richardf8 | A Caveat.

level_head has a post worth contemplating, regardless of its slant, called Unpatriotic.

It's noteworthy to my mind because it points to a way in which we, as Americans, have gotten sloppy in our thinking, especially over the past eight years, but going back farther than that even. We have become accustomed to an us and them style of thought. The right and the left alike have spent the Bush years assimilating the "if you're not with us, your against us" mentality. And here is my warning: any lefty who brings this framework to the Obama presidency is going to be disappointed.

What we have in Obama is someone who grasps realpolitik. And that tends to mean compromise. If the last 8 years have had any effect on our culture at all, it has been to make "compromise" on either side of the fence a dirty word. The partisanship that has been brewing since Nixon, that saw its full flowering in the "Republican Revolution" and the Bush administration have torn this nation limb from limb. Getting us to where we are now demanded that Franken take on Limbaugh, that Maddow deconstruct Coulter, but the battle is now lost and won, and its time for reconstruction.

I think that Obama's ability to blend that which I agree with along with that which I find distasteful speaks volumes about his ability to reintegrate a nation that has been separated as if by a centrifuge. To those who are seeking ideological purity, he will seem a sellout, but to those who want a nation at peace, he may just the ticket.

You can't always get what you want, but sometimes you get what you need.

[Edit:

bluerain notes: "I actually think it's grossly unfair to cast anyone who is angry at the selection of Warren as displaying an "if you're not with us, you're against us" mentality." This assessment is correct and just, and I have therefore removed the reference from the body of the post. Thanks to her and

orv for helping refine my thoughts on that.]

Threaded | Flat

its true we have gotten very much into an Us vs Them mindset. Or maybe we have always had this mindset. I can't say for certain my political awareness came about maybe in 1992 before that it was all very vague and well out of my understanding.

Still I think it will take a long time for the healing you describe to come. If it ever does. People will not put down their swords easily and people like to be in their camps.

You are right that Obama is not an ideological purist and I think he is trying to strive for the middle ground. I hope he can find it personally. i'd like to see someone try and strike a balance. Pull us in another direction but create some much needed equilibrium. Let us see then.

I see it already among my friends. Anger that Pastor Rick Warren was given a leading role in the proceedings, ignoring the fact that Bishop Gene Robinson was there as well.

I actually think it's grossly unfair to cast anyone who is angry at the selection of Warren as displaying an "if you're not with us, you're against us" mentality.

I'm certainly very angry about Warren's selection, and the Robinson sleection did only so much to mollify me. Let me ask you this: how would you expect a black American to feel about an open racist giving a presidential invocation, and how mollified do you think that person would be if a black preacher were given a lesser speech, one that ended up not even being televised or broadcast over radio, on an earlier day?

Can you honestly tell me you think this hypothetical black person would simply say "oh, well, all right, then"?

Because that's a precise analogy. Bigotry is bigotry. Warren has said in public that he thinks homosexuality is equivalent to incest or pedophilia.

Nobody expects black Americans to make concessions to racism. And it is insulting to ask that GLBT Americans make concessions to anti-gay prejudice.

On the whole I do not think I see the world in anything like black-and-white terms. I'm a big fan of reasoned discussion and of considering all viewpoints, and that's what makes me happy about the idea of a President Obama after eight years of blind and rigid ideology.

But don't tell me to regard bigotry against me, or the honoring of an unrepentant bigot, as just a difference of opinion. Because I won't. Not ever. That's where I draw a line in the sand; this far and no further. Do you understand?

I hope you're wrong.

Part of the reason we've drifted so far to the right as a nation is that Republicans always try to remain ideologically pure, and Democrats always compromise to try to make nice. This lets Republicans effectively run things even when they're not in the majority, and makes the Democrats look weak when they should be strong.

Our ideology will never prevail if we continually try to "out nice" the other party. Politics doesn't work that way.

I see in Obama a practical moderate.

Gotta admit, I'm comfortable with a practical moderate.

Thank you for updating your post. I'm still not in 100% agreement with you about this--but that's the point, isn't it? :)

And I'm sorry for arguing as stridently as I did, but this is something I feel strongly about. For years and years I've had to put up with people, even other liberals with the best of intentions, telling me and people like me that we have to accept homophobia as just another legitimate side of the issue. It makes me bristle, and I consider it a moral obligation to speak up.

Kind of ironic that your entry got more than thrice as many comments as LH's. And he usually gets more than you.

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