Sad Politics

The so-called “Birthers,” making the claim that Barack Obama was actually born in Kenya rather than in Hawaii, embody perfectly the worst sort of politics. They want to show that since the President was not born in the United States, he is in ineligible for his position. Their strategy may have some political and legal validity since U.S. Presidents must legally be born in the United States, but it has been destroyed by Obama’s birth certificate. What seems most pathetic about this strategy is their inability to think the issue through. I’m left asking: Would it have been so bad if our President was born in Kenya?

The fact that these “birthers” have employed this strategy against President Obama is glaring evidence that they’ve run out of politically interesting things to say. The presidential ability to lead seems unaffected by the place they spent their very early years. To say Obama would be less effective as a President simply if he was born in Kenya is intellectually void. What bearing does this really have on his Presidential qualities? To answer this question, consider the following two possibilities: (1) A presidential candidate was born in country X, and at the age of 5 moved to the United States; (2) A presidential candidate was born in Hawaii and grew up in the United States. Legally, (2) would be the eligible candidate. But what presidential abilities would (2) possess that (1) wouldn’t? Some strange and empirically meaningless “American!” trait? Implied in our decision to declare (1) ineligible for the presidency is the insistence that (2) has some inherent quality making him or her more qualified for the presidential task. Or perhaps it is that (1) will have more sympathy towards country X than (2), leading him or her astray from American concerns. But don’t we live in an increasingly global society? Don’t we want a president who can sympathize with people other than Americans? I do.

The political atmosphere of angst and retribution after the September 11th attacks was understandable considering the tragedy, but was horribly shortsighted. The attacks should have been a wake up call, one which forced us to look inward and examine U.S. policies. As a nation, we wanted so desperately to return the blow dealt to us that we missed the opportunity for reform. The important question to ask was: What political reasons did the terrorists have for attacking the United States? A full and responsible answer to this question would have included the history of U.S. policy (i.e. occupation of Islamic Holy Land) that fueled the attacks. A blindly American President—like the one we had—struggles to answer this question honestly because such an answer requires scrutiny of “the greatest country in the world.” Such an inward look, one which notices the blemishes and mistakes, can be politically embarrassing for a President who thinks their country is undeniably great. So why require that the president be purely American? With the political and economic atmosphere becoming increasingly global, the view that American’s are inherently better is becoming increasingly embarrassing. For example, in his political campaign, John McCain asserted that American’s are the greatest workers. What does this mean? Is there some empirical data available to us that allows for this calculation? America has hard workers, but so does Columbia and China, nations which provide America with cheap goods. Are American’s really better than these workers? If so, then why? Would a Kenyan-born American President be so bad? If so, then why? Yes to either of these questions requires seemingly impossible explanations. In the end, it seems these "birthers" want a president who is blindly American: An overly patriotic president with little world-perspective. This is a dangerous desire.

But It's the Constitution...!

“Existence precedes essence,” the existential formula posited by Jean-Paul Sartre, is potentially relevant to more than just the struggle of self-definition (i.e. who am I?) If existence does precede essence, then we are born undefined and develop our essence as we live. It seems the birth of a nation entails a similar pattern of self-definition. Admittedly, a nation is born with some standards (constitutional laws, bills of rights, ect.), and these form the nation’s DNA. But the nation defines itself as it breathes, reacts, and experiences. So, the essence of the United States is much more than what the founding fathers wrote. Perhaps some of the constitution is still relevant and useful, but the founders could not comprehend the whole of the country’s future. So it is nonsensical to apply original constitutional laws to a modern context without first asking whether the original constitution is still relevant. For example, the context that inspired the right to bear arms is vastly different than the modern context of weapons development and control. With this view, we might realize that the right to bear arms should be amended, and at the very least, some unnecessarily dangerous automatic weapons should be banned. Indeed, the nation can and should redefine itself, forever moving towards an ideal.
This redefinition seems especially important when we note what portion of the population possessed authentic rights under the country’s founding documents: Slaves certainly lacked the right to anything (besides perhaps the right to a religion which kept them at least somewhat passive and accepting of their position in life); women were hardly allowed an education. In our modern context, women and African Americans—as well as other minorities—are political leaders, intellectuals, and cultural icons. Undoubtedly, the essence of this country has changed dramatically. I can’t help but question the motives of those with blind faith in the constitution; those “originalists” who reach back into our past and hold tight to the words of our founding fathers as if they are the words of God. I equate this with an attempt to preserve a less free world: A world where men make the decisions and Gay’s stay quiet. Hence I think President Obama’s living document theory of the constitution—a theory which admits the value of the constitution, but insists that it be altered to maintain its relevance—is a more suitable approach to modern law.

