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opinionAlso in this section:
Endara Hill, Father Gallego in his church and his community E. Jackson, Richardson's the best in a strong Democratic field Bernal, A disgraceful spectacle Sirias, A debt to a great teacher N. Jackson, Take back the night Silkwood, OAS Secretary General Insulza
Richardson's the best of a strong Democratic field by Eric Jackson There will be a bunch of other televised debates to come, maybe some people coming in and surely some people dropping out, probably a scandal or two and surely a lot of superficial things to be said --- and then the really scandalous and superficial stuff, the candidates' TV ads, will kick in. At this point in the 2008 US presidential race, however, the Democrats have a lot of reason for optimism. The Republicans have 10 candidates and will probably get another one. Only a couple of them, John McCain and Rudy Giuliani, seem to have any leadership qualities at all and each of these has big problems with parts of the GOP base. In a general election Giuliani's essential arrogant creepiness would come to the fore and the Democrats' nominee would surely wipe the floor with him. Mitt Romney would have to brush off the dust from rolling around, put away the rubber snake and start talking a different tongue once nominated, so as to take on a liberal coloration in what's not likely to be a good year for Republicans. McCain is the guy that the Democrats ought to fear the most. But the party that led America to war for a lie and then lost that war is and will be in a bad way. Being a man of the left, my most natural attraction on the Democratic side would be Dennis Kucinich and I'm naturally suspicious of corporate lawyer Hillary Clinton. There are, however, mitigating circumstances for both of those gut reactions. First of all, although Hillary did her time as a corporate lawyer and shows no sign of second thoughts about failed "mainstream" policies like Plan Colombia and the so-called Washington Consensus about globalization on multinational corporations' terms, she also did her time as a people's lawyer with the Children's Defense Fund and she's enough of a pragmatic chameleon that she'll likely jump off of the most odious bandwagons that her husband's administration drove. We'll get some indication of that when we see if she backs a free trade agreement with the death squad administration in Colombia. I watched Kucinich when he was mayor of Cleveland way back when, as I lived within TV signal range of northern Ohio. I would not be surprised if the same character assassins who went after him then are now working on the Hugo Chávez vilification crew. Corporate hoodlums tried to steal Cleveland's public electric utility, splitting the Democratic base in that city by playing the most cynical of race cards, narrowly falling short on a move to recall Kucinich and ultimately making him a one-termer. Years later Cleveland consumers were able to look around and compare their electric bills with those that their neighbors in the suburbs were paying and reach far more positive conclusions about former mayor Kucinich than they had back then. But still, "skilled administrator" is not the image that the name Kucinich evokes. He was a young man back then and surely he has become calmer and wiser with age and experience, and he was only mayor for two years, so I don't take Kucinich's present administrative abilities as disproven, but rather as unproven. That's the same big problem I have with most of the rest of the Democratic field and one of the lesser problems I also have with most of the Republican candidates. The presidency is an administrative post, requiring some substantially different skills than are required in legislative jobs like senator or representative. Although the first thing I consider when evaluating a presidential hopeful is whether she or he is going to lead us into a war that ought to be avoided, the next thing on my list of questions is the one about administrative competence. In the debates Bill Richardson and Barack Obama in particular have often come across as "policy wonks" whose presentations have too much subtle nuance to inspire many emotions. That will not do when the task is motivating the party faithful to work hard and the wavering voters to show up at the polls with a firm determination to throw the Republicans out of the White House. I take that from Obama as a sign of the man's brilliance, as a demonstration that although his administrative experience comes mainly from a few years managing a nonprofit church-related group as a young man, he understands the challenge of the job he seeks. The message of the Obama campaign is not "vote for the brother," but that the senator who once led the Harvard Law Review is in every way prepared to lead the United States of America. William Blaine Richardson III, or to put it in the Spanish style of three-quarters of his ancestors, William B. Richardson López-Collada, leaves no doubt about that issue. Bill Richardson's a two-term governor of New Mexico, re-elected in a landslide. He was US Secretary of Energy, the American ambassador to the United Nations and a seven-term US representative. To be a successful candidate Richardson needs to raise more money and come up with some more rousing stump speeches, but he's already demonstrated an aptitude to do the sort of work that a president does. My political views are such that I'm going to have certain disagreements with some of the policies that any of the Democratic presidential hopefuls espouse on the campaign trail or carry out in the White House. It was that way with Bill Clinton and would be with Hillary. But I'd be comforted by the prospect of positive changes were any one of the eight significant Democratic candidates --- or Al Gore, were he to jump into the race --- the nominee. This is a strong field, and not only when compared with the truly awful incumbent. Bush Jr. is clearly the worst president in my lifetime, far worse than even Richard Nixon. Bad ideas have been carried out to their disastrous conclusions in his administration and the present historical juncture calls not only for damage control but for better ideas and new directions. Who has the best ideas? That's the main reason why there are debates among the presidential primary candidates. Several of the candidates, including Bill Richardson, impress me on that score. None of them would lead me to consider a Republican alternative or a third party protest vote in a general election. Who's best qualified to lead the country? Among the present batch of Democratic hopefuls, that would be Bill Richardson.
Also in this section:
Endara Hill, Father Gallego in his church and his community E. Jackson, Richardson's the best in a strong Democratic field Bernal, A disgraceful spectacle Sirias, A debt to a great teacher N. Jackson, Take back the night Silkwood, OAS Secretary General Insulza Unclassified Ads | Calendar | Outdoors | Dining | Science | Sports | Español | Front Page Archives | Wappin' Radio Show | Just Music
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