Barack Obama
Culture war commencements
Obama's speech at Barnard and Romney's at Liberty were a stark illustration of their ideological differences
President Obama at Barnard College and Mitt Romney at Liberty University
(Credit: AP) It’s come to this: “An incredibly boring white guy.” That was how a “Republican official familiar with the campaign officials” described the “prized pick” for Mitt Romney’s vice presidential candidate. Framed as the Romney campaign’s desire not to make John McCain’s mistakes, it distills something fundamental about this election — how it’s become a culture war in the most profound sense, one way of looking at the world diametrically opposed to the other.
This is not supposed to be the “change” election, and yet somehow we have an incumbent who, at a commencement address at Barnard just today, approvingly drew continuity from “Seneca Falls to Selma to Stonewall,” and talked about black and Latina girls seeing themselves in his administration. His challenger, meanwhile, visibly hopes same-old and presumed competence carry the day. There was so much in the 2008 election that scrambled the familiar calculus and allegiances – the young black man with the exotic upbringing against Hillary, the white boomer woman; and McCain, the only “white guy” in the picture, recruiting a guns-and-baby-toting Republican woman praising Title IX. But this week all you have to do is read Barack Obama’s speech at Barnard and Mitt Romney’s at Liberty University to see a dichotomy as stark as the one on either side of a picket line.
What mattered in Obama’s speech wasn’t the standard praise for his wife, mother or mother-in-law, or his hopes for his daughters. It was how he talked about the Constitution, of which he said, “Yes, it had its flaws — flaws that this nation has strived to perfect over time. Questions of race and gender were unresolved. No woman’s signature graced the original document.” But, he added, “What made this document special was that it provided the space — the possibility — for those who had been left out of our charter to fight their way in. It provided people the language to appeal to principles and ideals that broadened democracy’s reach. It allowed for protest, and movements, and the dissemination of new ideas that would repeatedly, decade after decade, change the world — a constant forward movement that continues to this day.”
It’s a formulation that sees the inclusion and participation of the excluded – even when the process is painful – as the consummation of the country’s ideals, not something from which it needs to be “taken back.” Contrast that with Romney at Liberty this weekend, in which he cited David Landes to declare that “Culture makes all the difference … Central to America’s rise to global leadership is our Judeo-Christian tradition, with its vision of the goodness and possibilities of every life.” There was the purposeful declaration that “marriage is a relationship between one man and one woman,” the shout-out to the anti-gay marriage Chick-fil-A founder and various clergy, the sermonizing. And crucially, there was an invocation of resentment, of persecution: “Your values will not always be the object of public admiration. In fact, the more you live by your beliefs, the more you will endure the censure of the world.” (Who’s supposed to play the politics of victimization, again?)
As for “incredibly boring white guy,” no one sentient would deny picking Palin was a mistake, but it wasn’t a mistake because she was a woman – the implication of that unnamed Republican’s comment, intended or not. It was a mistake because the McCain campaign thought demographics alone would give them the sheen of being transformative, and it blinded them to all else.
It’s not crazy to think that this time, safety and competence might appeal at a time of economic uncertainty. The Romney campaign didn’t create the supposition that a white guy is the standard, the safe and the certain, or that “diversity” is something you get one chance to try — even if they’re only too happy to exploit it. But in the end, from what can be determined from her wildly erratic public performance, Palin turned out to be a fairly conventional social conservative. (The erratic part ended up making all the difference.) This time around, Romney and his camp are manifestly uninterested in heeding what, per Newsweek’s headline today, “New Mexico’s Governor can teach the GOP.” That would be Susana Martinez, the first Latina governor, a pro-life, pro-gun Republican who differs from Palin in a crucial way: The worst thing a critic is quoted saying about her is that she’s “maintaining a competent, minimalist administration so there’s nothing to hang around her neck during the next campaign.” That sounds … incredibly boring, actually.
It’s not just being female and Latina that would set Martinez apart from the current GOP direction, though given their steady alienation of those groups, that’s not nothing. She’s chosen not to be a mother, off-message for a Republican moment that considers elaborate mother-worship an effective rejoinder to accusations of misogyny, and she has no patience for what little we know about Romney’s immigration stance (“‘Self-deport?’ What the heck does that mean?”).
But most significantly of all, she essentially dismisses the fiercest conservative dogma of the moment, calling the mantra of “lower taxes” “this five-liner of nothingness,” to Newsweek. The primary caretaker for a disabled sister, she says, “I believe in providing services to adults and children who can’t take care of themselves … Sometimes Republicans engage in number-crunching analysis that doesn’t always take the neediest into account.” It was a clear shot at the Ryan budget, an article of faith for Republicans – and a reminder that even when wrapped in social conservatism, there’s a whole other sort of radicalism at stake in this election.
