We all remember McCain’s flightretreat suspension of his campaign, and the flummery that followed.
YouTube lets us relive those moments. Even better, it lets us choose which moments we want to relive. You’ll find wonderful clips such as this montage of David Letterman’s pissed off self when McCain stood him up:
YouTube. The world is watching. And can hit replay, send links over email, stumble, digg, Twitter, etc.
We are one people,
We are one nation,
And together we will begin the next great chapter in the American story
With the words that will ring
From coast to coast,
From sea to shining sea,
I’ve got news for the Christopher Buckleys of the world — if Sarah Palin is enough to make you decide you’re not a Republican, you’re not a Republican.
There’s going to be a bloodbath. A lot of people are going to be excommunicated. David Brooks and David Frum and Peggy Noonan are dead people in the Republican Party. The litmus test will be: where did you stand on Palin?
One person far away, an acquaintance, died a few years ago. She tried to help me during one of my more bleak periods. It doesn’t touch me so much as it marks the end of a period of relative innocence, when nobody you know has died yet.
I miss a young man I loved once, or at least was overly fond of, but circumstances dictated that things should be otherwise. And I know it was for the better.
Old friendships snapped, not always my fault, but they are snapped nonetheless.
There are years I remember from University, during the period of stalking and danger, when I cherished every day even though I was afraid. Everything from those days has an aching clarity: bookstores, streets, people, restaurants, food I haven’t ever seen anywhere else, parking lots, dorm buildings, quads, auditoriums, balconies, malls, weather. It was a time of transition that might have ended abruptly.
Parts of me are gone, permanently, and can never be reclaimed, even if it was safe and I wanted to.
I used to be someone else, literally, and I can never be that someone ever again. I don’t really miss that, but I am sad that my development had to be so sharply delineated, that some things had to be cut off. It’s like a limb that you amputate because it had turned gangrenous; you had to, even though not all of it had turned that way. And there are phantom pains when you wonder, if only things could have been different.
Paranoia still grips my relationships with people. I am, frankly, pure poison many times, and personal relationships that persist are rare with me. I’m better than I used to be, but it’s something I need to think about it and consciously put away.
Professional relationships are natural to me. Without someone to assist, I am lost and adrift. Without employment as a power behind something, it’s hard to cope. Especially when part of you wants to be more.
Romantic love is not something I’m able to feel. I love my friends, but I wonder what it’s like to be able to trust someone that completely. I can, I think, write characters who love, but that final closure is not something I myself can engage in.
No family, ever.
I am watching birds fly away across the horizons, one by one.
But this is no different from what everyone feels, at times. The details are different, but there are ships that are gone, tides that have left, and birds that have abandoned us.
Yet there are birds that stay, or migrate back when you thought they had disappeared forever. Sometimes it’s a fleeting glimpse into a world that was, or a world that could have been, but grief makes a life fuller.
To be yourself, you must grieve.
I said elsewhere once that you always have yourself to fall back onto. I have always had someone, even when I was in transition.
Who could forget McCain’s VP pick! You have to admit, she eats up the news like none other. She’s a real gift to the media, the blogosphere, and Saturday Night Live.
You’ve already seen the more devastating bits of the Katie Couric interviews, but I liked some of the picking apart that The Young Turks did. Here’s one of the best, where Sarah Palin endorsed Hamas, hopefully without meaning to1:
The Young Turks is among the first daily internet news shows, thanks to sites like YouTube.
Marié Digby does a very heartwarming rendition of Rihanna’s Umbrella, which always reminds me of Leave It to Psmith, modulo some beatbox rap in its original rendition.
She extracts the warm romance out of the cynicism and turns this into a soft love song.
I do actually wish you well in this political campaign, although for whatever reason you’ve made some… questionable decisions.1 We all make mistakes. Some of them are less revokeable than others, and some of them are more important than others.
So believe me when I say that I speak from the bottom of my heart in honestly warning you: with respect to demanding the release of the video tape of Obama at a party with Khalid, you are playing with fire.
Here is the main reason for my too-late warning:
Obama knew this was coming.
It has been an undeniable possibility, and that for months. The fact that you were turning your campaign to the attack almost certainly meant that your current tactic would be almost inevitable.
Remember when you brought up Ayers? He unleashed the Keating 5 ads shortly thereafter, something that had obviously been planned far in advance, even down to the domain name and the videos. And he was composed enough to actually brush off Ayers, successfully, in the debates afterwards.
This is different. Obama went to Khalidi’s party2, sure; and he toasted the man; that is undeniable. You, on the other hand, funded Khalidi to the tune of $448,873.3 Do you realize what he probably has planned for you? This is a trap.4
Obama is going to destroy you. He can mitigate; you cannot. Even the Drudge Report has pulled this story, and you know Matthew Drudge is, more than most of the right at the moment, on your side. Obama likely has something planned, or knew this was a non-issue or would blow up, all by itself, in your face.5
And it looks like the explanation for the LA Times suppression video suppression has shown up. Good job, you. I had hoped to God6 that your campaign advisers were more sensible, though they may believe this is the absolute last ditch effort they can make and thus they will make it.
You’ve likely royally screwed your campaign. Even more. I didn’t think that was possible.
Good luck on this.
Sincerely,
S∂
Still supporting Obama ‘08
To all the rest: yes, I’m closing comments. I don’t have time to deal with all the political batshit on both sides that might result on my blog, tiny and insignificant and unworthy though it is.
Also, I find it strange this request came at nearly end of business on the 28th. This is the sort of thing that needs to hit the morning before decisions can be made. Tactical timing, I suppose. Didn’t quite work out.
The political blogosphere is crazy right now. Fatalistic, perhaps, but sometimes that just puts the crazy in bas-relief. It’s been a very memorable run-down towards November 4th, and these are some of my favorite videos along the way.
One of my favorite YouTube series, This Week in Blackness, released its first episodes during the tumultuous times in August through, well, now. So they were around to cover the notorious Obama Waffles. Dealing with racism is always a difficult topic, but Elon James White does it like comedy usually does—saying things up front in ways that make you laugh. And think.
TWiB covers the Obama Waffles scandal better than most:
I voted today (mail-in, as always). I took a while to read through all the little candidates, not just the Senate/Rep and of course President boxen. Someone gets to be in charge of utilities for the state of Washington. That must be glorious fun. Being in charge of the lands and forests and stuff sounds way cooler.
