Vogt's story illustrates rather clearly the ambivalence I've held for Obama's campaign since it began gathering momentum last fall. For some very serious reasons it's this ambivalence I want to reflect upon in celebration of his election. Admittedly, had Vogt tried her experiment in a deep red district, she likely would have been met with similar reactions, but such a claim is based upon false equivalence. Each campaign held qualitatively distinct positions on tolerance and inclusion. McCain emphasized a distinct kind of belonging: "Country First." Patriotism and American exceptionalism never pretend to be anything but ideologies of us versus them. Moreover, the persecution of difference is not only expected from such a campaign, such a campaign would be incoherent without it. Obama's campaign, on the other hand, took as its raison d'etre the idea of "unity."

Much has been written about how this simple idea, combined with Obama's even-keeled personality, transformed Obama's campaign into a screen upon which liberals of all stripes and extremities projected their best hopes and ideals. It was a very pretty idea with astounding effects. The ubiquitous images of British Invasion-like crowds certainly lifted our spirits - but they should have also lifted our eyebrows. If we've learned anything from the heinous political experiments of the 20th century, it's that any movement capable of producing this kind of enthusiasm deserves flood-lights of skepticism. I draw this equivalence tentatively; by it I mean to indicate an elemental similarity, not a political one. Above all, the pretty idea needs to be called into question.

What exactly does "unity" mean? The idea glimmers. To the elegance of this idea even "tolerance" seems divisive and petty. Only perfect inclusiveness is consistent, only perfect acceptance - even of the most irritating differences. But, really, "unity" can mean only one of two things: either setting aside the very differences that unity should be resolving, or reveling in a shared identity. Its most practical consequence is at best a vague suggestion for the ground rules of conflict resolution, a call to focus on ends rather than means. But, then, this is called negotiation or compromise, not unity.

For me, this problem transcends mere semantics. It brings into sharp focus the degree to which the campaign has gambled the very thing I've grown to admire most in Obama: his respect for ambiguity. No further evidence for this is required for anyone who's read his early biography. What emerges there is a portrait of a mind shaped by a lifetime of ideological, cultural and emotional cross-currents, and that has achieved after long struggle an impressively productive working relationship with difference and conflict. In fact, it's precisely Obama's aversion to any purist idea of "unity" that makes him the first candidate of my generation.

It's certainly naive to have expected a national campaign to keep above the fray of bumper-sticker discourse, but for a while its practice superceded its theory. Indeed, the most important speech of the campaign was likely Obama's response to the media frenzy surrounding his relationship with the Reverend Jeremiah Wright. The content of his speech, to be sure, wasn't anything new to someone with a basic understanding of American history. What was breathtaking was the forum in which that content was presented. Nuance, which had for so long been persona non grata in national politics, had finally staged its long awaited comeback - and to abundant fanfare. Unfortunately, that was just about the last we heard from it. After Obama accepted the Democratic nomination and hunkered down into streamlined national candidate mode, it became clear that the campaign felt the time for subtlety was over.

There is something to be said, however, about how nuance has been forcing its way back onto the national stage since Election Day. The demographics have been painting a picture of a generational shift that looks more like the America I've grown up in than the America of Obama's mother. Looking at the numbers, several trends appear that run counter to the prevailing stereotypes. You'd be reminded, for instance, that the Evangelical vote has been increasingly liberal since the early '90s, and never more so than in this past election. So, yes, nuance seems here to stay, primarily because without it we have no chance of understanding the implications of what we've just done as a nation.

Make no mistake, however: the enthusiasm for "unity" remains, it's just been displaced. After Obama secured victory, his admirers went through a process of reality-testing, in which they tempered their former enthusiasm. It's now common to hear them dropping the "D" word into casual conversation, for example. "I'm expecting to be disappointed," they say. "Obama's clearly got the right ideas, but he's inheriting some of the most difficult problems in our nation's history. Don't expect too much." All well and good, but this emotional hedging still seems to be hanging on to an impossible idealism, unalloyed by the inconvenient facts of his policies and governing style.

