"Hijacked"

EVENT

Political Things I want to talk about: 1) organic foods, 2) ends and means, and 3) activism. But I don't know enough to trust my opinion yet, and anyway, those subjects are too large to take on up front right now.

Instead, I'll defer to something easier: This post from Street Prophets. The context is a religious-political debate, but what ought to be of interest to everybody is the question of expediency raised by the post and its implied measure of latitude for a rigorous progressive religious critique.

"Doing the Lord's work is a thread that's run through our politics since the very beginning," Obama told church members. "And it puts the lie to the notion that the separation of church and state in America -- a principle we all must uphold and that I have embraced as a constitutional lawyer and most importantly as a Christian -- means faith should have no role in public life."

He also accused the Christian right of "hijacking" Jesus to polarize the public.

"Somehow, somewhere along the way, faith stopped being used to bring us together. Faith started being used to drive us apart," he said. "Faith got hijacked partly because of the so-called leaders of the Christian right, who've been all too eager to exploit what divides us.

"At every opportunity, they've told evangelical Christians that Democrats disrespect their values and dislike their church, while suggesting to the rest of the country that religious Americans care only about issues like abortion and gay marriage, school prayer and intelligent design," he said. (Chicago Tribune)

The Street Prophet posts asks, in the present instance, whether Obama is harming his campaign more by alienating possible support than he is encouraging the liberal religious vote?

I'm interested in what you think.

Personally, I'm encouraged by this sort of "risky" statement. It isn't an ends/means conflict to me. Successful politics and ethical politics can coexist when one can take their stand diplomatically. Likewise, uwdomke neglects Obama's actual phrasing. With the exception of the Religious Right (which he mentions by name), almost anyone (who may have voted for Bush / state "marriage protection" / ID / etc.) can assume from the content of Obama's statements that he's actually referring to someone even further right. In this sense, the accusation is of an intangible quality from which almost anyone could find a way to exempt themselves. In fact, it almost brings the discussion of the pragmatic value of the comment full-circle. If the comment only applies to the "so-called leaders of the Christian right" (who presumably won't be voting for Obama anyway) is there any reason to call it a worthwhile risk? Not because it isn't worthwhile, but because it isn't really much of a risk?

Maybe. It depends on who is listening and what they're listening for.

There is at least a residual risk, however. As uwdomke points out, a lot rests on the word "hijacked":

It's a potent word, laden with assumptions about motives and imagery of terrorism. As a result, it's certain to raise the ire of those on the right. Yet it also may not sit well with some on the center or left who strongly share the sentiment -- but nonetheless may not want a like-minded candidate to use it.

The speech is a sort of turnabout of the Republican gambit of the early 2000s, when the loyalty of any dissenters were questioned. In this case, the Religious Right is associated a group they try to visibly separate themselves from – terrorists – and which separation, given the militarism of the Right these days, has been largely successful. The superficial meaning of Obama's statement, that the Religious Right has dictated a discourse inwhich progressive/Liberal Christianity is irrelevant/unacknowledge is, in fact, fair. Almost anyone considering themself a liberal Christian has a sense of this. I certainly have.

And yet, his word choice economically packages a whole range of arguments we've (and I've) been making for years: that fundamentalisms have more in common with each other than they do with a mainstream understanding of the same faith; that fundamentalism preempts the process of negotiation and compromise that we typically engage to resolve issues in community; that the Religious Right has taken our theological and political debate toward an undesired and undesirable destination. In other words, the word "hijacked" itself is not a subtle reference. It begs an particular interpretation that, at this moment, most populist readings of the facts are only too happy to support.

While I do not doubt that Obama's speech might "raise the ire" of the Right, I doubt that they will make a scene over it. Today, they're too vulnerable. To accuse Obama of anything in this light would acknowledge and widen a debate, a line of questioning, that compromises conservatives on their own friendly issues. I don't think that this speech is going anywhere controversial fast.

What is encouraging, however, is that a contending Democratic candidate can make such a comment without an immediate negative upshot. This is a far cry from the steamrolling of liberals that followed 9/11 and preceeded the start of the Iraq War, or even Kerry's silence against the Swift Boat campaign in 2004. It signals, if nothing else, a very healthy lack of timidity. I'm not discouraged yet. The political pendulum still has leftward momentum, and might gain some yet.

END OF POST.