nyceve: we feel your despair. We feel the despair borne of a political-military-industrial establishment that invents wars and ignores looming environmental catastrophe, that enriches itself without limit and without regard to the public good, that shreds the principles our society was built on, lies about it with impunity, and laughs.
But while it may be irrational to hope, hope is our only chance. Without hope, we don't have the strength to organize and to act. With it, then there's at least a chance we can. Barack Obama, the Audacity of Hope guy, gets that.
Obama made not one but two major speeches yesterday. The first, covered extensively here, was his subdued, cerebral speech to the DNC Winter meeting. Saying repeatedly "politics is not a game," he challenged the party to treat the campaign as a unified effort to raise the political discourse of our nation, rather than as blood sport.
But it's his second speech -- to a crowd of 3000(!) students at George Mason University -- that infused me with hope, and might cheer you up too. As a bonus, it previewed the six policy themes that may form the backbone of his campaign platform.
Excerpts and video below.
Read More