-By Warner Todd Huston

Well, I have come to the conclusion that Mark Morford of the San Francisco Chronicle just threw away the last tiny shred of credibility he might have had left by dreamily imagining that Barack Obama is so omniscient, so “ethereal” and so messiah-like that he isn’t a “normal” human being. Maybe Mark thinks he might be an alien from another planet, some trans-dimensional traveler, or maybe an angel come down in human form to lead us sheep into the promised land? I’m not exaggerating either. In his latest piece he calls Obama a “Rare Kind of Attuned Being,” a “Lightworker,” he says he is “ethereal” and “magical” — hello Rush Limbaugh — and feels that Obama is “not really one of us” in the “normal way.” Morford and those who feel like him have lost all touch with reality and the sickness is spreading.

I think that columnist Morford is off his medication, or maybe he’s just drunk, or perhaps he fell on his head recently? Or perhaps Shirley MacLaine came down off the mothership and stole Mark’s computer… something freaky is going on there in San Francisco, anyway. Or maybe what makes me think something weird is in the air out there is just that Morford’s latest editorial is one of the most amazing examples of the wild eyed ranting of the most whacked out Obamessiah believers yet to show up in print instead of just on the nutrooter blogs. Instead of appearing in a purportedly legitimate newspaper, this is the fodder for the fantasy land of a Coast to Coast with George Noory. Instead of serious political discussion, this sort of thing belongs on Jerry Springer.

But get ready to see this sort of insane euphoria spread as Obamessiah dons his no lapel flag vestments and deigns to appear before the people who love him unconditionally, uncritically, and uninformed of anything he really stands for.

I won’t bore you with his whole, nutty piece, but here are just some of the lowlights of Morford’s slavish devotion to the political Svengali that is Barack Obama.

• Barack Obama isn’t really one of us. Not in the normal way, anyway.
• The appeal, the pull, the ethereal and magical thing that seems to enthrall millions of people from all over the world, that keeps opening up and firing into new channels of the culture normally completely unaffected by politics…
• Even Bill Clinton, with all his effortless, winking charm, didn’t have what Obama has, which is a sort of powerful luminosity, a unique high-vibration integrity.
• I’ve heard from far too many enormously smart, wise, spiritually attuned people who’ve been intuitively blown away by Obama’s presence…
• Many spiritually advanced people I know identify Obama as a Lightworker, that rare kind of attuned being who has the ability to lead us not merely to new foreign policies or health care plans or whatnot, but who can actually help usher in a new way of being on the planet, of relating and connecting and engaging with this bizarre earthly experiment. These kinds of people actually help us evolve. They are philosophers and peacemakers of a very high order, and they speak not just to reason or emotion, but to the soul.
• The unusual thing is, true Lightworkers almost never appear on such a brutal, spiritually demeaning stage as national politics. This is why Obama is so rare.
• Those attuned to energies beyond the literal meanings of things, these people say JFK wasn’t assassinated for any typical reason you can name. It’s because he was just this kind of high-vibration being, a peacemaker, at odds with the war machine, the CIA, the dark side. And it killed him.

Have you lost your lunch yet? Well, you may not have lost your lunch, but this pseudo religious tripe may be proof that Morford has lost his sanity!

Naturally, Morford had to revel a bit in his Bush Derangement Syndrome and regurgitated several slams against Bush, but the real message of this rambling little editorial was in this one little segment nestled deep in Morford’s ranting.

(not coweringly religious, mind you, but deeply spiritual)

And there you have it. Like most extremists, leftists Morford pretends to stand against religion when all the while he is looking for something man made to replace it. Acting as if he is too smart, too cool for superstitious religion, Morford replaces centuries old teachings with this whacked out, new agie, childishness in this case built on a mere politician. But, even as he creates his newfangled religion, like all leftists, he has to attack everyone else who subscribes to a real religion. He must belittle, degrade and ridicule religious people everywhere.

