heartbreak

my heart broke a little yesterday, as I watched john edwards take the podium and announce in new orleans that he would be suspending his campaign for presidency as of the results of the florida primaries

it was important to me, the thought of having a president who was also a fearless idealist, intellectually and emotionally. that he be a person who was able to stare the worst head on, without blinking or turning away. I’m not talking here about the death of his son, although I do think that, and the obvious love he has for his wife are central to the core of who and what he is, and why is able to believe in something greater than what exists. but what I am talking about is that we have someone who was unafraid to dig into the psyche of what keeps us as Americans apart from each other, and to give voice to it.

after the 2004 elections, I thought the only saving grace from the disaster manned by the democratic party would be the fact that we would be forced to re-examine our political beliefs, to centrifuge them down to the essence of what it meant to be a democrat, and then to reorganize and rebuild. much the way the republicans had done so well over the past decade. become a political party driven by beliefs, widening a constituency based on the introduction of new ideas and deepening it with new life into familiar ones.

since the 1972 elections, we have been so focused on making sure we laid claim to the “liberal” tag—that we lived up to it above all else, that what he haven’t done is lived up to the actual basis and claim of the democratic party. where once being a democrat meant the espousing of a populist ideology, grounded on liberal economic policies and social agendas, the party platform has moved towards centrist economics, leaving in its wake the very working class which once defined it. I like that john edwards was unafraid in pushing that conversation open: poverty and the working class. and the fact that there is a cost to be exacted for the ideals we believe in. through taxes, the renouncing of extravagance, and the physical and emotional exertion needed to realign our goals.

in the end, I guess we proved what we tried to claim was the opposite of our intent—that image is still key. a white man talking about outdated core beliefs of class and equity is not as sexy as a woman or a black man debating any other issue under the spotlight of the public stage.

that’s not to say I won’t be happy, ecstatic, to see hilary clinton or barack obama being sworn in this winter. but their politics are more feathery, effortless. I’m concerned about clinton’s voting record on appeasing the mid-conservative vote, as exemplified by her mercurial stance on the war. I’m concerned with obama’s lack of record in general, his absence from giving voice to an actual platform, an actual statement beyond feel-good generalities. give me something.