Barack Obama gave a speech today in Independence, Missouri. You can read the transcript here. It was another moving, excellent performance of the kind we’ve come to expect from Obama. Apparently, we now take it for granted that Obama will give a great speech, because we no longer give him any credit for them. He spoke of patriotism and of what it means to love this country. Here’s just one example:
I believe those who attack America’s flaws without acknowledging the singular greatness of our ideals, and their proven capacity to inspire a better world, do not truly understand America.
Of course, precisely because America isn’t perfect, precisely because our ideals constantly demand more from us, patriotism can never be defined as loyalty to any particular leader or government or policy. As Mark Twain, that greatest of American satirists and proud son of Missouri, once wrote, “Patriotism is supporting your country all the time, and your government when it deserves it.” We may hope that our leaders and our government stand up for our ideals, and there are many times in our history when that’s occurred. But when our laws, our leaders or our government are out of alignment with our ideals, then the dissent of ordinary Americans may prove to be one of the truest expression of patriotism.
The young preacher from Georgia, Martin Luther King, Jr., who led a movement to help America confront our tragic history of racial injustice and live up to the meaning of our creed – he was a patriot. The young soldier who first spoke about the prisoner abuse at Abu Ghraib – he is a patriot. Recognizing a wrong being committed in this country’s name; insisting that we deliver on the promise of our Constitution – these are the acts of patriots, men and women who are defending that which is best in America. And we should never forget that – especially when we disagree with them; especially when they make us uncomfortable with their words.
It would be hard to find a more eloquent defense of dissent in this county, but the blogosphere decided to dissent about something other than the war or FISA or torture today. They decided to throw a tantrum over one sentence from this speech that referred negatively to MoveOn.org (without mentioning their name). You should read the full context of his remarks (the offending sentence is highlighted).
My concerns here aren’t simply personal, however. After all, throughout our history, men and women of far greater stature and significance than me have had their patriotism questioned in the midst of momentous debates. Thomas Jefferson was accused by the Federalists of selling out to the French. The anti-Federalists were just as convinced that John Adams was in cahoots with the British and intent on restoring monarchal rule. Likewise, even our wisest Presidents have sought to justify questionable policies on the basis of patriotism. Adams’ Alien and Sedition Act, Lincoln’s suspension of habeas corpus, Roosevelt’s internment of Japanese Americans – all were defended as expressions of patriotism, and those who disagreed with their policies were sometimes labeled as unpatriotic.
In other words, the use of patriotism as a political sword or a political shield is as old as the Republic. Still, what is striking about today’s patriotism debate is the degree to which it remains rooted in the culture wars of the 1960s – in arguments that go back forty years or more. In the early years of the civil rights movement and opposition to the Vietnam War, defenders of the status quo often accused anybody who questioned the wisdom of government policies of being unpatriotic. Meanwhile, some of those in the so-called counter-culture of the Sixties reacted not merely by criticizing particular government policies, but by attacking the symbols, and in extreme cases, the very idea, of America itself – by burning flags; by blaming America for all that was wrong with the world; and perhaps most tragically, by failing to honor those veterans coming home from Vietnam, something that remains a national shame to this day. And yet the anger and turmoil of that period never entirely drained away. All too often our politics still seems trapped in these old, threadbare arguments – a fact most evident during our recent debates about the war in Iraq, when those who opposed administration policy were tagged by some as unpatriotic, and a general providing his best counsel on how to move forward in Iraq was accused of betrayal.
Most Americans never bought into these simplistic world-views – these caricatures of left and right. Most Americans understood that dissent does not make one unpatriotic, and that there is nothing smart or sophisticated about a cynical disregard for America’s traditions and institutions.
Even this extensive quoting doesn’t put these comments in their full context. To get the full context you need to read the parts where Obama describes the formation of his respect and love for America, its institutions, traditions, and ideals. Only then will you truly understand why he feels strongly opposed to the more strident and wide-sweeping attacks the left sometimes makes on this county.
I am tired of hearing people on the left complain about Democrats that did not want to be associated with the General Betrayus advertisement and that went so far as to condemn it. I condemned it as the stupidest, most self-defeating, and predictably self-defeating political advertisement I have ever seen. I am still stunned that MoveOn placed that advertisement without running it by anyone in Congress to see if they would stand by its message. Of course they weren’t going to stand by it. I can’t think of a viable party in any country in the world that would stand by an advertisement that accused the commanding general in the field in a time of war of betraying his country merely because he was going to testify before Congress. It’s as if eight-year olds were devising this public relations strategy, and the people that are still defending them are like two-year olds.