Of course, Morford realizes how silly he sounds to be as starstruck as a 13 year-old girl that is infatuated with the latest rock-n-roll boy band. He even gets so defensive about it he preemptively calls everyone one who will look at him askance all sorts of names.

This is what I find myself offering up more and more in response to the whiners and the frowners and to those with broken or sadly dysfunctional karmic antennae - or no antennae at all - to all those who just don’t understand and maybe even actively recoil against all this chatter about Obama’s aura and feel and MLK/JFK-like vibe.

I see, so if you don’t “get” the Obamessiah fever you are “sadly dysfunctional”? It seems to me that Morford is working himself up to consider “unbelievers” in the same way Torquemada did in the 15th century! Is Morford too far from burning Obama deniers at the stake?

This sort of unrealistic, deification of Barack Obama is the sort of thing that can easily propel him into the White House. It is also the sort of thing that can cause people to imagine his presidency to have been, in hindsight, a bitter disappointment. What sane person cannot realize the expectations for an Obamessiah are simply impossible for Barack to live up to?

You think Clinton’s years in office were retrospectively considered the most wasted opportunity in a life time? Wait until a president Obamessiah turns the big White House key over to a Republican to hear the lamentations of the faithful begin to ring out. The “bitterness” will likely be unbearable.

Apparently, Morford isn’t alone in his silliness. The Politico is reporting that Representative Jesse Jackson, Jr. (D, IL) said Obama’s victory “overwhelmed him.”

“I cried all night. I’m going to be crying for the next four years,” he said. “What Barack Obama has accomplished is the single most extraordinary event that has occurred in the 232 years of the nation’s political history. …The event itself is so extraordinary that another chapter could be added to the Bible to chronicle its significance.”

An Obama addition to the Bible? Like I said, the sickness is spreading.

So, I have an idea. Let’s defeat Obamessiah and forego all the gnashing of teeth and wearing of sackcloth that will surely be the result of an Obama presidency!

And if Mark Morford has a nervous breakdown because of it all… well, I don’t know about you, but I am willing to risk that happening.

(Photo credits= Photo of Mark Morford: www.sfgate.com, photo of Obama: Reuters)

With the announcement that Hillary Clinton is abandoning her quest for the Oval Office the Democrat National Committee (DNC) – and specifically the DNC’s Rules and Bylaws Committee – has effectively selected the candidate for their party. I say selected because, by construct, the decision making process was taken away from the party faithful and placed in the hands of an elitist class of party insiders. These party insiders – superdelegates and the DNC Executive Committee – have literally usurped the will of the people by marginalizing the popular vote in deference to manipulated vote worth and their own self-importance.

The right to vote – the right to have our votes count – is the fundamental bedrock of our Constitutional Republic. It is through this fundamental right, this Constitutional Right, that We the People affect our control over government. Through our ballot choices we select delegates to the Electoral College who represent our amassed votes. These delegates, in turn, vote for the President of the United States. This process serves as a safeguard against mob rule and the bad choices to which emotionalism can lead. The Framers were brilliant in this respect.

Party politics is a bit different, although it has been based on this model in the past.

Through the primary process the electorate selects delegates to represent them at the party conventions. These delegates, representing the will of the people and bound to the victorious candidate in each respective state – at least in the first round of voting – then cast their votes for their party’s presidential nominee. At least that’s how it is supposed to work.

Enter the superdelegate.

In 1982, the Hunt Commission recommended to the DNC a rule that set aside delegate slots for select congressional Democrats and state party chairs and vice chairs. Ironically, the commission felt that by empowering an elitist class of delegate they would safeguard the process from being manipulated by the party leadership.

In 1998 the category of superdelegate ballooned to include all Democrat governors and DNC committee members. In 1992 additional superdelegate slots were allocated to the states to cover party leaders and elected officials not covered by previous definitions. And in 1996 each Democrat member of Congress was awarded superdelegate status. At the August 2008 Democratic National Convention in Denver, superdelegates will make up approximately one-fifth of the total number of delegates. Please keep in mind that these superdelegates were not elected by the people to represent anything at the party convention.

