Stand up, stand up, stand up... for change

Oddly I found that I was quite moved by the closing of John McCain's speech last night. While he hasn't entirely "lost it", he's clearly lost a couple steps (in the sense that aging athletes lose steps)...which I think makes me feel that he is being used to some extent, and that is really awful to consider. I think I was moved because he sort of represented elderly people in general and there is a real pain involved in turning away from them as leaders and ultimately as active participants in society...you might have a great deal of respect for them as people, great appreciation for what they did to build society, but as they begin to lose their powers (imperceptible though the loss may be to them) you are forced at some point to deny them things they may seek. This feels terrible.

But I can't put Sen. McCain, or anyone who's reached that point, in the incredibly taxing role of a reformist President. I don't believe McCain still has the enormous powers required to put an active hand to the tiller of the huge ship of the federal government -- and thus to elect him is to allow the status quo to continue. Change and reform above all else require energy, they require persistence and followthrough. If McCain was the leader of a movement committed to reform, I'd feel differently -- but as far as his team is concerned the "reform" theme is about a week old. Barack Obama's massive organization is well-aligned with his message; he has many partners who actively seek the same results he does. Meanwhile, McCain is a maverick in his own organization: his inner circle has been selling his "experience" for months, and the outer circles of the GOP establishment aren't into cleaning themselves up (whatever that would involve). McCain just seems too weakened to do it for real all by himself. Once elected I imagine his advisers constantly giving him the slip, fooling him into signing off on things, or simply failing ("sure, Mr. President, we'll get that picture of the Walter Reed building for you...") because attention to detail requires more energy than perhaps anything else imaginable. This would leave unelected functionaries all across Washington (the same Republican ones manipulating the current figurehead) running the show themselves -- and since they aren't about the "reform", it won't happen.

The only change would come with Obama: the one who hasn't been in Washington too long, the one with the deep intellect and knowledge, the energy of a man in his prime, and the committed team of like-minded workers and advisors he built with that energy -- not to mention the internal drive and belief that drove him to weather the slings and arrows in seeking this office. If you believe in a democracy where the elected official himself is the one who's really in charge, you want Obama, as painful as it may be to turn away from a hero like McCain. If you're comfortable with the status quo -- that is, rule by the neoconservatives behind the W curtain -- you can indulge yourself by voting to see one more smile on the old veteran's face.