Barack's Oz

» FireDogLake: Barack Obama In Iowa . . . Or Oz (Scarecrow)

Not the typical location I'd expect to find such agreement with, but here it is ...

If Obama has any doubt where the divisiveness comes from, all he has to do is watch the White House and their obstructionist loyalists in Congress. Or he could turn on cable news shows, and not just Fox, but MSNBC and CNN too. Chris Matthews and Tucker Carlson have been personally attacking Hillary Clinton every night on such weighty matters as how she laughs, or why she claps when introduced. CNN guests routinely criticize Hillary for defending herself or they criticize Bill for deflecting the blame. Yesterday, on ABC's "This Week," George Will pontificated that Hillary Clinton "has a computer chip where her soul should be." Yep, it's all Clinton's fault.

If Obama thinks such malicious attacks are only directed at Hillary, and wouldn't be directed at him the moment he became the frontrunner, or he thinks it's Clinton's fault, he has no clue what the Democratic nominee will face next year.

Obama called on his audience to "stand up" against the politics of the past, and that's right. But the politics of the past were designed by Newt and Karl and capitalized by Georgy and Dick's fear mongering. If Obama (or any candidate) wants to be taken seriously, he first needs to convince Americans he understands what the Bush/Cheney regime, its radical followers and a complicit media have done to America and its political discourse and realizes how hard it's going to be to repair the damage. Blaming the Clintons for everything is not just missing the point; it means you're not ready.

Barack's speech to Iowa J-Jers was fine as far as standard political cheerleading goes. But it's terribly naive to assume that what would make Barack less divisive is simply that his name isn't Clinton. My own support for HRC isn't for nothing ... it's due to the fact that - very much the opposite of Barack's naivete - I think there's a great deal more practical knowledge on her part of how to combat the conventional wisdom machine that drives so much of modern politics. It's hard to see such perseverance in someone who, despite the genuinely great qualities and potential he possesses, has all of two years experience in confronting that..