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FROM THE PHONE BOOTH: The Smallest Space in  Hollywood

	FINEFROCK

Tribal Loyalties:
Michelle’s Rhetorical Sister
by Steve Finefrock - Hollywood Forum [scriptwriter] 3/14/08

Just a scan of the midpoint of an Ebony story on Obama’s campaign is worthy of your own examination to see if you notice what caught my eye:
 
The morning of the Iowa caucuses, Valerie Jarrett sat calmly sipping mint tea in front of a fireplace at a hotel in West Des Moines. As the CEO of one of the nation's largest real estate firms, The Habitat Company, a member of the University of Chicago's Board of Trustees, former chair of the board of the Chicago Stock Exchange, and former head of the Chicago Transit Authority, Jarrett already had plenty on her plate.

But the former adviser to Chicago Mayor Richard Daley and longtime friend of Michelle and Barack Obama had made the decision to leave her position on the Federal Reserve Board and "come inside" to work full time on the campaign as a senior adviser. And, on that morning, she felt good. "This is such a unique opportunity to have two close personal friends embarking on this journey, I would regret this for the rest of my life [if I didn't participate]," she says. "I really think he has a chance to not just change our country but change the world ... When he wins, I'll feel like this is MY country again."

Jarrett is just one more overlooked aspect of the highly tribal campaign of Barack Obama. Heaven knows what else is there to be found by an Attentive Media.  These two ‘grafs literally were noted at random, and there was a woman who feels much like Michelle Obama’s first-time pride in her country: “When he wins, I’ll feel like this is MY country again.”
 
When was it before, so that it can be ‘again’ Ms. Jarrett?  What does it take for all the Jarretts, of all races, and mostly on the left, to think of this as “MY country” – either now and again, or ever again? Is the Federal Reserve’s role in managing our monetary system – central to controlling inflation and encouraging economic growth for all citizens – something that gives you pride, as a part of its operation?
 
How about a central role in Habitat housing? Are you proud of a country that has a higher rate of home ownership than the rest of the world? Were you once, and thus can you be again? Did the stock exchange’s marketplace of moving capital to the most efficient use make you proud? Does University of Chicago academic prowess make you proud?
 
This has to be just one of many nuggets of the tribalist thinking which seems to be rampant among the Obamaniacs.  I can’t have randomly found the singular, unique example of Michelle Obama’s mad-about-America utterance. There have to be more – not just this one, but many yet to be found. The MSM, and even cable TV, hasn’t ferreted this ferretlike statement for broadcast and analysis.
 
It’s all part of a growing pattern: tribes and clans adhering to themselves, and waiting for the whole nation to give them power before they can be proud – now, or then, or ever again. One saving grace is that the Clinton Conundrum has given us great solace and entertainment, and a rest before the battle ahead.  That is to say, that Bill Clinton’s frustration at always wanting a chance to vote for a black presidential candidate, and he gets that chance NOW of all times!
 
As Rick Lazio found, that you can’t be mean to the girl, so has Hillary found that you absolutely, positively must not be mean to the black.  What is a party dripping with affirmative action babies to do? This is a tar-baby suitable to the one in the Uncle Remus tales with Br’er Rabbit fooling Br’er Bear into releasing him from the sticky tarbaby.  How will the liberals let go of this internecine battle?
 
Geraldine Ferrarro has gotten a taste of this tar, and more are to come – all the claims of bias in the media and frustration with political correctness which was denied by the left, or dismissed as unimportant or insignificant, is now sticking them in their six o’clock position. WATCH YOUR SIX, democrats.  More is coming.
 
But your great diminishment is perfectly presented by Jarrett, her longtime friend Michelle: you are pride of your tribe without question. No one dare question pride in democrat party accomplishments, lest the fate be that which befell Zell Miller. Nor doubt the ‘accomplishments’ of the race or ethnicity, or gender – else called an Uncle Tom or its equivalent, depending on the tribe of race or gender.  Tammy Bruce offended her tribe for dissenting amidst her feminista sistren in NOW’s chapter in LA, and now is known as a “conservative lesbian” – not true, she’s merely a good bit less wacky than the rest, but she’s so cast out as to seem rightwing compared to her once beloved tribal elders. For the left, patriotism is loyalty – unquestioned and undoubting – to the party, or a selection of activist groups, not to the nation.
 
The democrat party – yes, it’s democratic, but you’d hardly know it much of the time – is a collection of tribes, who are proud of the nation only when they control it. Witness the scene early in Clinton’s first term, when some sourpuss complained over a military jet overflight during a formal ceremony. “Relax. It’s okay. They’re ours now” said a compatriot, satisfying his anti-military cynical colleague that those offensive warbirds now ‘belonged’ to his clan, his tribe, his party.
 
When the government is “theirs” then they are proud. When the nation does their bidding – for each tribe, a different bidding, for there are many rooms in this hotel of tribes – in tax policy, affirmative action, judges on the bench, appropriations, et al, only then are they proud. Only then will they be able to be proud ‘again’ like sometime before. Only then will it become their country again. Now, it’s whose country, Ms. Jarrett?
 
Were there a truly aggressive media monster, they’d doubtlessly find a potful of such revealing utterances by Obamaniacs.  This discovery cannot be the only one in existence beyond Michelle’s gaffe.  There have to be other gaffes – but then, this one was buried deep into a story in Ebony magazine.  How many political reporters read that highly tribal ‘zine?  And would recognize the offending phrase when stumbling upon it?
 
The tribes are coming to the election booth, folks. Get your own tribe registered, and signed up on-line to make contributions, and to the precinct location on election day. It’s our conservative tribe who reliably cares for the nation at large. We are proud even when we’re out of power. It’s when we’re in power that the nation is made partially whole again, so it can earn our pride. As well as the pride of the left, as rare as that may be.
 
They just don’t get it – and so far, the media ain’t getting busy at catching them at revealing that Michelle Obama’s remark was not a gaffe, but an example among many of why this candidacy must be stopped. ExileStreet

copyright 2008 Steve Finefrock

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