Small-Town Lessons for Obama

13 August 2008

–by Mike Murray

I recently returned from vacation to find an interesting message on my answering machine. An Obama representative had called to invite me to one of Barack’s “town hall” campaign events. It was to be held in Berea, at my alma mater: Baldwin-Wallace College. The caller said that an admission ticket was reserved in my name.

It figures that opportunity would knock while I was away.

Still, I’m not certain that I would have accepted the invitation. On the one hand, I have to admit that I am curious about the whole “Obama mania” thing. Having witnessed it first-hand, seasoned reporters have related sundry versions of the same story: “Gee, I thought I could maintain a reasonable degree of objectivity. But, standing amid a throng of enthusiastic Barack Obama supporters, I found myself swept up in the excitement.”

For the record, reporters are not innately objective. Three-fourths of them, after all, vote consistently Democrat. It’s ludicrous for them to assert (as they so often do) that their political allegiance fails to influence their coverage of issues and candidates. Such claims defy human nature, and they fly in the face of non-partisan scrutiny.

Just the same, I give them points for honesty – for admitting their susceptibility to mass hysteria. When scores of people of similar mindset gather and swoon, deep in the throws of cult-like rapture, it’s hard to maintain emotional separation. Few people are capable of resisting such temptation. Participant infects participant, intensifying the effect. It becomes powerful, intoxicating. The speaker at the podium serves merely as catalyst; the rocket fuel that feeds and supercharges the mood of the crowd is the crowd itself.

I wonder, is that why I was invited: to subject me to the phenomenon in an attempt to win me over? Because even casual readers of my web-site content must know that I have serious reservations about Barack Obama. I know precious little about him – and what I do know, I don’t much like. Forget Obama’s campaign platitudes, his lofty rhetoric. His actions speak louder than his words. And his actions add up (to me) to little more than a calculated effort to serve his own ambition.

I see no evidence of bi-partisanship. I see no genuine attempts at transcending ideology – or race, or gender, or region, or class. I see nothing of the “new kind of politician” that Obama claims to be. Instead, I see more of the same-old, same-old. Same old politics; same old tactics. Cozying up to the back-room bosses who run Chicago’s political machine – as Obama did in launching his political career – hardly qualifies as a “new way.” Neither does courting the highly partisan members of the netroots, as he has done in his pursuit of the presidency.

The vaunted political movement that Obama is alleged to have built is a myth. The truth is that he simply ingratiated himself to established groups – some mainstream, some not – that possessed the power to supply him with bushel baskets of money and volunteers. It snowballed from there, largely on the strength of their efforts.

John McCain might be the older man, but he has (at least for the past eight years) adhered more closely to the politically evolutionary ideals to which Obama says he aspires. It is McCain who has been willing to break ranks with extremists within his own party. It is McCain who has been willing to reach out, to compromise and collaborate with members of the opposing party and with independents. It is McCain, in short, who has been willing to forge a new path.

McCain also has a boatload of experience. Obama: nearly none. And worse, even, than Obama’s lack of knowledge of governmental affairs (foreign and domestic) is his failure to understand America itself. Barack Obama is familiar with places such as Honolulu, New York, Boston, and Chicago – and few others.

That is to say, Obama grasps issues and concerns shared by residents of big cities (metropolises that are strikingly similar in demographic makeup and political ideology), but he knows little of life in towns of medium and small size – places were the overwhelming majority of Americans live and work. Hence his lament to San Francisco swells during a fat-cat fundraiser that people in middle-America are “bitter,” and that they “cling” to religion and guns. And that they have “antipathy” toward those who look different than they.

Obama is vacationing in exotic Hawaii this week. He would have been better served, it seems to me, had he opted to travel to West Virginia and stay in a cabin in a small town – as I, my wife, and our dog recently did. I am always refreshed by my visits to the “almost heaven” state. Communing with majestic mountains, dark forests, and cool waters renews me.

So does interacting with small-town folks. Pleasant memories from this year’s trip grew out of simple activities, such as a visit to a Kroger’s grocery store. As I rushed down an aisle, intent on quickly working my way down my shopping list, I was halted by a cart that was turned sideways and that blocked my path. I was about to impatiently (but politely) ask the man beside the cart to move it. A voice inside my head reminded me that I was on vacation, that there was no hurry.

So I stopped and waited. When the young man turned in my direction, I could see that he was holding a small child. He lifted her up above his head, then down to his waist, then back up again. The toddler giggled for all she was worth. The mother was nearby, perusing the contents of a shelf. She hummed as she compared prices.

It was a weekday and the daddy sported jeans and a two-day stubble – a clear sign that his work was probably non-professional. And judging by his mate’s casual dress, she too (if employed) was blue collar. They appeared to be of modest financial means. But they seemed happy enough to me. After a few moments, the man saw that he was in my way and apologized. I replied that it was “no problem.” I often utter that phrase reflexively, not really meaning it. This time, I was grateful for the interruption.

After I had finished shopping, I headed for the checkout. When it was my turn, I placed my items on the conveyor belt. The clerk asked if I had a preferred shopper card. My answer was “no.” As she began to scan my purchases, the older woman behind me reached over and swiped her own discount card through the reader for me, saying as she did so, “Hon, no one should have to pay full price.”

Then there was the African-American couple I encountered at Pipestem State Park. They were entering a primitive Homestead House (set up as a kind of small museum) just as I was exiting it. As I passed them, I remarked that the place was tiny. The woman began singing: “Let me tell you a story ‘bout a man named Jed, a poor mountaineer barely kept his family fed…” She smiled and said that the house reminded her of the one in featured in The Beverly Hillbillies. She said it used to be her favorite television show. She paused for a moment and added, “It still is!”

I was taken aback. I wondered if the woman was pulling my leg. I couldn’t imagine a person from back home in Greater Cleveland, for example (black or white), making a similar claim. Most urban residents today find that old program to be quaint at best, and over-the-top hokey (that is, insulting to country folks) at worst. But a few more moments of pleasant conversation, her half carried out in a lyrical twang, convinced me that she was sincere.

Her speech pattern jogged my memory. It reminded me that when blacks converse in diverse locations in America, as well as in faraway places like England and Australia, they employ the same regional accents as do people of other races. Experiencing that phenomenon always serves as a small reminder to me that, everywhere, people are people. That when placed in similar circumstances, they all act pretty much the same.

Considering his many false impressions of small-town Americans, it is a lesson that Barack Obama seems yet to learn.

The man I observed in the grocery store in Hinton, West Virginia probably owns a shotgun. And he, his wife, and their child probably attend church now and then too. But I can assure Barack Obama, they aren’t “bitter.” Neither are the black folks I met in the park. And none among them has antipathy for people who don’t look (or talk) like them.

Berea Pundit