A slight reconsidering: Super Tuesday, Episode IV Revisited

Perhaps I let my temper get the better of me. Perhaps I've dealt with too many people from other parts of the country who, as soon as I mentioned the state of my birth, started treating me like a less intelligent version of Forrest Gump or an extra from Deliverance, or senile old tour guide bastards who thought that "Alabamer" (his pronunciation, not mine) was a foreign country, and then thought he was funny when he said it. Perhaps I'm tired of yet another defense contractor trying to be another Halliburton and believing that the United States Air Force is a wholly-owned subsidiary of theirs, and then getting upset when they lost the contract because of deficiencies in their offering. Perhaps I'm even tired of the type of cynical pandering for votes and speech before research and thought that, too often, serves as a cheap substitute for the type of statecraft that made our nation great. Perhaps I'm tired of being viewed by the rest of the nation as some sort of Jerry Springer/Gone With the Wind/Flowers In the Attic/Bull Connor-esque reject because I had the audacity to be born in the South. If someone's treated like crap for too many years, they either start to believe it, or they start to get damned angry. Guess which one I chose.

Don't get me wrong. I'm still very, very irritated with the junior Senator from Illinois, and doubly so with Ms. Pelosi and First Lady Clinton for their incendiary remarks. One would think that all of them would know that Senator Brownback, whenever he speaks, is probably wrong. One would think that aircraft for which 60% of the labor and materials come from the United States would still be a boon to American jobs. I was wrong.

In the end, however, I found myself asking a simple question: Is my disgust with Obama greater than my utter hatred for Hillary and McCain? Considering this is his first major misstep, once I simmered down, I realized that the answer was obvious. In spite of his embrace of symbolism over substance, he still has far fewer ethics concerns and other downsides than either of the two remaining major candidates. So, for now, I will continue to support the audacity of his hype. But know this: I have absolutely no loyalty to any politician, no matter how polished they look, or how well they can speak. After all, Adolf Hitler, a man whose name became synonymous with some of the deepest depravities of human evil, was one of the most influential orators of all time, and we all know how much of a fucking nightmare he was. So congratulations, Senator Obama. You're the best of what's left, maybe, this year.