Martin LeFevre: Obama In Lincoln’s League?

We’re being fed a lot of pabulum here in the States about Barack Obama and his wunderbar Administration. Media mouthpieces are even starting to use the phrase ‘radical change.’

Maybe there’s a silver lining in all the blather. Perhaps saying what’s required to adequately respond to the global ecological, economic, and political crisis precedes actually taking the right course of action. More likely however, all the talk about radical change is meant as a substitute for actually radically changing.

Today I forced myself to read a treacly piece by Joe Kline in the latest Time magazine. They usually give Kline one page, but this week he got four, and it was three too many. It contains gems like: Obama is raising “the most powerful citizen army in U.S. history.”

Lordy, lordy, we’ve been reborn! Not so fast there pastor. Just because the Mephisto pair have been moved out of the White House, does not mean the dark cloud over this continent (yes, it engulfs Canada as well) has passed, and sunny skies are on the horizon.

In Republican circles, they say media mavens like Joe Klein have “drunk the Kool-Aid.” And they may be right. This “new, gloriously unexpected and vibrant face of our country” has the depth of a high school pep rally.

When a respected journalist waxes lyrical about “the millions who trekked to Washington for the Inauguration, who cried their eyes out and cheered their lungs raw…as testimony to The Man’s [emphasis mine] sheer inspirational power,” I get a queasy feeling.

We’re seeing the flipside in the mainstream media of the patriotic run-up to the US/UK invasion of Iraq. At that time, uncritical journalists became complicit in the war; now, uncritical journalists run the risk of complicity in creating a demagogue.

For now, Obama seems to have his head screwed on straight. He appears to understand that tone is not transformation, and that presidential memos will not change predetermined mindsets, much less the structural momentum of decades of American policies.

We’re in uncharted territory, and yet in every sector one hears the same implicit hope that we don’t really need to make radical changes, just extensive reforms of the existing system.

It won’t work, mainly because national policies, even with multilateral cooperation, cannot meet intensifying global challenges. Most people are still applying a two dimensional mindset to a three dimensional reality. Radical change is required at every level, and as yet few embrace it.

But what does ‘radical change’ really mean? As Davos is demonstrating by descending into a dead-ending, blame America game, radical change requires a new architecture for the global society—a genuinely global compact. Even more fundamentally, it means a redefinition of citizenship based on the unassailable principle of the sovereignty of humanity.

Taking real strides toward a true world order has little to do with ideals, and nothing to do with utopian visions. But neither will the “drip, drip, drip of diplomacy [and the] steady accretion of talk and trust” of Klein and his comrades suffice. The habit of gradualism is the hardest thing for entrenched elites, whether in politics or the media, to let go.

Three good things have happened in America since Obama took office a fortnight that seems like a year ago. President Obama rhetorically ended “the global war on terror;” Americans became more civil toward each other; and people are more open to new possibilities. These are significant things, but they are not radical changes.

The presence of sentimentality indicates an absence of heart. However the absence of sentimentality doesn’t necessarily mean the presence of heart. Bush was a sentimental president; Obama is not. But is Barack Obama a masterful political calculator, or a full-fledged human being?

Obama’s non-responsiveness to the leveling of Gaza by the Israelis in the weeks preceding his inauguration does not auger well for this question. The only thing Obama said while it was happening was: “Obviously I’m concerned.” That kind of statement bespeaks an abundance of political calculation, and a lack of human heart.

A person can rise to the top through political calculation and charisma, but he or she cannot attain greatness through them. Obama may aspire to be in Lincoln’s league, but Lincoln was great because he saw the crisis of his time—the struggle to preserve the Union and end slavery--as a measure not only of America, but also of humanity.

One of Lincoln’s young assistants during the Civil War, the college educated John Hay who became like a son to him, initially saw him as most others did, as a self-educated “prairie lawyer.” By the end of his first term, Hay said that those who still looked down on Lincoln “know no more of him than an owl does of a comet, blazing into its blinking eyes.” Will people say such things about Barack Obama?

The question is moot. In philosophical terms, an Obama presidency is necessary but not sufficient. Talking about rejuvenating national citizenship is a woefully inadequate response, born of fear and failure of imagination. It mocks the radical changes that are required to meet the human crisis.

- Martin LeFevre is a contemplative, and non-academic religious and political philosopher. He has been publishing in North America, Latin America, Africa, and Europe (and now New Zealand) for 20 years. Email: martinlefevre@sbcglobal.net. The author welcomes comments.

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