But, MAN, he don't say nothin' specific!

By Joseph Walther

I’ve listened to many speakers throughout my life; a few were absolutely terrible; most have been OK; a few more have been downright good; and two have been positively inspiring. This column is about one of the two in the latter category.

All good writers do a lot of listening. While all listeners are not good writers, I do the best I can with what I hear.

For well over three-years, I’ve participated in a couple of well-moderated forums where the topics vary considerably depending on what’s hot at the time.

For the past three weeks, the hot topic has been speeches, Barack Obama’s speeches in particular.

Those who have heard him speak—at least the ones who have emailed or called me—tend to classify his speeches as either highly inspirational or inspirational but devoid of specifics.

One emailer, Mark Gingrich, wrote; “Obama is an outstanding speaker but he doesn’t go into any specifics.” Another emailer, Jack Nubenski, wrote; “This man (Barack Obama) could motivate the devil to turn good! He’s got my vote.”

So far, the emails I’ve received fall into a variation of two basic themes that share a common agreement, but with a major qualification. A big time qualification, indeed.

The common agreement is his unquestioned inspirational ability and the fact that the Senator comes off as politically atypical; a person who does NOT sound like a politician.

The major qualification is that some people knock him for his lack of specifics while others do not seem to care at all about the lack of specifics.

Here’s the interesting part, though. The universal theme of those emails from people identifying themselves as Conservative is, “fabulous speaker but non-specific.”And, to this group, they see his lack of specifics as a serious flaw.

Those identifying themselves as Liberals, on the other hand, also think he’s unbelievably inspirational but don’t seem to care about his lack of specific remedies.

I’ve heard him speak on television and in person. If you’ve heard him speak on TV and think he’ inspirational, you’d be absolutely mesmerized if you heard in person.

Terms like captivating, motivating, and inspiring don’t begin to capture the mood in his audiences. It’s a truly amazing experience to watch his audiences as they literally fixate themselves on both his presence and his every word.

Personally, I think Senator Obama IS a motivating speaker of the highest caliber. I also acknowledge the charges that he does not get into specifics and that that he lacks some experience. But, there’s no question that he’s an atypical politician.

On the other hand, he seems well informed about most issues and he demonstrates a remarkable degree of intellectual curiosity.

Combined with a knack for surrounding himself with highly qualified advisors—both PRO and CON issue wise—his positive qualifications seem to outweigh his shortcomings and elevate his status to that of a serious contender.

I think he purposely fails to mention specifics and relishes in being politically atypical. Furthermore, I think he has surrounded himself with a superb campaign management team.

His campaign manger knows how to run a campaign effectively, but even more important, Senator Obama knows EXACTLY what he’s doing as a viable candidate.

The best presidents we’ve had as a nation have been those who have been non-specific relative what they’re going to “fix.” They were not specific because they knew that, alone, they couldn’t fix ANYTHING, let alone micro-manage specifics.

They’ve always seemed to know that our real underlying problems have had more to do with poor coalition-building on the part of its presidents, than a mere lacking in the ability to “fix” things at the micro level.

The main theme of Obama’s campaign is CHANGE. He’s said so from the beginning of the primaries. And, so far, he’s shown a potential to create this change through a means not seen in Washington, DC for the past twenty-years: UNITY.

He certainly has the oratory wherewithal. Combining it with his intellectual curiosity and general knowledge on most issues gives him a better shot than all of the others at creating the changes that WE, the people, mean by change.

This country has been in the throes of gridlock for many years. It began to increase in intensity with George H. W. Bush’s Administration. It increased significantly with the beginning of the first Clinton Administration.

By the end of Clinton’s second term, it was rapidly headed toward critical mass. Throughout George W. Bush’s two Administrations it’s reached absolute critical mass.

Blaming gridlock on the Executive Branch is easy to do, especially if you dislike the President. It might feel good, but it’s stupid. All it does in is throw the country into a state of political paralysis.

The Executive Branch, by Constitutional mandate, is only ONE of the three SEPARATE branches in our system of government. And, while important, it’s not the MOST important.

