Though we're in the middle of the most exciting political race I can ever remember, it's time for this blog to sign off for good.

I want to express my appreciation to those of you who have come by so frequently and made this an interesting place for me to poke around.

As I look back on this, my first and only blog, it has become clear to me that I had a lot of room to grow and mature as a person and as a blogger.  I think some of that has happened and some is still to come.

Thanks for the support, the correction, the sparring and the introspection of this journey. 

Nothing bad has happened that's caused me to turn this off, just a realization of a need to clear some of the past misdirected thoughts and foolish posts and begin fresh in another venue.  In short, it's time for me to put off some of my poltical-ness and fully embrace my Christianity.  It's time to shelve my critical commentary and use my time and energy to build people up.

As I delve deeper into my faith and into being a father of teenagers and a community leader, I will carry with me the memories, the lessons and the thrill of sharing and shaping thoughts in this virtual debate center.  I will, of course, stop by and read Tallpockets, Whit's Whittlings, Azron, notacynic and others.  And I will be praying every day for the success of our next President, whoever he or she may be.

God Bless each of you.  It has been a wonderful ride.

sharp (Tim)

I just caught Senator Obama's response to the Pastor Wright speech before the National Press Club. I really didn't want to say anything about Pastor Wrights speech because I would have been very condemning.  The truth is, I was shocked at the arrogance and the bitterness and the lack of any willingness to be accountable for his own words.  I thought that performance might do in Barack Obama.  Now, it just may be his Sister Soulja moment.

Barack comes across so incredibly well.  He certainly gives the appearance of sincerity.  And I walked away today feeling much better about him than I have before.

I appreciate that he stands by his friends.  But at some point, you have to make judgments and he made one there.

The Pastor Wright situation threw the door open wide for this country to talk about race relations from both white and black perspectives.  But that door slammed shut so fast it took the air out of the room.  Until yesterday.  Pastor Wrights speech before the press club drew such vigorous approval from the black guests in the audience that we can no longer deny that he's right - his speech, opinions and attitudes are a part of the black church experience.  Will someone please stand up and condemn racism on both sides in this country?  Then we can begin to make it better.

Barack did just that.  He's no apologist for white crimes and he shouldn't be.  But he seems to understand that indulging the kind of race baiting and blatant bigotry of Pastor Wright is adding fuel to the fire, not water. 

I was duly impressed.  Tremendously impressed with Barack Obama today.

sharp

...some of the declarations made by talking heads.   It seems like they have come to agreement that Obama was "tired" last night in his post-PA election speech.  He seemed pretty good to me.

I don't envy the Democratic Party for having to decide between these two.  Both have tremendous strengths and both have glaring weaknesses (as most do).  But it seems like the worst thing of all for the party to have this thing just keep going on.  Not only are they spending millions upon millions of dollars, but they're spending them to bash one another.  And not only that, but the longer they go in this internal fight, the more folks will feel like their candidate has been stolen and they won't support the nominee if it's not their guy (gal).

Tough primaries create tough candidates, though.  And for a while it looked like all of Obama's weaknesses and vulnerabilities were going to be plastered on the airwaves in September and October instead of March and April. 

In the end it could still work out well for the Democrats.  But John McCain has to be feeling pretty lucky right now.

sharp

Obama is just now being asked about his associations with Ayers (Weather underground bomber whose house was the setting for the launch of Obama's state senate campaign) and Tony Rezko, who is currently on trial for something or other at a felony level.

Interesting is how I would describe his relationship to each man and further the way that he has characterized it.  He would appear to have us think he barely knew the men.  Remember Jeremiah Wrights pastoral rants against white America?  Obama never noticed them.  Then only noticed one or two.  Then when pressed, said he knew of them but didn't agree with them.

Rezko bought a piece of land next door to the Obama's for a huge amount which (allegedly) led the way for Obama to buy his house for a song.  It's probably fairly common deceit in Washington circles, but he's supposed to be different.  Ayers is the unrepentant bomber of the Pentagon and other pretty well known spots as I understand it.

But more interesting than these relationships is the difficulty the left wing of the Democratic Party is having in handling it.  Some want to ignore it completely.  Among them are those who want to crucify anyone who asks about them - left, right or center.  There are others who tend to the Hillary tactic of blaming the Republicans (remember "vast right-wing conspiracy"? - except the real wing in that case left some sauce on a blue dress, but I digress.)

Micheal Isikoff in Newsweek is from the latter group.  It doesn't seem to matter that the Clinton campaign is raising these issues.  Or that ABC News moderators put Obama in the (surprisingly unexpected) hot seat to answer these questions.  He says the right wingers are preparing to use this against Obama - and they tie it nicely together with the code words "swift boat".  But, last time I checked, raising the question was ok. And the last time I checked the Democrats were preparing to "swift boat" McCain (to continue the dissolving of that phrase's lucidity) with whatever issue they could get their hands on.  My guess is the Keating Five thing will be the left's "swift boat" of McCain.  In 2000 it was the 20 some year old drunk driving arrest.  That was the "October surprise" which we'll now refer to as "swift boating". 

Isikoff and his partner in journalism even drew up the image of Willie Horton - apparently still upset that Dukakis got a bad rap for that whole early release/rape and murder thing - which requires the willing suspension of disbelief that the Mad Magazine-like cover of Dukakis in a helmet popping his head out of a tank and looking ridiculous had no effect.  And that his professorial consideration in his response to his wife being (hypothetically) raped didn't leave most of us thinking "is this guy a human being?".

So who do you shoot when someone on your side starts shooting at you?  Apparently, you start to shoot everyone in sight.  And if they don't have a gun, just remind folks that they had one once.  Just 20 short years ago.

Politics is never dull.

sharp

The economy is said to be in horrible shape. 

While it's never good to have near zero growth in an economy, we have to understand that recessions happen and they're good for an economy.  They release resources from the inefficient places they go in boom times and allow them to go to the most efficient places.

That said, our employment rate is 95% and most of that 5% is transitional or planned (retirement, leaving the workforce for school or parenting, etc.).

But the bad is not readily apparent.  It's actually the stimulus packages being proposed.

Politicians of both parties are falling all over themselves to offer more stimulus for the economy.  Heaven forbid we should not have boom times all the time.  Especially if we can just spend a few hundred billion more every few months to make it better (yes, it's an excellent point that Iraq has caused many times that to be spent.  No argument here, but does that justify another bad decision?). 

I would hate to be a politician and to be expected to create jobs.  They don't have the power to do that, only the free market can do that.  But try they will, because they've learned that looking like you don't care is the ultimate sin.  No one will come behind you for the day of reckoning for the overspend.  No one will try to match the jobs to the spending when this is all over.  And the ultimate for any politican is voting to send a check to every American during an election year.  Have you noticed that's when this always happens?

Maybe there's more to John McCain's railing against inefficient spending and his refusal to drink at the trough of earmarks than I had first thought.  Maybe that's the kind of leadership we need.  I'm still not excited about him, but he's looking pretty good at the moment.

Politics is never dull.  But it's often very, very bad.

sharp