OBAMARAMA

Matt Damon and Robert De Niro appeared on Hardball with Chris Matthews last night, and at the end of the interview Damon came out swinging for Sen. Obama:

MATTHEWS: Well, let’s break with that tradition right now. Where do you guys stand on ‘08? Who should be the next president?DE NIRO: (LAUGHS)

MATTHEWS: Okay. Give me the one, two, three. Who would you most like to see as the next president? And number two and number three, something like that. You don’t have to nail it down, go for win, place, show or something. Who do you want?

DAMON: Barack Obama.

[…]

MATTHEWS: Would you campaign for Obama? Would you go out and work for him?

DAMON: Yes, I would support him strongly.

Hopefully video will be available soon.

One of the media’s favorite games is to compare emerging political figures to politicians of the days of yore. It’s a real treat for them — an opportunity to exhibit their extensive political knowledge while also giving viewers what I expect they think is a helpful point of reference in evaluating the candidate. The comparisons can sometimes be helpful, but are more often gratuitous and occasionally asinine.

Sen. Obama is no exception. His insurgent popularity has already been likened to that of Bill Bradley and Howard Dean, his charisma to that of Bill Clinton. One article quoted a voter who compared Obama’s presence in New Hampshire — I kid you not — to Jesus.

As usual, the Sunday morning talk shows perfected the sound bite comparison, jumping from simile (”He speaks like Clinton”) to straight up metaphor. On the Chris Matthews Show, Howard Fineman, Chief Political Correspondent for Newsweek, called Sen. Obama “the black Bill Clinton.” A few minutes later in the same show, New York Magazine contributing editor Jennifer Senior called him “the black RFK.”

I’m not sure how helpful such oversimplification is to the debate (I suspect he’s actually “the black Barack Obama,” or just Barack Obama for short), but the comparisons to successful, revered statesmen are certainly welcome, and will in time no doubt be proven justified.

The most articulate parallel I’ve seen, though — and one that actually compares substantive aspects of Sen. Obama’s character with those of another great leader — comes from the previously-discussed Newsweek cover story:

Theodore Sorensen, JFK’s adviser and speechwriter, says, “He [Obama] reminds me in many ways of Kennedy in 1960. The pundits said he was Catholic and too young and inexperienced and wasn’t a member of the party’s inner circle. They forgot that the nomination wasn’t decided in Washington but out in the field.”

If Ted Sorensen is hailing Obama’s similarity to JFK, better listen up. Few knew President Kennedy better, and few are more qualified to herald such a comparison. Incidentally, if you’re fed up with politics-as-usual, Sorenson’s excellent book, Why I Am a Democrat, may help convince you to get back on board (as it did for me).

Here is Sen. Obama talking to Charlie Rose about “trying to figure out, ‘how can I be most useful?’” Give me a call, senator, I have some ideas.

Everyone is talking about Sen. Obama these days. His charisma, his momentum, his potential. But when it comes to the practical issue of whether or not he should seek the presidency in 2008, the question on many lips seems to be the same:

“Is America ready for a black president?”

That’s what Newsweek asks in its new cover story. It was all over the Sunday morning talk shows, too, with Chris Matthews & Friends tittering over poll numbers like “83% of the American people say they would be comfortable with an African-American president” (though a lower number thinks their friends and family would be comfortable). Anyone talking about Sen. Obama’s chances is apparently deeply concerned over the answer.

But this question — is America ready? — is actually a complete and utter cop-out, and one that misses entirely the point it claims to pursue. It’s also not a question that can be answered by either speculation or polling (which is notoriously unreliable on questions of racial tolerance — most everyone will SAY they’d vote for a black candidate, but a voting booth is a very private place).

While it can sometimes be valuable to think of the country as a collective unit on questions of public opinion, in reality America is a nation of individual voters, each of whom will (hopefully) have the opportunity to contribute to an answer to the pundits’ favorite question by way of the democratic process, and all in good time. In the interim, perhaps the more pertinent question is one Americans can ask themselves:

“Am I ready for a black president?”

