This just in: Herman Cain concluded his suspension-of-campaign speech with a quote from a Pokemon movie. I think it wasn’t the same Pokemon quote he used a couple of weeks ago, but most eight-year-olds could probably tell you.
Not sure I could’ve supported my argument below any better.
Cain’s words this morning are a good introduction to my analysis, so I’ll quote from it. “We have decided . . . It would be best to suspend this campaign. That’s the bad news. Here’s the good news. The pundits would like me to shut up, drop out, and go away. Well, (insert folksy allusion to his sweet grandmother), I am not going to be silenced and I am not going away. And therefore as of today, plan B.”
“I call it the Cain Solutions.com. There are three audiences out there that I have had to deal with. There’s the media class, the political class, there’s We The People. It is We The People that got us to this point. It is We The People that want change in Wash D.C. It’s We The People that’s responsible for the movement going through this country. I call it the Tea party movement, the conservative movement, the people’s movement. The people will show that they are still in charge of this country.”
Please, Lord, let it not be the people who’ve supported him, Perry, and Bachmann. Or those who believe the President was born in Kenya, or who think the Supreme Court “kicked God out of the public schools,” or who are convinced that Jewish homosexual socialists run the “lamestream media” that hates them because they’re Christians. Because there are millions of them, most of whom are Christians who’ve failed in the charge to love the Lord with their whole minds — that is, by seeking truth unfettered by political affiliation — but who, by God, hate a lot. Not necessarily “hate a lot of things,” but simply “hate a lot.” That, in Christendom today, is much more appealing than THINKING a lot and quite a bit less messy than, say, “loving a lot.”
It’s not their conservatism that makes them a frightening force. It’s their elevation of dumbness as a civic virtue. Never has that been more evident than in this year’s presidential campaign, with Cain’s providing a sterling example.
As we all were waiting with baited breath for Cain’s announcement regarding the continuation or termination of his presidential campaign, pundits from the right and the left — I was watching CNN — were busy chattering about his campaign thus far, specifically, the fairly evident lack of policy understanding he evinces and the cringeworthy bad judgment he’s demonstrated in response to the sexual misconduct charges engulfing him. Between his Libya-question disaster and revelations of his secret friendship with an attractive younger woman, commentators say, it’s been a rocky road for the now-former candidate.
Even the political questions themselves appear to have been beyond Cain’s grasp, and I don’t think it helps his cause to claim that “So you agreed with President Obama on Libya or not?” — literally, the question posed to him two weeks ago by the Milwaukee newspaper editor — is a terribly complex, deliberately tricky inquiry. Do we agree that it’s pretty straightforward, if somewhat grammatically awkward? I think I wouldn’t be comfortable arguing that Cain was so perturbed by the syntax that he couldn’t quite get the point of the question. I invite my classically-educated readers to do a quick Shirley-method sentence diagram to break down the essential elements of the question if they disagree with me.
Simple question, not designed to trip him up? OK. Let’s go on.
The pundits’ discussion of Cain’s difficulties, which I would call his ineptitude, lead, as it should, to a discussion of Rick Perry’s problems, especially his debate performances, which show, to be generous, a decidedly lightweight and incurious intellect not offset by his glowering manliness. Which, of course, introduces talk about Sarah Palin, and Christine O’Donnell, and Michelle Bachmann, all of whose canon of public political and social utterances indicate staggering heights of vapidity and shocking depths of ignorance. And while on-air journalists can’t really say so, we know that the regular buffoonery of Fox News anchors and pundits offers succor to the happily underinformed and a feast of food for thought for those whose minds are engaged.
Cain’s background and his campaign show that “you didn’t need a degree from Harvard to run for President. You didn’t need a political pedigree to run for President,” he said this morning, and he described himself as “a common man” who could lead this nation.
In this, he is partly right. You don’t need a degree from Harvard to run for president, nor do you need a political pedigree. You do, however, need to be smart. You ought to know what’s going on in the world, and you have to demonstrate a profound grasp of the issues you hope to represent and affect as the leader of the free world. You will be expected to know something about Libya, for example, other than the fact that if Barack Obama did something, you pretty much disagree with it just because it was Barack Obama who did it. It may please your supporters, but a foreign policy, it isn’t.
Bill Clinton rose from humble beginnings to become, administratively, one of the most intelligent, effective Presidents this country has ever had. No one would have thought that a chubby kid from a broken and violent home in Arkansas would become, more than a decade after his presidency, a statesman and humanitarian admired throughout the world for his razor-sharp intellect and a heart of gold, tarnished sexual moral compass notwithstanding. And the current President, a bi-racial kid raised by a single mom, a boy who only saw his father twice in his life, used his considerable mind and character to rise to power as a man whose intellect and grasp of issues is unquestioned, even when his policies are.
Clinton and Obama. Cain, Perry, Bachmann, et al.
It’s hard not to see the difference.
When Democrats favor people from humble beginnings, it’s because the candidates have risen from their position and have demonstrated some degree of intellectual vigor and robust curiosity about the world they hope to lead. When Republicans fawn over someone lacking a political pedigree and a privileged beginning, they worship their “commonness” and elevate their simple-mindedness. Their perceived “common” man status requires a stunted intellect and a preference for the comfortable state of perpetual ignorant bliss. The “common man” — or woman — is applauded not for being of simple beginnings, but for being simpletons. Therein lies the difference between the conservative movement and the largely-informed electorate, therein lies the most essential truth of this presidential campaign, and therein lies the biggest tragedy of American politics.
Church Voting in New England
The two items voted on at the annual church business meeting were the budget and elders. I voted yes for the budget and then made my own box under the elders’ names. I wrote the name of the woman sitting next to me at the table and checked that box. Been doing this for years, they must know it is me.
Our pastor chose to talk about the church slogan “Love God, love others, and make disciples.” Sounds simple, something we should all get on board with.
But what does loving others look like?
We idled the car in my folk’s driveway finishing our talk before picking up the kids. I explained that love does not discriminate. At the meeting, I felt as loved as a black wanting a seat in the front of the bus in Mississippi in 1955.
Change churches? No, we have friends, our children have friends, we like the short drive, we will stay, things could be worse… I’ll keep writing in women for elders and when we have our family budget meeting, I’ll use my 50% vote to put less in the offering plate.
Comment by Anonymous — December 5, 2011 @ 2:05 am
Keep fighting the good fight, and thanks so much for your comment. Let me know how the Lord works to change things in your church, will you?
Comment by Keely Emerine-Mix — December 5, 2011 @ 3:31 am