Obama should say of this record:
"This is a politics of cynicism, and it is not what America needs right now. Not when so much is broken, and when the only way we're likely to transform our broken system is by a politician whose message is to reject cynicism, who works to inspire the American people to believe, "Yes We Can!" have a government that lives up to the promise of our ideals, of our shared values."
When Hillary tries to change the rules in the middle of the game and be awarded the delegates from the disallowed Michigan and Florida primaries, Obama should do more than argue against it. He should say:
"After seven years of a president who has violated the Constitution he took an oath to defend, and who has run roughshod over the rules that are supposed to maintain our precious system of checks and balances, does America need another president who shows so little respect for the rules everybody agreed to follow in this election process?"
Every attack Obama launched should be a way of fleshing out the overall promise of the campaign.
Hillary Clinton and John McCain may have the best of intentions for what they would like to do as president. But they'll not be able to change much. That's because the system is broken, it's degraded. And it will prevent the change we need-- unless the American people are inspired to join together to take back their government. And Clinton and McCain will not be able to summon forth the American people for that purpose, because they are so shaped by that very system.
These people are enmeshed in the old politics of cynicism --the system that's dragged America down in recent years, that serves special interests and not the people, that's become so dishonest and manipulative-- and they cannot call America to restore its soul. They will not be able to summon the American people to the struggle against entrenched interests that are so strong they can only be surmounted by an energized citizenry demanding the politics serve our best values, and serve the people.
Even if their intentions for what to do with the power of the presidency are laudable, they will be able to accomplish little. The system won't let them, and they will not tap into the one power that can redeem this broken system.
This should be the theme of Obama's campaign, and this should be the focus of his criticisms of both his opponents.
When he's attacked unjustly, the counter-attack should be to point out how this confirms Obama's theme of how his opponents are part of the problem in American politics today, not part of the solution. The attacks themselves become evidence of how the other two candiates for the presudency are people who have been shaped by the old politics of character assassination, of distortion, of innuendo, of fear-mongering, of tearing the opponent down instead of raising the country up.
It's an Aikido type of approach: the opponent's attack provides the energy to be used for his undoing. Obama did it deftly, and agreeably, when Hillary tried to reproach him for not "rejecting" Farakan as well as "denouncing" him. With respect to the attacks upon him, he should use those attacks --just as deftly, if not so amiably-- to tie his opponents to what it is that needs changing and to his offer to Americans to provide the leadership to change it.
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If anyone who reads this piece and who believes this advice to be potentially valuable for Obama can help get this into his hands, or the hands of those close to him, please make the effort.
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