Column: The ABC's of trivial pursuits
May 2, 2008
After the past week, I’m beginning to think this election has reached the depths of trivial. Barack Obama successfully fended off the latest in a series of small and genuinely irrelevant qualms, primarily brought up by his primary opponent Hillary Clinton. Considering the past few weeks, labels judge him an elitist as well as complicit in anti-American preaching and even the Weather Underground revolutionaries.
During the course of these events, his own poll numbers have weakened. An article last week revealed Republicans increasingly believe him fallible in the general election. Even so, Obama has bounced back, deflecting criticism over the Rev. Jeremiah Wright on Tuesday with his “outrage” and denunciation. Few would disagree that his troubled divorce from the reverend matched a consistent campaign message and voice. Genuine emotion appeared to support his words, and rightfully so, given his 20-year friendship with the man.
Hitting back isn’t Obama’s style though. I’ve never seen the senator look quite so displeased and sad as during that denunciation. Just the nature of the last primary debate deflated him with its questions picking at Wright and Bill Ayers. Kicking the reverend out of his presidential campaign spotlight is probably wise, considering the parasitic drain. Look to history and I don’t think a candidate has ever had an outside associate that’s dragged him down with such intensity and received so much media attention, often exaggerated and unfair. More than anything, the recent charge of Obama’s elitism baffles me. Nobody can explain to me how a white, Ivy League former first lady can attempt to brand herself as the working class candidate and Obama as a lofty, out-of-touch intellectual.
On that note, what exactly is “elitism”? People use the term casually and talk about how Obama isn’t connecting with the working voters. Questions about his experience and policies seem natural, but doubts exist over his bond with voters. Really? Some bring up his affluent education, but there’s also his years living all over America and the world, years as a Chicago community organizer, and his rallies of thousands. To me, this shows vibrant connection.
Undergoing the pressures of a presidential campaign naturally requires any candidate running to be a little elitist, and it’s dishonest to pretend that’s not the case or to hide intelligence in a forced laugh or a shot of whiskey. Vocabulary, for instance, is a strong point for Obama, and I prefer that to the inability to speak or recognize that al Qaeda is Sunni and Iran is Shiite. What makes an elite education, ability and background so bad? Xenophobia and impulse fuel many of our current, ill-informed policies, which cultivates a climate of fear from people who parade their common, working folks color like none other.
Yet many Americans see this charge of elitism and view it in the same lens they view “liberal” as a dirty word and informed education as a social crime. Zero sense backs this desire for a just-folks, C-average leader.
A natural problem does occur if that education turns to pretension, to name-dropping and artificial flash without understanding. But Obama’s charisma and sheer emotional impact on countless people wipes out that charge. Calculating in the experience factor makes the campaign questions more difficult, of course, and opens up the issue of whether substance backs up the words, but this elitist charge should hardly stick.
Debate the details all you want, but these empty charges that focus on meaningless trivia only cheapen the process. Election day and respect isn’t won on minutia such as not agreeing to a 22nd debate or a radical preacher. Fight on real grounds, Hillary.
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