No one could have accurately predicted how many Clinton-era technocrats he would recruit into his cabinet, but the reaction from left-leaning bloggers has been one of shrill disappointment: disgust, even. But let's take a moment to review some reasons why we should have known before his election that "disappointment" would miss the mark. Those tax hikes for the wealthiest 5%? Most likely they'll be deferred until 2010. Offshore drilling? Count on it, even if it's only a quick-fix. That stimulus package? Most of it's going to corporations and businesses, because Obama knows that jobs are created on the supply-side. Health care? Universal only in name; Obama never supported anything like the socialized systems folks like Michael Moore advocated. Deficit spending? If that sounds like "more of the same," that's because it is. In sum, let's face it: he's never been the "progressive" candidate the GOP feared and Berkeleyites wept for. He's a pragmatist. If one is desperate for a clear political taxonomy, he's at best center-left.

Even given all this, I still think Obama's the best thing since sliced bread, and to a certain extent I can forgive his campaign for mitigating all the progress he made in reintroducing complexity to national politics. Why? Certainly because of his mind - I've already given my reasons for that. But also because I like his face and his name. No matter what he says or does - assuming, of course, that his administration makes it over the very low bar of competency Bush has set - he has given the idea of America a new lease on life. For the most superficial reasons, his face has become the face of a nuance so deeply complicated and moving that the world will be occupied for years deciphering its mystery, a mystery made even more profound by the beauty of his name. More than anything yet in my life, I look forward to these years unfolding.

My sleep patterns have been affected. After a year-and-a-half of this long, anxious campaign I'm ready for it to be over. My eagerness, however, is tempered by a careful qualification: this story needs to have a proper ending. I have no fundamental party bias in regard to the properness of this ending, I should add, as unbelievable as that may sound. The last general election, for instance, though excruciating to live through in its final hours, rounded out narratively. All expected Bush to steal his second term, and Kerry, for all his virtues, failed to distinguish himself beyond his role as the non-Bush candidate. Bush seemed the perfect criminal, and Kerry his perfect victim. In that last weekend before Election Day, the narrative winds swirled like the furious wake of a swift boat, and so the outcome was expected to be equally tumultuous. It wasn't the resolution I wanted, but it was a proper resolution.

This year is different. The narrative winds are blowing so strongly behind Barack Obama that no other outcome is psychologically acceptable. If John McCain wins, there will be no catharsis - an "upset" storyline wouldn't sufficiently contain the disappointment. Even his supporters would be dumbstruck. No sigh of relief would come from the dwindling GOP faithful as the Democrats settle into a supermajority in Congress, and the pundits bombard them with reminders that theirs was a victory that shouldn't have happened. Even when our hypothetical is modified to account for a clean McCain victory, such an ending would nevertheless inflict a kind of trauma upon the nation - as much because of its impropriety as the feverish worry that would follow.

All this serves to highlight one of the most exquisite ironies of Obama's campaign, which is that its rhetoric of change is on the one hand overblown and ridiculous, but on the other a frighteningly sober description of the tremendous opportunity he'll have on his hands if elected. I often find myself returning to Colin Powell's phrase: Obama is a "transformative figure." Indeed, if there's one irrevocable thing that we've learned from these twenty-one months, it's that things can be done differently in American politics. The manner in which Obama's conducted his campaign has shown us the optimistic path; McCain's choices revealed the cynical one.

I truly believe that the voting public now sees through Obama's grandiloquence, and knows very well that his promises will likely prove to be empty. But the reason his magic hasn't worn out is because everyone - Dems, GOP, and independents alike - knows that his grandiloquence is at least accurate in how it correlates to the fundamental changes that will take place in American and world politics. Indeed, it was around the time that Joe Biden was tapped for VP that, for the better, Change began sounding more like the work of change, and Hope began sounding more like an indication of the long road ahead. And in the ringing of Powell's phrase was the harmony of two things that have never been joined in national politics in my lifetime: promises and real possibility.

All this is at risk in a McCain victory, and the possibility of such a tragic disappointment horrifies me. I've spent this past weekend glued to my computer, reading, watching and listening to every article, poll, projection and analysis I could find, even though I've long been certain of a tidy Obama victory. Anything to comfort my fear of once again falling into the strange sadness that followed after the last election. It was a sadness that impacted all the national identifications and investments that, as an ironic youth, I had tucked away in complacency and self-importance. That winter's sadness lulled into the place in my soul hollowed out by September 11th and the onset of the Iraq war - an identification brought into awareness by the loss of America's prestige. I fear this sadness because it limits my horizons. The Bay Area is not America, but after the last election it became the only America I could accept.

