mamboni
17th August 2010, 07:02 AM
A Stranger in Our Midst
By Robert Weissberg, Professor of Political Science - Emeritus at the
University of Illinois , Urbana
As the Obama administration enters its second year, I -- and undoubtedly
millions of others -- have struggled to develop a shorthand term that
captures our emotional unease. Defining this discomfort is tricky. I
reject nearly the entire Obama agenda, but the term "being opposed" lacks an
emotional punch. Nor do terms like "worried" or "anxious" apply. I was
more worried about America 's future during the Johnson or Carter years,
so it's not that dictionary, either. Nor, for that matter, is this about backroom
odious deal-making and pork, which are endemic in American politics.
After auditioning countless political terms, I finally realized that the
Obama administration and its congressional collaborators almost resemble
a foreign occupying force, a coterie of politically and culturally
non-indigenous leaders whose rule contravenes local values rooted in our
national tradition. It is as if the United States has been occupied by
a foreign power, and this transcends policy objections. It is not about
Obama's birthplace. It is not about race, either; millions of white
Americans have had black mayors and black governors, and this unease
about out-of-synch values never surfaced.
The term I settled on is "alien rule" -- based on outsider values,
regardless of policy benefits -- that generates agitation. This is what
bloody anti-colonial strife was all about. No doubt, millions of Indians
and Africans probably grasped that expelling the British guaranteed economic
ruin and even worse governance, but at least the mess would be their
mess. Just travel to Afghanistan and witness American military commanders'
efforts to enlist tribal elders with promises of roads, clean water, dental
clinics, and all else that America can freely provide. Many of these elders
probably privately prefer abject poverty to foreign occupation since it would be
their poverty, run by their people, according to their sensibilities.
This disquiet was a slow realization. Awareness began with Obama's odd
pre-presidency associations, decades of being oblivious to Rev. Wright's
anti-American ranting, his enduring friendship with the terrorist
guy-in-the-neighborhood Bill Ayers, and the Saul Alinsky-flavored
anti-capitalist community activism. Further add a hazy personal
background -- an Indonesian childhood, shifting official names, and a
paperless-trail climb through elite educational institutions.
None of this disqualified Obama from the presidency; rather, this
background just doesn't fit with the conventional political r�sum�. It is just
the "outsider" quality that alarms. For all the yammering about George W.
Bush's privileged background, his made-in-the-USA persona was absolutely
indisputable. John McCain might be embarrassed about his Naval Academy
class rank and iffy combat performance, but there was never any doubt of
his authenticity. Countless conservatives despised Bill Clinton, but nobody
ever, ever doubted his good-old-boy American bonafides.
The suspicion that Obama is an outsider, a figure who really doesn't
"get" America , grew clearer from his initial appointments. What "native"
would appoint Kevin Jennings, a militant gay activist, to oversee school
safety? Or permit a Marxist rabble-rouser to be a "green jobs czar"? How about
an Attorney General who began by accusing Americans of cowardice when it
comes to discussing race? And who can forget Obama's weird defense of his pal
Louis Henry Gates from "racist" Cambridge , Massachusetts cops? If
theAmerican Revolution had never occurred and the Queen had appointed
Obama Royal Governor (after his distinguished service in Kenya ), a trusted
locally attuned aide would have first whispered in his ear, "Mr. Governor
General, here in America , we do not automatically assume that the
police were at fault," and the day would have been saved.
And then there's the "we are sorry, we'll never be arrogant again"
rhetoric seemingly designed for a future President of the World election
campaign. What made Obama's Cairo utterances so distressing was how they grated on
American cultural sensibilities. And he just doesn't notice, perhaps akin
to never hearing Rev. Wright anti-American diatribes. An American president
does not pander to third-world audiences by lying about the Muslim
contribution to America . Imagine Ronald Reagan, or any past American
president, trying to win friends by apologizing. This appeal contravenes
our national character and far exceeds a momentary embarrassment about
garbled syntax or poor delivery. Then there's Obama's bizarre, totally
unnecessary deep bowing to foreign potentates. Americans look foreign
leaders squarely in the eye and firmly shake hands; we don't bow.
