A Few Choice Words

Not Dealing

You could call it another kind of denial. I call it “not dealing”: refusing to come to terms with problems you know are severe and consequen-tial. This country is the world’s champ at not dealing.

Here are a few current examples—and how some have tried to penetrate the veil of neglect.

Obama’s speech on race was a stirring wake-up call that many insisted on sleeping through.

We can play Reverend Wright's sermons on every channel, every day and talk about them from now until the election, and make the only question in this campaign whether or not the American people think that I somehow believe or sympathize with his most offensive words.

Indeed, the Wright tape has become the news instead of the speech. It’s much easier to deal with than the issues Obama brought up.

We are also discovering (with dismay) the deeper connections between oil prices, housing, the financial system and the economy in general. These linkages, causes and effects will be hard for Americans to acknowledge and harder still to deal with.

“Now, the shadow banking system is facing the 21st-century equivalent of the wave of bank runs that swept America in the early 1930s,” says Paul Krugman, and all the rescue money that’s been proposed could be the “quid without the quo.” Meaning, where’s the requisite bank regulation that will prevent this from happening again? And where are the candidates with their reform proposals?

You remember Katrina. What money the feds did provide was siphoned off in corrupt scams, bureaucratic ineptitude and—the U.S. specialty—lack of follow-through. Even now, the country is unable to come to terms with the magnitude of the disaster, much less help those still suffering.

In Iraq we refuse to admit defeat and talk in vague, hallucinatory terms about “winning” and “victory” instead of creating bona fide contingency plans to exit. People seem to be so frustrated and ill-informed about the war that they finally just don’t want to deal with it.

Maybe a few more sincere mea culpas (pace Hillary Clinton) would help wake people up. Conservative Andrew Sullivan wrote a moving piece about his change of heart. Strong words and apparently a first step on his road to dealing with the tragic realities of this war:

. . . I never believed that America would do what America has done. Never. My misjudgment at the deepest moral level of what Bush and Cheney and Rumsfeld were capable of—a misjudgment that violated the moral core of the enterprise—was my worst mistake. What the war has done to what is left of Iraq—the lives lost, the families destroyed, the bodies tortured, the civilization trashed—was bad enough. But what was done to America—and the meaning of America—was unforgivable. And for that I will not and should not forgive myself.

No Incongruity Here

After Bill and Hill floated at least four times the idea of Obama serving as Hill’s vice president, Barack quashed the idea in Mississippi today. How, he asked with sarcasm, could an unqualified commander-in-chief stand next in line for the presidency? In another stunning display of campaign incoherence, Howard Wolfson, Hillary’s chief spokesman, explained:

“Sen. Clinton will not choose any candidate [as her vice president] who has not at the time of choosing passed the national security threshold, period,” Wolfson said.

But in an unusual logical twist, Wolfson said Clinton considered it possible that Obama might be able to demonstrate his readiness for commander-in-chief between now and August, when the Democratic National Convention meets in Denver and the party’s nominee must choose a running mate.

“We have a long way to go between now and Denver. And it’s not something she’s prepared to rule out at this point. But certainly anyone who is chosen as a vice presidential candidate needs to be prepared to be commander-in-chief,” Wolfson said.

—reported by Mike Dorning of the Chicago Tribune

Hypothetical Eavesdropping in the Obama War Room

DAVID PLOUFFE (campaign manager): Jeez, I feel terrible about Samantha. But the boss insisted she had to go. I mean, what the hell, Hillary is a monster, and we gotta fight fire with fire. Our next speech in Mississippi should slam her for that "60 Minutes" interview. Something like “As far as I know, she hasn’t cheated on her tax returns. Why won't she reveal them?" And of course it's past time to bring up the Clinton pardons and their stonewalling on those documents, and Bill’s holier-than-thou bullshit.

DAVID AXELROD (chief political consultant): Come on, David. We aren't gonna win by getting in the gutter with her. Even David Brooks sees that. We need to get back to the high road.

PLOUFFE: But our polls stink, and maybe it's the “kitchen sink.” I mean, comparing Barack to Ken Starr! And those racist dirtbags with their Hussein and Islam slurs. And Hillary praising McCain as a good potential commander-in-chief!  . . . God.

AXELROD: Barack has got to be true to his cause. The only way to beat these slimers is to make everyone understand they are part of the old political system.

PLOUFFE: Easy for you to say, when they keep eating his lunch. . . . Hey, let's get some sandwiches in here.

AXELROD: OK, you write him a speech for Mississippi, and I’ll write him a speech. Let’s see which one he delivers.

THE BOSS walks in: Guys, we’re going to start talking about Chicago, my strength as an organizer and my record of helping poor people in trouble. It’s the economy, stupid, as someone once said, and Hillary has no “experience” on that to counter mine. Let’s see if we can pick up some “downscale Democrats,” as the condescen-ding clowns at MSNBC call them. We're going to counter every old-politics jab she makes at me. And we’re going to start referring to her as “Mrs. Clinton.” She grew up in Park Ridge, you know; I grew up on the South Side.

Well, one can only hope.