Barack Obama is on the stump for Democrats this weekend, appearing at rallies in Virginia and New Jersey. He’s also cut the final ad for Prop 50. It’s a good thing. The party still doesn’t have any orators as good as he is, although there are some who are very good. And despite all the right wingers claiming that he’s nasty and divisive we all know who takes the trophy on that one and it isn’t him.
He said all the right things for someone in his position. He joked and he entertained. Like this:
But he had a particular moment that I thought was just riveting and very important. It was inclusive and unifying in the way that I think a lot of people are yearning to hear. He spoke about values and our history without soft-soaping the past but still holding out some idealism and hope about the future. It’s always been his strong suit and I think it’s especially necessary right now.
Here’s the part I’m referring to:
At the end of the day, what this is about — what politics in a democracy is always about, is values. What do we care about. What do we believe, what do we prioritize, what are our core convictions.
A lot of people have asked me lately whether I’m surprised by the direction the country’s taken. And even though I am the hope and change guy I try to be honest with them. So I say yes, there are things I am worried about.
I am worried about how quickly basic democratic rules and norms have been weakened. I am worried about how willing Republican in Congress have been to surrender their roles as a co-equal branch of government, refusing to buck the president even when they know he’s out of line. Even though lot of them will privately admit that power is being abused in ways that will hurt their constituents and hurt the country.
I worry about a Supreme Court that, so far at least, has shown no willingness to check this administration’s excesses, even when those actions break legal precedents and seem to defy the bedrock principle that no one is above the law.
I worry about the growing concentration of economic power in this country, with just a handful of mega-billionaires and companies controlling what we see and what we hear. And I worry about how much that economic power distorts the political process. I worry about how readily not just business leaders but others with influence like law firms and universities have been willing to bend the knee to this president’s autocratic impulses to avoid retribution, protect profits, or simply to avoid controversy.
America has always had competing stories about who we are and what the nation stands for. The first story says that “we the people” just means some of us. In order to qualify you have to be the right color, or come from the right family, or worship in the right way, or have enough money. It says that even though we got rid of a king, there is still a caste system in America, a pecking order of who makes decisions and who makes decisions and who gets opportunity and who is obliged to serve.
It’s a story that’s policed by fear and force. It tries to convince people that for their group to win another group has to lose. That is somebody doesn’t look like you or think like you or practice religions the same way you do, they must be a threat to you way of life and they need to be put in their place.
That is how Donald Trump thinks about America. Make America great again by putting the people like him back in charge even if they don’t know what the hell they’re doing.
And I worry sometimes how we’ve come to accept this as normal. But this is what I also tell people when they asked me about this, what I also try to remind them. That story is not new. That’s is the oldest story in the book.
It is not even uniquely American. For most of human history, that is the way society has worked. For somebody on top and somebody on the bottom. There were lords and there were peasants. And for a long time, that story of caste and privilege and concentrated power that was the law of the land here in America. If you look like me, you were likely treated as property. If you were a woman, or a white man who did not own property, you could not vote. Four a long time if you were an Irish or Italian immigrant, “we’re not hiring.” If you were Jewish or Asian, don’t bother applying to our school. If you were Native American you weren’t even treated as an American even though you were here!
But from the very start, there was another story, born of this nation’s true revolutionary spirit. A story that says, we the people means what it says, that all of us are included, that we are not subjects, we are citizens, defined not by race or religion or gender or sexual orientation, but by our commitment to a common creed and a willingness to accept not just the privileges, but the responsibilities that come with that citizenship.
That’s what made the American experiment unique. That’s what made us special.
And through generations of struggle and sacrifice. Through the faith of abolitionists and the struggle of suffragists, through civil war and civil rights protests, through union organizing drives and government reforms and investments in public education, we moved closer to those founding ideals. And in the process we inspired the world.
And that’s the story I believe in, Virginia. I believe in an America in which we all deserve equal protection under the law and nobody is above the law. I believe in an America where every child has a chance at a good education and anybody who’s willing to find a job or start a business can work to make a decent living, an America where equal opportunity isn’t just reserved for those who are born into privilege or happen to have the right connections.
I believe in an America where we don’t fear each other but look out for each other.
If we want that story to continue, if we believe in that better story, we need leaders who believe in it too. We need leaders who will tell the truth. And who will take responsibility and tackle hard problems and bring people together instead of tearing them apart. We need leaders who won’t serve bosses in Washington or big corporate donors but instead will serve the people who put them there.
I realize that he’s uniquely talented at this and has the ability to deliver these words in a way that is accessible. But Democrats need to really look at the message he’s conveying. I truly believe it’s what a majority of Americans would like to hear from their leadership.
It’s not that anything has ever been perfect. In fact, it’s because it hasn’t ever been perfect that most of us feel so desperate about going backwards now. There’s a lot wrong with our society in the best of circumstances but now instead of trying, however feebly at times, to progress and make things better we are actively going backwards. It’s terrifying, especially for people who have struggled and fought for the progress they’s managed to make.
People need to hear that their leaders understand this and can help us find the courage to resist what is happening by seeing it clearly and summoning up what’s left of our ideals to put it right.
Yes, people care about affordability and inflation and all the kitchen table issues and they are a motivating factor. But I refuse to believe that most Americans don’t, deep down, care as deeply about the country they live in and the world they are leaving to their children. They’re scared and don’t know where to turn and when the professional political resistance spends all its time navel gazing and talking about how much they hate themselves they feel adrift.
Democrats need some inspiration right now. That’s why they’re turning to people like Mamdani in New York and Newsom and Pritzker in California and Illinois. Now Obama has entered the arena and thank God for it. Maybe there is some hope for change after all.