yes we can

was forwarded this video several times today and thought it was worth sharing for the half-dozen or so of you out there who still haven't seen it. (i'm talking to you frank-o.) believe it aired originally at a rally in l.a. yesterday featuring michelle obama, caroline kennedy, maria shriver and oprah, it's a section of obama's speech following his defeat in the new hampshire primary set to music by will.i.am of the black eyed peas and sung or parroted by a slew of famous believers. the video's impressive, no doubt, but watch it twice and maybe use headphones because it's actually the content of the speech, not the slick production values, that inspires.



and while we're at it, berkeley resident and pulizter winner michael chabon weighed in this morning with an op-ed piece in the washington times. it's worth reading entire but here's a brief section of particular note:

In a better world, if there were such a thing (and so far there never has been), we would not need a president like Obama as badly as we do. If there were less at stake, if our democracy had not been permitted, indeed encouraged, to sink to its present degraded and embattled condition not only by the present administration but by a fair number of those people now seeking to head up the next one, perhaps then we could afford to waste our votes on the candidate who knows best how to jigger, to manipulate and to conform to the vapid specifications of the debased electoral process it has been our unhappy fate to construct for ourselves.

- snip -

But the most pitiable fear of all is the fear of disappointment, of having our hearts broken and our hopes dashed by this radiant, humane politician who seems not just with his words but with every step he takes, simply by the fact of his running at all, to promise so much for our country, for our future and for the eventual state of our national soul. I say "pitiable" because this fear of disappointment, which I hear underlying so many of the doubts that people express to me, is ultimately a fear of finding out the truth about ourselves and the extent of the mess that we have gotten ourselves into. If we do fight for Obama, work for him, believe in him, vote for him, and the man goes down to defeat by the big-money machines and the merchants of fear, then what hope will we have left to hold on to?

Thus in the name of preserving hope do we disdain it.

otis redding - change is gonna come

please remember, if you live in one of the super tuesday states, to set aside cynicism and go to the polls tomorrow and vote. it'll be good for us. promise.