Obama editorial brushed off much
The Daily Herald's endorsement has been done far before the primary election had run its course. After all, this is all about the election for president of the United States at a critical time.
Has Obama shown viable credentials for handling complex financial issues, for understanding the complexity of a long, contentious war with militant Islam, the technical problems of alternative energy, the immigrant problem, and much more?
Obama is glib and hopeful, but has not shown a capacity for good judgment, for a leadership of a major operation of any sort. The editorial calls him "visionary, positive and genuinely altruistic, Real."
Real is not what Obama is.
Personal, hopeful, a good speaker perhaps, but not too persuasive if only coming from a handsome suitor explaining how he will take care of your daughter in marriage. The editorial says "the record shows he has made an impact on real issues," but mentions only legislation in which he had a part with many others and which has drawn no favorable comment. Nothing major here.
The editorial says, "He can bring us together." Does that mean he will give up his left-wing issues of the sort that are Democrat staples or are the practical people supposed to join him in left field?
"Hope springs eternal," but hope is not action. This premature endorsement now hastily brings on the very negative aspects of how Obama came shooting out of the cesspool of Chicago Cook County politics.
Fact is, Obama never had to face a real opponent to get elected to the Illinois or the U.S. Senate. He never got vetted.
Instead of being swept away by hope, your editors should have been reading the U.S. attorney's proffer of Obama's close friend, Rezko, 78 pages of detail on how to steal millions of public money and split it up with connected pals, and to decide how much goes to political campaigns, as it did flow to Obama's.
Or how can Obama give back to someone the break he got on the price of his fancy home, another slimy deal from Rezko. Or flush out the details of how Obama's legal firm handled Rezko's acquisition of many millions for housing the poor in Obama's district, buildings that become uninhabitable.
Too hasty an endorsement hasn't allowed ventilation of such issues. And in the area of hope, let's wish that if Obama did become president, he would not fire the good U.S. Attorney Pat Fitzgerald, as Clinton did to all 50.
You could have held back your endorsement until the hard-ball process of American politics had assigned worth or rejection, or just wait for Hillary to do it.
I hope our nation doesn't pay a high price for empty suit learning on the job. The Daily Herald can be excused for feeling forced to make a choice from a dysfunctional lot, and the choice of Hillary or Obama for least damaging is a puzzle.
However, in Pate Philips' way, you should have said, "Let them duke it out."
Jack Roeser, chairman Family Taxpayers Network
Carpentersville