Edwards endorses Obama: The "third person" decides not to -"Hold on"

Right after the Walmart left-hook and just before the Rezko upper-cut in the sandbox that was the South Carolina debate, this exchange occurred: CLINTON: Now, wait a minute. Wolf, wait a minute. Wait a minute. Just a minute. BLITZER: Senator Edwards, let them wrap up. Then I'm going to come to you. Yes? CLINTON: I just want -- I just to clarify -- I want to clarify the record. Wait a minute. EDWARDS: There's a third person in this debate. BLITZER: Wait a minute, Senator Edwards. Hold on. Guess Edwards decided not to wait for Wolf to come back to him. Let's be clear, the endorsement by John Edwards today in Michigan of all places (guess the boys wanted to kick some dirt in Hill's face) was just more political-strategy-as-usual by the Obama campaign. It was obviously pre-planned and perfectly timed to marginalize Sen. Clinton's huge win in West Virginia. Am I disappointed? Yes. Because he endorsed Obama? Absolutely not. As has been the case through this never-ending primary, I didn't care who would receive his endorsement. It was honorable enough for me that he was letting it run its course giving no weight to either side until the nominee was chosen. I'm disappointed he didn't keep his word after having done so for all this time. He'd just told Larry King, no less than 48 hours before delivering his rousing, 2o-minute "Yes We Can/He Picked My Plan" speech, he was going to hold his endorsement until the voters had their say! As I sat listening, all I could do was shake my head and say, "Is there anyone who can resist the lure of power, privilege, prestige and public adoration?" Immediately, as if in answer to my question, Lauryn Hill's "Mr. Intentional" popped into my head: "All their talk is seasoned to perfection/The road they walk commanding your affection/They need to be needed, deceived by motivation, an opportunity to further situation/Why they're so important is without explanation/Please don't patronize me, Mr. Intentional…" Two glaringly apparent reasons for his "pouring forth" NOW, come to mind:

1. Obama made an offer Edwards' male ego could not refuse ("an opportunity to further situation" maybe? - damn I love Lauryn Hill!). I don't know, but I could swear the "We" I heard every time he talked about what was going to happen in this country, was more of a "He and I we" and not an "All of us we." But I could be wrong.
2. This was his "I bet you'll pay attention to me now dammit!" moment - particularly since yesterday, he launched his "Half In Ten" anti-poverty campaign and with the exception of the Philadelphia Inquirer, the major mainstream media outlets gave it no coverage - ignoring it, pretty much as they'd ignored him during his campaign.

Oh well, can't always be the best judge of character.

I've Decided - Not Too Late I Hope!

After watching the debate in Austin, I have to say, since my candidate - John Edwards - was eliminated early on in the primaries, I have been struggling to decide between the "Black, silver-tongued devil" and the "Female wheeler-dealer" (I have to be honest here people). Since another Republican Administration is not an option, as a 52 year-old Black woman, I made my decision tonight. I may be a day late and a dollar short, but I have decided. I don't care what the media has to say at this point (listened to the Anderson Cooper after-party and it's the same old, same old - men behaving badly), I have finally figured all of this out. The reason Sen. Obama has been referred to as an "empty suit" is because he was. I compared my notes taken on prior debates to the one tonight where he kept reminding every one - "I have detailed plans." - and I finally got it! He's NOT HAD a detailed plan. All along, he's been ambiguous as he formulated his details. The reason they sound so much alike is that he's been listening, re-tooling and borrowing the messages of Edwards and Clinton all along! She has been consistent and bold on every issue (that may not have been a good idea because it put too much out there for him to clone and give to people as something new and substantive) and even though I've thought of her as a "wheeler- dealer," NO ONE can touch her on health care. I remember her first foray into the eel-tank of Washington politics as a First Lady with the cojones to have a thought and the audacity to try and make it work (I thought then, she should have been the president instead of Bill). I admired that about her, but I knew the machine would not allow it to come to fruition (again, men behaving badly). Health care is something this woman has been dogged about for a very long time and she can go toe-to-toe with the best (and worst) of them on the topic. Her grasp of the Washington that IS, makes her a much more viable candidate in my opinion. Yes, we all want "change," but she knows what it's going to take for that to happen. She's been in the thick of it - good and bad - as First Lady and a senator and she knows that just asking for change won't make it so. I think he does too, but he can't say that, given the platform upon which he's been running. Anybody listening to the whole debate should be able to see that they are, as Maya Angelou said, "more alike than they are different" on policy (with a few distinct exceptions). The last question of the debate was her finest, finest hour (if she'd answered anything BUT, I would have done some serious eye-rolling!). As a woman, who's been through her share of the fire and is willing to be honest about it, as a mother of a son who returned from a year in Iraq in one piece, as an aunt of a nephew now serving his THIRD tour there and as a Navy veteran myself, I connected with her tonight like I never thought I would. As a Florida voter, disenfranchised by the DNC and the local Democratic Party, I hope somebody can slap Howard Dean upside the head and let him know that you can't spit on us in the primary by not counting our votes for the nominee and not seating our delegates at the convention. If he wants a unified Democratic Party, he needs to know that we matter - or maybe someone else can head the DNC.

