It’s a damn shame. This should have been one the most significant and inspiring presidential election seasons since the first time Americans went to the polls in 1789.
Perhaps I was expecting too much or I am naïve or as some would say even pollyannish. But I couldn’t help myself.
A woman could actually become the next President! And if it wasn’t going to be Hillary then it could have been Barack Obama, the son of a black Kenyan father and a white American mother! In America?! Perhaps there was hope for that strange form of commercial and competitive democracy practiced in that enigmatic country I used to call home.
But instead of an inspiring inflection point of hope in America's social evolution the Democratic campaign has again degenerated into the traditional verbal mud slinging free-for-all more deserving of a Vince McMahon WrestleMania pay-TV event then a potential watershed moment in American politics.
So what happened? Four things have happened:
Due to some cruel trick of fate perhaps, both a woman and a mixed race man want the same prize. Both have an excellent chance of winning it with basically the same ideas on major points of key policy.
"We're in it to win" Hillary is the quintessential politician and was always going to be first and foremost about The Win. She can be a scrappy fighter who would rather win without honor than lose with it.
Obama is unfortunately for both politically practical and possibly personality reasons not able to resist striking back in kind - albeit to his credit still with less vigor, less venom and more truthfulness. The siren call of possible victory may be slowly overpowering even his inherent sense of what’s right, of what’s worthy and of what’s truly inspiring.
But most of all, what has happened is that Bill has happened.
After seven years of roaming the world as one of the most inspiring, action-oriented, values-driven and respected ex-Presidents ever, Bill has come home to roost. Somehow the lofty work of The Clinton Foundation, The Clinton Global Initiative and the powerful ideas expressed in his recent book simply entitled Giving have left Bill unfulfilled and surprisingly and disappointingly in his essence unchanged.
For the Clintons it’s apparently 1992 all over again and Bill clearly loves it. Perhaps the idea of a Clinton dynasty is too tempting. Maybe he thinks that if the family Bush can create a dynasty, with its bankrupt ideas and intellectual paucity, then the only way to affirm his value and ensure his legacy is to follow in those footsteps. Maybe he misses being at the heart of power. Perhaps, like his wife Hillary, underneath it all there still lives this hungry political beast. And even seven years of experiencing the life of a statesman has not quieted that savage beast.
Whatever the reasons may be, this potential and possibly fleeting moment of inspirational change is slowly and sadly becoming nothing more than politics as usual. What we could have become is looking, sounding and feeling more and more like what we have always been. It's a damn shame.
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