[Edward Cohen]
The winds of change are blowing harder across the United States with each passing day. For many, Washington seems sclerotic and tired. A young and charismatic figure appears on the horizon, though many question his readiness for the task. Despite the doubters, he appeals directly to Americans to seize once again the task of international leadership and domestic regeneration. The year is 1960 and John Kennedy is running for President. Or is it Barack Obama in 2008?
The idea that Barack Obama is the next John Kennedy is one of the most commonly heard clichés in US political commentary today. Yet in what sense can they usefully be compared? One was born into wealth and privilege and was groomed for high office from childhood, the other into difficult family circumstances and began his political education as a community activist on Chicago’s impoverished South Side. The most useful comparison lies in the ability of both men to personify the idea of generational change and the blank slate that is so central to the American national psyche and which propelled them both into the political spotlight.
In entering the tense political environment of the late 1950s, Kennedy appeared to be the quintessential political outsider. As a relatively inexperienced, and Catholic, senator running against a two-term Vice-President, many political observers dismissed Kennedy’s candidacy on the grounds that the Democrats would not risk nominating such a young upstart candidate with a narrow and potentially divisive appeal and fairly uninspiring legislative record.
Yet what distinguished Kennedy was his ability to capture the national imagination. His call for Americans to seize their historic mission to lead the defence of liberty abroad and fight for renewal at home struck a chord. While his message was not universally shared, he persuaded the electorate that his program best captured the authentic American spirit. This quickly contributed to the emergence of a personal mystique that sustained his high popularity over the next three years.
Today, it is this effort to capture a classic American narrative and image that is the implicit objective of Obama’s campaign. His speeches ooze with a thrilling idealism, which, combined with his euphonious voice and seemingly effortless charisma, have associated him in the minds of many Americans with a new “politics of hope”. The overall impression is that his election as President would indicate beyond doubt that America remains able to renew itself through leaders whose own story defies the stale power of establishment Washington.
One of the greatest difficulties Kennedy faced was a widespread, though particularly Southern, anti-Catholicism. (This was an element of fundamental schisms within the Democratic Party at the time.) This hostility was exemplified by the unedifying spectacle of Kennedy explaining to a large audience of Protestant pastors in Houston that he would not, in fact, be taking orders from the Pope if elected President. This entrenched prejudice led to a vociferous debate about Kennedy’s ‘electability’ that centred on the assumption that the United States was not ready to elect a Catholic candidate.
Similarly, a great deal of the early discussion that attended Obama’s announcement of his candidacy centred on the question of whether the country is ‘ready’ to elect a black President. Opinion polling to date suggests that race is not a major impediment to Obama’s prospects of success. Obama has also worked constantly to challenge the perception that he would only work for the advancement of black interests. In an interview with America’s National Public Radio network earlier this year, Obama argued that “in the history of African-American politics in this country there has always been some tension between speaking in universal terms and speaking in very race-specific terms…I am more likely to speak in universal terms”. Obama has even drawn criticism from black leaders such as Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson. They are unhappy about his relative unwillingness to campaign on traditional civil rights activism and black marginalisation.
The idea of unifying the country around generational change as a way of overcoming sectional division has a natural appeal to Obama, as it did for Kennedy. It is this that drives him to articulate a more universal message. One recent poll put him nine points behind Clinton in African-American support, suggesting, perhaps, the gradual onset of a tension between post-racial politics and more conventional civil rights-era politics.
As with Kennedy, however, the criticism most commonly aired is that Obama is not ‘experienced’ enough. The country, it is argued, isn’t ready to take a risk with an untried chief executive. In response to this attack, Kennedy famously compared ‘experience’ to the frothy wake left behind by a boat. What was important, he said, was where the skipper was now steering it. This idea goes to the core of what Obama must convince the electorate if he is to derail Senator Clinton’s campaign. Obama’s strategy so far has been to try to reframe the debate into one over what kind of experience and basis of judgment is most appropriate for the national crossroads at which the United States now finds itself.
America is entering the twilight of an administration badly tarnished by an unpopular war, corruption scandals and legislative paralysis. Obama is attempting to tap into populist anti-Washington sentiment, a persistent, if rather blunt, theme in US politics. This is, of course, an implicit rebuke to Clinton, who has recently trumpeted her extensive Washington relationships as a plus for her campaign. Similarly, although Kennedy’s patrician background hardly positioned him as the anti-establishment candidate, he did employ the idea that official Washington had remained inert while the world changed rapidly around it. ‘Experience’ for both Kennedy and Obama was simply a by-word for stodgy, tired establishment politics and status quoism.
The difficulty that has always surrounded this argument in the modern context is that it leaves the problem of risk and uncertainty unresolved. Steadiness, discipline and competence were touched upon repeatedly by Kennedy’s then opponent, Vice-President Richard Nixon, and Senator Clinton relies on them today. Clinton’s campaign is premised on the idea that she understands the needs of the Democratic party (and the country) better. Rather than voting for a change, she hopes that Democrats will nominate the candidate most likely to win. The subtext of Obama’s positioning against Clinton is that as the vast majority of Americans already have strong views on Clinton, be they positive or negative, she will have a much tougher time building a new progressive consensus. The test over the next months will be to see whether these lingering doubts continue to cause Clinton’s lead to narrow. She has already been beaten into third place in the Iowa caucus, with Obama coming a clear first.
Perhaps Josh Lyman, the fictitious White House Deputy Chief of Staff on The West Wing, put it best. The issue in Presidential campaigning, he said, is not what the answer is to the question of who can best govern America. Rather, it is power over the question itself. Once you’ve done that, the answer becomes obvious.
As it was with Kennedy, the real battle underway in the Democratic Party today is over which narrative is more compelling. Does America need to change the nature of its politics or can the current system can still be harnessed for progressive change?
