Bob Kuttner makes an important point in this column, discussing the populist rhetoric that Obama is adding to his stump speeches with increasing frequency. This is strong stuff. Coming from John Edwards, similar words were often criticized as divisively populist. But Obama manages to be a unifier—yet around a very progressive critique of what ails America.
This jives with Chris Hayes' observation that attending an Edwards speech was "a bit like attending a funeral for the American dream." The man had the right content, but perhaps the wrong delivery, given the American workers' relative lack of class conscious. But if Obama, whose candidacy has already consolidated support among young people, high information voters, and black folks, can mesh his rhetoric of change with specifics that appeal to the (white) working class, his campaign could be the best vessel for economic justice in a long time.
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Adam Doster, a contributing editor at In These Times, is a Chicago-based freelance writer and former reporter-blogger for Progress Illinois.
