1. While things get more dire economically, Obama’s favorability numbers continue to rise as his unfavs continue to drop. The graph below is through 11/28. Barack should hope his approval rating trends like this when he is paid to work for us.

Results through November 28, 2008

2. I’d like to note, in case I’m the first, that Obama doesn’t have an official job right now and he is working his tail off. He’s probably paying for his own press conferences knowing we need a leader and the one getting the paycheck has gone AWOL, or even more AWOL than usual.  Doesn’t this make Barack the ‘World’s Best Volunteer Ever?’   I hereby nominate him for that and I’ll never complain about volunteering for him again. 

3. Finally, helping your country by shopping has been soundly rejected once and for all. It’s not just being spoon-fed paternalistic pablum by every administration since Jimmy Carter that is now distasteful but, in contrast to calling upon our charity and courage as Obama has, George Bush’s vapid advice ’to shop’  is now spot-lit as the poverty of purpose it has always been. Many bummer consumer stats here and one telling graph below.  The silk lining may well be that we are ready to pitch in and work off our national malaise of powerlessness by powerfully working toward solving our problems. Living modestly, conserving in all things, volunteering to help ourselves, each other, our communities, the country and our fellow earthlings toward a sustainable future will be a good thing.  As the great American proponent of ‘Self-Reliance’, Ralph Waldo Emerson said, “As a cure for worrying, work is better than whiskey.”

k

l

This is what we’ve been waiting for since January 2008.  I’m holding my breath and hoping Barack et al have checked it over and believe that it will fly.  As much as I have mistrusted HRC, it would be a heart-breaker if Bill sullied her stairway up. Again.

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Former President Bill Clinton has agreed to make public the names of more than 200,000 donors to his foundation as part of a deal with President-elect Barack Obama to clear the way for Sen. Hillary Clinton to become secretary of state, The New York Times reported on Sunday.

Citing Democrats close to Clinton and Obama, the newspaper reported Clinton had decided to publish his contributor list to avoid an appearance of conflict of interest with his wife’s duties as secretary of state.

Her appointment is expected to be announced on Monday.

A member of Obama’s transition team confirmed the conditions of the agreement as reported by the Times.

Letter to Chris Matthews & Friends

Dear Chris:

You are correct, hundreds of qualified people did not just come out of hiding to fill important posts and surprise you with that kind of  ’change’. Get real, and imagine what you would discuss, ruminate and conclude on your show about the appointment, to critical posts, of unfamiliar people who have no record of experience.  Even ‘creative appointments from the private sector’, like a Warren Buffet to Treasury, are rarely wise or pragmatic, and you and your panel would hyper-ventilate at potential conflicts of interest.

You are in search of the same old “Hardball Fodder” you are used to having because you’re lazy and not self-examined. Suggestion: ‘Change’ your show for a change.

Change is in the simple competency of matching the qualified to the position that will be most effective for all of us. Change is having the ability to know to look ahead and plan for the likely crises down the road. Change is doing what you say you are going to do, and not doing it at anyone else’s pace. Change is being an example of what you espouse because, for you, those have been words to live by. Do unto others, forgive those who trespass and turn the other cheek. Empathy is not naiveté, sympathy or weakness. To be grudge-free, and coldly clear-headed, in order to effectively consider the entire field of players and thinkers for their potential in an important role is wise for all concerned. You are mercurial.  Don’t forget what you claim to admire in Barack Obama, although I presumed for you, that it is his patience, wisdom and judgement. Obama’s success will be measured bottom up. If a few television shows fail because they can’t adapt, so be it. That’s change.

I marvel as the Limbaughs, straight-faced, watch in fear, horror and simple base indignation as this election, our election, has quickly turned the United States into a very popular country in the world again. Intangible but overt good-will is trickling in: our allies are abuzz, rogue nations are pulling back to inspect the change-over. Our long missing democracy materialized early in the evening on November 4th, no longer just words, with the world as witness. Somehow Fox & Friends pretend not to notice, relentlessly negative. The Hannitys continue to blab about the danger of a President Obama, about how much we hate our country while they love their country unconditionally. Who believes that? Who believes that we all see the same country, and with the same degree of complexity and bias?

We just took part in the first truly “for the people, by the people” election since at least the 19th Century and that sucks? No acknowledgment by the Ingrahams, just an immediate pivot to :”We’re on the road to hell with Obama, and to hell with the rest of the world”. Is that really how they want to roll, rooting for continued failure on all levels? Is there a downside to Obama’s national approval rating rising to 68% post-election? The slight mood shift, perhaps a temporary sigh of relief at the end of a long, unnecessarily low-minded Presidential campaign, has aroused a hint of characteristically American optimism in spite of tumultuous indicators for the near future. There is a tacit agreement by the majority of the majority, to put aside divisive issues, and urgently work hard to work together, to resolve urgent issues. The deal was struck on November 4, 2008.

Are Fox & Friends unable to, if only as spectators, pull back and admire the audacity, that in our United States, we chose what I can now state without laughing to ‘hope’, pull together and get through this as individuals, communities and a nation (i.e., as the Obama campaign was run)?  How programmed are they to argue with apparent conviction, that their country’s power structure of domination by division, fear and control is anything other than a scourge?

Are the Limbaughs prepared to be jobless if everybody changes the channel because it’s just mean-spirited in lean times to peddle pessimism about the future of our country? Who will be left in the country they love, then, if no one is listening?

