I just watched one of the most recent Jon Stewart episodes last night and was glad to see that along with a "Moment of Zen" tribute to the great Tim Russert at the end, he also tackled the issue of progressive "buyer's remorse" about Obama from a fresh angle. He coined a new term -- Baracknaphobia -- which I think is not just funny, but more than appropriate for our current situation. I"m sure most of us hope he makes it all the way for the Middle East, Africa, and Latin America's sake, but here at home in the consumer nations he won't end up providing anything that different. I was appreciative that he sparked the younger community into political interests again, but now his blind support has dangerous potential to get in true progressives' way. This primary season was extended purposefully, don't be lead to think it was just a random miscalculation. No primary season in history has been this long or this paid attention to every step of the way. Barack and Hillary getting front-runners will be a great mark in prosperity, but the cross-divisions that it created on the Democratic side worked all just a little too well for Republicans, and I"m sure our current shadow government. Not only do you have the simplistic "white-woman-vs-black-man" internal battles, but you have all news of current politics upstaged and almost slid right out of mainstream media. Why else but to draw attention away from the fascist institutions that Bush hopes to secretly erect past the point of disassembly before his term ends?! Not to mention that, quite sadly, the enthusiasm generated for Obama encourages progressives to pin everything on January 2009 and believe that there will be a BIG change, a turning point, a whirl-wind storm that will tear the old politics of Washington apart and we just have to wait.

Barack says that only in America could his story be possible, and he's probably correct, but Cynthia McKinney, first Black congresswoman in Georgia, has a much truer American story. She was one of the first to raise questions about 9/11 and how much advance knowledge our government had, and was told to back off, stay down, don't rock the boat... by BOTH parties! The Georgia democrats ousted her in the 2006 election to make sure she wasn't there to vote on the war funding bill. She could've stopped it, her no vote would've been enough to cut our ravenous war parties off at the purse-strings! That's a true progressive, yet when I try to explain this to the Obamanites, they say that no, we should be happy to vote democratic this time around because there is someone who will REALLY challenge the system heading for Washington. Right...! It's not just the Republicans that need to be be knocked down, it's the oppressive machine of the entire Two-Party system! Cynthia says that her birthday present to herself a year ago was to declare her independence from the national leadership that ousted her and have continued to be complicit in war crimes. That's why she's running as a Green now, and we'd better all hope that she knocks out Nader at the convention this month and continues on strong into the general. Obama will go down in history, yes, but the only way that will actually be refreshing and satisfying for us so thirsting for systematic upheaval is if Cynthia McKinney is seen and heard right there beside him. She's the actual Black and female voice that needs to be heard now, forget Barack and Hillary!

Speaking of which, it's not just because he beat Clinton to the punch that women's issues may very well suffer under him. The Jeramiah Wright controversy (which was another form of societal over-reaction even though some of the the comments were in fact offensive) may have elcipsed this incident, but he called a female investigative reporter "Sweety" while cutting her off from a question. He later apologized publicly and apparently called her to give a private version as well, but the degrading sentiment seems to have stuck. He later embarrassed another reporter by commenting on his 'baby face' while he was trying to hit on a female counterpart in the audience. The great understanding Obama then took it upon himself (as was reported on NPR's "Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me" with the actual audio) to call the man and apologize for -- I kid you not -- "messing up his game!" If that ain't straight-up Good Ol' Boy mentality, I don't know what is.

Something is definitely changing in this country, the peoples' outrage and planet's unrest are both finally close enough to the surface that it will hit home in this national election. The best way to challenge our current structures is not to buy into the idea that the next president, however inspiring he may be now, will change them, but to say "YA BASTA," enough is enough, and reach forward as the people, the supposed ultimate authority in this nation, and demand they be changed DESPITE what the next figurehead may or may not do. That's where the true power always has been, and that's where it will be again. I"m almost glad we have an Obama now, a shallowly hopeful symbol set to maintain the basic roots of the machine, because now we can raise real hell and show that the people and only the people have spoken and even a compromise candidate is no longer enough!