Enter the DNC Executive Committee under Howard Dean; the über elitists of the DNC.

During the 2008 primary election cycle the DNC Executive Committee penalized the states of Michigan and Florida for executing their primaries before the committee said it could execute them. Initially, both of these states were to lose their delegates to the convention and have their state’s vote totals ignored. As we all know, the DNC’s Rules and Bylaws Committee voted last week to allow the Michigan and Florida delegates to be seated but in doing so devalued their votes to only half that of the other states’ delegates.These initial and subsequent decisions by the DNC and the DNC’s Rules and Bylaws Committee have resulted in Hillary Clinton having received a majority of the popular vote and Barack Obama receiving an adjusted majority of the delegates.

Further, without the role of the superdelegates neither of the candidates would have attained an unbeatable number of delegates for the nominating process at the convention, thus creating the need for an open convention, a convention where the candidates would literally have to court each vote from each delegate.

By manipulating the worth of the votes that will be cast by the Florida and Michigan delegates and by the existence of superdelegates to the weight of 20% of the total vote, the DNC under Howard Dean has literally selected their party’s candidate over the will of the Democrat populace, evidenced by the total popular vote.

This is astounding.

The very idea of the “superdelegate” (and yes, the GOP has them as well but in vastly smaller numbers) lends itself to the Socialist dogma of the elitist class; a class of government official and politician that knows better what is good for the party – for the nation – than those they would govern. Regardless of the fact that these superdelegates were elected at one point, they were elected to do a much different job then that of electing a candidate to represent the party. In essence, they represent the party and not the proletariat…I mean party members.Then there is the decision by the DNC Rules and Bylaws Committee that literally resurrected the concept of a human’s worth being just three-fifths (in this case one-half) the worth of another. By slashing the value of the Florida and Michigan delegates’ votes the DNC has literally told the voters in Michigan and Florida that they – politically – are worth half that of the voters in every other state. It matters not that these Florida and Michigan Democrats have donated hard-earned money to the party, money that the party willingly took and spent. It matters not that honest and hardworking Florida and Michigan Democrats knocked on doors, put up yard signs, got petitions signed, etc. The Florida and Michigan Democrat organizations usurped the authority of Howard Dean and the voters are to be punished for it.

Perhaps I am being too literal here, too beholden to our rights as they are afforded under the US Constitution, maybe I adhere to the reality that our country is governed by We the People and not a group of elitists who want to emulate the Socialist class system of government, but it seems to me that the DNC hierarchy is disenfranchising their own party members. It seems to me that from the DNC’s refusal to “count every vote” and their refusal to recognize the one-man-one-vote system of representative government we embrace in this country they are refusing to recognize each citizen’s right to vote; each citizen’s right of governmental oversight. In essence, the DNC has stolen this election from their own party members by commandeering the candidate selection process. Talk about affirmative action!

All this said, two questions stand out as questions each and every Democrat must ask themselves as they head into this election: What other constitutional rights are you willing to forfeit? And what other constitutional rights is the DNC preparing to deny?

Frank Salvato is the Executive Director and Director of Terrorism Research for BasicsProject.org a non-profit, non-partisan, 501(c)(3) research and education initiative. His writing has been recognized by the US House International Relations Committee and the Japan Center for Conflict Prevention. His organization, BasicsProject.org, partnered in producing the original national symposium series addressing the root causes of radical Islamist terrorism. He also serves as the managing editor for The New Media Journal. Mr. Salvato has appeared on The O’Reilly Factor on FOX News Channel and is a regular guest on talk radio including on The Right Balance with Greg Allen on the Accent Radio Network and on The Captain’s America Radio Show catering to the US Armed Forces around the world. His opinion-editorials have been published by The American Enterprise Institute, The Washington Times & Human Events and are syndicated nationally. He is occasionally quoted in The Federalist. Mr. Salvato is available for public speaking engagements. He can be contacted at newmediajournal@comcast.net.

