A Game of Thrones

But howsoe'er, no simple man that sees
This jarring discord of nobility,
This shouldering of each other in the court,
This factious bandying of their favourites,
But that it doth presage some ill event.
'Tis much when sceptres are in children's hands;
But more when envy breeds unkind division;
There comes the ruin, there begins confusion.

            William Shakespeare, Henry VI-Part I

This past week I began to review the works of Shakespeare, and in his very first play, Henry the Sixth, Part One, he portrays a situation that gives one shivers in its eerie resonance to the situation in which the Democrats find themselves. While the English tussle with the French their ranks are split into warring factions over very little of substance, outside of pride and ego. I was made to realize once more how little people have actually changed over time and the passing of various guards and governments.

The intrigues and jealousies that begat the War of the Roses are based on an argument between comrades over law and politics that is so mundane that Shakespeare doesn't even bother to inform us of the details. Surely the disagreements have as little to do with substance as those we see in the race for the Democrats, and are as much involved in competing personalities.

At this point in the struggle for the nomination one surveys a landscape of spin and counter-spin where people use the most obscure details of the past as a basis for attack and counterattack while the talking heads build every misstatement and every bit of drama into theatrical conflicts of mythic proportion. None of this has much to do with what people intend or believe. Instead it's a royal battle between media magicians who spin their webs, each striving to wrest control of the collective narrative.

This one will go to the bitter end. The next six weeks will be the longest in Obama's life while Hillary uses the time to try and keep him on the ropes playing defense. He will show us who he is and how he responds in dark places when things don't look so certain.

The word from the Hillary camp we will hear over and over in association with Obama is 'unelectable'. Like the words 'hope' and 'change' it's a meme that if repeated often enough, may begin to stick. Although both camps will pull back from direct involvement in the most vicious street fights, it won't really matter because there are plenty of surrogates out in the field and in the press who earn their keep by slinging mud for their faction.

So much for a 'new' politics.