I've been trying to articulate my support for Barack Obama to friends and relatives and thought that it would be worthwhile to write down a quick impression of the latest dust-up over the idea of words in politics.
Obama, whose rhetoric has been dismissed by the Clinton campaign as all style and no substance, has made the claim that leaders such as Thomas Jefferson, FDR, and Martin Luther King, Jr. understood the power of words quite well, using them to provoke and inspire. Could anyone argue away the Declaration of Independence, Roosevelt's first inaugural speech, and King's "I Have a Dream" speech as mere words? Obama might have also thrown his conservative supporters and critics a bone by mentioning Reagan's famous "Tear down this wall" speech, which didn't end the cold war by itself, but can't be discounted as inconsequential. It should also be noted that it is not a list of Abraham Lincoln's policy decisions that is chiseled into a wall of the Lincoln Memorial, but the texts of the Gettysburg Address and the sixteenth president's second inaugural address. "With malice toward none; with charity for all" hardly constitutes political substance, but it's been etched in stone for over 85 years. (I also wonder if Clinton or any Democrat would dismiss some famous negative statements -- "Bring 'em on." "Axis of evil." "With us or against us." -- as mere words.)
Clinton's line of attack seems to fall short, especially to anyone with any amount of historical knowledge, and certainly is not a strategy that can survive the logical counter-attack: more policy specifics combined with soaring rhetoric. As Obama continues to pepper his speeches with more details -- never minding that his specific policy positions can already be found by anyone with an Internet connection -- what will Clinton be left to criticize? If she responds to specifics, she undercuts her original critique. It would be as if Dorothy had uttered another famous quote, "Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain," after pulling back the curtain herself. (I've found many of Clinton's strategies to be lacking in foresight; she's arguably the more experienced candidate when measured against Obama, but that advantage will be taken away as soon as the national campaign against John McCain begins. Will she try to position herself as the baby bear of politics, with just the right amount of experience?)
I wonder how much historical knowledge the Clinton campaign has as it employs these dismissals of Obama's gift for speech, for claiming the mantle of hope, and for inspiring young voters. Are they not aware that it was another 46-year-old presidential candidate who, understanding that inspiration is as important to voters as perspiration, called himself "The Man from Hope," and had a 14-minute video with that title produced for the 1992 Democratic National Convention? If one really wants to get hung up on specifics, it might be worth telling Hillary Clinton that Bill Clinton moved to Hot Springs, Arkansas when he was seven years old.
(Regarding the experience argument, here's Bill Clinton from 1992. It's almost as if the Obama campaign sent a Clinton cyborg back from the future to pre-emptively make the case for their candidate.)
Posted by Doug at February 19, 2008 04:22 PM