archive › 2008 U.S. Presidential Election
Use Your Illusions
Žižek offers hope for those of us burdened by cynicism. He also touches on genocide, farming and the importance of awakening from our dreams. (Tom Waits might counter, “you’re innocent when you dream” and Zizek may reply, “Shut up you’re not real!”)
I wanted to be the one who links to a Žižek article for a change. I even went to Wikipedia to copy the funny Z’s.
Obama’s victory is a sign of history in the triple Kantian sense of signum rememorativum, demonstrativum, prognosticum. A sign in which the memory of the long past of slavery and the struggle for its abolition reverberates; an event which now demonstrates a change; a hope for future achievements. The scepticism displayed behind closed doors even by many worried progressives – what if, in the privacy of the voting booth, the publicly disavowed racism will re-emerge? – was proved wrong. One of the interesting things about Henry Kissinger, the ultimate cynical Realpolitiker, is how utterly wrong most of his predictions were. When news reached the West of the 1991 anti-Gorbachev military coup, for example, Kissinger immediately accepted the new regime as a fact. It collapsed ignominiously three days later. The paradigmatic cynic tells you confidentially: ‘But don’t you see that it is all really about money/power/sex, that professions of principle or value are just empty phrases which count for nothing?’ What the cynics don’t see is their own naivety, the naivety of their cynical wisdom which ignores the power of illusions.
…It is unlikely that the financial meltdown of 2008 will function as a blessing in disguise, the awakening from a dream, the sobering reminder that we live in the reality of global capitalism. It all depends on how it will be symbolised, on what ideological interpretation or story will impose itself and determine the general perception of the crisis. When the normal run of things is traumatically interrupted, the field is open for a ‘discursive’ ideological competition. In Germany in the late 1920s, Hitler won the competition to determine which narrative would explain the reasons for the crisis of the Weimar Republic and the way out of it; in France in 1940 Maréchal Pétain’s narrative won in the contest to find the reasons for the French defeat. Consequently, to put it in old-fashioned Marxist terms, the main task of the ruling ideology in the present crisis is to impose a narrative that will not put the blame for the meltdown on the global capitalist system as such, but on its deviations – lax regulation, the corruption of big financial institutions etc.
The End of the GOP Ticket
I feel bad for John McCain. I think he’s a great person who’s done great things. On the trail he had to concede some of his McCain-ness (I’d like to avoid that other M-word which became meaningless as soon as the whole GOP started to embrace it) and I definitely don’t agree with him on most policy issues.
But, he was the best Republican candidate in my lifetime, and maybe the last Rockefeller Republican the GOP will run for a long time. Unfortunately he ran against the best Democratic candidate in a lifetime.
His running mate on the other hand… you know the drill.
And when McCain and Palin split up in Arizona Wednesday, the personal differences were stark.
McCain drove himself home in a Toyota sport utility vehicle. Palin’s departure was a grander event. She left with an entourage of 18 family members and friends and a Secret Service detail, heading to the airport in a motorcade stretching more than a dozen vehicles, flanked by a dozen more cops on motorcycles.
Bob Dylan on The Election
“I was born in 1941,” he said, a wavering sentimentality in his scratchy voice. “That was the year they bombed Pearl Harbor. I’ve been living in darkness ever since. It looks like things are going to change now.”
If Bob says so, it’s good enough for me.
PUMA’s Damn America, Move to Canada
Some of the most interesting reactions in last night’s election came from the supposed Hillary Clinton holdouts who chose personality over ideology and decided they just couldn’t vote for Obama. Here are last night’s comments from Hillaryis44, which quickly go from cocky to sad and then onto racist with the eventual cry of “God Damn America,” a phrase which was abhorrent to these bitter people, just weeks ago. I guess they hate America now because someone they think hates America was elected President, if that makes any sense.
They still claim his supporters must be puppets of the media. Even after an overwhelming victory, they refuse to accept the existence of rational support for Obama and denounce most of America.
These are the scum of the American Electorate. Swayed by personal attacks, rumors, and misdirection. Seemingly unattached to any real issues and more concerned with phony narratives and firsts than the direction of the country.
6 PM: Obama Simply Can’t Beat McCain.
moononpluto Says:
No way in hell is obama plus 15 in pa, noone ever has had it more than 5
wbboei Says:
What’s with Hillbuzz asking us all to “be nice” to Obots if Oliar loses??
Are they kidding me with that shit? I plan to gloat my head off and give the subtle O’liar finger to every bot I run across.
Right on. We will treat them with the same love and respect they treated us and hillary after
…
Theme Time Blog Post: Elections, Part 1
Okay Wonkette, I see your election day theme time musical jamboree and offer more election music for your consideration.
