I must confess: I just don’t get it.
Since long before I was eligible to vote, I’ve always been an avid follower of politics, politicians and policy. There’s probably a picture of me somewhere at 7 years old with my “Bobby!” button from Robert Kennedy’s tragically shortened presidential campaign in 1968. I spent innumerable hours in the Spring and Summer of 1973 watching the Senate Watergate hearings, live on TV, and I spent nearly every Fall weekend during Junior High School and High School knocking on doors, leafleting at supermarkets, and making GOTV calls for my father’s friends and associates who were running for local political office.
In every election since reaching voting age — national, state, local, and primaries — I have cast my vote based on careful study of the politicians and issues. Somehow, although I can never seem to get birthday cards in the mail to my relatives on time, I’ve never missed an absentee ballot deadline. I read newspapers, magazines and websites, write letters to editors and my state and national representatives, I blog and comment on blogs. All this because participating in and understanding politics is a vitally important part of how I engage with the world.
Yet with all this knowledge and analysis and awareness, I don’t understand the visceral hatred, the vitriol, and the ill-will directed at the Clintons — Hillary in particular — even (or especially) by people in their own party. They arrived on the national political scene full of confidence, competence and political and personal achievements. At the same time, there appeared a fully-formed opposition assailing them with a load of unfounded accusations, vile rumors, and allegations of such spectacular wrongdoing which not even the Kennedy family, with nearly a century in the political spotlight, had been able to amass. In the 16 years since they’ve been a part of the national political scene, that body of hatred has continued to grow, out of all proportion to anything they could possibly bear responsibility for.
I’m not naive or oblivious to scandals and faults. I read the same newspapers and websites as many of my friends and contemporaries who maintain this disgust of Hillary (and Bill), I go to the same rallies and protests, I live in the same states and neighborhoods, I work at and patronize the same businesses as some of her vocal detractors. Yet somehow, I admire her — them — for their intelligence, skill, and dedication to participating in what they believe is the betterment their country.
I just don’t get it.
So, I’m asking anyone who reads this to help me understand. This isn’t specifically about this election; however a lot of the negativity from within her own party is really coming to the front during this campaign. I know this will be ugly, and I know that the hatred is not always rational. I’m hoping, however, that maybe we can all learn something here about political motives, expectations, tactics, and personalities which can explain what can earn one person such animosity.
Please. Help me understand.
On October 2, 2002, Illinois State Senator Barack Obama gave a speech to a crowd gathered in Chicago for an anti-war rally. It was an excellent speech, like all of Senator Obama’s speeches: well, written, filled with passionate phrasing and the rhetorical rhythms of his idols, Dr. Martin Luther King and John F. Kennedy.
…I stand before you as someone who is not opposed to war in all circumstances. The Civil War was one of the bloodiest in history, and yet it was only through the crucible of the sword, the sacrifice of multitudes, that we could begin to perfect this union, and drive the scourge of slavery from our soil. I don’t oppose all wars.
My grandfather signed up for a war the day after Pearl Harbor was bombed, fought in Patton’s army. He saw the dead and dying across the fields of Europe; he heard the stories of fellow troops who first entered Auschwitz and Treblinka. He fought in the name of a larger freedom, part of that arsenal of democracy that triumphed over evil, and he did not fight in vain. I don’t oppose all wars.
After September 11th, after witnessing the carnage and destruction, the dust and the tears, I supported this administration’s pledge to hunt down and root out those who would slaughter innocents in the name of intolerance, and I would willingly take up arms myself to prevent such tragedy from happening again. I don’t oppose all wars. And I know that in this crowd today, there is no shortage of patriots, or of patriotism.
What I am opposed to is a dumb war. What I am opposed to is a rash war…
Even just reading it, without hearing the Senator’s rich baritone embracing his words, there can be no doubt that it is a wonderful speech. But the difference between Senator Obama and Dr. King is that, while both could be described as inspiring orators, Dr. King was also an activist, putting his entire being into the actions necessary to turn his words into reality.
And what has Senator Obama done to act on the sentiments expressed in his speech? When he spoke before that crowd in 2002, he was free from the responsibility of having to make an actual decision on whether to support the war. He was an outsider, and he asks us to believe him when he says that if he were not an outsider he would have voted consistent with his opposition to the war. His actions don’t agree with that.
Since he was elected to the Senate in 2004, in every single vote on funding the war — the only indisputable power the Constitution affords Congress over the actions of the military — Senator Obama has voted alongside Senator Clinton to continue funding the war. He hasn’t continued his oratory in the Senate or in the pages of the Congressional Record. He hasn’t shown any great willingness to stand up to the majority of Democrats or the whole Senate to express his opposition to the war.
Even his own words don’t support his assertion that he would have voted against the Authorization to Use Military Force. On Meet the Press with Tim Russert in 2004, Senator Obama said:
“I’m not privy to Senate intelligence reports. What would I have done? I don’t know,”
and
“There’s not much of a difference between my position on Iraq and George Bush’s position at this stage.”
The less said about the second statement, the better, but the first statement is honest and realistic. It takes into account the complexities of governing, when one has to compare and evaluate evidence and opinions from not only one’s own heart and gut, but from supporters, advisers, constituents, party leaders, and the effect of that decision on one’s future plans and ambitions.
There were 23 Senators and 133 Representatives who opposed the resolutions, and sadly none of them are still in this race for the presidency. The differences between the major Democratic candidates on nearly all other issues are very slim, so Senator Obama has declared this one distinguishing position as the bedrock upon which his campaign stands. He asks us to trust that his judgment, as evidenced by this one position — free from the danger of consequences and clear in the perfect vision of hindsight — will make up for his lack of experience, his undemonstrated leadership, and his reliance on passive notions such as “hope.”
Based on the experience of 2000 and 2004, when the electorate placed their trust in an unproven, lightly-experienced, “nice guy” who spoke of passive notions such as “compassion,” Senator Obama’s foundation appears to me not anchored in solid bedrock, but floating in a dangerous quagmire.
