary in the cage of this latest development is Joe Biden, who had very kind words to say about a speech on which he had no need to comment in the first place.

  So I agree in part with Retired Military Patriot that this speech - whether by design or accident - will be precisely the gravitational force that draws superdelegates further into Obama's orbit. And while some of those superdelegates may continue to hold their cards close to their vests late into spring, I believe that Obama won their hearts tonight, and it will take a miracle or a calamity for Hillary to swoon them to her side now. For Obama's speech demonstrated to the Nobility at least two critical attributes: he showed not only that he can turn a snarling, unthinking Cerberus of political tumult into an opportunity for dialogue on the very themes that undergird his person, but that he can do it in a strikingly candid and impressively balanced way.

  Consequently, the political leadership having largely applauded Obama's A More Perfect Union, the media churning out memes of the power of his words and message, and the intelligentsia gravitating invisibly yet palpably toward his beacon, I believe the populace will sense a familiar swell, and will be pulled back in by the gravity of their instincts.

  This is because although Obama didn't pander, he struck chords that lie in every American's lives and experiences, and he earned the legitimacy of the only voices given license to approve him as "safe" once again. It doesn't have to happen in overwhelming numbers. It only has to happen in enough numbers to tilt the critical mass, to trigger the invisible logarithm of mass spirit and historical moment.

  And it will.

  —DCLaw1 Read DCLaw1's other letters
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