A few weeks ago, I wrote in about the promotion of celebrity, glitz, race, and gender issues directly by the media and subtly by the campaigns of Senators Clinton and Obama. Interestingly, Senators Clinton and Obama and their respective campaigns have both stated that neither of them are promoting the gender or race, respectively, card. Then, lo and behold, it comes out that the Clinton campaign set a “trap” for the Obama campaign on the issue of race and the Obama campaign bit “hook, line, and sinker”. Only time will tell whether the strategy of pandering to bigotry by the Clinton Campaign and foregoing South Carolina by promoting race as an issue and the extreme willingness of the Obama campaign to bite without any questions asked will pay off for either Campaign and/or hurt the Democratic Party on Tsunami Tuesday, February 5 and beyond.
More below the flip…
Regardless, the much bigger and underlying issue is integrity and credibility, which is why before I go any further I must point out that I am a supporter of John Edwards, the adult wing of the Democratic Party. Senator Edwards, as most of you know, last summer was confronted by the national media that he was subtly pandering to the white, male vote in the context of electability in November, 2008. John, without any hesitation or equivocation, responded directly and forcefully to the effect “If you are voting for me because I am not a woman…because I am not African-American…then I do not want your vote”. Before that time, during that time, and since that time, JRE has continued to lead the Democratic discussion (and to some extent the Republican discussion) on the issues being addressed during the campaign (i.e. universal health care, economic stimulus package and the economy, predatory lenders and the home mortgage crisis-these are just examples as the list goes on an on).
Recently, I hear the candidates and their campaigns talking about unity. If the candidates and their campaigns will stick to a discussion of the issues like Senator Edwards has done, then unity will likely not be an issue at the Convention and there would be no reason to discuss such an issue at this time. However, when candidates and their campaigns welcome, condone, and encourage the media promotion of celebrity, glitz, race, and gender as issues, then I suspect that unity will be very hard to accomplish since these issues are deep-rooted, filled with strong emotional feelings, and very, very divisive. The City of Los Angeles, the host of the debates this Thursday night, provided our country with a very visible example of the tragic consequences that can result from such divisiveness following the Rodney King state court trial.
Therefore, it seems somewhat prophetic that the Thursday night debate is in Los Angeles and Senators Clinton and Obama have another opportunity to follow John Edwards by doing what he did last summer…by truly being transparent, enhancing credibility, and demonstrating integrity…by showing that this is not about YOU THE CANDIDATE, but rather about US THE PEOPLE…by instilling unity before the nomination process is over rather than later when it will likely be too late even if it may not be politically, strategically in the best interests of YOUR CAMPAIGN and you might not be the next President of the United States of America (but it will be best for the United States of American and each of US who call it home). The opportunity will be there on a national stage at the debate in Los Angeles for Senator Clinton to tell the voters “If you are voting for me because I am not black…because I am not a white, male, then I do not want your vote” and for Senator Obama to tell the voters “If you are voting for me because I am not white, then I do not want your vote”. And, mainstream corporate media, for one of the few times in this campaign, show why you were once looked up to in this country as the Fourth Estate and confront Senators Clinton and Obama on this issue if they will not address the issue voluntarily and/or directly and do not accept any non-responsive, non-direct, “beat-around-the-bush” answer. As a sidelight, the respect Senator Obama would have right now if he had come out and said the foregoing BEFORE the South Carolina Primary and got the same results he obtained would make unity a non-issue right now.
When the candidates and their campaigns directly, expressly, and unequivocally take race and gender out of this Democratic Campaign, the glamour of celebrity and glitz will also fall by the wayside. The mainstream corporate media will then have no choice but to follow the real issues (and hopefully all of the candidates) that are truly important to the substantial majority of America. If, or when, that happens, unity will flow naturally following the nomination no matter who the nominee is.