I’ve been giving some thought to a column by Gideon Rachman in last week's FT on the “lousy, empty speeches” of Barack Obama. Gideon is a brilliant fellow and, it so happens, an old friend. It has troubled me that he could be so wrong about this, and I feel I owe it to him to set him straight.
Surely the simplest test of a speaker is the effect he has on his audience. It is indisputable that Obama has moved and even inspired hundreds of thousands of listeners. This is something that even his political enemies concede. His speeches might be “empty”—I’ll come back to that—but how can a political speech be “lousy” if it does exactly what a great political speech is supposed to?
One answer of course might be that the people Obama impresses are all idiots, or more than usually susceptible to mass hysteria. Since I myself find his speeches moving, this argument does not much appeal to me—but that might be how Gideon accounts for Obama’s success. Some of the adulation is exaggerated enough, I admit, to lend this view credence. But it isn’t just Obamaniacs, or Democrats, or wavering independents such as myself who admire the man’s way with a speech. People who would never dream of voting for him agree that he is a fabulous speaker. Has the whole country lost its mind over Obama’s oratory? I think I would rather say, “He is a great speaker. Just look at the results.”
Gideon is on firmer ground when he calls the speeches vacuous. The problem here, though, is that the best political speeches are almost always vacuous, at least in the sense that Gideon invokes—namely, failing to get “stuck into the detail”.
Unwilling to argue that Martin Luther King and John F. Kennedy gave lousy, empty speeches—why is that, by the way?—Gideon has to assert that “the fierce urgency of now” meant something momentous when King said it but was meaningless when Obama quoted the phrase. And he has to say that JFK’s “Ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country” really amounted to something, whereas Obama’s “Yes we can” is vapid. But all those expressions are impotent when excerpted from the speeches they were used in. They derive their force from the words that surrounded them, and from the circumstances in which they were spoken.
Gideon lays great stress on challenging the audience: that is why King and Kennedy were great orators, he says, and Obama is not. But isn’t “Yes we can” a call to action—a challenge to the audience—much like “Ask not…”? Also, remember that Obama’s main audience at the moment is the Democratic electorate. On some important issues, notably trade, he has pandered to party sentiment. But his theme of national unity really does challenge the Democratic base. This call is indeed, as Gideon muses doubtfully, “less obvious than it sounds”.
Many Democrats hunger for revenge after two terms of George Bush; the mutual loathing of the two parties would be difficult to exaggerate. When Obama calls on Democrats to reach out to Republicans and make common cause in addressing health reform and other issues—with his party controlling both houses of Congress and confident (maybe too confident) of winning the White House as well—you bet he is challenging his audience. It tells you something that he has been the only Democratic candidate to do it. The strategy risked offending the progressive wing of the party; because of it, many of its members remain suspicious, despite his (from their point of view) impeccable voting record.
“Why is this stuff so appealing?” Gideon asks. Here is my answer. Obama understands rhetoric. (That repeated “Yes we can…”, with variations, is called anaphora.) He has an appealing, positive and uplifting message. As I say, he (gently) challenges his audience. His timing is good: he promises a less combative style of politics, and this is something the country now wants. And let’s not forget that he is black. The possibility, now becoming the probability, that Obama will be America’s first black president gives every speech a mighty extra jolt of excitement. People who listen to his speeches think that history is being made. Every orator should be so lucky.
One more thing. In my column for Monday’s FT (which I'll post shortly), I ask what went wrong with Hillary’s campaign. I mention her difficulty in seeming sincere. Obama has no such difficulty. He seems authentic. In American politics, that is an unusual thing, and it makes a huge difference. (“What greater crime can an orator be charged with than that his opinions and his language are not the same?” – Demosthenes.)
"The dogmas of the quiet past are inadequate to the stormy present. The occasion is piled high with difficulty, and we must rise with the occasion. As our case is new, so we must think anew, and act anew. We must disenthrall ourselves, and then we shall save our country." Lincoln's Second Annual Message to Congress, December 1, 1862.
Reminds me of that funny Onion headline (paraphrased):
FDR: 'We have nothing to fear but fear, and a crippling, decade long financial depression'
You are absolutely right that Obama challenges the Democratic base. For my own part, I view bipartisan activity with the GOP and the corporate elites to be about as likely to succeed as kissing a snake. These groups have simply no interest whatever in the well being of the people of the United States.
To quote Merle Haggard, another 8 years of this and there won't be an America, in any meaningful sense.
Nonetheless, I am willing to vote for him. What are my choices? John McCain? The man who believes in eternal war while extending tax cuts for the wealthy?
I voted for him 8 years ago. At that time, I was under the illusion that McCain was an honest man, rather than an intermittent lier who occassionally suffers bouts of remorse.
For that matter, I voted for Dole in 1996. Never again. These people are corrupt past redemption. I don't believe in the myth of the "good hearted" mobster.
Obama's speeches aren't entirely vacuous.
After all, except for the wonkish diversions into policy detail, his speeches are mostly about reorganizing how we think and behave as participants in self-government.
All that talk about mutual responsibility toward one another, engagement in the process, raising our expectations and standards ... Hey! That is the stuff of Democracy.
Policy is essentially the output.
What our leaders evoke from us--and what we evoke from them and each other is the input.
Garbage in = garbage out.
Inspiration in ....
To Mr. Connor;
Your argument - though ad hominem and dim - would be greatly improved if you could spell.
