Leaving the Sidelines

Despite the half-hearted attempt in my previous post to do an unbiased analysis of the facts it is probably clear that I have come to support Senator Barack Obama in the Democratic Primary for President. This may come as somewhat of a surprise to some of you as I have long been a supporter of home-state boy Senator John Edwards and to be honest until recently I was torn between the two, and thrown into the mix was an outside hope that Al Gore who I’ve supported for even longer, and would really be my first pick, might get back in the race (an outside hope to which I still hold).

In the world of political junkies it is fairly surprising that I’ve held out this long. While this contest started much earlier than any other we are now only a few month from the beginning of primary contests (which may begin as early this December this cycle) so I think it’s time to get off the sidelines. I think what ultimately made my decision is my belief that it is principles, more than ends which matter in politics. I am not looking for and am quite frankly tired of the approach to politics in which a candidate seeks to put together the biggest possible coalition by patching together the right batch of policy ends.

Barack Obama is the only candidate that I have seen that is articulating a vision that it focused on the change of process, not just policy. He has proven himself to be effective at working with and gaining the respect of people from conflicting viewpoints, a far cry from the railroad politics that currently seem to dominate Washington in both parties. This approach is not based on moderation, compromising principles where convenient, which I detest in politics. It is instead rooted in the principle of pluralism. Simply put that there is no way that we can be certain that what we believe is correct, but that through open discussion and pursuit of that viewpoint we can arrive at a solution with others. It is based on respect not just for difference but for the republic which the founders of our country built. And it is an approach which the Senator seems to bring to all issues, and shows a kind of confidence that is rare in politics. Contrast it instead to the Bush Administration which has sought to cloak its insecurities in simplistic policies, hyper-masculinity, and the projection of “certainty”. That’s why I can’t think of anyone better to fix the mess President Bush has made (and continues to make) of not just our country but the world.

It was ultimately this contrast between the two front runners for my support, Sen. Edwards and Sen. Obama, which tipped the scales. In an appearance on the Reverend Al Sharpton’s Radio Program last month John Edwards was quoted as saying,

“Compromise is not going to get us there, triangulation is not going to get us there, being careful is not going to get us there. We need somebody who's used to fighting these people and beating them and I've been doing it my whole life.”

While this quote was celebrated by some on left, it lost me. If I were shown this quote without attribution and were asked to guess who said it, I would probably say George W. Bush. It parallels exactly his attitude that I am right, you are wrong, and there is nothing to talk about other than your complete and utter surrender. It is this thinking that has lead Bush to be a failure as both a businessman and now as a President. Although the ends that John Edwards has in mind may be ones that I like a great deal more than George W. Bush’s that does not make it right to me. So despite my hesitation to abandon the man who I had supported for so long I finally realized what a friend who had also been a staunch supporter of Edwards had been telling me. It’s not that I’ve left the Edwards camp, it’s that they left me. Where this left me then is right where my heart had been for a long time, in Camp Obama.
I want the next four years and beyond in this country to be much better than the past seven, and to do that it will take a change not just in whose ends were pursuing, but in the approach we take in getting there. That is the fundamental problem I see in our country now and to paraphrase Senator Edwards “You can't simply replace a group of ideologue Republicans with a group of ideologue Democrats, just swapping the ends of one party for the ends of the other."