Irin Carmon is a staff writer for Salon. Follow her on Twitter at @irincarmon or email her at icarmon@salon.com. More Irin Carmon.
America’s drone exceptionalism
Always the world leader, our country has pioneered terrifyingly expansive new rules for drone warfare
(Credit: Salon/Shutterstock) Here’s the essence of it: you can trust America’s crème de la crème, the most elevated, responsible people, no matter what weapons, what powers, you put in their hands. No need to constantly look over their shoulders.
Placed in the hands of evildoers, those weapons and powers could create a living nightmare; controlled by the best of people, they lead to measured, thoughtful, precise decisions in which bad things are (with rare and understandable exceptions) done only to truly terrible types. In the process, you simply couldn’t be better protected.
Continue Reading CloseTom Engelhardt, co-founder of the American Empire Project, runs the Nation Institute's TomDispatch.com. His latest book, "The United States of Fear" (Haymarket Books), has just been published. More Tom Engelhardt.
Using Bush’s playbook
"Karl Rove politics" aren't quite dead: Obama's strategy in 2012 will mirror W's in 2004
George W. Bush and Barack Obama (Credit: Reuters/Larry Downing) Barack Obama’s presidency was born from nothing so much as his repudiation of George W. Bush’s administration — its policies and politics, its style and tone. One of Obama’s most effective 2008 stump speech refrains was his promise to end the era of “Scooter Libby justice, ‘Brownie’ incompetence and Karl Rove politics.”
But the political dynamics for winning a second presidential term often differ markedly from winning the first. So don’t be surprised by many eerie parallels between Obama’s 2012 reelection bid and Bush’s 2004 campaign. The president may not rely upon “Karl Rove politics” in the strictest sense, and nobody would confuse David Axelrod with Rove. But Obama’s reelection route and rhetoric may bear more than a few Rovian hallmarks.
Continue Reading CloseObama’s next moves on marriage
The president should speak out against state marriage bans and stop enforcing DOMA
President Obama (Credit: Reuters/Yuri Gripas) President Obama’s support for same-sex marriage is a huge victory for the gay rights movement, but it’s also a qualified one. Obama said he still supports the right of states to deny couples same-sex marriage rights, but “personally,” he thinks that’s wrong. In addition to making Obama’s stance on gay rights a bit less incoherent — how much sense did it make for him to oppose both gay-marriage and the gay-marriage ban in North Carolina, which passed on Tuesday? — the president’s much-anticipated “evolution” opens the door for him to be a more fierce advocate for gay rights.
Continue Reading CloseObama goes viral, wins Twitter
The president's endorsement of gay marriage becomes a cleverly -- and intensely -- choreographed meme
When Barack Obama blew America’s mind by declaring his support for same-sex marriage Wednesday, he explained that his views on the subject had long been “evolving.” But while evolution is a process that can take millennia, social media moves with considerably more swiftness. However long it took the White House (nudged though it was by Joe Biden’s Sunday blurt that he was “absolutely comfortable” with marriage equality) to get to that place, it took no time at all for Obama’s sentiments to become a meme.
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Mary Elizabeth Williams is a staff writer for Salon and the author of "Gimme Shelter: My Three Years Searching for the American Dream." Follow her on Twitter: @embeedub. More Mary Elizabeth Williams.
Obama’s finest hour
For once, the president who ran on a platform of hope and change lived up to his ideals
President Obama (Credit: Reuters/Yuri Gripas) On Wednesday, the real Barack Obama stood up. He is a better man and a better president for having done so. And America is a better country.
Homophobia is the last refuge of open bigotry in American life. Racism, anti-Semitism and misogyny still exist, but they lurk in the shadows. It is no longer socially acceptable in any segment of society to openly say that blacks are violent or Latinos are lazy or Jews are grasping or women are genetically inferior. But it is still acceptable to say the crudest and most hate-filled things about gay people. In his 1999 book “One Nation, After All,” sociologist Alan Wolfe found that Americans were remarkably tolerant and open-minded about every controversial subject except one: homosexuality. Attitudes toward gays have become far more enlightened during the last 13 years, but Wolfe’s findings touch on a profound social reality: Many Americans still feel gays are somehow unacceptable, or scary, or immoral, or just different in some way that makes it acceptable to discriminate against them and/or openly disparage them.
Continue Reading CloseGary Kamiya is a Salon contributing writer. More Gary Kamiya.
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