American conservative have political heartburn. We are forced once again to choose the lesser evil when we vote for president in November. Though this itself is not unusual in many election decisions, it is especially egregious this year because the Republican candidate eschews so many principles important to the conservative segment of the Republican Party and the Democrat opponent is as close to a socialist as we have had in over two hundred years. For this reason some conservatives have suggested sitting out this election to let the Democrats mess things up so badly that that Republicans will be a shoo-in two or four years.

But is this a good idea? Even just four years of such a president when combined with a congress that shares his beliefs may very well transform our country to such an extent that the changes made may be impossible to reverse.

If a Democrat president together with a Democrat congress appoint and approve liberal judges who serve for their lifetimes, the liberal Democrat legacy will continue for decades and long after any potential Republican resurgence. There are many examples throughout the country where such judges have over turned the will of a majority of voters on very skimpy grounds to advance a liberal agenda. In many cases liberal judges make law from the bench and over rule previous court decisions and legislative action. The power of the judiciary has increased far beyond the constitutional expectation of checks and balances among the three branches of government.

In another area of great importance federal government departments and presidential appointees of cabinet positions approved by a Democrat-controlled Senate would run the extensive array of government agencies and would be in charge of federal rule making. All government Departments: Health, Energy, Homeland Security, Interior, Commerce, Labor, Defense, Treasury, Agriculture, Veteran Affairs, Interior, Education, Transportation, Housing, and the office of Attorney General, would be in Democrat hands. I didn’t mention the State Department because it is difficult to see how much difference there would be between the current Department of State and the one run by a Democrat appointee, and in any case it is likely it would reflect the policy set by the Democrat president. These departments exert enormous independent authority over lives of Americans and will execute the socialist agenda of the Democrat president.

In addition to these top positions, cabinet Secretaries appoint a myriad of secondary department leadership positions that actually handle day-to-day management and they also exert enormous power over people’s lives. Then there are the FTC, FCC, and the thousands of other federal agencies. The FCC alone has significant authority over radio and TV and could enact rules to stifle conservative access to the air ways; remember the “fairness doctrine”? How about the EPA? This agency will lead any global warming initiative passed by congress and signed by whoever is president because both the Democrat and Republican nominees support the idea of controlling carbon dioxide emissions and how we can run our cars and electric power plants.

If you think dealing with hurricane Katrina was expensive, consider that according to The Heritage Foundation, the economic damage of the Lieberman-Warner bill would equal the cost of “660 hurricanes — 35 per year — for two decades.” The price tag of Lieberman-Warner is more than hundreds of hurricanes, and Democrat bureaucrats will have no trouble spending the Lieberman-Warner largess.

The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) says Lieberman-Warner would effectively raise taxes on Americans by more than $1 trillion over the next 10 years, and these policies would be in the hands of Democrat socialists under a Democrat president administration.

The Environmental Protection Agency has concluded that the Lieberman-Warner bill would result in huge annual reductions of U.S. gross domestic product and that gas prices would increase by $0.53 per gallon in the near term to $1.40 per gallon later on, just due to the changes required by Lieberman-Warner and not considering other cost factors. These increases are on top of the over $4 per gallon price of gasoline we pay today.

Climatologist Patrick Michaels thinks Lieberman-Warner would have virtually no effect on the climate, perhaps 0.013 degrees (Celsius) of “prevented” warming.

Also, let’s not forget “Hillary care”. If you remember the Hillary Clinton health-care plan of 1993, you will recall that under the façade of providing health care to everyone, it would have nationalized one-seventh of the American economy. The current version is really a universal health insurance scheme and is favored by the Democrat presidential nominee and congressional Democrats. Although the media may try to sell this bill as a solution to health care availability to all, it is actually an attempt to mandate by government how much and what kind of medical care we may have; a typical socialist dream.

Such is what is at stake in the November presidential election; do we hold our collective nose and vote for the ‘unconservative’ Republican, or do we risk sliding father down the socialist ramp to government control? I have clothespins for sale. Vincent Gioia is a retired patent attorney living in Palm Desert, California. His articles may be read at www.vincentgioia.com and he may be contacted at gioia@gte.net

As one of those pop-cultural non-conformist types, please indulge me while I go ahead and toss that stifling, mind-numbing muzzle called political correctness.

