Those who can, do. Those who can’t, teach. And what they teach is
what they can’t do any more, because either the body or spirit or
both have lost their singleness of purpose; because they have
seen too much and suppressed too much and compromised too much,
and in the end tasted too little. So they take to rekindling
their old dreams in new minds, and warming themselves against the
fires of the young.
— The Secret Pilgrim, John le Carré
It has been a long time since a teacher has become President in
this country. Professor Woodrow Wilson of Princeton came to the
post with ideals too lofty for prime time, and arguably did some
real damage. Indeed Winston Churchill implied that Wilson’s
approach unwittingly laid the groundwork for World War II. Sunday
School teacher Jimmy Carter came with a crabby disposition, a
cranky rhetorical style and a creepy disdain for other opinions.
His tenure brought the Republic to its knees, on the verge of
losing its status as a great power.
Now we have University of Chicago Professor of Constitutional Law
Barack Obama. Part of his appeal on Election Day was his vibe as
the cool professor, the one guy who didn’t put you totally to
sleep and who could make impractical ideas sound romantic. So we
give him the highest pulpit in the land, and stand ready to hear
soaring flights of noble aspiration. Our ears our perked to hear
the call to our better angels.
And what do we get instead? Sour grapes, poor-mouthing, downers,
doomsaying, negativism, and bile. Yeah, the hope and change may
show up, but way on down the road.
Frankly, I think the President’s statements, his general tone,
have been nothing less than vile. We can prove this by imagining
the alternative. Honestly, now, even if like me you are no fan of
Obama, you could have been won over, at least in the short term,
if he used the Reagan playbook. Say he stood up on January 20 and
issued a broad appeal to the nation to come together in a
commitment to a shared optimism. Yesterday’s finances,
yesterday’s troubles, we yesterday, today can be different. This
is the point — we thought so, anyway — of The Audacity of
Hope. He could have asked people to have faith and buy the
new home, the new car, though staying within reasonable budgets.
He could have asked businesses to suspend their planned layoffs
for six months, to give new policies and a new spirit a chance to
lift their sagging fortunes.
Now a hardheaded accountant type may argue that businesses would
do what they needed to do and not respond favorably to such a
request. In actuality, the business cycle is hostage to national
mood, which is why consumer confidence is seen as the key
indicator of an economy. The front you put up is a big part of
salesmanship. There is no doubt that many businesses would have
stepped up and held off their downsizing. Some would announce the
decision, hoping to benefit from the publicity, and others would
get on board more quietly. Believe it or not, that kind of direct
call to the nation would itself have put a trillion new dollars
into the economy, maybe more. Such is the power of the Presidency
and such is the power of the good will that was directed toward
incoming President Obama.
In place of this we get short-term despair and long-term sorta
maybe optimism, contingent on giving his administration a
trillion dollars to reward old friends and buy new ones. We must
sign on to his whole agenda, and we must prostrate ourselves
before his throne. On top of all that, this teacher has many
preachy lessons for us backward types. We must stop our partisan
bickering and narrow self-interest and parochial jingoism and
patriotic chauvinism and ethnocentrism and irresponsible
financial behavior. This professor ain’t cool, he’s cold… and a
scold.
How about some talk about our national virtues, or don’t we have
any? Apparently, Obama says, he must “remake America.” I never
thought I would be looking back on Jimmy Carter’s rhetoric with
nostalgia.
I hear a lot of audacity in Barack Obama but very little real
hope.