The Torture Game

In the face of new evidence regarding the effectiveness of the enhanced interrogation techniques used by the CIA to obtain information regarding potential terrorist attacks, President Obama must be bold in his resentment and disgust. The GOP has—for the most part—purposefully painted the debate regarding these techniques to allow for only two mutually exclusive choices. Either, (1) the techniques did not work and therefore it makes sense for us to be against them (though it seems many will still support them), or (2), the techniques did work and we must therefore support them. If the evidence supports the effectiveness of these techniques, couldn’t President Obama and the Democrats still stand up against them? Couldn’t they say: “Sure, they seem to have worked, but nonetheless we find the whole thing appalling and certainly do not approve. Find better methods which do not contradict our principles as a country.” This produces a third possibility, the one least talked about: (3) The techniques did work, but we find them appalling and do not support the CIA’s use of them. Because of this, we want new methods which “save American lives” but do not make us—at least the more sensitive among us—uncomfortable. The GOP wants to say that if the methods were effective, the CIA was immediately right for using them. But this presupposes that enhanced interrogation techniques (i.e. simulated drowning, or worse) were the only methods available to the CIA, or even the best methods available. But how could they prove this? Did they exhaust all other methods? This issue has been incorrectly painted as a last resort scenario in order to justify the use of harsh techniques. This is a popular game among philosophers, who argue that perhaps it would be justified to torture if we could unlock necessary information to stop a ticking bomb that would kill many civilians. This hypothetical, though possibly useful in some rare scenario we have yet to experience, is really irrelevant to the current debate on torture. But many supporters of torture have improperly presented the debate in this manner, making everyone unnecessarily nervous so as to produce consent. For the most part, President Obama has acted as a President of values—values I sometimes disagree with—and I hope he can continue to stand tough against the GOP’s support of barbarism.

Is Water a Form of Wealth?

President Obama’s assertion that we should “spread the wealth around” was met with disgust from free-marketers and other economic conservatives. For them, what you earn—what is rightfully yours—should not be redistributed to others. Their belief is not unfounded, and I do believe there is something to be said for personal gain. Nonetheless, I do think the Capitalistic desire for excessive wealth is unhealthy. I can’t help but ask the question: What social benefit will manifest from your excess in wealth? That is not to say that the poor do not deserve the money they earn, or that in general a drive for money is unhealthy; after all, money is necessary for survival and even enjoyment. Unfortunately, more than ever, money is necessary for basic human survival. Hence we see a distribution of water; a distribution based upon wealth rather than on need. Ironically, it is those who can least afford this water that need it the most. For this reason, a redistribution of water is necessary. The one billion people who have little or no access to water need it much more than the wealthy bottled-water drinkers could imagine. But this produces a more fundamental question: Is water a form of wealth? It seems that the redistribution of water supplies currently being sold as commodity would entail both a limitation of free-market/capitalist principles (i.e. the limitation of private enterprise) and a redistribution of wealth. But water is not itself a form of wealth, it is a source of wealth. Furthermore, because water is a basic human need—only second to oxygen—it is immoral to make it a source of wealth if others are being deprived of it. Now certainly some of this water deprivation is environmental in cause. But this does not take away from our positive duty to supply water to those who are deprived of it. Proponents of economic freedom must make an exception: We should not deny other human beings a basic human necessity (in this case water) so that we may increase our wealth. Water is not wealth, it is life.