We're at that lull in the presidential primary season when pundits try to
make the most of the least election returns. Iowa and New Hampshire are in,
plus Barack Obama's landslide in South Carolina and now Florida's votes.
Attempting to judge the mood of the electorate at this early stage of the
primary season and ordeal is like trying to get salt out of a clogged shaker
and then reading the candidates' fortunes from just the few grains that
spill out.
But when the top comes off the shaker next week, and the results of
Super-Duper Tuesday start pouring in, election returns will be everywhere.
How like the Age of the Internet: Flooded by data, we'll lack only the
judgment to know what it all means. Hey, what a country - the despair of
pollsters and delight of those of us who love a surprise.
Joaquin Andujar may had had his erratic moments as both pitcher and
outfielder for the St. Louis Cards, but what he once said about the once
national pastime goes double for America itself: "You can sum up baseball in
one word: You never know."
Sr. Andujar's word count may have been a little off, but his analysis was
right on.
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Americans are in one of our uncharacteristic periods of drift - or what
feels like it. The presidential race hasn't fully jelled, and every lover of
suspense and newspaperman enamored of good copy can hope it won't for a
while - not even after all those primaries on Mardi Gras, which this year is
literally Fat Tuesday for the country's politicians. Twenty-two states -
count 'em, 22 - will be holding presidential primaries that maybe fateful
day.
And just maybe Hillary Clinton can hold on to her presumed lead long enough
to cinch the nomination Tuesday. If hubby will just stay out of more
trouble. In the meantime, the nation pauses and waits. The lull is almost
palpable. The air is still - the way it is on the Gulf Coast while folks
await a hurricane.
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Meanwhile, not that it matters much, an unpopular lame-duck president has
given his State of the Union message to no great effect. One thinks of the
last few months of the Eisenhower administration, when all eyes were on the
next president, not the underestimated old man in the White House. Or, to
cite a more exact parallel, the last year of the Truman administration, when
a still feisty president with even less support in the polls than George W.
Bush was hewing to his course. The country could hardly wait to be free of
him and chart a new course, or at least welcome a new captain aboard the
good ship America. It would be left to history to redeem his presidency, as
he always knew it would.
For now the country seems to be in a state of suspended animation, or at
least what passes for one in this always dynamic, not to say hyperactive,
society. As all await Tuesday's results, speculation takes the place of any
actual news. The State of he Union never seemed so purely ceremonial an
address.
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But what appears drift may be only flux as Americans sort things out before
moving ahead, as usual, in all directions - economically, socially,
militarily, politically and of course technologically, this being the land
of the free, home of the brave, and natural habitat of tinkerers. The only
thing about the future one can be sure of is that it'll be interesting.
Who would have thought a year ago, or even six months ago, that Barack Obama
would be coming on like this year's John F. Kennedy, complete with Caroline
and Teddy's endorsement? Or that John McCain would start looking like a
prophet instead of the last man standing in support of this war in Iraq. The
candidate who was in favor of the Surge before it had a name now has made
the war the centerpiece of his advancing campaign - instead of the issue no
Republican once dared mention.
And who would have thought that Bill Clinton's unmatchable political
instincts would have so deserted him in South Carolina? It was embarrassing.
Here was Bill Clinton making precisely the wrong analogy when he tried to
pigeonhole his spouse's opponent as another Jesse Jackson, meaning just
another black candidate.
Anyone with the slightest political intuition would know that Barack Obama's
campaign this year bears no real or even much of an imaginary resemblance to
Jesse Jackson's in the 1980s. Senator Obama's whole appeal is different,
just as his background, approach, and simple but eloquent style are
different. A politician as astute as Bill Clinton must have known that, but
what th' heck, he saw his opening, even if it was below the belt, and he
took it. Continued... |