Dickdar
The guy is cold. I've said it from the start. Actually, it surprises me that I've gotten this guy so right. But maybe it's just that like recognizes like. Like gaydar. Except this is is dickdar. Obama's kind of a dick. Calculating.
Throughout the election people all over the web were yammering about Obama being a radical, or a crook, or a wimp, or this or that or the other off-target fantasy. I kept telling people, nope. He's smart, he's subtle, and he's got a nice touch of ruthlessness. Radical? Nah. Weak? No.
This does not mean that Obama has no moral core, no strongly-held beliefs. It means he reads the power dynamics and plucks the strings he needs to pluck.
Latest evidence: Rick Warren. The gay-bashing pastor of a right-wing mega-church will be giving the invocation at the new president's inaugural. The Left is predictably batshit. But who's really hurt by this? Who did Barack Obama just shiv? Every other right wing loudmouth religious nut but especially, especially, especially Dr. (yeah, right) James Dobson.
Obama just chose the leader of his religious right opposition. He just knocked the nasty out of his craziest opponents by picking the kinder, gentler version of the creature. Dobson is done. Warren is the new voice of the bible-thumpers. And that new voice will now owe the new president.
If Warren says something crazy at the ianugural, he embarrasses himself, makes himself and by extension his people, the skunks at the picnic. He'll have driven his own movement still further into intellectual exile.
If he doesn't say something crazy, he signals his readiness to treat with Obama and achieve some sort of detente. Which will drive the loonier of the loons into frothing madness.
Either way, Obama wins.
Gays will scream. Gay marriage supporters (and I am one) will scream. But no one will scream louder than James Dobson. And in the end, I'd guess within a year, gays and their supporters will get what we need from Barack Obama. And we'll get it in part because of this move.
This isn't betrayal. This is a guy showing a hell of a lot more smarts than the so-called "gay community" has shown in advancing its agenda. This is a guy who doesn't want to posture or express himself: he wants to win.
Oh yeah. My dickdar is definitely tingling.
Throughout the election people all over the web were yammering about Obama being a radical, or a crook, or a wimp, or this or that or the other off-target fantasy. I kept telling people, nope. He's smart, he's subtle, and he's got a nice touch of ruthlessness. Radical? Nah. Weak? No.
This does not mean that Obama has no moral core, no strongly-held beliefs. It means he reads the power dynamics and plucks the strings he needs to pluck.
Latest evidence: Rick Warren. The gay-bashing pastor of a right-wing mega-church will be giving the invocation at the new president's inaugural. The Left is predictably batshit. But who's really hurt by this? Who did Barack Obama just shiv? Every other right wing loudmouth religious nut but especially, especially, especially Dr. (yeah, right) James Dobson.
Obama just chose the leader of his religious right opposition. He just knocked the nasty out of his craziest opponents by picking the kinder, gentler version of the creature. Dobson is done. Warren is the new voice of the bible-thumpers. And that new voice will now owe the new president.
If Warren says something crazy at the ianugural, he embarrasses himself, makes himself and by extension his people, the skunks at the picnic. He'll have driven his own movement still further into intellectual exile.
If he doesn't say something crazy, he signals his readiness to treat with Obama and achieve some sort of detente. Which will drive the loonier of the loons into frothing madness.
Either way, Obama wins.
Gays will scream. Gay marriage supporters (and I am one) will scream. But no one will scream louder than James Dobson. And in the end, I'd guess within a year, gays and their supporters will get what we need from Barack Obama. And we'll get it in part because of this move.
This isn't betrayal. This is a guy showing a hell of a lot more smarts than the so-called "gay community" has shown in advancing its agenda. This is a guy who doesn't want to posture or express himself: he wants to win.
Oh yeah. My dickdar is definitely tingling.
This entry was posted by Michael Reynolds, on
Thursday, December 18, 2008.
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12:29 PM
I agree. Cannot understand what the hysteria is about. Maybe the blogosphere lends credence to neurosis by allowing it to blow everything out of proportion. I think this is incredibly . . . shrewd, I guess is the word, of Obama.