I’m going to dispense with the subtleties and point out what most are thinking but won’t say for fear of the inevitable “progressive” backlash (shhhh… they’re everywhere): So-called “same-sex marriage” is a counterfeit. It’s a fraud and not even a good one at that. If marriage is a Rembrandt, then the ridiculous and oxymoronic notion of “gay marriage” is a Rembrandt knock-off from the pages of Mad Magazine. It’s a silly novelty.

I know. I’m “mean-spirited.” But in light of the California Supreme Court’s recent opinion — which enigmatically manufactured a “constitutional right” to “same-sex marriage” out of thin air — I think we need to come back to earth for a moment. Mind you, re-entry into reality’s atmosphere will inevitably burn some folks.

When same-sex friendships (or more often, seconds-old acquaintances) are twisted and sexualized, practitioners of “the sin that dare not speak its name” are forced, at every level, to merely mimic the genuine article. They jump through a series of inelegant hoops to create a fantasy world wherein two people of the same gender clumsily imitate natural heterosexual pairings properly designed for procreation and the healthy rearing of children.

Even “gay sex” (male-male anal sodomy) is a crude, man-made imitation of the natural heterosexual reproductive process (only the fallen mind of man could concoct such depraved and foul behavior). Sadly, as millions of homosexuals have had to learn the hard way, this disordered, makeshift simulation of a natural biological process is coldly rejected by the very human biology it mocks.

As the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has illustrated time and again, unnatural behaviors beget natural consequences. Homosexual conduct — especially among males — creates an environment ripe for infectious disease and emotional and spiritual injury. This, by definition, is perversion. (”Perversion: Pathology. A change to what is unnatural or abnormal: a perversion of function or structure.” – Dictionary.com)

Homosexuality is a dead end. It’s emotionally, spiritually, and physically sterile. But it’s not surprising that, as with most sins, those trapped in the aptly named “queer” lifestyle desperately seek affirmation of their behavioral choices. Deep down, I believe most of us know when we’re doing something immoral, let alone unnatural and unhealthy, and so we want others to convince us otherwise. But that isn’t how the real world works. God calls on us to repent and believe in His Son. In return, he saves us from death, giving us the gift of eternal salvation.

Consider comedian and talk show host Ellen Degeneres. After recently announcing that she intended to “marry” her friend, Portia DeRossi (a woman), Ellen sought approval from presidential candidate John McCain, whom she had as a guest on her show.

She, along with so many other self-described “gays,” “lesbians,” and “bisexuals,” desperately want others — especially those who respect God’s natural design for human sexuality –— to join them in ignoring the pink elephant in the room: Homosexual conduct has always been and always will be, in every way, wrong. It is unhealthy, and it is sin.

I’ll admit it, Ellen is a sympathetic figure with a quick wit. I’m sure she’s a very nice person, and I don’t dislike her at all. But she’s playing with fire. Ellen compounds the sin of homosexuality by using the platform she’s been given to lead others astray. She guides her many adoring housewife fans into rebellion against God’s divine and explicit natural order by suggesting they celebrate sin and entertain, along with her, the “gay marriage” delusion.

Still, God will not be mocked. It’s the height of humanist hubris to believe that man (including judges) can radically redefine that which God has created. We can never sanctify that which natural law rejects and God expressly condemns. Especially when God Himself, out of sheer love for each of us, offers us so much more.

I’m sorry (well not really) for my lack of contrived “sensitivity,” but Ellen, sweetie (to borrow from a presidential candidate), no amount of wishful thinking or going through the motions will make your illicit same-sex “relationship” with Ms. DeRossi a “marriage.” You may get a piece of paper that says it is, but, in the eyes of God and most of the world, your counterfeit “marriage” will never be worth the paper it’s written on.

Again, I know. I’m a hateful, homophobic bigot … yada yada yada. But for those who disagree, your gripe isn’t with me; it’s with your sovereign Creator who loves each of us in spite of ourselves.

