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January 12, 2009
Obama The Writer
It's not, I think, an exaggeration to say that Obama is the most able writer to win the presidency since Lincoln.
This article is an excellent, though too brief, look at writing and the presidency, with the president-elect and President Lincoln as the throughline. Among other more favorable views of Obama's writing talents, Raban writes that Barack Obama doesn't reach Lincoln's prowess in terms of wit -- not humor, but wit. He provides as evidence the following 1860 transcript of Lincoln speaking about Kansas and Nebraska and the issue of whether to admit them to the Union as slave or free states:
If I saw a venomous snake crawling in the road, any man would say I might seize the nearest stick and kill it; but if I found that snake in bed with my children, that would be another question. [Laughter.] I might hurt the children more than the snake, and it might bite them. [Applause.] Much more, if I found it in bed with my neighbor's children, and I had bound myself by a solemn compact not to meddle with his children under any circumstances, it would become me to let that particular mode of getting rid of the gentleman alone. [Great laughter.] But if there was a bed newly made up, to which the children were to be taken, and it was proposed to take a batch of young snakes and put them there with them, I take it no man would say there was any question how I ought to decide! [Prolonged applause and cheers.]
I don't know if Barack Obama has this talent for wit. I don't know whether he has a Gettysburg Address in him (his Philadelphia speech on race, A More Perfect Union, was as close as he's come). But we can safely predict that he's going to spend the next four to eight years striving to meet Lincoln's precedent. And we're lucky to be around to observe such a thing.
Filed under: Barack Obama Speeches || Lincoln
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Posted By Bob Cesca | January 12, 2009 11:07 AM
Comments
Indeed
Posted by: Myhero at January 12, 2009 12:08 PM
I read With Malice Toward None cover-to-cover, and I don't recall Stephen Oates ever letting on that Lincoln was a snark. (I think we need a comprehensive History of Snarkism to fill our knowledge gaps).
Posted by: CycloCynic at January 12, 2009 12:59 PM
"I would save the Union. I would save it the shortest way under the Constitution. The sooner the national authority can be restored; the nearer the Union will be "the Union as it was." ... My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or to destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone I would also do that. What I do about slavery, and the colored race, I do because I believe it helps to save the Union; and what I forbear, I forbear because I do not believe it would help to save the Union. I shall do less whenever I shall believe what I am doing hurts the cause, and I shall do more whenever I shall believe doing more will help the cause. I shall try to correct errors when shown to be errors; and I shall adopt new views so fast as they shall appear to be true views. I have here stated my purpose according to my view of official duty; and I intend no modification of my oft-expressed personal wish that all men everywhere could be free."
Now that's a patriot. Can you imagine any one of our elected officials saying something like this today? Can you imagine the media frenzy over such a statement?
Plug in your favorite social issue, and run with it, Bob. If slaves were still present today, or if Lincoln said he would throw illegal immigrants, gays, or women under the bus to save the union, what kind of a blog post would you write about that?
Posted by: politicalpartypooper at January 12, 2009 2:01 PM
PPP does make a point here. Could a politician get away with such rhetoric today? Or even better, in looking at the definition of rhetoric as:
: the study of writing or speaking as a means of communication or persuasion
Is that even what we get from our politicians today at all?
As a society we have lost the ability to communicate through discourse and logic. So sad.
Great article, thanks for posting it.
Posted by: willpen at January 12, 2009 2:29 PM
I will leave aside the discussion of what I consider one of Lincoln's more detestable moments, to thank Bob for such a great article. It was a worthwhile read.
QT
Posted by: QueenTiye at January 12, 2009 5:22 PM