These are the roots of an existential cynicism. In that last election young liberals joked half-seriously to defect to Canada if the outcome was undesirable. It doesn't feel like a joke anymore. I'd even venture to claim that the group most deeply invested in this election is the post-civil rights generation - my generation - for the simple reason that our investment has been alloyed with a sense of entitlement. We've come to believe that an eventual non-white male president is a foregone conclusion, we just have to wait for those other Americans to stop holding things back. If McCain were to win, the blow to our ideal image of America would be too severe to endure on home soil.

On the other hand, the possibility of an Obama victory will have at least two cultural consequences whose magnitudes it would be difficult to underestimate. The first is the visibility of a black American president with a Kenyan father and a Muslim middle name. Above all I support Obama because of the revolutionary force of these superficialities. If he is our president, the world will awaken on Wednesday a different place.

The second is the beginning of the end of a culture and politics of suspicion that for the past thirty years has come to define liberals (even among liberals). The most moving moments I've experienced during this campaign have been seeing older white people, who fit too perfectly the picture I've developed in my mind of uninviting racists, enthusiastically supporting Obama. Even if he loses, America will be a better place because of the opportunity he's people to perform their tolerance. One of the most powerful stories I've heard - which became a widely proliferated Internet meme - came from an Obama canvasser in rural Pennsylvania who asked a woman whom she would be voting for. The woman said Obama, but then shouted the question at her husband who was watching TV in the back room. He shouted back, "I'm voting for the nigger!"

This, I think, is the best we can hope for. The old stereotypes will not die so easily - they will remain in some form indefinitely. But it's become easier for people to see past them and, most importantly, to trust beyond them. We cannot expect people to transcend hate; but we can expect them to weather the undesirable in exchange for their self-interest. Somehow this formula doesn't drip with cynicism as one would perhaps expect: otherness as undesirable. Merely undesirable. Undesirable like taking your vitamins or eating your vegetables. Easily swallowed in the face of exigency, or certain gain. One doesn't commit crimes of hate against broccoli. I think the engine of this simple thought could take us far as a nation.

I'll admit, I do hold some snobbish disgust for the hipster's trademark existential dilemma, which I would define as the brazen denial of his or her uniform individuality. But this disgust is too familiar, too molded-over with ugly pre- and post-pubescent memories. I've no need to sustain it. In fact, my interest in hipster culture began quite impersonally. The way I see it, it's the latest symptom of the crisis of white male masculinity that finds its roots, really, in the 18th century with the birth of classical liberalism and the Enlightenment creed of the common dignity of men, but exacerbated logarithmically -- in the States, at least -- after WWII.

I won't go into details now -- this post is kind of a "trailer" for my essay -- but here are aspects of hipster culture that are interesting to consider alongside my claim:

• Tattoos on the most unlikely people
• Irony so acute that it becomes indistinguishable from sincerity
• The centrality of an art culture that apotheosizes instinct and refuses tradition
• Political apathy
• The impossibility of the hip hop hipster (but certainly not the impossibility of the hipster who listens to hip hop)

Stay tuned.

- Reflections on "unity," vis-a-vis critical exuberance.
- The New Sincerity: a theory of Hipsterdom in the Oughts.
- Jim Webb, the Obamacons and the future of the liberal/conservative divide.

Heady shit, mang.

It was also Dean's controversial 50-state strategy that made a huge difference. It basically created a capilliary network for the huge amount of money Obama raised to work as effectively as possible. We've all read about the ubiquitous field offices. In Ohio, for instance, story was that no Ohioan lived more than 30 miles away from an office. Without Dean's strategy, Obama would not have made the gains he did in red states, or flipped as many as he did. Moreover, enthusiasm over his candidacy wouldn't have caught on as quickly and as fiercely as it did.

So, hat's off to you, Dean. I remember balking at his campaign because the Williamsburg hipsters were so enthusiastic about him, yet ultimately being swayed by his message and methods. I'm glad he had the last laugh.

---

The smallness of Obama's victory is being exaggerated, and so his victory as such is being distorted. The Wall Street Journal's comment captured this trend efficiently: "One promise of his victory is that perhaps we can put to rest the myth of racism as a barrier to achievement in this splendid country."

"Myth?" We could expect that kind of assumption from the WSJ -- and the Chicago-Tribune ("From King to Obama, the Nation Heals" -- the perfect form of the verb is inappropriate) but it's popping up everywhere. Even the Times: "Obama Elected President As Racial Barrier Falls." I mean... c'mon.

So, the watch-waves may have been more evenly emanated, but the love-waves were focused in full force on Zooey. Me heart go pitter-patter. I want see again!!!