While on Ellen’s show, Senator McCain famously wished her “nothing but happiness.” I echo his sentiment. I wish Ellen nothing but happiness. But not the kind of quasi-happiness that comes in the temporal through sinful self-indulgence. Of that, God requires Ellen — and all of us — to repent. Happiness derived from sin inevitably rings hollow. If Ellen wants real happiness, the kind of happiness that’s accompanied by “the peace which surpasses all understanding,” I pray she’ll have a conversation with Jesus Christ. May we all follow the example of Moses who rejected the temporary “pleasure” of sin in Pharoah’s court in favor of peace beyond understanding, of doing what’s right even if it’s a lot more challenging.

To those of you who, like Ellen, may be planning a “same-sex marriage” in order to somehow affirm your “relationship,” know that you’re only fooling yourselves. True affirmation comes not from me, not from society, not from government, but from God alone — and He’s said, unequivocally, that none of us will get it unless we repent of our sin. The Good News is, He calls us to repent. He wants us to repent. He’ll give us the power to repent and to live for Him in the joy only He can provide.

But nonetheless, what a Pandora’s Box the California Supreme Court has opened. These four black-robed autocrats have engaged in the worst kind of judicial activism, abandoning their role as objective interpreters of the law and, instead, constructively legislating from the bench.

It’s absurd to suggest that the framers of the California state constitution could have ever imagined there’d be a day when so-called “same-sex marriage” would even be conceptualized, much less seriously considered. If anyone then had suggested the ridiculous notion, early Californians would have laughed their smocks off.

For now, however, the court’s ruling is relatively toothless. Governor Schwarzenegger is compelled by his oath of office to order officials to disregard the court’s opinion until either state lawmakers or “we the people,” through ballot initiative, actually legalize “gay marriage.” And if Schwarzenegger directs officials to start issuing “gay marriage” licenses before that, no county clerk has constitutional authority to do so absent a change in law. The court cannot change existing statutes, only issue an opinion as to the constitutionality of those statutes. And an opinion is just that, an opinion.

Nevertheless, since the court refused to stay its own opinion — as Liberty Counsel, the Alliance Defense Fund and attorneys general from nearly a dozen states had requested — and since Schwarzenegger and many county officials in California will, by all indications, submit to the court’s “supreme” will and begin issuing marriage licenses to homosexual duos on June 17, the court’s opinion will essentially be receiving a set of false teeth courtesy of the Governator. At that point, the court will have effectively imposed “gay marriage” on Californians in direct defiance of the express will of the people as overwhelmingly ratified with Proposition 22.

The court will have, for all practical purposes, “legalized” “same-sex marriage” (albeit through an arguably illegal process which paradoxically both invokes the constitutional “checks and balances” firewall and abuses it at the same time) because the other two branches of government will have waived the right of challenge.

Therefore, “same-sex marriage” will be treated as legal in California (whether or not it actually is) at every level of government. This “marriage” experiment from the Island of Dr. Moreau will have effectively, though not genuinely, been “legalized.”

Undoubtedly, out-of-state “gay” duos will then “marry” in California and head back to their home states demanding their “marriages” be given “full faith and credit.” Look forward to legal chaos. The California decision is the goose that laid the golden egg for Lambda Legal/ACLU types.

Still, hope remains. A measure that would amend California’s Constitution to maintain the definition of marriage as a union “between a man and a woman” has been certified and will be on the 2008 ballot. And there’s a good chance it’ll pass.

But more must be done. Anyone who ever said that the marriage “decision should be left up to the states” and that a federal constitutional marriage amendment was unnecessary, is now eating crow. It’s clear, now more than ever, that a federal constitutional amendment protecting marriage is the only foolproof means by which to ensure that legitimate marriage and family are not radically redefined into oblivion.

Matt Barber is one of the like-minded men with Concerned Women for America. He is an attorney concentrating in constitutional law and serves as CWA’s policy director for cultural issues.

