BRIAN LIBBY

Obama's 4th quarter lead

Four years ago the presidential race was neck and neck, with an utterly despicable George W. Bush fighting back from a small deficit in the polls to the pathetically un-charismatic John Kerry, which would ultimately lead to a narrow if unbelievably insane victory on election day. If America was stupid enough to re-elect a man who stole the election of 2000 and then used September 11 as justification to attack Iraq without real cause, I wouldn't dream of saying that this year's presidential race is over. 

But Obama's lead is substantial. According to today's numbers at www.ElectoralVote.com, if the election were held today the Illinois senator would command roughly 357 electoral votes to McCain's 181. 

Although politics are always important, particularly surrounding the economic crisis this year, I think voters see an unmistakable difference between the even-keeled Obama and his opponents. In fact, Christopher Hitchens summed up the Republicans' problem in Slate a few days ago in just 17 words:

"Vote Obama. McCain lacks the character and temperament to be president. And Palin is simply a disgrace."

Even so, McCain and his rifle-wielding beauty contestant granddaughter from Alaska could unquestionably still win. I mean, Barack Obama is black for one thing, and America is still a racist country. Can we really act progressively enough to elect this man after four years ago choosing his antithesis?

Many swing voters and Republicans have in the past felt loyal to McCain because he seemed like his own person: the "maverick" brand he's exploited to the hilt. But watching McCain in this campaign, it's become increasingly clear that he is a exceptionally dangerous risk taker. Anyone who would choose Sarah Palin, for example, is willing to make a deal with the devil in order to win. And if McCain himself weren't the candidate, you'd expect a "maverick" like him to admit the obvious: that regardless of policy convictions, she isn't even in the same zip code as a qualified vice presidential candidate, let alone someone next in line for the presidency itself. And because McCain is clearly old and frail, that'd be a very major worry.

15 years ago the idea of a President Quayle was enough for t-shirt makers to co opt the famous painting "The Scream" as emblem of potential disaster waiting to happen. And Dan Quayle was actually far more qualified to be president than Sarah Palin. And maybe even less ignorant. (You know, just stupid instead of really stupid.)

It's as if the GOP has to have some kind of ridiculous extreme in the vice presidential candidate. Dick Cheney, VP for the last eight years, has acted almost as a lone coup d'etat within the US government. He is to the GOP what the NSA is to the CIA: more dangerously covert than the dangerously covert.

First when Bush got the nomination in 2000, Cheney was called upon to choose a running mate for Bush, and summarily treated all the candidates as personal enemies, using private investigation to undermine all of them and nominate himself for the running mate's slot. 

Then after the election, Cheney came to epitomize what the New York Times recently called "an administration that is a quicksand of deceit." Bush had come into office as a moderate Republican, but with Cheney leading the selection of a cabinet, the administration took a much more conservative turn. Worse yet, much of the vice president's machinations were even done behind the back of George W. Bush himself. In my mind, Cheney is the Emperor Palpatine to Bush's Anakin Skywalker.

But Palin is more like C3PO, charming but totally clueless amidst the struggles going on all around. And the fact that she's a woman makes it all the more painful to watch, as if the strides made by Hillary Clinton have spit at by the GOP.

When a sports team I support has a fourth quarter lead, it's a time for tense optimism. Obama doesn't hold a multiple touchdown lead here, either. More like a one touchdown lead. (Kerry was leading Bush by a point or two at this point.) But something as big as a terrorist attack between now and November 4 or some other wild card initiated by the increasingly desperate Republicans will at this point be required for them to win.

Obama taking the White House seems almost too implausibly wonderful and reason for optimism to actually come to fruition. But maybe, if things hold for another three weeks, it will have taken one of the worst presidencies in American history to produce the conditions for one of the best.

Senior portraits

A little over five years ago I had just had my first and only photography exhibit at a gallery in Portland when I got a call from the publisher of a senior newspaper based out of Keizer, Oregon. She was looking for a new photographer to take portraits of the senior citizens, baby boomers and others profiled in the paper. Someone had reccommended me to the publisher, which I've never understood. After all, the review of my show in The Oregonian (pre-dating my being a visual arts reviewer there) made special note that there wasn't a single human being in any of the 25 photographs on display.

