Walter Dean Burnham described the president as the pontifex maximus of the American civil religion — the king replacement, the presider in chief.
What is curious about the role is that only a president may perform it, but not all — not even many — actually do so.
Franklin Roosevelt, with his Hudson squire manner and his radio voice, was by all accounts superb. Harry Truman, scrappy little jerk: no. Ike — better at D-Day; as president he seemed more like a nice uncle. JFK — his courtiers dearly wished to cast him in the role, and his inaugural showed promise, but he died too young. Johnson — “lugubrious bohunk” (a line of John Updike, who was trying to praise him): no. Nixon — anxious, embattled: no. Ford: no. Carter — tiny whiner: no.
Reagan — superb: forceful yet relaxed, dignified yet humble, at ease with words and with himself. Bush 1 — English as a second language: no. Clinton — God no. Bush 2 — English as a third language, yet in the aftermath of 9/11, beginning with his Ground Zero appearance, yes.
Obama’s acolytes were certain that fulfilling the pontifical role would be among the least and easiest of his accomplishments. He was so eloquent! Yet his speechmaking began to deteriorate with his inaugural, until he developed an array of tics — aloofness, petulance, long-windedness.
In the Tucson speech he stepped into the role. His political enemies will sigh, but must acknowledge that he has grasped an opportunity uniquely open to the president.
And there is something else: If the president chooses to slip some politics into his pontificating, he can do that too. Consider one of the first and grandest incarnations of the role, Washington’s Farewell Address. It is the grace summation of a lifetime, and it enounces principles of ongoing interest. It was also a direct hit at the Republican (now Democratic) party of Thomas Jefferson and James Madison, who, by 1796, were essentially chorus girls for the French Revolution. They knew that had been hit, and they just had to grin and bear it.
So: pause, breathe, then — once more into the breach, once more.
The speech was well written. I am not going to get too worked up that Obama took political advantage the way he did. What I am worked up about are the events after the shooting and preceeding the speech. They were lies and intended to cause harm for political reasons. We are being played.
And I am pretty sure George Washington did not give out t-shirts at his farewell speech.
And Rep. King's misguided new gun control law is a further example of Republicans attacking themselves like a injured dog does by over licking a wound. Seriously, get a neck cone on Rep. King.
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"And I am pretty sure George Washington did not give out t-shirts at his farewell speech."
And neither did President Obama. But students at the University of Arizona did.
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Well Washington's address was written mostly by Alexander Hamilton.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuseokcrounders, nonsense. Obama's advance team totally controls the venue where the president will be. If they were not involved in the decision but became aware that t-shirts were going to be given out Team Obama should have immediately objected. It was inappropriate. Definitely not what you do at a memorial. Obama's advance team should have requested they not be handed out at the event.
And requesting that is not an infraction of free speech.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThe Democrats have discovered, or re-discovered, how to do the good cop/bad cop routine. In the 2010 election Obama tried to be his own bad cop and his partisan rhetoric backfired. This time, he's let his media allies take the lead in accusing political opponents like Palin of somehow inspiring a massacre, then Obama gets to sweep in, act presidentially above the fray, and reap the kudos for very subtly implying that the accusation has merit while simultaneously denouncing it. Expect to see more of the same strategy in the leadup to 2012, because everything - EVERYTHING - is grist for their political mill.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI'm breathing fine, thank you, and this will be my last comment here or anywhere else.
You would be absolutely right had this speech been given in a vacuum. The words and tone were right even if the political carnival venue was atrocious. No one can tell what is in a man's heart, but the president seemed sincere.
The speech obviously was not given in a vacuum. For five days prior to its delivery, the left-wing in this country engaged in one of the most dishonest, scurrilous defamation campaigns in American history. Tens of millions of Americans were said to be complicit in murder. While my conservatism tends to be more of the NRO variety, I have friends in the Tea Party as well. These people have been deeply outraged by what was done to them. I think in this sense the Establishment Right in D.C. and New York fail to grasp how deeply this outrage has offended a large segment of the country. If the president wanted to interject politics, he should have avoided his moral equivalency and called out those who engaged in the blood libel. He did not explicitly, and this should have been done.
Finally, this should have been a memorial that didn't require such considerations. Innocents were murdered. Yet this seems lost in the pep rally atmosphere and the blasphemy that preceded it.
So most of us are just breathing fine. We just find it incredibly hard to seperate the president's fine speech from what his media and political allies did in the days that led up to them.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseWrong as Lowry and I repeat:
Obama's voice and delivery come across as caricatures worthy of a 1970s Saturday Night Live skit. He is not a great speaker. He is not even a good speaker. There is little, if any substance to his talk. Recall how much time he spent and how many ways he said the same thing in referencing the tragedy of the nine-year-old victim. He didn't say anything substantive about her, he was just listening to the sound of his own voice, which he finds superlative. His tone, his demeanor and what little there is of his substance was, once again, and, as usual, arrogant and condescending. I thought at least conservative pundits were clear on this.
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Sort of sounds like you had your mind made up on this issue irrespective of the facts.
I do agree that the t-shirts where inappropriate. However, I just don't think that the president or his 'advance' team had anything to do with their distribution.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseActually, most of Washington's speech was written by James Madison. The bulk of it had been prepared for the end of Washington's first term, when he originally considered retiring. He then dusted it off four years later. While it may be right to characterize Madison as a Jeffersonian, he was first and foremost, I think, a Madisonian and rarely gets enough credit for that.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseSpeech was good for what it wasn't: a crass political opportunity (see Clinton, Bubba).
