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.