And I know all the arguments. There is no argument that can trump what actually happened. The anti-war movement never recovered. Our dissent was marginalized. And why? Because, as Obama said, the country doesn’t buy into ‘cynical disregard for America’s traditions and institutions.’ The pro-war faction has always understood this. That’s why during the Vietnam War the FBI developed their COINTELPRO program to actually incite the New Left to greater acts of violence and radicalism. If you burn an American flag, people stop listening to you. If you plant a pipe-bomb on government property people will want you thrown in jail. Real patriots work to make America live up to its ideals, but they don’t attack the institutions themselves because they believe in them. There is an art to effective dissent and there is also an art to undermining legitimate dissent. The Betrayus campaign couldn’t have failed these tests more spectacularly.
If you listen to what Obama is saying, you’ll understand why doesn’t agree with the kind of dissent MoveOn opted for:
As I got older, that gut instinct – that America is the greatest country on earth – would survive my growing awareness of our nation’s imperfections: it’s ongoing racial strife; the perversion of our political system laid bare during the Watergate hearings; the wrenching poverty of the Mississippi Delta and the hills of Appalachia. Not only because, in my mind, the joys of American life and culture, its vitality, its variety and its freedom, always outweighed its imperfections, but because I learned that what makes America great has never been its perfection but the belief that it can be made better. I came to understand that our revolution was waged for the sake of that belief – that we could be governed by laws, not men; that we could be equal in the eyes of those laws; that we could be free to say what we want and assemble with whomever we want and worship as we please; that we could have the right to pursue our individual dreams but the obligation to help our fellow citizens pursue theirs.
For a young man of mixed race, without firm anchor in any particular community, without even a father’s steadying hand, it is this essential American idea – that we are not constrained by the accident of birth but can make of our lives what we will – that has defined my life, just as it has defined the life of so many other Americans.
That is why, for me, patriotism is always more than just loyalty to a place on a map or a certain kind of people. Instead, it is also loyalty to America’s ideals – ideals for which anyone can sacrifice, or defend, or give their last full measure of devotion. I believe it is this loyalty that allows a country teeming with different races and ethnicities, religions and customs, to come together as one.
And even more specifically:
I remember, when living for four years in Indonesia as a child, listening to my mother reading me the first lines of the Declaration of Independence – “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal. That they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” I remember her explaining how this declaration applied to every American, black and white and brown alike; how those words, and words of the United States Constitution, protected us from the injustices that we witnessed other people suffering during those years abroad. That’s my idea of America.
I never lived in a foreign country, but I studied enough history and philosophy to develop a deep and abiding respect for our country’s institutions that is very similar to Obama’s. And I formed the same understanding of patriotism, which I see as a combination of a defense of our institutions with a constant call to improve upon them. I’m no shrinking violet when it comes to criticizing America but I never do it with wanton disrespect or cynical disregard. And I’m politically astute enough to know that a majority of Americans will not listen nor will they be convinced by arguments that show that kind of disrespect to any of our institutions…including the armed forces.
MoveOn blundered when they launched the Betrayus advertisement and the blame for their decision lies with their decision makers, not with the people that do not care to be associated with their decision. But my problem with the Blogosphere’s reaction goes deeper.
There is a stunning lack of maturity in the progressive movement. Maybe it is because we are young and have been out of power our whole lives. But surrogates need to understand something. Obama is the candidate. The candidate wants to push his message. If you become the message, you’re no longer pushing the narrative. If you want fame for yourself or publicity for your organization more than you want to elect the candidate or achieve your organization’s goals, then you’re part of the problem, you’re making the candidate’s job harder, and you should expect to get a stiff-arm from the campaign. If a surrogate goes off message he or she will get disowned in order to reclaim the narrative that the candidate wants to focus on. Surrogates need to understand this going in and not take it too personally when they get tossed in front of a bus. I am positive that Wesley Clark understands the rules of the game, but it is quite obvious that most of the blogosphere does not.
Barack Obama doesn’t want to discuss John McCain’s military service. It is not a narrative that benefits him. He doesn’t want his allies gratuitously attacking the military and its generals. That is not an association that helps him. It’s nothing personal. It’s strictly politics. And if your ego gets bruised everytime the candidate stiff-arms an off message progressive, you best get into another line of work.