Six years ago on the evening of the 2002 state of the union address, I was loopy and baffled, looking to the president for some guidance and some answers. I was glued to the screen, exhausted by the still-smoldering rubble in Manhattan, Virginia and most recently, Afghanistan. Every word that shot from his stifled smirk mattered, whether I shouted at the screen in defiance or half-nodded/shrugged at words and concepts that were new to me. The Axis of Evil was introduced that night. Phrases like War on Terror still had some mystique and luster. Last night, the same ideas sounded more like predictable punch lines to an old, off-color joke. This year’s state of the union address commanded as much attention as something I’d play in the background while folding my laundry and talking to my mom on the phone.
This is a round-about way of saying that the heaping neapolitain sundae of optimism that’s dripping all over this election season has earned another scoop: the president is finally, officially and obviously irrelevant. But it’s not just the president that doesn’t matter any more. The whole school of bleak and terrifying politics is going down with him. The same day of the address, Rudy Giuliani, the “Mayor of September 11” looks to be laying his campaign upon its death bed. He’s learned the hard way that you can’t get by on terror any more. Americans can’t just be raped and milked by the fear of the past or, to borrow and fudge a magnificent phrase from Art Spigelman: this means that we don’t have to cower in the Shadow of No Towers any more.
I don’t have to waste key strokes here explaining the significance of Ted Kennedy’s monumental endorsement of Barack Obama earlier in the day. It’s marvelous—and indicative--that the announcement trumps the president’s address as the leading political news of the day. I have to say, though, that I can’t pretend to place Obama in the lineage of Bobby, Jack and Dr. King because I never knew those men. By the time they got to me, they were gone and canonized. I recognize them only as saintly icons, painted on velvet at my friend’s grandmother’s house. No one in my generation has ever heard a politician (or anyone of note, really) speak to us about hope and optimism and a new tomorrow with the earnestness and enthusism that Barack is speaking to us. This is all brand new to the army of awoken giants in the youth voting demographic.
There were also clues, buried in the fanfare of the state of the union, that tired, dour partisanship is losing its relevance. One of my personal favorites was when the president vowed not to support funding for cloning. The point itself is debatable, but as he said it, one half of the room stood up clapping and the other half sat on its hands. In a long shot of the hall, they looked like . . . clones. Not that a Star Wars reference is necessary here, but it’s good to remind the people that the clones may have won the Clone Wars but their demise was quickly hastened by something called A New Hope, also known as Luke Skywalker.
The tired partisan clone image was not helped by Hillary, who sat fuming the whole night in her blazing red Imperial Guard dress with its pointy collar, wishing she could shoot lightning bolts out of her hands. It must be infinitely frustrating to be on the losing side of hope and optimism. Not that I’m counting Clinton out at this point, but it’s an understatement to say that yesterday was a rough day for her.
So now, with no time to breathe or analyze, our collective attention turns to Florida, which might prove to be the Republican kingmaker this time around. The optimist would ask, “what are the odds that the same state that made the electoral blunder of the century could do it again?” And I’m with the optimist on this one, except it’s hard to say what a blunder would look like this time. There is no George W Bush in this race, just confused sums of his whole: an evangelical, a businessman, a warhawk.
It’s exciting, though, to think of McCain taking Florida, if only because he’s appearing on stage with the “independent” Joe Lieberman and that his brilliantly scatalogical senatorial career drives people like Mitt Romney up the wall. With this president no longer relevant, a race between Barack Obama and John McCain would blow partisanship out of the water, create new, living heroes and effectively end the clone wars. A New Hope indeed.
No comments:
Post a Comment