Reflections on the Democratic Debate in Philadelphia

Since Hillary and Obama share the same ideology and, for the most part, the same policy prescriptions, the debate last night in Philadelphia broke no new ground in terms of drawing distinctions between the positions of the candidates. Both railed and inveighed against the usual bogeymen with typical Democratic Demagoguery: ”special interests”; unscrupulous oil companies, whose obscene “windfall” profits need to be appropriated (one wonders: have Democrats missed the inexorable petroleum-hungry industrial rise of China and India?); heartless insurance companies; the machinations and housing crisis-induced manipulations of “greedy” Wall Street (no doubt Hillary will apply her acumen acquired through some home-grown avarice trading commodities futures to help the nation address this problem).

The debate was noteworthy only in the sense that it solidified the glaring weaknesses of each of the Democratic contenders.

By default, Hillary was the winner. Her response in the debate to the Bosnian sniper fabrication defines completely the shortcomings of her candidacy. What she offered as an explanation was perhaps the most circuitous, long-winded, pathetic and evasive answer ever given in any of the previous debates. Hillary stammered endlessly, bobbing and weaving, grappling with some sort of explanation wherein she could dispel the fact that she is, in the words of William Safire, a congenital liar. All of the Clinton signature and trademark defects were on full display: the circumlocutions, the incessant spinning, the exaggerations, the attempt to defend the indefensible, the parsing, the evasiveness. What possible additional damage would have accrued to her candidacy had she simply said, “I didn’t tell/or I stretched, the truth? The spectacle of her response was so painful

I’m thinking that it could actually turn out to be fortuitous that the left put Obama out there before he was ready. He has been working so hard on his campaign organizing activities that he has not had time to study the issues. It is no wonder he avoided voting on anything controversial in the state legislature. He didn’t have a real position and didn’t want to risk alienating one side or the other.

Obama started his career working for the Gamaliel Foundation, a group that trains activist groups in Saul Alinsky organizing techniques. The name Gamaliel comes from a guy that supposedly advised the Sanhedrin (sp?) not to prosecute the Christians because if their teaching were not of God, it would die a natural death. They claim that this man influenced the apostle Paul and that their organizing methods are based on the work of Paul. Alinsky says the same thing and interestingly, so do the Liberation Theologists. They oppose the hierarchy and authority of the Christian Church, but they think that they can use the church and work within it to advance the socialist agenda. It’s the same MO as the DSA used with the Democrat Party.

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