Obama's Bewitching Charm

By ALICIA COLON
January 11, 2008

When even conservative pundits wax giddy about Senator Obama, it's time to wake up and get back to reality. We're told that excitement is in the air because history is about to be made. This just confirms the fact that we've all lost our collective minds.

Exactly what is so exciting about Barack Obama? Is it his charm, oratorical skills or just simply that he is an African American with support from white Americans? Why weren't all Americans outraged at Joe Biden's description of Obama: ""I mean, you got the first mainstream African-American who is articulate and bright and clean and a nice-looking guy"?

People seem to have lost the ability to distinguish between oratory and substantive dialogue. Mario Cuomo wowed my Democrat sister who lives in California when he gave the nominating speech for Bill Clinton in 1992.

I had to inform her that Mr. Cuomo had been my governor for 12 years and New York had paid dearly for his leadership, with businesses leaving the state headed for New Jersey. I looked at Mr. Clinton's sorry record in Arkansas and wondered how any voter could take his candidacy seriously.

Perhaps the issue is not the intelligence of voters but their maturity. I can certainly recognize the heady giddiness that comes with a political wonderment.

In 1960, I became a political junkie with John F. Kennedy's campaign and this was the first time I heard the word "charisma". I was just in high school but I started reading U.S. News and World Report to follow his trail. When he came to New York, I was among those cheering masses on 23rd street eagerly reaching to touch his arm as he passed by. I stayed up on a school night until Richard Nixon made his concession speech. Oh Glory. A Catholic in the White House with a lovely expectant wife and a beautiful toddler daughter. Who wouldn't be excited about the future?

In 1993, I recognized that same excitement of the Democrats at the William Jefferson Clinton inauguration and tried to relate it to my earlier Kennedy passion, but the comparison didn't mesh. World War II veteran and Lt. Commander of PT 109 John F. Kennedy's stature dwarfed Bill Clinton. JFK also espoused lower taxes, a stronger military and "ask not what your country can do for you."

I was as conservative then as I am now, but if the press hadn't kept silent about his personal peccadilloes, my Kennedy crush would probably have been crushed.

Meanwhile George Will is impressed with "cerebral" Obama. Young women weep at his powerful speeches, but do they understand what he's saying? Fans thrill when they hear his words "our time for change has come." What does that mean? He's for ending tax cuts, so does change mean raising our taxes? Have they paid any attention at all to his left-wing record or his reckless statements since he announced his candidacy? Or are they all transfixed by his poise and debate skills? What on earth was he thinking when he set a date for the withdrawal of our troops in Iraq (March 31st)? Was he simply pandering to the Moveon.org crowd? Then what did he mean when he threatened to go into Pakistan after terrorists without Musharraf's knowledge? Who in the Democratic Party was he trying to impress with that tougher than tough statement?

In another time and place, I might find Mr. Obama an intriguing possibility for leadership, but these are extremely dangerous times and the presidency is not on job training for neophytes with poll-driven thought processes.

It should be noted that many of Mr. Obama's supporters are not African American which should once and for all lay to rest the racism canard against this country. We are indeed ready for a woman and an African American to be president. Republicans have superb candidates of every hue and gender, and perhaps the best thing about the Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton candidacies is that they may inspire those with better qualifications to run in the future.

acolon@nysun.com

Obama's Bewitching Charm

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