I took my first portraits for the paper that month. I didn't like having to drive all over the metro area to meet up with the subjects. And as I'd appear for the assignment with a tiny pocket-sized digital camera with no lighting equipment, I felt silly having to explain to the subjects that I wasn't really a professional photographer.

Even so, taking portraits for Northwest Senior News afforded me the chance to focus on portraiture (if you'll pardon the pun) in a way I never had before. I'd always wanted to take pictures of my friends and family and explore the challenges of capturing people in a flattering way, but usually resisted out of shyness. My sister Sara is the only person I've ever taken a lot of pictures of. Now, suddenly, I had people expecting to sit down with me and pose for as long as I wanted.

Many of the subjects turned out to be fascinating as well. Initially I was a bit arrogant about the journalistic content of a regional senior citizen newspaper. But they did their homework and found lots of worthy people to profile, and I relished taking their picture.

One of the first people I photographed, for example, was a longtime antiwar activist who had co-founded the Oregon Peace Institute with Elizabeth Furse, the Oregon Congresswoman in whose US Capitol office I interned in 1993. Another guy was a volunteer for Northwest Medical Teams and, once I found his house way out in Clackamas, told me stories about going to Third-World countries all over the globe.

A favorite portrait of mine was of this woman; her name I can't remember, but she is the co-owner of Flying M Ranch in Yamhill County. Growing up there, my family often headed for this rural restaurant and horse stables.

Like many, she was uncomfortable about having her picture taken, but unlike most she wasn't nervous. Beside the corduroy shirt and old-school beehive hairdo, I like her sense of disinterested self confidence in the picture. It practically feels implied that she'd call anyone "Hun". I decided not to tell her, though, of the raucous all night kegger some friends and I threw at one of Flying M's cabins to celebrate high school graduation back in 1990. Or how one of the windows was damaged when a party crasher tried to steal our keg. 

Another favorite, both in terms of the picture and the personality of the subjects, was this husband and wife from Vancouver: Jim and Tonnie.

The two regularly and proudly celebrate their Norwegian heritage, not by wearing Viking horns or inventing new and better cell phones, but by regularly dancing in the Norse Runderdanske troupe of traditional Norwegian dancers at a local church. The couple possessed not an ounce of self-consciousness when they agreed to meet me at their home in full dance costume. Jim even gave me a copy of some of their Norwegian music when I half-jokingly told him it'd make a good soundtrack for one of my short films.

Often there seem to quietly be people moving to Portland to retire from other places on the west coast, particularly California. This man I photographed in his new condo, whose name I believe was Walt, had been a TV producer and screenwriter. As we talked, he showed me a couple of his old TV screenplays. He wasn't an arrogant guy at all, but I could tell he enjoyed showing me the fruits of his labor in that galley-bound screenplay on his bookshelf. After all, as much as I long for time off, it must be hard to give up your life's calling one day, move to a condo in Portland, and have very little to do.  I'm not usually one to frequent senior centers or do a lot to reach out to others who used to be in interesting businesses, but I could have sat with Walt for hours and listened to stories about the golden age of television. I also loved the guy's ascot.

One afternoon I was also sent to a community center in Multnomah Village to take pictures of three retired magicians. The backdrop didn't offer much: just a middling interior with offices and meeting spaces. But luckily these guys each brought a magician's prop of some sort. The guy pictured here, whose name I believe was Duane, had a perfectly debonair marriage of a floral bouquet pulled from out of his sleeve and a suit to go with it. I love old men in suits, by the way, especially when they're worn by men who didn't necessarily dress so formally in their earlier years, like Allen Ginsberg.

The reason I'm writing about these photographs now is that after five years I've decided to finally give up my monthly photography gig with the paper. Lately it's felt like every photo assignment I go to is rushed: speeding there to make the appointment, trying to get the shots without dragging the subject through tons of angles, trying to Photoshop a bad photo into being a serviceable one. Even so, I cherish the time I had taking the pictures, and if Trude were to call me in a jam, with some octogenarian ready for his or her close up and nobody to take the shot, it's not out of the question that I'd reach for my camera again.

A joyous jam: Oden's first dunk! (And Rudy's first between-someone-else's-legs pass!)

