Friday, January 11, 2008

Debating Barack Obama



As I oft find necessary to say in preface, I do not endorse Barack Obama--nor do I campaign against him. The same goes for his main rival (at least in the way the newsmedia has spun it), Hillary Clinton. Both of them are way too centrist, too tied to corporations and too tied to militarist foreign policy strategies for my taste. Certainly they are different and apart from the Republicans; just not far enough for me to jump on the bandwagon. While I do not openly back any candidate, I'd probably find closer political company among John Edwards and Dennis Kucinich. Sadly, their anti-corporate platforms have naturally won them the ire of the corporate run media, and both candidates (Edwards and Kucinich) are marginalized in journalistic political discourse. In the end of course, the pragmatic side of me will support whomever the Democratic presidential nominee ends up becoming, because all of their imperfections are preferable to the nutter freak show going on at the GOP. But while getting my pragmatic vote, any Democrat to win the White House can expect to catch hell and criticism from me--cuz that's how it's supposed to be.

That being said, on the Jan. 9th edition of Democracy NOW! host Amy Goodman had on two black progressives, scholar/writer Michael Eric Dyson and journalist Glen Ford (Black Agenda Report), to discuss their opposing viewpoints on Barack Obama. It was a refreshing debate that dared to feature two normally like-minded black figures debating the merits of Obama, his strengths and short-comings. The debate itself was not a slam-dunk for either, as they both made valid points. With my personal political leanings, I would probably score it 60% to 40% in favor of Glen Ford--whose criticisms, while not taking away from Dyson's pragmatic observations, still are hard to dispute.

But why not see for yourself and make up your own minds.

Part 1 of the debate above.

Part 2 is below:





A transcript of the broadcast can be read here:

http://www.democracynow.org/2008/1/9/barack_obama_and_the_african_american

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