This seems to me to be the really pressing question when discussing an Obama candidacy (or a Rice candidacy, or, with a different adjective, a Sen. Clinton candidacy). If the answer is yes, then there you have it, Mr. Matthews. If it’s no, then we shouldn’t be afraid to talk about why. At this point in our history, we should welcome such a public discussion.

Asking whether America-at-large is ready for a black president, on the other hand, is just a way to pass the buck and speculate without the danger of having to draw a conclusion. America will demonstrate the state of its readiness soon enough.

The good old “liberal media” is proving once again how utterly inaccurate that appellation is with its coverage of Sen. Obama.

We all remember GOP hack Ed Rogers unleashing Sen. Obama’s middle name as a weapon on Hardball. In its weekly media analysis, Media Matters for America notes that Rogers was not the first to do so, however — nor has he been the last, as the media has adroitly picked up this non-issue and run with it.

CNN’s Jeff Greenfield went above and beyond the call of duty when he not only invoked Sen. Obama’s middle name as a liability, but actually compared his clothing to that of the president of Iran, since both frequently opt to go tie-less. Greenfield, displaying a deeply unimpressive talent for wordsmithery, referred to this “fact” as “a sartorial time bomb,” then combined these two pointless observations into what could be the most asinine question of the political year: “Now, it is one thing to have a last name that sounds like Osama and a middle name, Hussein, that is probably less than helpful. But an outfit that reminds people of a charter member of the Axis of Evil?”

Thanks so much for the insight, Jeff. This is what passes for news analysis these days?

This video from the folks at RunObama.com gives a great insight into the excitement that drove the success of Sen. Obama’s appearances in New Hampshire last weekend. Watch for the woman towards the end who says that Sen. Obama “challenges my cynicism.” Right on.

Indiana Sen. Evan Bayh announced this morning that the odds of his receiving the Democratic presidential nomination “were longer than I felt I could responsibly pursue.” He recognized that running for president “would have required me to be essentially absent from the Senate for the next year instead of working to help the people of my state and the nation.”This decision is undoubtedly grounded in Bayh’s experience in New Hampshire last weekend, where his appearance drew little attention from voters, thousands of whom flocked to three packed Obama events. The Chicago Tribune called Sen. Bayh’s decision not to run — despite having raised $10 million — “the first casualty” of “the Obama effect.” Sen. Bayh was widely seen as a viable alternative to Sen. Hillary Clinton, a role played even better by Sen. Obama.

OBAMARAMA salutes Sen. Bayh’s decision to focus his efforts on his work in the Senate and on behalf of the people of Indiana. Too rarely are politicians with presidential aspirations ready to put serving their constituents above serving their own ambition.

What sort of Obama blog would this be without posting Sen. Obama’s appearance on MNF this week? It was a great moment — and just the sort of appearance for someone looking to broaden his recognition…perhaps in preparation for a national campaign of some kind?

Hopefully we can look forward to a similar announcement in the not-too-distant future…

The best indicator of how frightened the right is of an Obama candidacy is to look at from where the attacks start coming. And with the first real salvo arriving this week from disgraced former House Majority Leader Tom Delay — who called Sen. Obama’s views those of a “Marxist leftist” — it’s clear their knees are knocking.

As well they should be. A Marxist leftist? I understand Delay has been busy censoring comments on his new “blog,” but I’d expect a little better from the man who threatened to steal the lunch money of the United States Supreme Court.

Sen. Obama’s response, of course, was all class: “Former Congressman DeLay’s rhetoric is exactly the sort that the American people rejected so resoundingly in November,” Obama spokesman Robert Gibbs said in a statement. “They want us to move beyond the name-calling and slash-and-burn politics that have served this country so poorly and deal with the real challenges we face.”

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