I CONTINUE to follow intently the Obama-Clinton wars. Aside from contentious issues of race and gender, the heart of the matter, is the clash between believing in the dream or vision that Obama is painting versus the brass tacks reality that Clinton is proving. The audacity of hope, of youth versus the certainty of experience and competency. Obama is untested in many ways but his supporters rally to the idea that is the right man to lead the country and charismatic leaders will unite and show the way. The Clintonites battlecry is that it is the daily grind that makes a good leader, someone who is tested and has the grit to deal with details.

In many ways, we humans are caught in this debate—of being idealistic and therefore dreamers, or being pragmatists and thus practical. I have been asked whether people change or not. What do you think? Do people change for the better? For sure, people change for the worse—fast. To those who think people do change, they are the optimists. For those who don’t, perhaps they are the pessimists. That spells out the difference on how you view life and your outlook with people.

Seeming dichotomy or cleavage, to either pick one or the other and damned either way. How can one eat on dreams? How can one go on living without a dream in one’s heart?

Specifically in the Philippine context, we do not see our leaders offering hope or making things work. Maybe this is the one reason why are stuck in this rut—no common vision to heal our perceived divisions and no method to just make our system function. We see this all around us. In other places and specially in the United States, they are torn by the ugly multiple-headed monster of racial divide—white, blacks and Latinos; the gender divide—man, woman, gays, lesbians; generation divide—baby boomers, generation X. Is it not such a relief that we don’t have all these issues here save one—the class divide? At least this is not something we are born with but rather born into. That means we can get out of it one way or another.

I think this lack of a big issue to fight over is holding us back. We coast along because there is no issue that stares you in the face that makes you blink or stand up. You can cite poverty, corruption but these are undercurrents that canot be easily identified or grappled. It is also acceptable and downright fashionable for politicians to use similar situations to represent a cause without feeling too strongly or taking it too personally. For race, gender and age, it is so sensitive that the charge of bigotry cannot be more than a breath away.

This brings us back to the point of dreams versus reality. I believe we can live in a world with our dreams intact and our realities handled, with our idealism pursued running alongside pratical stuff. Tough to draw the line but that is exactly the point of living—finding that balance. The Good Book exhorts us to be “as innocent as doves and as wily as the serpent.” How else to describe what it takes to be a man of the world yet rooted in the eternity? The other image is for man to reach up continuously for the stars with feet planted squarely on the ground.

People do change for the good given the chance, the motivation and tons of grace. Otherwise, it will be determinism of a vicious kind. Otherwise, what do we make of deathbed conversions? Otherwise, is there a point to the whole challenge of getting out of our little egos?

There are lessons to be learned in the Obama-Clinton great debate, in the substance and nature of sensational causes in our own public arena, and in the clear reflection of each person. Dreams and reality are not two sides of coin; they simply are.