But far worse is Obama's tone-deafness about American government. How
can any ordinary American, even a traditional liberal, believe that jamming
through unpopular, debt-expanding legislation that consumes one-sixth of
our GDP, sometimes with sly side-payments and with a thin majority, will
eventually be judged legitimate? This is third-world, maximum-leader-style
politics. That the legislation was barely understood even by its defenders
and vehemently championed by a representative of that typical American city,
San Francisco , only exacerbates the strangeness. And now President Obama
sides with illegal aliens over the State of Arizona , which seeks to enforce
the federal immigration law to protect American citizens from marauding
drug gangs and other miscreants streaming in across the Mexican border.
Reciprocal public disengagement from President Obama is strongly suggested
by recent poll data on public trust in government. According to a recent Pew
report, only 22% of those asked trust the government always or most of the
time, among the lowest figures in half a century. And while pro-government
support has been slipping for decades, the Obama presidency has sharply
exacerbated this drop. To be sure, many factors (in particular the economic
downturn) contribute to this decline, but remember that Obama was recently
elected by an often wildly enthusiastic popular majority. The collapse of
trust undoubtedly transcends policy quibbles or a sluggish economy -- it
is far more consistent with a deeper alienation.
Perhaps the clearest evidence for this "foreigner in our midst"
mentality is the name given our resistance -- tea parties, an image that instantly
invokes the American struggle against George III, a clueless foreign ruler
from central casting. This history-laden label was hardly predetermined,
but it instantly stuck (as did the election of Sen. Scott Brown as "the
shot heard around the world" and tea partiers dressing up in colonial-era
costumes). Perhaps subconsciously, Obama does remind Americans of when
the U.S. was really occupied by a foreign power. A Declaration of
Independence passage may still resonate: "HE [George III] has erected a Multitude of
new Offices [Czars], and sent hither Swarms of Officers [recently hired IRS
agents] to harass our People, and eat out the Substance."
What's next?
(usma-forum)
By Robert Weissberg, Professor of Political Science - Emeritus at the
University of Illinois , Urbana
As the Obama administration enters its second year, I -- and undoubtedly
millions of others -- have struggled to develop a shorthand term that
captures our emotional unease. Defining this discomfort is tricky. I
reject nearly the entire Obama agenda, but the term "being opposed" lacks an
emotional punch. Nor do terms like "worried" or "anxious" apply. I was
more worried about America 's future during the Johnson or Carter years,
so it's not that dictionary, either. Nor, for that matter, is this about backroom
odious deal-making and pork, which are endemic in American politics.
After auditioning countless political terms, I finally realized that the
Obama administration and its congressional collaborators almost resemble
a foreign occupying force, a coterie of politically and culturally
non-indigenous leaders whose rule contravenes local values rooted in our
national tradition. It is as if the United States has been occupied by
a foreign power, and this transcends policy objections. It is not about
Obama's birthplace. It is not about race, either; millions of white
Americans have had black mayors and black governors, and this unease
about out-of-synch values never surfaced.
The term I settled on is "alien rule" -- based on outsider values,
regardless of policy benefits -- that generates agitation. This is what
bloody anti-colonial strife was all about. No doubt, millions of Indians
and Africans probably grasped that expelling the British guaranteed economic
ruin and even worse governance, but at least the mess would be their
mess. Just travel to Afghanistan and witness American military commanders'
efforts to enlist tribal elders with promises of roads, clean water, dental
clinics, and all else that America can freely provide. Many of these elders
probably privately prefer abject poverty to foreign occupation since it would be
their poverty, run by their people, according to their sensibilities.
This disquiet was a slow realization. Awareness began with Obama's odd
pre-presidency associations, decades of being oblivious to Rev. Wright's
anti-American ranting, his enduring friendship with the terrorist
guy-in-the-neighborhood Bill Ayers, and the Saul Alinsky-flavored
anti-capitalist community activism. Further add a hazy personal
background -- an Indonesian childhood, shifting official names, and a
paperless-trail climb through elite educational institutions.
