[This and other Obama-focused thoughts are available and archived on http://blog.HopeAgainstTheMachine.com]
Many people ask me what I think about the Reverend Wright clips, and how they affect Obama's candidacy.
I think that Obama -- like most of us -- takes the good with the bad with people who he associates with. And, like most of us, he develops relationships on the commonalities, and tends not to focus on the areas where there are disagreements or incompatibilities. And, thanks to his relationship with Reverend Wright, Obama has developed a set of invaluable skills that we could only wish our current President had, and uniquely equip Obama to be an effective President of the United States of America.
I think that Wright is a complex, charismatic speaker who says incendiary things to make a rhetorical, emotional impact... but someone who also preaches some very inspirational, positive concepts like "The Audacity of Hope" -- an idea that Obama embraced and turned into a book and a campaign platform. Of course, we don't get exposed to never-ending sound-bites of his sermons about the Audacity of Hope... despite the fact that these positive messages were probably just as powerfully evangelized and staged. So, of Reverend Wright's two sides, his positive, inspirational were fully adopted by Obama, whereas his more troubling, negative views are nowhere to be found in or around Obama's campaign.
Honestly, if it weren't for Wright, I don't think Obama would have had the power and the confidence to become a serious presidential nominee.
Regarding Obama's judgment associating himself with Reverend Wright for 20 years, I think Obama decided he'd take the good along with the unsavory and negative. Obama used the good, inspirational aspects of Reverend Wright and took them to the next level with his own personal, positive charisma. The angry and negative aspects of Reverend Wright are clearly linked to the victimization and mistrust locked inside the older black community -- a era that Obama clearly understands, but did not experience first-hand. Obama relegates any victimization and venomous words to "the politics of the divisiveness" -- a type of politics that he is specifically running against in his campaign.
Obama acts as a bridge, if you will, between two defining generations. And just because a bridge links old, leftover anger to a new optimism does not mean the bridge is suspect. It's the responsibility of the bridge to enable each side to see one another, and providing a path from the old to the new. And for every problematic issue with Wright (be it his friendship with Louis Farrakhan or other unsavory aspects of his personality, style and rhetoric), I think Barack Obama has proven to America that we can trust his character -- that we can trust him to act as that bridge without being infected by the negative, hurtful aspects of the people he associates with.
Importantly, I think this relationship with Reverend Wright helps explain why Obama is so uniquely comfortable and confident in "speaking with our enemies" (i.e., Presidents of Iran and Syria). Think about it: In a way, dealing with a complex, polarizing individual like Wright may have provided Obama with the tools and experience needed to be in the presence of shocking speakers without being thrown off course by the distasteful rhetoric that America's enemies so often toss at us. And, more importantly, Obama seems to have developed the skills to find the good pieces in complex characters (including Wright), and act as an amplifier for the goodness in people, while subjugating the nastier bits to background noise. This is what great leaders do naturally. And this is how I believe Obama handled his relationship with Reverend Wright.
For instance, Obama clearly has the intellectual capacity to see the meat behind the rhetorical bones of phrases like "G-d Damn America." In this example, Reverend Wright linked that very phrase to the Bible, where it says in no uncertain terms, Thou Shalt Not Kill. The "G-d Damn America" phrase was specifically about damning America for bombing and killing hundreds of thousands of Japanese with two atom bombs in WWII. If nothing else, this is an interesting biblically-focused view into America's final acts during WWII -- a view that is counter to the culture of war that exists in America, yet should align well with the religious culture in America.
Drawing this parallel has its fans and detractors alike, but this was Reverend Wright's perspective on how America would be seen through the eyes of G-d based on his interpretation of the Ten Commandments. As a minister, that's actually his job. And as a minister in a church that serves an urban black community, theatrical phrasing and stagecraft are also considered to be part of the job.
I think Obama sees the complexity in what was behind this phrase, and like many reasonable people I know, would not be offended by the superficial emotional rhetoric. Like most, I think he would clearly be able to see through the throw-away rhetoric and actually be intrigued by the biblical viewpoint lying beneath the inflammatory words. I know that ever since I heard this sound bite, I have given thought to this alternative, non-mainstream viewpoint. I don't fully buy into it, but it has served to broaden my perspective of history from what is traditionally taught in high school. I think we would all benefit if we were open to more than one perspective, even if one of these perspectives was wrapped in a venomous context simply to create an emotional impact.
Too often, we find our current leaders reacting to rhetoric (i.e., Saddam saying he has WMDs, Achmadinijad calling America the Great Satan, Putin saying America is not a democracy, etc.) instead of understanding that the rhetoric is designed to serve an emotional purpose. The real meaning behind much of this posturing needs to be mined from beneath the emotional words and phrases. To this point, I think this country needs a President who can see past the packaging of sometimes unseemly rhetoric, and yet still be open to the underlying messages within.
Imagine a President that does not overreact to angry rhetoric, but looks between the lines for opportunities for negotiation. Imagine a President that can understand that a foreign leader can have both really bad and really good sides, and actually has the patience and demeanor to find the good sides of otherwise troubling characters, and amplify those positive areas to push progress. Imagine a President who seeks out the good where, on the surface, there only looks like trouble. Imagine where we'd be today as Americans if our current President was so lucky to have learned how to deal with complex people and complex situations better. Imagine where we'd be today if our current President did not hastily over-react to charismatic leaders who spout unseemly things just to make a point or to stoke an emotional response.
If Obama can sniff out the good in Reverend Wright and leave the ugly behind as excess baggage, perhaps President Obama would make our nation's foes famous for the good things they mean, and relegate the bad things they say to the footnotes of history.
There's more...
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