I’m beginning to think that perhaps the Democrats have nominated yet another lame-o candidate, in the tradition of George McGovern, Jimmy Carter, Michael Dukakis, and John Kerry. Barack Obama is a hard man to get to know, but the more we know, the less we like, it would seem, if the polls mean anything.
I think I understand some things about Obama’s personality. I was an Air Force brat. We moved frequently, all over the country, and outside of the country. I went to high school in Germany for three years. By the time I had left home, at age 17, I had lived in at least ten different places; South Dakota, Kansas, Texas, Illinois, Pennsylvania, California, Germany, North Dakota, not necessarily in that order, and a few other places I don’t remember. Since leaving home I have lived at numerous addresses in Iowa, California, and Tennessee.
Obama had a similar background, having lived in Hawaii, Indonesia, Cambridge, Chicago, etc., having had a Kenyan father and a peripatetic white mother. The effect of this, as I can testify from personal experience, is to both endow and saddle one with a certain detachment. It is hard to work up a lot of enthusiasm for the home team, if this is the sixth or tenth home team you have been called upon to root for.
Obama has a previous reputation for detachment, at Harvard and the University of Chicago, and a current reputation for throwing anybody or any issue under the bus that gets in the way of his ambition. I’m not a politician like Barack, but I can relate to that. I think I understand how he got that way. I’m not knocking it, but I have to ask myself, would I vote for me for President of the United States? I assume you realize, dear reader, that is a rhetorical question.
John McCain, on the other hand, is one of those straight-ahead guys, whose future direction, and bedrock principles and beliefs, were laid down at an early age, and have sustained him ever since through unimaginable ordeals and pressures.
He may have had some measure of adolescent identity crisis, I don’t know, but I very much doubt that it came close to what Barack and I have had to deal with. Obama wrote a whole, prize-winning, book about his search for identity. On the other hand, McCain has had to deal with circumstances that neither Barack nor I can conceive of, not only as a resident of the Hanoi Hilton, but in the cockpit of his fighter jet before it got shot down, and in his long political career since his torture and release.
Even though I possess the requisite hair and narcissism, I would never presume to throw my hat in the ring for Prez, or even Senator or Governor. Of course, I never went to Harvard, taught at the University of Chicago, had a best-selling autobiography, or got elected to the Illinois State legislature and the United States Senate. And I am terminally white. I have no trouble admitting Obama’s superiority to moi, as a candidate, or generally, as a remarkable human being. I hope that doesn’t make me a racist?
I don’t like Obama’s ideology, to the extent that I can figure out what it is. It appears to me to be an America-disdaining, quixotic mirage that I have, in my twilight years, rejected in favor of an embrace of things as they are, America-affirming and cautiously optimistic, despite the nightmare of history.
I think he, Barack Hussein Obama, the One, is going to lose, and oh, will there not be a great gnashing of teeth when he does?
Time will tell.
I should say again, John, that I really appreciate the moderate, tentative tone of your last couple of posts. As for the presidential election, I’m pleased with both candidates. Though I’ll vote for Obama, I won’t be greatly disappointed with McCain. I respect his experience and his no-nonsense demeanor. To me both candidates have representative and attractive American characteristics and strengths, and I believe either one will be an improvement over the current president — although no one really knows of course.