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So, I open the paper this morning over my bowl of cereal and decaf Earl Grey tea, and what do i see? The New York Times has chosen to endorse Hillary Clinton. I suppose this shouldn’t come as a surprise. Indeed, the board’s decision is partly based on their satisfaction with her job as their state’s senator. The piece, well-written and thoughtful, left me unsettled.

I have long been an Obama supporter. I have volunteered at his campaign headquarters. I have donated money to support his candidacy. But I am resistant to cults of personality, and as much as I have found him utterly inspiring and truly uniting, I remain cautious of yes-manship and quixotic political larks. And the Times basically draws the line, saying “sure, Obama’s great, but let’s get real….” In the end, they’re saying, Hillary’s the one who can actually get things done.

But here’s the thing: I support Obama because I view him as the pragmatic choice. In this week’s New Yorker, George Packer poses this very question of whether it’s more important for the commander-in-chief to win over the American people or know how to schmooze the Washington insiders. Both the Times and Packer position Clinton as the workhorse candidate who can actually broker legislation that, in the long run, will amount to “change”. And I don’t doubt Hillary’s shrewdness in negotiating across the aisle, even with her past enemies (a profile of her in The Atlantic last year left an eerie and indelible image of her communing with old stalwarts of the right in intimate, closed-door prayer groups).

The only reason I even latched on to Obama so many years ago (after reading a profile in, um, the NYer) was because I saw in him both a person authentic and open enough to inspire and unify a divided citizenry, and a politician smart enough, ambitious enough and savvy enough to sit in the smoky parlors with the politicos and get deals done. I think the answer to Packer’s question is that you need both; and I think Obama has the whole package.

Karen often rightly points out that on the nuances of many key issues we both tend to side with Senator Clinton’s policies. But I harbor no fantasies of a utopian progressive era. I just want to start to fix the things that are broken. Health care. Budget spending. Foreign policy. Education (well, maybe someday that will get back on the agenda…). It will be slow. It will be painful. It will take so much compromise it will often feel like we’re not moving forward. But I believe it will take a leader like Obama to get even that far.

I didn’t watch the Democratic Debate last night on CNN, but I did read a recap this morning, and it made me sad. Overt bitterness between candidates is nothing new, of course. But I feel angry with the Clintons for introducing the negative tone into the race, and I feel frustrated with Obama for failing to turn it to his advantage thus far.

If anything, Senator Clinton is benefiting from the nastiness at the moment, and not because Obama can’t dish it back. In fact, he’s quite good at this verbal sparring, but it’s unattractive on a candidate whose success is based on our willingness to engage in childlike hope about our country’s future. Meanwhile, it makes Clinton seem tenacious and smug. Maybe Joe Klein thinks that Bill is trying to sabotage her campaign, but right now it looks like tactical brilliance.

Though recorded back in 2005 with Fooled By April, I wrote this song in the fervent political season of 2004. Though John Kerry wasn’t as an inspirational a candidate as I had hoped for, I, like so many others, had been inspired by Obama’s keynote speech at the Democratic Convention. I had a melody I’d been playing with, mumbling a chorus, something like “why didn’t you say so…” Obama’s speech reminded me that words matter. So I tried to take my three minute ditty and make the words matter.

New Song
by J. Gordon Wright

Don’t ask the question
If you don’t like the answer
Don’t ask the question
If you won’t hear the sound

Don’t beg a reason
When you can’t name me one
Give me a reason
I need a reason

Let’s sing us a new song tonight
Let’s make it a sing-along this time
Our voices are strong enough
We’re loud enough to beat the band
So sing out
Let’s sing us a new song

Everyone’s watching
To see who’ll take the first step
Everyone’s watching
To see who’s got the hand

I was just watching
Until I closed my eyes
Now I am moving
Finally I’m moving

Let’s sing us a new song tonight
Let’s make it a sing-along this time
Our voices are strong enough
We’re loud enough to beat the band
So sing out
Let’s sing us a new song this time
Let’s sing like we’ve never sung, tonight
Our voices are strong enough
We’re loud enough
We’ll sing and you’ll find out

I remember a time when a word was easy as wind
I remember a time when I could breathe it all in
But the change that came didn’t last too long
And the breeze that blew didn’t carry on
It’s a long time now
But it’s finally come
And I know that we’ll find out…