PBO flubbed two prior opportunities to seem presidential (Hasan presser "shout-out" and the panty bomber "allegedly") so I was just glad to see that he didn't do something stupid like turn the service into the Wellstone redux.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseObama’s speech last night was the beginning of his 2012 Presidential Campaign nothing more and nothing less.
This was “Campaign Obama” and he should have been immediately recognizable. Did you notice the t-shirts? They were pure Organizing for America garbage. (The fact that they would bring t-shirts to a "memorial service" speaks volumes.)
This was all the same stuff he said during the last campaign. “We’re not Red State America and Blue State America, we’re the UNITED States of America.” Right? And those who were fooled the first time around could be forgiven since Obama was a blank slate to most Americans.
But, this time we have three years of him in the national spotlight and over two years of his ACTIONS as President. His actions make clear that he doesn’t mean a word of what he said last night. I wish he did. Most Americans wish their President was a man who would say and mean the things Obama said last night.
But, those of us with clear vision, not clouded by the emotion of the moment, KNOW with certainty that Barack Obama does not mean them.
And, he will not live up to them between now and 2012 and that may be our only hope. That he will expose himself. Because if Charles Krauthammer (see separate article) can be fooled by this man, what hope do we have that 11% of Americans will not be fooled? (Libs - 11% plus to 40% who are already in the Obama bag equals 51% and a second term)
PS One other quick point…what kind of person is willing to hijack the memorial for, and take advantage of the death of, a 9 year old little girl for his personal political gain? Answer: One that will do ANYTHING to win re-election. Consider for a moment a lame duck Obama Presidency where he doesn’t have to face the voters again. You think the first two years were radical?
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse"And there is something else: If the president chooses to slip some politics into his pontificating, he can do that too."
Yes, he can. The question is whether he should. And at a memorial service, the answer is unequivocally no. And if he does (and Obama certainly did), he should be criticized for that, not praised.
What he can't do is turn a memorial service into a campaign event. Can't. Can't. Can't. To do so would be unacceptable in the extreme. And if does (and Obama certainly did), he should not only be criticized for that, but excoriated for it, not praised.
If NRO can not understand that, then I suggest that NRO has spent too much time with the movers and shakers, and has forgotten what it's like to live in middle America. NRO needs to watch a few more Jimmy Stewart movies to understand what the words "class", "dignity", "honor", and "respect" actually mean to people outside the beltway.
I urge each and every writer at NRO who has praised this speech (and I'm not saying it was awful, there were praiseworthy parts, mostly at the beginning), to reread or rewatch with a critical eye, rather than the hopeful ones you apparently used. Then I urge you to reconsider your words.
I am not expecting much. Getting a journalist or columnist to admit he's wrong is harder than getting a politician to do so. However, the writers at NRO are undeniably wrong in this instance. That's not an opinion. It's a verifiable fact.
Please, take your own advice. Pause, breathe, and think about whether you'd want a President to launch a campaign at your own memorial service. Think hard about that, and if you still think it's ok, then I guess you and I are at polar opposites of the spectrum regarding dignity and class.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThank you Mr Webb for a splendid and candid observation. I just hope the voters will not be as foolish as they were the first time around.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseHiya Rick! Your mention of LBJ reminded me of my figuratively drooling anticipation of Robert M. Caro's final installment in his superb LBJ biography series -- sure hope he can complete it (though I did find his third "Master of the Senate" a bit repetitious.)
Sorry for plugging a different biographer -- but I'll be reading you, too, in all the old familiar places (libraries). But if I ever catch you at a book-signing somewhere, well...
Many fond remembrances of your Firing Line questioner days!! :)
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbusePresidents are first and foremost political creatures. Sure, we expect them to rise above the pettiness once they achieve office, but why are we surprised when they continue to dip their toe into the political waters while in office?
The words of Obama's speech could have been spoken by other presidents. I didn't expect him to rebuke the Krugman's of the world - that's not the time or place. Had he done this it would have seemed very much out of place.
The issue is that his own rhetorical history is lacking in civility, so it's a bit offensive to be "preached" to by someone who has very recently called his political opponents "enemies". He has now set a bar that I don't believe he can attain. Within a year we will hear non-civil rhetoric from Obama. I don't necessarily have a problem with it either, except that once again, he speaks from both sides of his mouth.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI liked his comment:
"We are grateful to the men who tackled the gunman as he stopped to reload. (Applause.) Right over there." (Applause.)
I am such a bozo that I would have added, "he certainly was not retreating."
Obama knew just how far to take that dig at Palin.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse.....seems that the oh so civil NRO has taken it upon itself to apologize to the president for the actions of we barbarians who took strong exception to left wing attacks...I guess that non beltway conservatives sometimes embarrass the review....were sorry!
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseMr. Brookhiser, thanks for the work and the humor as well...
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI feel sorry for many of you. Hate or love the president, last night he was the nation's leader. There was no political calculation in his heart. You can tell he and his wife were profoundly touched by this incident. And the speech was simply beautiful. Tomorrow, we can return to our fight over the size of government. But for now lets just relax a bit.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseReagan — superb: forceful yet relaxed, dignified yet humble, at ease with words and with himself as befits a person whose entire adult life has been spent lying and selling things. Work: sportscaster, actor, union leader, union buster. Nothing with his hands, never got dirty, never produced a product anyone could use.
Actors make the best Presidents - they already lie automatically.
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