The Legislative Branch, not the Executive, runs the country. Our legislators enact the laws of the land and set the rules by which the country functions and the manner in which the Executive Branch operates. No matter WHAT the Executive Branch may want to do, Legislators have the power to legislatively hold them accountable.

The Judicial Branch, though a seemingly endless maze of federal and state courts, is supposed to ensure the legality and ultimate constitutionality of what the other two branches do.

However, replacing interpretation with activism relative to our Constitution only throws more sand into the gears of government.

Even though all three branches of government are independent, the entire system falls apart when any single branch fails in its constitutional responsibilities. And, RIGHT NOW, all three branches are failing miserably.

The current Executive Branch seems to believe that it can do whatever it wants, whenever it wants and has proceeded to act exclusively in accordance with its OWN interpretation of the Constitution.

They’ve truly made convenience the imperative while effectively relegating truth to the status of a mere option. They’ve raised obfuscation to an art form of unprecedented proportions, while the Legislative gang has done nothing to interfere.

Meanwhile, all out pure partisan warfare has rendered the entire Legislative Branch politically impotent to a point that NOTHING of any real meaning gets done.

The gang on Capitol Hill has permitted the partisan extremes to hijack the entire process; replacing viable non-partisan issue-oriented dialog with partisan positional agreement at all costs. Positional veracity, or lack thereof, no longer means anything.

In other words, unanimous party agreement is now far more important than it is for both parties to test the effectiveness of various party proposals and work together to reach workable compromises.

The reason that little—much of the time NOTHING—gets done in Washington is unprecedented GRIDLOCK caused mostly by the United States Senate filibuster rules.

Under these rules, as few as forty senators, representing as little as 11% of the population, can bring the entire legislative process to a screeching halt for months on end.

Both sides are guilty of it, too. When the Republicans were in control, the Democrats had a filibuster orgy. The Democrats are in control now and the Republicans, having stocked up on plenty of lubrication, are making up for lost time in a monumental way.

Continuing at the present rate, this current gang of “Rs” will have broken all filibuster records by doing so a total of 140 times. And, this is ONLY during THIS term!

Presidential candidates can give all of the rousing, inspirational speeches they want. They can lay out their agendas with details galore as to how they’ll solve specific problems. But, none of it means a damn thing.

Write this down! A United States President cannot solve a single problem if our nationally elected legislators refuse of do their jobs. The United States Congress has to be willing to forego partisan bickering and LEGISLATE. Get it?

TV talk-show sages of either political persuasion, Conservative or Liberal, can call it whatever they wish and continue to blame the other side until pigs fly.

As well, political analysts representing ALL forms of media outlets, can pontificate, prognosticate, and predict outcomes until the end of time. It won’t solve a thing until everyone starts calling this crap what it is: OBSTRUCTIONISM.

Until then, none of the candidate-defined proposals—including the minutest of specifics—have a snowball’s chances in hell of succeeding.

I will vote—even to the point of self-herniation while racing to the polls—for the first candidate who demonstrates an ability to replace obstructionism with meaningful political dialog among our national legislators.

Neither will I care a hoot about the gender, sexual orientation, religious affiliation—or NONE—age, race, nor political party affiliation of such a candidate!

If a President can accomplish this, delving into specifics won’t be necessary. The Legislative Branch will effectively deal with the specifics. And, once they begin doing this, the Executive and Judicial Branches will fall right into line, just as the Constitution intended.

At present, the only candidate showing any potential for doing this is Barack Obama. Additionally, he’s the ONLY candidate who has not claimed to have any secret solutions relative to any specific issues. And, he most certainly possesses the ability to inspire throngs of people.

IF he receives his party’s nomination, and IF the country elects him, and IF he can continue to inspire the people of this nation to move off of their collective butts with the same fervor he’s inspiring people to come out and support his candidacy, he may just be the ticket we need to get ourselves, as a nation, back on tract.

We shall see. Have a great week.

Joseph Walther is a freelance writer and publisher of The True Facts. Copyright laws apply to all material on this site. Send your comments. Just click here.