Once, during the commodity-rationing days of the Second World War, Eleanor Roosevelt publicly mentioned that the White House might substitute salads for desserts to help conserve unrationed sugar and hence keep it that way, which promptly caused a run on sugar, which thereby forced its unscheduled rationing. Later, the puzzled, Congressionally chastised and somewhat shaken first lady commented, "It never crossed my mind that you couldn't tell the American people the truth and count on them to behave themselves accordingly."
Eleanor, of course, knew better than that. She spent an adult lifetime diplomatically and necessarily hedging on what she knew to be much harsher truths about American society, especially those that conflicted with hidebound attitudes about race. Her husband was not unsympathetic; just presidentially wary of offending white voters and all those powerful Southern pols who held the legislative future of his New Deal and the war's prosecution in their grubby, racist little hands.
Better to step gingerly, very gingerly and with very, very small steps at that. That was the smart political move, because both Eleanor and Franklin knew they could not, in fact, tell the American people the whole truth and count on them to behave themselves accordingly.
And so it has been with minor exceptions since the mid-20th century, and well before that, of course.
Not only race, but issues of gender, the fair distribution of wealth, America's proper role in the world, fiscal intelligence ... One could go on and on, listing all the things that smart politicians avoid telling the truth about. The "why" has already been answered. They got where they are by not telling the truth, by not trusting the American people, by not counting on them to behave themselves and to do the right thing.
And now comes Barack Obama, who surely felt as shaken as Eleanor Roosevelt in the wake of the nation's outcry over a few mostly truthful words about America's role in the world. It was as though he had spoken the words himself; and he could have, but in far more diplomatic terms. It was merely the harshness of the original words that shocked -- their theme, rephrased and softly spoken as a Press Club lecture, on the need for soft American power over hard would have gone down with little notice and absolutely no uproar.
That's what those original words were fundamentally about: not black liberation, but national liberation -- the blownback consequences of our international arrogance and one region's monstrously executed suggestion that we start thinking about changing course. For our own good, as well as others.
But they were spoken by a black preacher, whose church was attended by this black politician, hence the latter's response was culturally defined and necessarily confined to the meaning of blackness in America, and not the meaning of America, period.
Sen. Obama went, it would seem, as far as he could go. As he composed his responding speech he scratched his head more than once, I'm sure, asking himself why he was writing only about racial miseries -- which we can do nothing about overnight and which the good reverend was not, in reality, addressing -- rather than tackling the enormously pregnant question of imperial miseries -- which we can at least begin reversing on January 20, 2009.
As far as he went -- as far as he could go -- he performed brilliantly. That's not just my review; that's the review of virtually every commentator out there, whether center, left or right. With grace, eloquence and almost unparalleled intellectual integrity he tackled the "Race Question" in America.
Americans' degree of receptiveness to being told the truth and then behaving accordingly remains, of course, undetermined. But there are hints. In a weekend Washington Post story, a white male in Pennsylvania spoke for probably millions when he offered that Sen. Obama "could have thrown [his preacher] under the bus, but he didn't, and that shows loyalty. I respect that." Nevertheless the reverend's words seemed to this gentleman "completely un-American," and this left him still uncomfortable about the Illinois senator.
But that comment in itself poses a separate and quite interesting question. Did he mean "anti-American," not un-American? -- anti-American in the literal sense that the preacher opposes American policies? That usage would have been more fitting, because there is nothing more authentically American than a local community leader questioning his government's actions abroad. After all, no less than that most American of all American presidents, Teddy Roosevelt, once said that "To announce that ... we are to stand by the president, right or wrong, is not only unpatriotic and servile, but is morally treasonable to the American public."
In our culture -- and please permit me to stress that stipulation -- I can't think of anyone better qualified to publicly address what is "morally treasonable" than a preacher. And that's all the Reverend Wright did. It's as American as stuffing ballot boxes.
So the next question is: Will Obama tell the American people the truth about our role -- our multicolored role -- in the world? Can he extend his intellectual eloquence to the race-transcending issues raised by Wright? Can he, with the same pluck, face down the American people, tell them the truth and count on them to act accordingly at the polls?
Or would he be left as shaken and chastised as Eleanor Roosevelt? No, no, Senator, set us straight about race, if you must -- we'll let you go that far -- but don't tell us we have most everything else wrong, too.
That's what I'd like to see asked and answered.
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