Saturday, August 23, 2008 - Posts
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The poor Old Capitol Blues and BBQs festival—it had the dubious honor of competing today, adjacent to the old state capitol grounds in Springfield, Ill., with the Obama-Biden rally. It didn't fare well, at least during the rally—the barbecue vendors looked like they were suffering as much in the Midwest heat as everyone else, but with the added insult of a lack of customers. Crowds amassed despite sweltering temperatures to see the rally; far fewer came for ribs and music, even though the festival is an annual event and had been planned for a year.
But really, it seemed to me a metaphor for the economy that Biden was busy espousing on (his zinger about McCain not being able to decide which of his seven kitchen tables to sit at and worry whether or not he could pay his bills did get a good response). Few wanted to pay the $5 to get in the festival, it seemed, even for a sight line of the speech that wouldn't leave you packed in like a sardine on an extremely muggy day. (The festival literally backed up to the press tent at the rally. You could see the stage from a distance; you just couldn't get into the Obama event from there.) At first I thought it was just Springfieldians being thrifty—I grew up here, so I know the reluctance of the local population to pay a cover charge. But as I ducked into a restaurant to get water during the speech, I saw that not only were people glued to the big screens showing the speech just outside—when I first went in, you could hear a pin drop—they were focused on the economy; people shouted every time there was a mention of fixing it.
Festival attendance may have suffered from the heat, all right—it was 90 degrees and humid, and who wants to eat ribs in that weather?—but I couldn't help but think it was eerily symbolic of the haves and have-nots Biden was contrasting, even though the festival's proximity was accidental, to be able to pay to see the speech from a less-sardinelike setting.
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It's not just the foreign policy chops; he brings some blood (and flab!) and jaw-flapping to a sometimes too-cool-for-school campaign. Voters actually liked it when Bush tripped over his own tongue; when he failed in his battle with blurting, they could relate, and that is the beauty of the Biden choice: He's got the smarts, the experience, and without question could be president. (In fact, watching the Democratic debates during primary season, I always thought that a viewer who came to the exercise cold would have assumed Biden was the front-runner.) But he also brings the humanity that Democrats have not always seen as important. It is.
Though no one has a more heart-breaking personal narrative than he—his first wife and their baby daughter died in a car accident soon after he was elected to the Senate—he sure never talked about it during primary season, showing an Irish Catholic restraint that will be familiar to a lot of the voters Obama needs to win over. And his working-class roots aren't just nice; they're why I fully expect him to know how to play rough and be plenty comfortable in the role of bad cop, taking on the Republican ticket in a way the candidate himself cannot. A guy who commutes home on public transpo every day taking on Mr. Can't Keep Track of His Houses? As we say in the Democratic Party, pas de probleme.
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I've sat through too many Senate hearings to be excited about Joe Biden, of the long pontificating question (example), for vice president. Obama-Biden: a ticket of orators. I know that HIllary—or rather, Bill—would have been the snake in the presidential sleeping bag, as Slate's David Plotz said months ago. An impossible choice, the rationalist in me keeps reminding myself. But if Obama had taken the gamble anyway, I would have trusted his judgment in making that bet. And I'd be feeling one part elated and one part hugely nervous this morning. Instead of vaguely let down. And I wasn't even a Hillary supporter.
Yes, there is a sound argument for choosing an experienced white man, a party establishmentarian, a foreign policy expert. And it's nice that he's Catholic and has blue-collar origins. But mostly I hope this team knows how to fight, and fight hard. Watching the McCain ad that's already putting Biden's words to work against him, and then the dueling ads about McCain's can't-count-them houses and Obama's Rezko house deal, it seems to me that the Republicans are out-duking the Democrats. Denver will undoubtedly produce plenty of smartly staged smiles. I hope Obama-Biden also proves quickly that they're smart about showing their angry side.
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