Until last night, not once in my life had I followed a preseason NBA basketball game with much interest. But the Trail Blazers' first exhibition game of the year had me jumping up and down with joy in the living room as I watched the highlights.

A professional sports fan can spend an entire lifetime rooting for a team without feeling something really special is in store. Look at the poor Milwaukie Brewers fans, whose team just made the pro baseball playoffs for the first time since the early 1980s, and quickly got swept. Or fans in Cleveland who haven't had a major sports championship since the 1950s.

The Portland Trail Blazers have given fans much to cheer about in the past: a world championship in 1977, NBA Finals appearances in 1990 and 1992, the league's best record in 1991, a 20-year streak of playoff appearances that continued into the first part of this decade, and numerous other trips to the Western Conference Finals.

But watching the 2008-2009 Blazers take the court for the first time last night--even if it was only on video replay, with no live coverage--I saw a team with more than enough talent to go all the way in the very near future. This team is ridiculously young; all its best players are 25 or younger. But dear God what talent!

And that was true even before Greg Oden took his center's spot on the court after a year delay. Seeing him in there at all would have been a treat. But the guy dunked with tremendous authority in the first two minutes of the ballgame. Then he dunked again. And blocked shots. 13 points in 20 minutes, on a team surrounded with All-Star and All-Star-caliber talent.

At every single position the Blazers have talent, depth and flexibility.

Brandon Roy is already an All-Star as a shooting guard after one season, and yet he's equally talented as a ball-distributing floor leader. Behind him is Rudy Fernandez, also new to the Blazers and making his debut last night. Rudy was the high scorer for Spain in the gold medal Olympic basketball final against the United States: maybe the most talented basketball team ever assembled in the history of humankind. 

At the point is Steve Blake, a more workmanlike player who is solid at best. But Roy can and does often take over the point, and that'll be even easier now with a virtuoso like Fernandez. Did I mention Rudy not only dunked numerous times last night, but had five assists and a pass through the legs of an opposing Sacramento player?

Then at power forward you have LaMarcus Aldridge, who was the #2 pick in the draft a couple years ago and averaged 17 points in just his second year last year. You have Travis Outlaw, who is tall and fast enough that his quick-release jump shot is virtually un-guardable. You have Jerryd Bayless, the rookie point guard who was the MVP of the Las Vegas NBA summer league and turned pro from the University of Arizona after just his freshman year. There's sharpshooter Martell Webster. There's Joel Prizbilla, who has played well as the starting center for Portland the last couple of years and now will back up Oden. Channing Frye, a former lottery pick, could be starting for some teams at power forward. Sergio Garcia is another Spanish phenom who, although he stagnated a bit last year, seems all the more determined and polished now; he was actually the leading scorer last night and also had several assists.

Should something change, the Blazers have in Kevin Pritchard a general manager who has quickly become known throughout the leage for the slurry of moves assembled this astonishing blend of young talent. See his six draft-day trades in 2006, including getting Aldridge, Roy, and the rights to Fernandez. Then there's the trades that netted Bayless this year. Then there's Nate McMillan, who seems to be a disciplinarian coach that, quite crucially, is able to balance that hardness with a bond of affection with players. Hell, even Maurice Lucas, Portland's leading scorer in the '77 championship season, is the assistant coach working big men like Oden!

Believe me, I'm all too painfully aware of how having promise far from guarantees a trip to the promised land. The memory of Dennis Dixon and the Oregon Ducks, #2 in the nation last year with the leading Heisman Trophy contender until Dixon's injury and an ensuing tumble, is still a sensitive bit of scar tissue. And so, of course for all of us Blazer fans, was Oden's injury last year before the season even began. But it's all the more because of that kind of sports tragedy, that it's so wonderfully satisfying to see Oden dunking in the Rose Garden with power, grace and ease.

When I think of #52 slamming home the basketball in a manner that at once recalls Shaquille O'Neal's muscle and Hakeem Olojuwan's grace, all in the context of a young team that was already 41-41 a year ago before adding Oden and Rudy Fernandez, it's a lot more cathartic and joyous than you could ever rightfully hope to feel about an exhibition game. It was nothing less than a revelatory moment, as if that first slam-dunk two minutes into the game was thrusting not only the ball but an era of Blazer basketball from one era to the next.