First, Hank Williams, the father of the football guy, sings to us. Singing about You’re Gonna Change (Or I’m Gonna Leave), because who can’t agree with that?
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Next, let’s go with Lie To Me by Tom Waits, because, MY FRIENDS, YES WE CAN have federally financed enemas, fancy Neiman’s jackets and balance the budget, too.
And of course John Zorn’s magical Ballad of Hank John McCain, because an angry man goes blind and knocks his head against the wall.
For the undecided voter, some inspiration from Scott Walker’s 30 Century Man.
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Sarah Palin and The Masked Avengers
How… what?
Flat Stanley
Obama’s newest advisor:
“Sometimes I get a little nervous before talking in front of a crowd, but Flat Stanley helped me practice the speech,” Obama wrote. “He made me recite it in front of him and then even gave me some advice so the speech would go smoothly. Flat Stanley is really a great coach.”
The Voter Fraud Myth
“If they found a single case of a conspiracy to affect the outcome of a Congressional election or a statewide election, that would be significant,” Richard Hasen, election law expert at the Loyola Law School, told the New York Times last year. “But what we see is isolated, small-scale activities that often have not shown any kind of criminal intent.”
But that hasn’t stopped Republicans trying. Five of the 12 US judges who were fired last year, in the scandal that led to the resignation of US attorney general Alberto Gonzales, were axed because they refused to pursue the issue of voter fraud with sufficient vigour. It also explains the Republican attacks on the community group Acorn, which pays people to register voters in low income and minority areas. Some of Acorn’s workers made up names. That should be and has been condemned. But there is no evidence that it has resulted in a single fraudulent vote ever being cast since Acorn began its large-scale voter registration drives four years ago.
Problem is, the GOP is already setting this up as their talking point for why they lost the election, if they lose. If the margins are high enough I don’t see it gaining much traction, but if it’s close I can’t see why Jon McCain wouldn’t use this as a scapegoat, it’s too easy a target.
Hopefully one of the new administration’s new concentrations will be election systems reform.
The Reason Obama/Biden is Winning
A right-wing reporter asks some blatant McCain talking point attack questions to Joe Biden. Biden deftly and concisely handles each of the charges and asserts himself as a formidable and experienced running mate.
This is the reason Obama/Biden is winning. None of these straw man talking points stick and the ridiculous rhetoric of middle-class tax cuts somehow being Marxist makes the right sound like fools.
Even when the interview is skewed to the extreme the attacks just don’t make sense. At least the trivialities of the Bush campaigns against democrats had some focus and possible validity (i.e. perhaps Kerry did change his mind on some positions), the attacks by the GOP this cycle have been so far removed from anything real that they’ve fallen on deaf ears.
Sarah Palin “Going Rogue”
“Brace yourself for nine days of high entertainment.”
Police + Face + Cuts = ?
Ah, the glories of contextual publishing… The wrong side of Pittsburgh is Bloomfield? Funny I used to jog through there 3-4 times a week at night. I always thought it was a safe little Italy section…
Palin to Appear on SNL
Lame.
Obama is Funny (OK, So’s McCain)
Hey, this is really funny. I wonder who’s idea it was to call Al Franken.
Hey this is really funny. I wonder who’s idea it was to call… that famous funny conservative guy… uh… Dennis Mil– I wonder when Al Franken decided to join the GOP.
The View From Roanoke
The Guardian’s Gary Younge is following the presidential campaign from Roanoke, Virginia, in a series called “The View From Roanoke”. So far the series is superbly well written. Something about Younge’s outsider perspective gives things a refreshing neutrality and clarity.
An evening with the Garsts lays bare the depths of America’s political polarisation. A night out with many liberals could well produce the same confusion about what motivates the other side. The problem is not just that people do not agree with each other. It is that at times they don’t even seem to know each other politically beyond caricature. A sizeable section of both the Democratic and Republican base believes that the only reason the other exists is because they are either deluded, bigoted, misinformed, misanthropic, greedy, gullible or godless. Both believe that their information pool is contaminated - one by the liberal media, the other by the mainstream corporate media. The issue is not that there’s no middle ground, it’s that there’s little in the way of common ground.
Chris Rock On Letterman
Everybody and their blog has probably already shown you this, but it’s too great to miss. Chris Rock on the Clintons, Obama and Sarah Palin:
Note, the video may go down but you can find some transcript here, the first part of the video here, and a torrent here.
Update: President Clinton was great on the Daily Show last night. Would I vote for Clinton over Obama and McCain if he were allowed in the race? Without a second thought.