“Let us declare that in the wealthiest nation
on Earth, no one who works full-time should have to live in poverty, and raise
the federal minimum wage to $9 an hour.
This single step would raise the incomes of millions of working
families. It could mean the difference between groceries or the food bank; rent
or eviction; scraping by or finally getting ahead. For businesses across the country, it would
mean customers with more money in their pocket.” (2013 State
of the Union, speech)
Above
is our ever loquacious President deploying some of his favorite rhetorical
weapons and, has he have done with many of his speeches over these very long years, challenging the listener to
decide whether he is hopelessly deluded and naïve or utterly cynical and
duplicitous.
The first
sentence is the mother of all non-sequiturs – “Let us declare …etc.” Yes, let
us declare whatever makes us appear even more compassionate and virtuous …
maybe the onset of the millennium, swords into plowshares, where no one
“should” be overworked and exhausted, and then (to make sure it happens) propose
to lower the work week to 15 hours. This
is a classic Obama trope of misdirection and megalomania. There is no logical
or empirical connection between the Hope and Change declaration for the end of
poverty and the proposed action, a partisan political ploy.
One must
understand that the President’s declarations, whatever the subject may be, have
almost always been by design self-referential, in effect, all about Obama, The One.
They are intended to display and dramatize his boundless compassion – in His America no one should have to live
in poverty if we simply follow his
lead. Second, they are always, even by
the forgiving standards for politicians on the hustle, grandiose and
fantastical. In 2008 his election, he
said, would “heal the planet,” “slow the rise of the oceans” and “transform America and the world.” This
man does not waste his valuable time or unique talents on small things. He is
about, in his own words, “transformation”. Every speech was supposed to be equivalent
to the Gettysburg Address, every appearance a diffusion of edification and
enlightenment.
The rest of
this excerpt is a typically embarrassing and sloppy
descent into the real world which is terra incognita for Obama. Yes, maybe the minimum wage “could” mean the
difference between groceries and the food bank, etc. but likely not. The minimum wage has been raised many times
over the decades and now we have record levels of youth unemployment and food
stamp reliance. However, if we raise it one more time, the President avers, poverty
will vanish. “For businesses across the country, it would mean customers with more
money in their pocket.” Yes, but
businesses across the country will be employing fewer people since the cost of
labor will be raised. None of these details are important or relevant in the
long term because for Obama and his admirers it is always the intentions that
matter, and his are the highest and purest, worthy of declaration in yet one
more speech. The most important outcome
for Mr. Obama is that we all continue to understand how much he cares about the
unfortunate. The world, however, will turn, the minimum wage will no doubt be raised,
and, poverty will persist and this his solemn declaration will be
forgotten along with his many other rhetorical excursions into fantasy land.
In his speeches
Obama often asserts a fake unanimity as he urges “us” in this instance to join
him in this inspiring exorcism of penury.
The trap is thus set. Who can
oppose the end of poverty for anyone?
Who wants anyone to be evicted or without groceries? And so, from Obama the obvious, simple
solution – raise the minimum wage. Those who might possibly object must be
selfish, stupid or partisan. There is no
other explanation, and this is how he will orchestrate the conversation. There will always be someone with a corroded character and hidden agenda standing in his way
and making self-serving excuses. Obama’s framework is always one of invidious
comparison. The solutions to big
problems, his solutions, the only reasonable solutions, are obvious, straight
forward and simple and make life better and fairer for the many. The obstacles
to the solutions are: the few, the
mean-spirited, unenlightened folks in opposition who want the many to suffer
while they prosper.
Considers this
piece of an April 2011 speech:
“We are going to have to ask everybody to
sacrifice. And if we’re asking community colleges to sacrifice, if we’re asking
people who are going to see potentially fewer services in their neighborhoods
to make a little sacrifice, then we can ask millionaires and billionaires to
make a little sacrifice.”
Who exactly is
this “we” doing the asking? It is Obama,
himself, of course, but he is setting up yet another invidious comparison as conjures
himself into a virtuous collective (“We
are the Ones we’ve been waiting for…” as he announced in his 2008
campaign). In contrast to the many, the
needy and oppressed who must sacrifice in the essentials are those billionaires
don’t even want to give “a little.” Obama puts great rhetorical stress on this
“little” he is “asking” – how could the most reasonable and decent of
individuals who have so much possibility object? It is another way of
scapegoating and demonizing an easy target, another way of making himself
appear to be the benevolent, selfless problem solver obstructed by a few
selfish, inconsiderate reactionaries. Of course, he is not “asking,” either –
more misdirection and subterfuge from the candidate who promised the most
transparent administration in history. The
“sacrifice” as little as says it will be will not be voluntary; it will be imposed.
Obama operates
in a Manichean world of friends and enemies. In one of the most candidate
moments of his presidency he told his followers in a Univision speech in 2010, “we’re gonna reward our friends and punish
our enemies” and his rhetoric is always shaped with this goal in mind.
So, when Obama
utters those simple pronouns “we” or “us” the listener needs to grab the hand, twist
the decoder ring frantically, decipher the message with care and prepare for
another admonition followed by more restrictions or regulations.
After the
Newtown shooting President Obama in one of his many speeches on the topic said,
“We must change!” Again, who is the “we” that has to change?
Well, clearly, not him. Given that the person directly responsible for the
carnage was already dead this was yet one more rhetorical juke, a move to set
up and “punish” those he perceives as his political “enemies.” The change he has in mind is to turn the
screws on these miscreants long held in his cross hairs who had nothing to do
with the tragic events. This unfortunate
target had already been named and identified in an unguarded moment in 2008,
those “bitter clingers to their guns…” Mr. Obama does not approve of gun ownership
(except for the government paid agents who guard him and his family) and, as we
have come to learn, he believes that his approval or disapproval comes with a
moral authority that should bind all of us.
So as we look back over the last seven years of teleprompter sweetness and contemplate his departure, let us with a
modesty and sincerity approximating that of our President declare that this
nation has had the wisest, most virtuous, most compassionate of leaders and that we
are all now so convinced – let him then for a long season, be silent.
