November's Trip to Wonderland

I was part of history tonight.

In my small corner of the world, I watched a first in the history of the American presidency as a woman candidate and an African-American candidate debate for the Democratic nomination for the 2008 election. The event was only 50 miles from my own home, yet I had no chance of attending this spectacle hosted by Cleveland State University in the Wolstein Center right in the heart of downtown Cleveland. It wasn’t like I didn’t send in my entry for the public lottery for the remaining tickets. I think what did me in was the fact that, though I’m sure of my choice of candidate, I checked that I was undecided.

We might be under the illusion that our democratic process is somehow fair, somehow egalitarian for candidates, but as a voting grown-up, I have to relinquish the fairy tale of real democracy along with the death-grip I used to have on the Easter Bunny. Democracy is a fairy tale. While I’d love to think that both candidates were given a fair and balanced opportunity to present their positions on many critical issues facing the nation right now and continuing into the next 20 years, I know better. The beginning of the debate was antagonistic, and Senator Clinton called out Brian Williams and Tim Russert on that very point: she’s been given the first question, put on the defensive, consistently throughout the debate process since the Democratic nominee field was narrowed to two. She’s right, of course, but took it like a woman.

In any debate structure, the party to answer second usually has the advantage what’s been said can be built upon, detracted from, or flat out refuted. The second party most often gets the last word, has the opportunity to successfully interrupt and usurp the verbal point. Yeah, Hillary, you’re right. That’s the shaft.

The worst part about it is that Republican media have railroaded the Clinton campaign with biased reporting and propaganda since Iowa. It makes me wonder if the Republican base is so desperate to keep another Clinton off the ticket to the extent they would elevate a candidate who might ensure that another Republican wins the White House in November. And the polling numbers are bearing this out, at least according to the media as well. More and more of the former Democratic male voter base who supported Bill Clinton's presidency 1992-2000 have swung away from the Clinton think-tank from the delirium of what's been phrased as the Obama Jesus Juice.

Why are male Democrats moving toward Obama when they know how successful the Clinton Think Tank, which includes not only Bill Clinton but any or all of their trusted cohorts, was and will be again? Are our male Democrats so fearful of a woman president to the extent they would actually repudiate a known policy base for a shaky inexperienced unknown one? Could our men be listening with their testosterone parts instead of their brains? Or is it simply that they are sheep following a misleading media? Our media wouldn’t do that, would they?

Let’s add a revision of the First Amendment to the list of critical issues facing the nation to include “REPORT THE FACTS; RESPECT THE TRUTH.”