None of this disqualified Obama from the presidency; rather, this
background just doesn't fit with the conventional political r�sum�. It is just
the "outsider" quality that alarms. For all the yammering about George W.
Bush's privileged background, his made-in-the-USA persona was absolutely
indisputable. John McCain might be embarrassed about his Naval Academy
class rank and iffy combat performance, but there was never any doubt of
his authenticity. Countless conservatives despised Bill Clinton, but nobody
ever, ever doubted his good-old-boy American bonafides.
The suspicion that Obama is an outsider, a figure who really doesn't
"get" America , grew clearer from his initial appointments. What "native"
would appoint Kevin Jennings, a militant gay activist, to oversee school
safety? Or permit a Marxist rabble-rouser to be a "green jobs czar"? How about
an Attorney General who began by accusing Americans of cowardice when it
comes to discussing race? And who can forget Obama's weird defense of his pal
Louis Henry Gates from "racist" Cambridge , Massachusetts cops? If
theAmerican Revolution had never occurred and the Queen had appointed
Obama Royal Governor (after his distinguished service in Kenya ), a trusted
locally attuned aide would have first whispered in his ear, "Mr. Governor
General, here in America , we do not automatically assume that the
police were at fault," and the day would have been saved.
And then there's the "we are sorry, we'll never be arrogant again"
rhetoric seemingly designed for a future President of the World election
campaign. What made Obama's Cairo utterances so distressing was how they grated on
American cultural sensibilities. And he just doesn't notice, perhaps akin
to never hearing Rev. Wright anti-American diatribes. An American president
does not pander to third-world audiences by lying about the Muslim
contribution to America . Imagine Ronald Reagan, or any past American
president, trying to win friends by apologizing. This appeal contravenes
our national character and far exceeds a momentary embarrassment about
garbled syntax or poor delivery. Then there's Obama's bizarre, totally
unnecessary deep bowing to foreign potentates. Americans look foreign
leaders squarely in the eye and firmly shake hands; we don't bow.
But far worse is Obama's tone-deafness about American government. How
can any ordinary American, even a traditional liberal, believe that jamming
through unpopular, debt-expanding legislation that consumes one-sixth of
our GDP, sometimes with sly side-payments and with a thin majority, will
eventually be judged legitimate? This is third-world, maximum-leader-style
politics. That the legislation was barely understood even by its defenders
and vehemently championed by a representative of that typical American city,
San Francisco , only exacerbates the strangeness. And now President Obama
sides with illegal aliens over the State of Arizona , which seeks to enforce
the federal immigration law to protect American citizens from marauding
drug gangs and other miscreants streaming in across the Mexican border.
Reciprocal public disengagement from President Obama is strongly suggested
by recent poll data on public trust in government. According to a recent Pew
report, only 22% of those asked trust the government always or most of the
time, among the lowest figures in half a century. And while pro-government
support has been slipping for decades, the Obama presidency has sharply
exacerbated this drop. To be sure, many factors (in particular the economic
downturn) contribute to this decline, but remember that Obama was recently
elected by an often wildly enthusiastic popular majority. The collapse of
trust undoubtedly transcends policy quibbles or a sluggish economy -- it
is far more consistent with a deeper alienation.
Perhaps the clearest evidence for this "foreigner in our midst"
mentality is the name given our resistance -- tea parties, an image that instantly
invokes the American struggle against George III, a clueless foreign ruler
from central casting. This history-laden label was hardly predetermined,
but it instantly stuck (as did the election of Sen. Scott Brown as "the
shot heard around the world" and tea partiers dressing up in colonial-era
costumes). Perhaps subconsciously, Obama does remind Americans of when
the U.S. was really occupied by a foreign power. A Declaration of
Independence passage may still resonate: "HE [George III] has erected a Multitude of
new Offices [Czars], and sent hither Swarms of Officers [recently hired IRS
agents] to harass our People, and eat out the Substance."
What's next?
(usma-forum)