She’s referring, of course, to her opponent in the Democratic primary, Mr. Obama, who is prone to wax poetic.
He goes on and on about the need to unify the country. About how we have never stopped being a great nation, but have just lost our way for a while. About how our people are our greatest asset.
Most often than not, behind poetry there is vision.
That is not to say that Mrs. Clinton doesn’t have a vision. But if she can’t effectively communicate it, her vision is of little consequence. If she can’t inspire the average Joes and Janes that comprise our nation, then nothing will change.
Change does not happen by mandate from the top down. It happens by consensus, and not the consensus of the House or the Senate. It happens by the consensus of the people.
As in “We the People, in order to form more perfect Union..”
Neither candidate is substantively different from the other. Their goals and dreams are almost identical. As President, either would be almost indistinguishable from the other.
Except when it comes down to words, those long-neglected jewels that we’ve grown so used to being thrown around like so much chaff. After two terms of words meaning anything other than what they mean they don’t mean, an eloquent orator takes us all a little aback.
We’ve all forgotten about the power of the spoken word when properly employed.
After too many years of a President stumbling over what is supposed to be his native language, a candidate that not only understands grammar, but also the nuance of words—the shadows and light that can play across a well-turned phrase, the subtle differences between words that mean the same thing, the elegance of the language—surprises us.
We’ve forgotten the language of hope.
After living with the language of fear, hope is like a foreign tongue. It’s a brave new world that we have to be re-born into, just as surely as an evangelical Christian is re-born into the resurection.
Mrs. Clinton is right that words won’t put money in my pocket. But she leaves off the rest: words that motivate are always better than words that dictate. Any candidate must know that any specific plan they have has little to no chance of making it through Congress and coming out whole and pure. Passing any legislation is a matter of compromise.
It’s a matter of having an ideal and working to get as close to it as you can. It’s a matter of having a big picture that defines your policy much more than having too many specific policy points that won’t fly after the elections are over.
Mrs. Clinton, I think, denigrates Mr. Obama when she says he’s all about words.
Words matter, perhaps more than she realizes.
It is not sound and fury, signifying nothing, as she would seem to suggest.
Words matter.
They are the fundamental connection we have between each other as human beings. And the ability to use them effectively should not be criticized, but rather lauded.
Like a bird on a wire or a cat on a hot tin roof, I have to make a move. One way or the other. The wire’s getting ready to short, and the roof’s just too damned hot. Neither one's a real comfortable place to sit, so I'm getting ready to fly, getting ready to jump or maybe both at the same time.
At this point, I’m leaning towards ideas and ideals over policy talking points.
Words have power, more so than Mrs. Clinton wants to acknowledge. And so does the politics of hope.
It’s a politics that can’t be captured in policy detail or 10 point plans. It requires a broader vision that will then define those policy details and 10 point plans. Not the other way around.
I believe in the politics of hope. The politics of vision. The politics that refuses to let go of idealism. The politics that starts with the premise that we are a great nation that can do anything it sets it mind to and goes on to use that power judiciously. To use that power for the people and not against them.
These days, it takes courage to talk about hope. To articulate a belief that our greatest days are still to come. That we can resume our position as the greatest country in the history of the world. That we can get back to the day-to-day life of being free, living without vanity wars, advancing rather than constraining civil liberties, and getting back to business that has been long neglected for too long.
Those are all tasks that require vision as well as political connections and maneuvering. Unless you can articulate one, you have no way of getting where you want to go. You might know stops along the trip, but if you don't know where you're going, you'll never get there.
And unless something changes, I’ve finally figured out who I’m going to vote for.
Wanna take a guess?
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