You can’t help but defend Bill Clinton sometimes.  For whatever else was wrong with the man (and we’re not to forget there’s still a lot wrong with him, both intellectually and emotionally), there were times throughout the 1990s when his thoughtful opponents had to take his side.  No, dammit, Bill Clinton didn’t traffic cocaine as governor, and he didn’t impregnate prostitutes, and he had nothing to do with that list of people who “mysteriously died” during his presidency. 

Among principled anti-Clintons (I consider myself one), the thinking has always been that when someone is as psychologically stunted as Bill Clinton, there’s no moral cause in making things up about him.  Left to his own devices, he will shoot himself in the foot sooner or later, leaving the critic ample opportunity to explain the wound.  As far as that goes, Clinton has long been the gift that keeps on giving. 

But these days, Bill Clinton more gives the appearance of a somewhat sad, loosely hinged older uncle who just can’t get out of his own way.  Everyone is so familiar with his act that the assertion he has an act feels like a non-event, which in one reason why Todd Purdum’s article “The Comeback ID” (for Vanity Fair) is the most unimportant newsworthy item of the campaign season.  Too much of it reads like a town cryer yelling about last week’s news.  “Clinton chases women!  Clinton pardoned criminals and cronies!  Clinton hangs out with shady people!”  We know, Todd. 

Mayhill Fowler’s thoughtful, unbiased questioning of the former president (“Mr. President, what do you think about that hatchet job somebody did on you on Vanity Fair at the end of the race?”) sets two parameters, the first being that “The Comeback ID” was a hit piece, the second that the timing of its release was meant to benefit the Obama campaign.

To the first allegation I’ll admit a preference for clearly defined distinctions between those who report and those who opine; and the two classes should never cross.  Employing this standard, Purdum does lapse into opinion making, though not in any significant way until the last section, entitled “A Solitary Man,” where we start reading passages such as “this is Clinton’s most grievous sin, his steady refusal to take grown-up responsibility for the consequences of his own actions.”  The entire section carries on like that, managing to be both offsides and old hat.  If speculating after someone’s mental fitness is all that turns a simple, somewhat dull, too-long essay into a hit piece, then we hope for the day Mayhill Fowler will passionately declare that Bush on the Couch ought never have been published.

As to the second point, you’d be hard pressed to prove a conspiracy where a magazine of no consequence posts an article in hopes of somehow disrupting two primaries that were foregone conclusions before the polls opened, in a race that was decided weeks ago but remained an open question only because one of the candidates refused to concede reality.  This may feel like a put up job to a Clinton partisan, but so would any piece of media, mentioning either Clinton, that didn’t roughly translate into a marriage proposal.

 If the end commentary doesn’t lose you, the sourcing will.  There’s an awful lot of “a former longtime aide said” and “four former Clinton aides told me,” all of which would be bad enough if it weren’t eclipsed by Purdum’s extraordinary decision to print Hollywood gossip as background (in the rumor of Clinton and Gina Gershon,).  Under the hands of a competent editor, “The Comeback ID” would have been far better at half the length.  As it reads now, it’s merely a frivolous article about a frivolous man.

-By Warner Todd Huston

The Daily Herald, a Chicago area paper, waxed triumphant over the ascendancy of Barack Obama to the assumed position as the Democratic Party nominee for the presidency today. The article was filled with soaring pronouncements of the historical nature of this moment and what it means for America but, by the end of the piece, “Historic candidacy brings hope, obligation,” one gets the feeling that the Daily Herald is saying that if you don’t vote for Obama it’s because you’re a racist.

Of course, the Herald’s piece is centered on America’s past as a pretext to say that Obama might somehow deserve to become president because of our past history of oppression. Just as sure, the Herald completely ignores all the great strides in race relations since passage of the 1964 civil rights legislation that finally sent the country on the right course for race relations. Sadly, the Herald piece seems to assume the country hasn’t changed at all since Lincoln took the oath of office.

Noting that Obama said that his moment was a moment for America, the Herald took that further.

