I
mentioned yesterday what I believe was a deeply meaningful speech by Barack Obama about religion and American politics. The headlines were pitifully simplistic and misleading. From the AP: "
Obama: Democrats Must Court evangelicals." From ABC:
"Obama Tells Dems to Get Religion." The ABC article wasn't bad, but generally speaking each story depicts Obama's point as a political one: that Democrats must be more forthcoming and religious if they are to win over evangelical voters.
I'm forced to wonder whether or not these reporters were at the speech. Maybe our cynical times don't allow for the contemplation of intellectual rather than electoral arguments in our politics, but this was not what Obama was saying. He was asking for a willingness to be fair-minded toward those with whom you disagree, to not stereotype, on either side, those with different theology (or none at all). He pointed to fundamentalists as much as he pointed to secularists. He asked for a deeper dialogue and modeled for us what a contribution to it might look like: thoughtful, sincere. Here was a call for nuance and mutual respect, and it was portrayed by our national print media, the
better media, as a piece of political advice.
The liberal blog reaction was worse. They accused Obama of having a "
Lieberman moment"
reinforcing unfair stereotypes by pushing "
the false idea that Democrats are hostile to religion." They, like the print articles, portrayed Obama politically, accusing him of pandering to evangelicals and selling out Democratic values. Nathan Newman at TPM Cafe
noted that some of these arguments literally invented things Obama was saying to support these accusations. None of them responded with anything resembling thoughtful, respectful discourse. They assumed the worst.
My question is this: would we- newspapers, liberal bloggers- know a heartfelt, nuanced and important argument if it hit us over the head? If everything is simplified to demographics and betrayal, talking points and posturing, can we possibly begin to believe in our politics enough to believe that government can contribute to our lives? Can we possible start to put back together our polarized, frustrated and basically lost society? Obama seems to want to find out. It's unclear whether or not anyone is willing to join him.
The NYTs has a moving article by Edward Rothstein on the personal papers of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Rothstein manages to quickly cover not only King's theology, but also the challenges of his transition from struggling with legal segregation in the South to poverty and ghetto-ization in the North, in only two pages. If you only know the iconic King of American pop culture, read this. I can't imagine a better two page introduction to King's thinking.
