Is Obama the antidote to decades of partisan acrimony? Conservative columnist Andrew Sullivan seems to think so in his latest Atlantic Monthly piece. Beyond a Liberal vs. Conservative or Democrat vs. Republican schism, Sullivan sees the partisanship of recent decades as the baggage of the Baby Boomers’ unresolved conflict over the handling of Vietnam. Obama, he argues, can transcend this ancient bickering. Simply having Obama as the face of the U.S., he further surmises, will also completely alter the perception of the U.S. in the muslim world, whose angered young populations have known Bush as the only leader of the America.
Sullivan from an accompanying web-only interview:
Part of the context of this piece is really as follows: if you believe the world’s okay, then the case for Obama is actually rather weak. Why would we listen to this rather young, untested figure? Let’s go to security mom, Hillary, or big daddy Rudy. If you believe, as I do, that the world seems to be hurtling toward something quite catastrophic, then the requirement of the United States to actually evolve itself to resist that trend—as opposed to accelerating it—is quite high. And Obama in fact puts the brake on what I think is our accelerating path towards global warfare and possible constitutional crisis.
First of all, I do agree on margin with Sullivan and I’m excited about Obama’s candidacy. I do believe we are hurtling towards catastrophe. While there is merit to this boomers vs. post-boomer argument, the divide also reflects growing uncertainty of America’s role in a nuanced, global world. On the foreign policy front, the shadow of Vietnam haunts Iraq, but so does an enormous fear of America’s diminishing capability to project hard military power without International or host nation support. We are proving even worse at military soft-power such as nation building, whose primary apparati were dismantled before we invaded Iraq. America has also seen a diminished ability to wield economic power against countries with large oil reserves. Similarly, nations with coveted resources like Venezuela, Iran, and Russia have taken brazen (often self-defeating) actions to cut off energy exports or bully trade partners. China’s huge demand for petroleum has stymied harder stances against Iran or the Sudan, whose Darfur and southern regions are rich with oil. On the home front, misunderstanding in globalized commerce manifests in backlashes against immigrants. For all of the oil industry’s sins, it is supply/demand increasing prices at the pump, not people in the Exxon boardroom.
Above all, I don’t want to give any of these academic points too much credence. The bottom line is that the world has become much, much more complex, yet the average voter’s understanding of the issues is increasingly dismal. (more…)
