Week in review, May 19 - 23.

It's been an active week in news and I've been busy, not blogging. Here are some things that have caught my attention:

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It's true that Hillary Clinton won a big victory in Tuesday's Kentucky primary. It's also true that Barack Obama's simultaneous double-digit victory in Oregon is nothing to sneeze at. But even Kentucky could not revive the hopeless Clinton campaign.

In recent weeks, we've been talking about mathematical impossibilities. I'll grant that there was a certain statistical probability factor in what has defined "impossible." Sure, it was theoretically possible that literally no one would vote for Barack Obama. But now, Obama has earned a majority of the total available pledged delegates. So, there are three remaining primaries: Puerto Rico on June 1, and Montana and South Dakota on June 3. Even if Obama gets zero votes and Clinton gets 100% of the votes, she cannot overtake his lead. This is BIG news for the Obama campaign!

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In related news, Mark McKinnon, a top advisor to John McCain, has stepped down from his post on the campaign. It has nothing to do with a sudden controversy, a poorly chosen remark, or even any negativity toward John McCain. But long ago, before anyone believed that someone other than Hillary Clinton would earn the nomination, McKinnon made a vow; now, he is sticking to it. Last summer, McKinnon refused to work on a campaign against Barack Obama. Now that Obama is the inevitable Democratic nominee, it is also inevitable that there will be negative attacks against him. McKinnon disagrees with Obama on a variety of policy issues, but has great respect for him and refuses to be involved in such negative attacks.

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In sad news, on Tuesday, Ted Kennedy announced his diagnosis of a malignant brain tumor. He is one of those omnipresent political figures who has served in the Senate for so long that it's just about impossible for me to imagine the Senate without him.

Often called a "lion of the Senate," he has literally been a senior Senator for longer than I've been alive. He seems somehow immortal to me, like a permanent part of the U. S. Government. Maybe it isn't the same for those who are at least in their 50s, at least old enough to remember him being a young guy and possibly old enough to remember him being elected. But for younger political activists, it's one of those symbolic acknowledgments of mortality. I wish him the best.

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In news relating only to "lions of the Senate," there is Robert Byrd, who has actually served in the Senate for half a century. On Monday, Byrd announced his endorsement of Barack Obama for President.

The amazement here is in the headlines. This opener from Newsweek makes for good news: "Sen. Robert C. Byrd, a former member of the Ku Klux Klan and a one-time opponent of civil rights legislation, endorsed Barack Obama for the Democratic presidential nomination on Monday."

It's also fair to say that Byrd has come a long way in more than 90 years of life. I recall, when reading Obama's political memoir, The Audacity of Hope, he wrote warmly of Byrd and of their conversation about the Klan. As a young, white man in the earlier part of the twentieth century in rural West Virginia, membership in the Klan was more like a way of life than an agenda and Byrd called the experience his biggest regret. Byrd was a Democrat from the era when Democrats dominated the politics of rural whites, Appalachians and southerners, before the Democratic party acquired terms such as "social liberalism" and "progressivism." It was the new Democrats of the 1960s who fought on behalf of civil rights legislation, not the elders of Byrd's era.

And for this, I'll embrace the support of a man like Robert Byrd. Whatever his experiences in the past, however elderly he may be, it goes to show that progress lies in the ability to change, to assess and reconsider your thoughts and decisions of the past. Social progressivism is not necessarily a product of the young rebelling against their parents and ushering in a wave of social changes as their elders die, although that certainly plays a role in it. I won't say that Robert Byrd is wholly defined by his prior membership in the KKK or his prior opposition to civil rights legislation, no matter how much it is highlighted in the name of good news reporting. It's just an example to be embraced.

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On Friday, Hillary Clinton has made some of her most unfortunate remarks yet, citing Robert Kennedy's 1968 assassination as a reason for her to continue her campaign.

The last thing that we need is someone - especially a fellow Democrat - planting ideas in some psychopath's head that it's a good time to take a shot at Barack Obama (literally). No, Clinton did NOT suggest it. But she speculated about it by implication. There are some people in the world who are just mentally imbalanced enough to think that that in itself is a suggestion. And some of them might even direct it at Clinton, herself. This primary has already involved more Secret Service protection than is the norm, due to fears of hate crimes based on race or gender. And there are people out there who are quite literally psychopathic and incapable of thinking rationally.

Furthermore, it was downright insensitive for several reasons. First, with the anniversary of RFK's assassination just around the corner and the Kennedy family already undergoing a stressful week with Ted Kennedy's cancer diagnosis, the casualness was callous. Second, as much as anyone might not like a politician, this is a democracy and they don't deserve to die. That's what activism and voting is for. If Obama were to be assassinated after securing the nomination, we wouldn't suddenly not have a candidate from the Democratic party. The party would assure that we have the opportunity to find a new candidate. Third, we already have enough problems with hate crimes in this country. Fourth, there is a strong connection between RFK's involvement in the civil rights movement in 1968 and Obama being the first formidable black candidate of a major political party. (That isn't to discount the formidability of Clinton as a prominent female candidate of a major political party and in either Obama's or Clinton's case, it should speak volumes about the success of both the civil rights and the women's movements of the 1960s. Better yet, it forces the majority of voters to choose on the basis of qualifications, rather than taking the easy route in the novelty factor of "the black candidate" or "the female candidate.") RFK's legacy is still alive and we can respect the historical impact that he made in his short lifetime. We can also hope that the realization of his legacy - seen today in Obama - does not befall the same fate. There is something to be said for martyrdom, but in theory, martyrdom leads to progress.

Keith Olbermann's special comment on the May 23rd edition of Countdown excellently summarizes why Clinton's latest comment is the culmination of reasons why she should not be President:



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I just found a blog for Democratic Politics in Indiana, Blue Indiana.