by Unknown | 2/04/2008 10:11:00 PM
Hi folks! I'm back from a nice relaxing weekend in Houston, where strandsofpearl and I hung out with Rebecca Goetz. Rebecca was the first history blogger I ever heard of -- she was profiled in U.S. News & World Report back when I was in high school. She's also an awesome person, and it was a pleasure for us to be able to spend some quality time with her.

I've just gotten back, and I haven't had a chance to check in with the latest academic/history/political news. Have I missed anything important?

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5 Comments:


Blogger Ahistoricality on 2/06/2008 2:18 PM:

OK, let's talk about Super Tuesday!

I think the question about whether the American electorate is more ready for a woman or a black candidate has been answered: Either is fine.

I think the question about whether the hyper-conservative attacks on John McCain are genuine or a shell game designed to make him more palatable to moderates and independents is entirely open.

I think the Edwards campaign dropped out too early.

I think pro-Obama folks will really like Lessig's video, but I'm not sure whether it's going to sway any pro-Clinton people away from her.

I think I need to start eliminating from my collection books which I've had for more than three years and never read, nor are likely to ever use in a classroom.

 

Anonymous Anonymous on 2/06/2008 10:38 PM:

There were blogs when you were in high school? Oh my god, Jeremy, you are way too young.

 

Blogger Unknown on 2/07/2008 1:48 PM:

Heh, you can read my bio if you so desire.

Ahist, I'll get to your comment later today -- after I eat and go to one final class.

 

Blogger Ahistoricality on 2/07/2008 6:35 PM:

We have replaced the rule of law with the Law of Humpty-Dumpty: "The Law is what I say it is, no more, no less."

We are damned.

 

Anonymous Anonymous on 2/08/2008 9:25 AM:

I was shocked when Edwards dropped out. I think it must have been a last minute decision, caused by the polls that came out just that night showing him losing ground (Rasmussen). He had to have been considering it before then, of course, and no doubt Obama and Clinton were trying to get him to drop out.

I was crushed when Edwards dropped out, even though I think Edwards was FAR from a perfect candidate. I've been even more crushed by Obama's skyrocketing popularity. In my opinion, Obama's approach is clearly a sellout of both populism and progressivism. His basic message, as I see it, is 'lay down your political arms and stop fighting and let the elite do what they do best" There is no question, I would argue, that at best he presents himself as an intermediary between the political and financial elite and the rest of us; but I think it's all too obvious that in fact he sees himself as a buffer between the financial and political elite and the dirty and unwashed masses.

Yet he cloaks all this in Reaganish calls of "hope" and Martin Luther King-ish calls of "yes we can" and "unity".

To me, Obama's campaign is one of the most perverse things I've ever seen in the political arena. The cynicism I see it in takes my breath away.

This campaign season WAS an opportunity for real progressive change, but somehow it's all been coopted, in my view.

But what's really funny is Obama's persistent selfportrayals as an underdog. What bull. That guy has been set up to succeed, starting with that supposedly brilliant 2004 keynote address, At the time he was a near unknown and he got to do the Keynote address. And yet, again and again he says, in his faux preacher style, "they said we couldn't do it! They said it was impossible!" Who said that? Idiot pundits? As I recall, he was being hyped, and hyped heavily as early as the 2004 election.

I understand progressives voting for Obama on a least worst basis, though I am in favor of going third party at this point (since I no longer see the Dems and Pubs as distinct parties). What I can't understand is all the swooning, all the hyperventilating, all the flying leaps onto his bandwagon.