A Necessary Correction

In my last post, I attributed the excellent, "Namond's world, by the numbers" post on the "Got that New Package!" blog to Ray Shea. Though Ray Shea is no slouch, I got that one absolutely wrong. My sincerest apologies to Racy Mind, one of the SIX bloggers who make such unbelievably great contributions to that blog. They all do such a wonderful job of putting into words what this show means. Go to the blog, read the posts and I'll give you a nickel if you can tell me I'm lying! What?? Am I the only one that realizes the wealthiest one percent of this country has all the real cash? Racy Mind's post immediately jumped in my head as I was writing the last post and I had to put the link there, mainly because as a registered voter and a mother of two sons trying to make it on their own, the realist I am knows from whence she speaks. I could easily substitute either of their names for Namond's and the statistics would still hold true and I know I'm not wrong on that one. Her statistics, like the Edwards campaign, gave voice to the voiceless. I hope when they fell in the woods of the blogosphere, they made a thunderous sound.

The Son of the South Concedes

Sitting here waiting on John Edwards to make his concession speech in New Orleans, I cannot help but think back to that heated debate in Myrtle Beach, SC. Though the CNN "after party" that night correctly predicted he would come in last, I felt he'd been the only candidate who truly understood and confronted ALL the issues facing America today. As a Black woman in America, Mr. Edwards spoke to the same realities I see played over and over again in this country. Dress it up anyway you like, but we do live in two Americas and on January 21st, Edwards clearly and succinctly rose above the bickering and personal attacks going on in the sandbox to not only define the current state of our union, but to provide realistic, attainable goals for truly creating the one America to which the other two candidates merely give lip service. He's now giving his speech at the Musician's Village in New Orleans where it all began last year. It is a fitting location given his comments on moral responsibility, poverty, backbone, conviction, universal health care and the fact that New Orleans had been and continues to be abandoned and forgotten by our government. He echoed all the things he said in the SC debate and added that after contacting Senators Clinton and Obama, they had pledged to make ending poverty central to their campaign for the presidency - a gem of a gift upon which they both will no doubt capitalize (after making it sound as if it were their idea all along of course). Let's be clear people, the one America of which Senator Obama has been speaking is not the same one America for which John Edwards was campaigning. Sen. Obama's is one of let's "move on" from the politics of the racial divide with no apparent accountability for its part in where we are today. Mr. Edwards on the other hand, spoke of how the politics of the racial divide needed to be faced and dealt with in a manner that would work to truly begin leveling the playing field. Big difference. And as far as Sen. Clinton? Well, since she only recently jumped on the one America theme, I'm not even including her in the comparison at all. As a rabid fan of HBO's seminal series, The Wire, I happened upon Ray Shea's excellent blog, "Got that New Package!", which not only presents the best analysis of the show I've seen anywhere, but provides an absolutely brilliant illustration of how on-point Mr. Edwards had been in constantly hammering on the issue of the two Americas in which we live. And if you think Mr. Shea's thoughts are to be taken with a grain of salt - don't. Raised and currently living in New Orleans, he has a true bird's-eye view of those two Americas. His January 24th post, "Namond's world, by the numbers," is at once a perfect representation of the Edwards campaign and a glaring commentary on what is lacking in the campaigns of Senators Clinton and Obama. John Edwards certainly spoke for me today when he said he understood how hard it is to speak out for change when you feel your voice is not being heard. But when you consider that going along to get along is exactly what's gotten us where we are today, doing the hard thing is definitely preferable. Even though each of the remaining two both represent a part of who I am, I hate having to choose between the lesser of two evils in November - especially since to date, neither of them has really done the hard thing. But, I will wait and watch and choose because the thought of another Republican administration is definitely not an option. I wish the son of a mill worker and his family the very best. Maybe he'll be offered and accept the Attorney General spot in the new administration because Lord knows our criminal justice system is in definite need of something new!