Barack Obama, although responsible for the looming financial collapse has, the Hannitys continue to insist,

never accomplished a single positive thing requiring a high degree of skill. Think on that. C’mon, not even the three-pointer he drained on his first try in Kuwait this summer? His money machine? We all loves us some Benjamins, right? Nope, as they have been telling us at every hour of every single day since January 3, 2008, he’s without a single significant achievement. For the next 60 days, the slacker Obama was supposed be picking out a dog with his kids – nothing accomplished again. And on that, well, we found out on 60 Minutes that the dog is also ‘deferred’.

Nothing at all has turned their world topsy-turvy, dislocated its center of gravity, and yanked its command-and-control switch. Now that’s something, if entirely unintentional. A revolution occurred, born of tacit agreement, spilling residual benefits everywhere, surrounding my belief with certitude. Yes We Did.

Did we agree to invite them along? Even the ones who…everybody? You’re a better person than we deserve rookie and I’m there with you. I’ll scoot over if they decide to join us.

*Sarcast-Insert™, see glossary

Why They Hate Her is Why She Would Be Great at State

Max Baucus and Ted Kennedy have grabbed HRC’s near paths to stardom in the Senate by claiming finance and healthcare, with Dodd stepping in at Kennedy’s request. HRC wants to have a big impact and she hasn’t, in a good way, yet. If Bill’s activities don’t disqualify her from the job, I think SoS is perfect for HRC. At 1st, I thought ‘NOT diplomatic, not prone to transparency, blindly ambitious, voted for Iraq War Resolution, called Obama naive, likes a half-truth, and is her most convincing when threatened with failure, not when making nice. And then, I realized that these traits translate as assets in a role as Chief Demander, steam-roller, power-broker, arm-twister, ultimatum- and cold-shoulder giver. If HRC drew a line in the sand, would you cross it? On the flip side for her own interests, being SoS in these times is an enormous challenge and so an opportunity to be great, really great, Nobel Peace Prize great (take that Al Gore). She will be expected to be ‘ready on day one’ to negotiate substantial agreements and show us solutions (at last!). She can be gracious or steely at will, show her tenacity, her fight, her encyclopedic knowledge, and deliver results, proving Barack to be anything but naive. She is agenda driven not visionary, familiar to world leaders, undaunted by the sheiks, and a famous supporter of Israel. Those still skeptical about whether Obama is a secret Muslim or has a soft spot for Hamas have Hillary to protect them. Sort of a great F-You to the Middle Eastern thugs who ‘endorsed’ Obama. Lastly, SoS is not a position where one can go renegade any longer than it takes to make a cell phone call.

It is not only dumb, but cynical in the extreme to think, for a nano-second, that Barack Obama is dumb and would imperil his drive to be the greatest U.S. President ever by appointing anyone whom he considers less than the best to any prominent position. Yes he is ambitious and competitive and we should only be worried if a president is not. We have yet to see Obama quake in front of a competitor, a rival, a thug, a terrorist or a world power. I haven’t seen him exhibit disingenuous motives or offer sympathy positions to anyone. If HRC feels valued by Biden and Obama for her assets and abilities and, if she values the wisdom of the vision she is challenged to implement, she could be the most important SoS in recent decades. Be it defusing Iran, testing the word of Congolese rebels, smacking down Venezula, or telling Syria, Lebanon and Jordan to get with the program or off the stage, her keen sense about when to strike could be just what we need.

I can see her now, gloriously triumphant in the desert sun at the signing of the ‘Israeli-Palestinian Territorial and Most-Favored-Nations Agreement Pact’. Behind her,  Bill is weeping tears of joy while Joe Biden can barely keep his smile from taking over his face as he passes the pen back and forth. I hope so, so shoot me. Hillary Clinton is driven to find a place for her greatness and Barack Obama has offered her the vehicle and pointed to her seat.  YOU.GO.GIRL

I think it is finally sinking in. I have given in to believing it’s real. I feel like Etta James sounds as she sings the first two words of relief in, “At Last”. I was never big on ‘Hope’ or ‘Change’ as talking points of the campaign, they were often mocking points and made me cringe. Oh, they look good on signs, but were impossible to describe during my 11 month, information-based crusade to recruit Obama volunteers and voters. In retrospect, internally, we volunteers, some of us skeptics, felt a certain hope, a hope that it would be possible to make a sea-change, and were given the right tools to go at it. Every day we motored on, marveling at the progress. Now, externally (in the world), I feel hope and see change, rapidly multiplying, even as the Obamas simply pick a dog in Chicago. All of the facts, the policies and proposed implementation methods that I tried to explain to seemingly deaf voters in every state, that vast, unreachable majority willfully unfamiliar with Obama, voted for him on November 4th and allowed me to appreciate these two inane words.

From 23/6.com, a joyful montage of election year repitition by ‘Our Very Own Bombast’:

In Valor There Is Hope

Tacitius, ca. 56 – 117

And in hope, valor.   ◊   11/04/2008

Ode on Keatsian truths, with apologies to Mr. Keats.  Tacitus never wrote the second part.

Historical Quote of The Day

“I’d never seen anything like that ad. Putting pictures of Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden next to the picture of a man who left three limbs on the battlefield — it’s worse than disgraceful. It’s reprehensible.”

• Sen. John McCain, quoted by CNN, on the campaign ad used by Saxby Chambliss (R) against Sen. Max Cleland (D-GA) in the 2002 U.S. Senate race.

McCain is now scheduled to campaign for Chambliss in his Georgia run off against Jim Martin (D).

ΔΔΔ

Where’s the valor, the integrity, the Band-of-Brothers, John?