I’ve always felt the turning point in the 2008 U.S. Presidential campaign was the moment when the sight of then-candidate Barack Obama after wrapping up the Democratic nomination was almost immediately contrasted with now-failed-candidate and angry man John McCain, in front of a sickening green background and performing to an audience which sounded more like a canned laugh track, giving a nasty, pitiful screed about the man who would trounce him in the election only a few months later. One man represented the best of what America would like to imagine itself as–intelligent, broad-minded, appealing to the better angels of our nature–and the other represented the impossibly tired bitterness of a rapidly disappearing part of our society. The choice, and thus result, was never more stark.
Fast forward twenty-six months, and we find ourselves dealing with a massive tragedy–not because of the number of people killed and injured (how many Iraqi and Afghani citizens have died every single day during America’s adventures overseas?), but because of what the attack says about the level and intentions of our political discourse and our overwhelming obsession with guns. And just as before, we’re presented with a contrast. On one hand we have the half-term governor of Alaska, whose defining characteristic is how little time she spends doing any one job, sitting in front of an empty stone fireplace (I assume most of the camera crew has already packed up and headed home) and describing how much it hurts to be a victim. Not Representative Gabrielle Giffords, who lies in intensive care in an Arizona hospital after being shot in an assassination attempt, of course, but Sarah Palin, who has put aside her dog whistle for the moment to discuss her First Amendment rights (she’s left Sharon Angle to discuss the Second Amendment ones) and avoiding “blood libel” (I’ll leave it to her speechwriter to explain whether the horrifically inappropriate term was used out of intention or shocking stupidity. I’m sure it’s unfair even to accuse the speaker of anything other than the best possible motivations, after all.)
On the other hand we have now-President Obama’s speech, invoking not the politically driven aspects of what happened (which I’ve discussed elsewhere) but the things which matter most at a time like this–what should ultimately bring us together. While Palin spent the majority of her speech feeling sorry…for herself, President Obama spent the entirety of his feeling sorry for others–most notably the nine year old girl Christina-Taylor Green, whose only crime was in believing that she would be safe outside a Safeway with a member of Congress. “I want us to live up to her expectations,” he said, in a powerful reminder of what ought to matter most to all of us. One speaker appealed to her rapidly fading base, raging against the dying of their light; the other appealed to everyone, as he always does, as he always has since entering the American consciousness.
It was another reminder of how very different the two philosophies are, and another reminder of how very different our country would be had the first one–me first, guns second, and damn all the rest of you who don’t agree–won out over the second–others first, put away the weapons, and join together in common purpose to repudiate hatred. It’s a contrast which Sarah Palin will never understand, for she lacks the interest in anyone other than herself to recognize it. But although the conflict is ongoing, it is a limited one, for her supporters have already lost the war only they wished to fight. Nothing made that clearer than listening to the rhetoric of an exceptional President again, for yet another time, soaring above violence and appealing to hope rather than despair.
As Robert Shrum put it: “At the end of the day, after listening to the president, we’ll know why he’s president and she never will be.” It’s like comparing apples and oranges. And as always, there simply is no comparison to be made between those things.
