Obama, Elitism, etc

Well, I know I'm full of promises for blogging more frequently but I have just been running around like mad. Since returning from Belize, I've had exactly two nights home alone and every other waking minute I've been surrounded by other people. Not exactly conducive to blogging. Also since returning from Belize, I've gotten re-sunburned, thrown one (semi) party, inaugurated the ridiculously amazing summer in San Francisco, taken up my soda habit again, gone to one baseball game (and been offered tickets to two others), and watched the newest episode of the office two and a half times. You get the idea. It's been busy, in the way that my life is always busy for totally unproductive reasons. (Until last night, when I finally paid my taxes and washed all the dishes that have accumulated since last Thursday.)

I need, need, need to do my big Belize post, but that won't happen today. Instead I'd like to post a few takes on the whole Obama "elitism" fracas. I have been trying to catch up on my campaign news, and suddenly I find myself super embedded in all these he-said-she-saids (literally and figuratively!). I believe that Obama could have phrased it all differently, but I don't think this should stand in the way of electing him. (I hope that it blows over in time for Pennsylvania.) I also just finished "Dreams from my father" which was pretty fascinating for a lot of reasons, not the least of which was Obama recounting his time as a community organizer in Chicago, when he spent all his time with the working class (albeit the black urban working class, or however you want to put it), and I never got the sense that he looked down on them. He sympathizes. He understands bitterness, and he is conflicted about elitism and class differences. So I stand by him still.

Here are a few interesting pieces:
-this one, which is comparing Obama's comments to some that Bill Clinton made back in the day
-a piece by Katherine Seelye of the Times, whose columns are consistently fascinating, about how the story was broken (broke?)
-good ol' Arianna Huffington, talking about how Hillary Clinton is using the GOP's tactics to tear down her own party (I normally have a pretty strong resistance to that line in the media, but I'm getting to the point where I agree with Huffington)

On the subject of Huffington, the piece in the New Yorker a few weeks ago about the death of print media/newspapers is actually much more interesting than I expected it to be (despite the incredible irony of the New Yorker, a mag whose average subscriber age has been increasing every year for ages, writing about the death of print media).

More later!