I hope you see that I for one do not adopt the “fashionable-nihilist” position you seem to wish to box inside my posts questioning Edward’s authenticity. You might be saying his goals are admirable; I’m saying spoken goals are no more meaningful than Obama’s being “cool.” Remember George Bush’s compassionate conservative goals in 00? Given Edwards’ lifestyle, not just his wealth, I draw a different conclusion than you about his legitimacy as a true candidate for the poor. Maybe he’ll do something to prove me wrong, I’m open to such an example.

On uber-rich revolutionaries: You’ve heard of Bill Gates (and Warren Buffet), no doubt. Bill Gates owns a > $50 million dollar home made from hundred year old redwoods from old-growth forests. But he’s also redistributing 85% of his wealth to the poorest nations in the world. Fashionable-nihilists forget to take this into account.

Gates Will Cede Day-to-Day Role At Microsoft
By Robert A. Guth and Don Clark
Word Count: 1,101 | Companies Featured in This Article: Microsoft, Google, Yahoo, RealNetworks, Symantec

REDMOND, Wash — Bill Gates — the Harvard University dropout who created the business framework for modern computing and in the process became the world’s richest man — plans to give up his day-to-day role at Microsoft Corp. to spend more time helping the world’s poor.

Mr. Gates, 50 years old, said he would remain Microsoft’s chairman, but begin a transition that in two years will remove him from overseeing product development at the software giant he co-founded in 1975. In July 2008, he will begin full-time work at his nonprofit foundation, which contributes money to health-care programs in developing …

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB115040182621081518.html?mod=home_whats_news_us

http://www.crooksandliars.com/2007/12/21/tucker-john-edwards-cant-be-president-his-house-is-too-big/

At the end, Tucker Carlson (I don’t like the guy) says:

“It’s such a syndrome though, I’ve seen it so many times growing up around rich liberals. .It’s absolutely some kind of a psychological condition where the people who live in the most excessive possible manner are also the people with the most left-wing re-distributionist politics who want to control how much money you have. I’ve seen it in every state in this country. What the hell is that anyway?”

He’s talking about BoBos, of course, but just doesn’t see it. The classic liberal BoBo doesn’t dissociate a message about equality from their own consumerism and wealth. For example, A BoBo might be happy to spend $20,000 on a Zen-themed bathroom renovation or but would question a person’s judgment if they put nice rims on a old Cutlass.

A rich elite is a rich elite is a rich elite.

There’s a sort of fashionable-nihilism argument “XYZ is a multi-millionaire! He’s not going to be a revolutionary!”. Well, I wasn’t nominating him for a revolutionary. I was saying his goals are the best of the lot.

Ted Kennedy is very rich. But he is a liberal stalwart. The idea that no rich person can ever have any interest in liberalism is simply refuted by history and evidence. And I don’t want to have to type a reply to the tedious strawman of making an extreme statement then knocking down the extreme statement strawman.

In my earlier comment, I meant that Obama seems to me to appeal to members of a certain class, the bourgeois bohemians, for certain reasons (and among other classes for perhaps other reasons). He appeals to the Steve Jobs of the world because he’s the JFK they’ve been looking for…and being younger, multi-racial, from Hawaii, a former Harvard law review editor, basketball player, former drug using, peace preferring rebel give him the merit or street cred, that is, the cool non-conformist (but now only conformed so he can beat the man at his own game) elements that appeal to the bourgeois bohemians. His theme is “I’m Cool.” I defer to “Bobos in Paradise” for more details about the bourgeois bohemians. Can you name another candidate that is as cool in the JFK kind of way?

As for Edwards, do you really think a man who is building a $6 million dollar home will be a champion for the poor? Especially if he believes his next address is 1600 Pennsylvania Ave? I want to believe in John Edwards, but with a lifestyle like his, I can’t, as much as he sounds like he, too, might have read A People’s History Of The United States. Because apparently, Edwards thinks he’ll be living in the White House for 4-8 years while owning (and leaving unoccupied?) a mansion in country where mentally handicapped people sleep on the streets? That ain’t right.

I’m inclined towards Edwards because when you come right down to it, a politician has to campaign on something, and fighting economic inequality and providing health care strike me as pretty good issues to stand on – even if one can only go a small amount in that direction due to “corruption”.

What does Obama stand for overall, besides being a new face? I don’t mean what are his policy working papers, more like what is his “theme”?

Where is the professor now? Why isn’t he rallying the troops to not only free the debates but, more importantly, open up the debates? I desperately want to see Ron Paul take a bite out of the the warmonger, civil liberty killers McCain and Giuliani. I would really like an opportunity to hear Dennis Kucinich challenge Obama and Hillary on healthcare reform. I would love for Kucinich to call Obama out on his support for the war. How does Obama square the circle of opposing the war but voting for the funding?

My support for Obama has to do with that as much as anything: he is a man with depth of vision. He can think past the end of his dick. Which is more than I can say for any of the fools who led us down the path we’re now on. And is surprisingly rare: I’d expect these folks in leadership positions in Washington to have better jnsight than me, but by and large, no.

Moreover, he has taken specific positions, on health care, on transparency, and other issues, and he makes a lot of sense. Personally, I think he’s wrong on healthcare, but I’m pretty pessimistic that healthcare issues are going to get addressed anyway in the next term–we’re going to be dealing with some fairly severe economic issues.

This line about how ‘we don’t know where he stands on the issues’ is a meme propagated by people too lazy to look at his website, or maybe the Clinton campaign, I’m not sure which. I was shocked to see it in NYT this morning. In an article that actually had a link to his website. I mean, does he have to talk about all that stuff in a speech for you to get it?

Like Barak Obama or not, he is more than a nice guy, he has a lot of charisma – perhaps less than Bill Clinton, but more than Senator Hillary Clinton.

Obama also with 20-20 hindsight guessed correctly to the anti-war crowd on the Iraq war. It’s not too clear how he did it, but if you argue against most wars, by chance you will be right sometimes. (The anarchy-libertarians such as Ron Paul also argue against most wars (and most government), which made Ron Paul correct to the anti-war crowd but also makes Ron Paul look like a fool to most Americans on the Civil War and Lincoln)

In contract to your perception of newness/unknownness as a weakness, others have suggested the opposite in the election.

Obama’a newness also means that he was/is unknown, which means he is more of a blank slate which people can paint their own pictures on and people know fewer things that would be considered negative by many voters. An unknown policy is one without opposition. It’s hard to object to “change” (for a better America), but when the exact policies become known, there may be more objection.

Barack Obama speaks with moral conviction, he’s honest, and his message is of unity. That’s enough to get my vote.

In the words of Micael Medavoy,

“We need a leader who will follow his conscience at the helm of a nation of citizens who are not afraid to vote theirs. There are those in this world who will hate us no matter what we do, but following the compass of our consciences, we will have behind us the moral and legal justifications for our actions — actions that for the first time in too long we can support together as a nation. America can once again lead the way to hope and human dignity for all.”

Obama is a milquetoast politico with little experience, no real “changes” to offer and who is just as captive to “special interests” as Hillary or Edwards or Romney. Still, he has a very strong everyman appeal to the generation born in the early sixties or later. I like him, I don’t support him, but I really like him. But I know he is not going to reform or change anything. The only candidates who really and truly stand for change and have the records to prove it are Ron Paul and Dennis Kucinich.