Regards,
TB
THE REASON HUSEIM OBAMA LOOSES OUT ON DEBATES IS BECAUSE HE'S PROGRAMED BY HIS MUSLIM FRIENDS AND THEY DONT KNOW ANYTHING WORTH WHILE. IF YOU ASK HIM A QUESTION, HE CANT HANDLE IT BECAUSE HE DOES'NT REALLY KNOW WHAT HE HAS SAID IN THE PAST. HE'S ONLY PROGRAMED FOR EACH DAY AT A TIME, THATS WHY HE SPENDS SO MUCH TIME ALONE, TO PREPARE FOR THE NEXT DAYS SPEECH. HE HATES TO TALK ABOUT HIS PAST, BECAUSE HE TOLD REPORTERS THAT HE'S BEEN LOOKING FOR HIS PARENTS, YET HE KNEW HIS FATHER, A DIGNITARY OF KENYA AND OTHER FAMILY MEMBERS. HIS PAST IS SKETCHY, BUT WE DO KNOW THAT A RICH PERSON IN ENGLAND (MONEY SCAMMING) GAVE OBAMA $3.5 MILLION WHEN HE BECAME SENATOR. I PICKED THIS INFO. UP ON DIFFERENT WEB SITES.
Sorry, but I love his speeches.
Michaal "I picked this info up on different web sites" Schmitz' comment floats like a Baby Ruth in the pool of Clive's excellent post about the real substance of Obama's speeches. Barack is fighting against the process of how we've done things for the past eight years (if not the past 25) in Washington. I think he's doing an excellent job. This is the pulse people are picking up on, and I pray he succeeds with it.
Are CAPITAL letters really necessary? There's way too much anger from people who oppose Obama. George "I am the unifier" Bush created a huge wedge that's polarized the country to no end, like we've never seen before and when the Conservatives had everything they could possibly want, including a war to support the military industrial complex, they're still angry. They're angry all the time. Just listen to the conservative radio shock jocks, they don't sound like a bunch of happy people.
Now Hilary sounds very angry, now. Shrill at times. Big Bill was angry earlier, but he's had to tone it down. What's with these people?
It's this kind of anger, undermining, and polarization that's created the mess that we're in now. So, it's very refreshing to hear Obama's speeches. He counters all of Hilary's onslaughts without anger--he just responds with clarity and it makes it easier on the ears to listen to what he's really saying.
Stay away from the caps lock key and make some sense and get informed. It's amazing that you would admit to believing every thing that you read on the internet to be true, even if it's repeated over and over again on different sites which originated from one source which may be false? How do you know it's true? Honestly, stop shouting with CAPITAL letters!
Gideon is on firmer ground when he calls the speeches vacuous. The problem here, though, is that the best political speeches are almost always vacuous, at least in the sense that Gideon invokes—namely, failing to get 'stuck into the detail'.
Interesting comment. I'm reminded of Hans Morgenthau's discussion of JFK's speeches, in "Monuments to Kennedy", New York Review of Books, January 6, 1966:
Mr. Obama is a frightening personage on the political scene. He would venture out into the world to apologize for America, reaching out to the Holocaust-denier-who-would-destroy-Israel; would reach accords with the likes of Hugo Chavez and Raul Castro, and would blithely pull out of an unstable, infant regime struggling for stability to let unchanneled rage let the blood flow. On the domestic scene he would confer citizenship upon 12 million plus illegal aliens [whoops, "undocumented immigrants"], and would cave into the bloated and corrupt NEA and AFT which continue to turn students into village idiots.
When Barack Obama first faced the criticism that he has no experience and that words are cheap, he answered words give hope. Many agreed and ran to Obama's defense. His supporters maintained that Obama's rhetorical skills were noteworthy and trumped his lack of experience. More to the point, they argued that Obama's rhetorical skills trumped the life and political experience that any other candidate brought to the race. They maintained that he, like Martin Luther King, spoke from moral authority.
We knew Obama borrowed his "audacity of hope" phrase from his preacher Reverend Wright. We also understood that Obama used the words of JFK, FDR, and Martin Luther King freely. Yet,in their hearts, most Americans believed that the rest of Obama's words were authentically his; rhetoric was his strong suit after all.
He awakened the yearnings of a citizenry hungry to hear a leader who understood the greatness of America and who would help us transcend the duplicity of Bush/ Cheney. We were led to believe that his rhetoric came from the inner crux of his soul, not the contriving machinations of a political machine. He would lead us to the Promised Land after eight long years under a less than honest man.
Now we have learned that much of Obama's rhetoric was first used by Deval Patrick to win his campaign in Massachusetts. It seems both men hired the services of David Axelrod,so Obama's supporters argue that the campaigns inadvertently melded. Patrick's words are now Obama's.and
Obama's supporters tell us to turn the page. Purists of course aren't buying it. Since Obama never gave so much as a nod to Patrick, they are calling him a plagiarist.
Both Aristotle and Quintilian argued the value of ethos in public speaking. A speaker's ethics they argued was paramount. Quintillian stressed the point that rhetorical excellence was "the good man speaking well," because a speaker's ethics affect his/her credibility and often speak more loudly than words. Emerson echoed this sentiment when he wrote: "What you are speaks so loudly, I cannot hear what you say."
Axelrod and Team Obama have been playing us like fools. Not only does Obama lack experience, his eloquence is sadly that of a parrot.