The U.S. presidential campaign is starting to get serious. Just a few candidates on each side, all looking relatively good, spending millions on ads before the election is even started.
For you to chew on (via. onegoodmove) :
Edwards discussing his low results in Nevada. Humble and confident that sanity will prevail. LINK
Obama and Clinton bickering about who’s got better rhetoric and who loves Reagan more (as if anyone is confused that either of them is a Reagan supporter), followed by Edwards pointing out how stupid they are being and giving concrete examples of tax reforms he wants to implement. LINK
My pick so far has got to be John Edwards. Obama and the Clint are okay, but when they talk there’s this buzzing in the back of my head. It might be my speakers are too loud – though they are truly crappy speakers – or it might be the sensor in your brain that buzzes when someone is shovelling shit down your throat.
When Obama talks about risking to dream of hope or finally bringing together America, it makes me feel good. I remember seeing the speech that got him started during the last presidential election: his life story and a message of future potential for amazing changes. It was touching and moving and an amazing change from the beleaguered mush we were getting from Kerry at the time, but where does it get us now? If hope could administer vaccines, we’d be in luck. But when a candidate has so much time to express themselves, and all that comes out is poetry (and repetitive poetry at that) how can you trust a person to get anything done?
Edwards tends to actually say things when he speaks. If you ask him what he wants he gives you an actual answer. And get this: if you ask him again, he lets you know that he already told you. Instead of jumping at the chance to indoctrinate us with the soundbite someone told him tested well with 25-55’s, he says “well, I already explained the reasons” and moves on to another topic. This not only makes him seem like less of a braindead puppet (Bush2 was the worst at this game, spouting phrases like “jobs of the twenty-first century” as often as Giuliani mentions 9-11), it also makes interviews and debates he’s in a lot more interesting. He’s saying more, you’re hearing more, you’re learning more.
The idea that United Statsers are so stupid that a clear, attractive person, speaking without repeating themselves, is too complicated for them to be able to follow the content is a sickly mixture of depressing and insulting. If inane, repetitive blathering is the only way to reach the people then the system has failed.
Edwards seems to understand this on some level. He is frank and uncomplicated but manages to impart real information in between catchphrases. Somehow I think he might be a little too legitimate to actually win the final elections (I love his anti-corporate message, but most people might find it radical), and if he gets into the white house behind Obama I think even that would be a victory for sane Americans, but I’d love to be wrong about it.