I call myself a progressive Democrat, yet I like and appreciate both Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton. I have many reasons for liking both: but in the interests of full disclosure, I will come right out and say I voted for Clinton in the NY primary. I am not part of the "strike". Even so, I have come to fully expect in this environment to be told that I might as well just go elsewhere. A culture that is at once progressive and exclusionary represents more than irony. This particular election season, it has created a paradox.
First of all, when I say paradox, I mean "any person, thing, or situation exhibiting an apparently contradictory nature." One way to explain the paradox is this: a large majority of DailyKos users (as well as kos himself) are openly embracing a candidate of hope and change: one who promises to change our politics, lifting the country up instead of tearing others down. Yet neither Obama or DailyKos are actually bringing the country--or even their own party--together right now. I can't blame Obama for not being able to do what he promises in the current political environment. And an honest, introspective explanation for our divided situation is not that the power-hungry "monster" named Hillary Clinton is tearing the party apart, thus actively preventing unity and hope. That kind of explanation, in fact, is part of the problem I have increasingly observed in the past few weeks.
Spreading perceptions of division can create a divided reality.
I call it the DailyKos Paradox because it is so readily apparent here, but it really applies to any person or place that uses divisive tactics and sensational smears to advance a candidacy of unity and hope and new politics. The only "civil war" may very well be the civil war some of you are creating. I'm talking about Hillary's Crash and Burn. I'm talking about the notion that Hillary is out for her raw ambition alone, is pursuing a "scorched earth" policy, and is destroying the party to win. The notion that she absolutely needs to drop out of the race. All of this rhetoric is far more divisive to the Democratic Party than Hillary Clinton is by staying in the race.
As Chuck Todd writes today, Clinton herself shouldn't be perceived as automatically hurting Obama's chances:
Clinton should feel no hurry to get out. In fact, she is also making Obama a better candidate by forcing him to up his rhetoric on the economy and start working harder to woo these working class, white voters who appear to be eluding him in the Rust Belt states.
The tone of many Obama supporters surely contributes to the reason why 28% of Clinton supporters polled said they would vote McCain over Obama. I am certainly not one of those 28%, and Clinton was absolutely right to tell her supporters today that such a decision would not be wise. But my question for DailyKos is: why risk pushing that number up? Do you not realize that if 28% of Clinton supporters were to somehow follow through on that promise, the task of electing Obama becomes monumentally more difficult for all of us?
I'm afraid we won't be able to rely on Obamacans and Independents alone to propel Obama to victory. McCain, too, will be able to rely on significant crossover appeal.
I sincerely believe that without unity now, there is little chance of there being unity then. On one level, this could be taken to show how skeptical I am of the assumption that Obama's candidacy OR presidency will inevitably be a unifying force. But more importantly, I mean that if the highest priority is to win in November, then it would be prudent to reach to the other side (of your party) instead of exacerbating the tension with divisive rhetoric and arguments. Maybe it would be prudent to begin to practice the politics that Obama preaches.