Obama often portrays himself as “above politics,” a man who by his mere presence will heal divisions at home and abroad. Daniel Larison, with his usual panache, eviscerates this myth:
Also, what is all this talk about Obama bridging the “violent chasm” between the West and the Islamic world? How does he do that? By saying, “I used to live in Indonesia, but by the way, in case you were wondering, I am not and never have been a Muslim”? Perhaps he bridges the chasm by reminding inattentive foreign audiences that he supported the bombing of Lebanon, has proposed sanctions and divestment schemes aimed at Iran and has vowed to launch strikes on Pakistani territory without that government’s permission. How’s that bridge looking now?
The other problem with this talk of Obama as a bridge-builder with the Islamic world is that people might take it rather too seriously and see him as being too close to the Islamic world. The logic of “only Nixon could go to China” applies here as well. Someone who is already seen, rightly or wrongly, as personally close to or understanding of the ‘other’ has much more difficulty engaging in the kinds of negotiations or contacts that Obama proposes to have. This may seem like an absurd aspect of domestic politics, but if Obama’s supporters were interested in his chance at being a viable national candidate they would stop saying these things right now. Having combated the false reports that he was a Muslim as a child, Obama has also been conflated or associated with two major hate-figures in the American mind, namely Hussein and Bin Laden. To portray him as the natural bridge-builder with the Islamic world unwittingly reinforces the negative associations that various chain-mailers, bloggers, pundits and candidates have been making. Above all, it stresses how dissimilar and to some extent unique Obama’s background is for most Americans, which makes for interesting magazine copy and punditry but does very little for a candidate’s electoral prospects. “Vote for Obama–he’s not like you in so very many ways” is not a winning slogan in a mass democracy. Identitarianism is one aspect of democracy that is one of its most deplorable features and one of its most basic and unavoidable. Being able to identify with a candidate is essential, and anything that weakens this hurts the candidate.
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