He did not say “Black America” or “White America.” Just “America.” And that is how it should be, this moment so long in coming for a nation founded on the principle that “All men are created equal” even as it enslaved some, disenfranchised others, and restricted for too long many men and women from actively participating in the political process that ensures our nation’s strength.

Of course, Obama didn’t say “black America or white America,” because he is smarter than that. But, this paragraph completely ignores the great strides this country has made in the last 45 years. Why is that, one wonders?

The Herald goes from Lincoln’s dream of “a new birth of freedom” to Martin Luther King, Jr.’s later “I have a dream” dream, right to Obama taking the Democratic Party nomination for president as if nothing else happened. Apparently, Condi Rice, Colin Powell, Justice Thomas… even Justice Thurgood Marshall never happened. American blacks went from slavery, to Jim Crow to sudden freedom with a Barack nomination with no other stops in between in this meme. This sort of rhetoric ignores nearly 50 years of advancement in race relations. It ignores the fact that American blacks fill high positions in entertainment, sports, business, government, and education the country over. In fact, in every single area of American life, black faces are seen as leaders and movers and shakers.

It is entirely disingenuous of the media to act as if we’ve gone from Jim Crow to Barack Obama in one fell swoop. But, it does fill the need of the media to over simplify the nature of American race relations and to keep blacks in thrall to past slights, unable to move philosophically into a future they already inhabit in reality.

Folks, this is the sort of starry eyed, triumphialism we will be seeing more and more as this candidacy rolls on. You can bet that this media narrative will trump about anything that McCain can come up with. We have a similar recent example of the social effects of the divide between the races in America to use as a bellweather of what we are about to be faced with here. We have but to remember what happened when the large portion of blacks in this country believed that O.J. Simpson was “innocent” merely because blacks are “oppressed by whites” and not by any reading of the actual evidence. With that bias in mind, Barack will be hailed as deserving to win to “right the wrongs” of our past and not because he is worthy of the office. This cultural divide is a result of the media’s negligence in reporting on how far we’ve come and its constant fanning of the flames of past slights.

After recounting America’s racist past, the Herald goes on to make it seem as if we still haven’t dealt with any of it. Without naming names, the Herald claimed that some people “invoked racism and sexism” during the campaign so far.

But there were those who invoked racism and sexism with incendiary rhetoric, stirring emotions and discontent we clearly still need to address as a nation. Such discussion is paramount to true equality for all as we move forward, but nothing can take away from the historic precedents set by Clinton’s primary candidacy and by Obama’s ultimate achievement.

Yes, Daily Herald, and most of it came from the campaign of the very candidate you are lauding, Barack Obama! Obama’s surrogates like Wright and Father Pflaeger have been the ones to ramp up the racism drama, not anyone else.

Remember, Herald, that Obama could not possibly have gotten where he is right now without the support of millions of white voters. I’d dare say that this singular fact, that millions of whites freely and happily voted for this black candidate, makes the lie to the Herald’s claim that we haven’t “addressed” racism as a nation.

And then comes the Daily Herald’s final hectoring of the American electorate.

The obligation is on each of us to participate as the presidential campaign moves to the next level. Learn as much as you can about each party’s candidate, assess them without regard to race or religion but by ability, and then make sure you are registered so you can vote.

Once again, the Herald seems to feel that America needs to be reminded that we shouldn’t vote based on “race or religion” — as if this warning is needed. The primaries themselves have proven wrong the Herald’s assumption that everyone is a racist. And votes on that basis.

Like I said, be ready for this to be the media’s meme. You are a racist if you vote against Obama. Obama’s candidacy is the only good thing that has happened to race relations since MLK strode the Earth. Race relations have not changed in America since 1964. These are the things we will be slammed with until November.

The media will tell us over and over that we deserve no credit for the long way we’ve come since slave traders bought and sold blacks in America. Obama is a sudden dawn of enlightenment that will ignore all the hard work done by millions of Americans prior to his candidacy.

In effect, the media agrees with Michelle Obama. They have never bee proud of America until Barack became a candidate for president either.