This Magic Moment

Having spent more time working presidential campaigns than most people ever will (18 straight months, ok, not all that much, but still, more), I feel like it's ok to say a couple things.

Iowa was wonderful, yesterday, not just for Obama supporters like me, not just for Democrats who want a Democratic candidate (Edwards counts, too), not just for Republicans who are concerned about people and values instead of money and machismo; it was a…it could eventually be seen as a pivotal day for America .

The key number is not any of those pumped out over the past 24 hours, but the poll a few months back that showed that 77% of Americans are concerned that our country is at least drifting (some of us would suggest has been accelerating for three decades) in the wrong direction. That heartfelt belief is the key to what's going on.

If Iowa 's choices were to hold up-and there are a lot of rea$ons they won't-America would be left with the best choice of presidential candidates of my lifetime. That's not a small matter.

As I consider Mr. Obama the best presidential candidate in at least…since I worked for another one sixteen years ago, and perhaps the best since…hell, I don't know, sometimes hyperbole just fails you…Kennedy, Roosevelt, Jefferson . We've had some great presidents, we just haven't had one in a really long time.

The best part of Iowa isn't that Obama won. It's how he won. Women weren't confused into thinking that Hillary Clinton represents them, except for corporate inner-circle women, who would be right. The kids (those younger than me) flocked to Obama, those concerned with health care understood that Hillary had already blown it once without learning anything, and unions cut a happy medium between Edwards' rhetoric and Obama's reality.

The most important number isn't that Obama won by 9%, it's the numbers underlying that reality. Unless corporate avarice is more widespread in New Hampshire than we've been led to believe, Ms. Clinton is in serious trouble. Of course Mr. Edwards' populist rhetoric is far, far more high-pitched than Mr. Obama's, which represents transitional difficulties beyond the simple fact that he's a personal injury lawyer (and so not to be particularly trusted, by definition). Mr. Edwards' appears to have enjoyed a conversion similar to St. Paul (or Al Gore) on the road to Damascus , but I take it as a good sign than he beat Hillary, too.

The Republicans, I have to say, weren't much less inspiring. I've never voted for a Republican presidential candidate, but I might have if it had been McCain-Gore. Voting for McCain is out of the question for me given his views on Iraq, but Iowa suggests that Republican voters are looking for…hell, how would I know what Republican voters are looking for, but from here it looks like at least a bunch of them want someone as independent as McCain was and is, but who doesn't stand for Iraq and instead stands for the entirely sensible things like less government that Ronald Reagan said that he stood for (as documented, very, very different than the corporate hegemony in the form of enormous government intervention that his administration gave birth to-that cut a lot harder against his supporters than it did the people that he beat).

I'm not saying that I've paid a lot of attention to the Republican candidates. My vote hasn't been in flux. I'll vote for Obama if he's nominated, probably Edwards if he's nominated, and if Hillary's nominated I'll look at the Republican and third party nominees.

I would look at Huckabee twice. Yeah, he's a Baptist preacher, but lots of good people are. Yeah, he's shaky on evolution, but frankly I'm not convinced that they've got it all figured out either. He doesn't have a track record as a political (as opposed to religious) doctrinaire in any sense that particularly concerns my limited knowledge, and the simple reality is that he's gaining momentum because he lacks ties to the Republican hierarchy that's ruined so much, for so long, no matter who's elected. So, I'll tell you I won't vote for Romney or Clinton, but I'm open on Huckabee.

I'm also open on Ron Paul. It pisses off my liberal friends, but I have a helluva lot of respect for libertarian ideals. I guess I've voted for Democrats most, by default in so many cases, and Greens second when offered the chance, but I've also voted for Libertarians and I've also voted for Republicans.* Ron Paul is the kind of Republican I could vote for without his having to run against…you know, Hillary Clinton, for example, or Donald Trump. Just in case you missed the fine print this morning, Mr. Paul was a surprise of Iowa-in double digits-and has somehow raised the proverbial shitload of money over the past couple months, mainly from boffins on the internet I guess.

I'm not an undecided voter, and rarely am. I'm more a contingency voter-I vote for someone who stands strongly (strongly, not rhetorically) for whatever issues are more important to me: Iraq, campaign finance reform, the rights of humans as balanced against capital and corporations, the environment, space travel (couldn't help throwing that one in, Jerry Brown concession speech, circa 1980)…

The fact of the matter is, and I've been saying this for nearly two decades: liberals and conservatives and Baptists and agnostics and environmentalists and contractors and grandma's and children and professional wrestlers and librarians….all have more in common with each other than we do with professional Beltway politicians and lobbyists.

The results in Iowa suggest that it's becoming common knowledge, and that strikes me as a helluva first step.

Peace and teleological agitation,

Clayton

*US voting only. My UK voting has been almost entirely Liberal Democrat, though I moved here vowing to "vote for Labour, as Blair is doing a pretty good job [pre Iraq ], and I'm never going to pay attention to politics again." For the record, I've never voted Labour.

No more politics, I want to go home.

Yeah more politics, back to the politics page