It is so rare to see this *lack* of condescension from a major politician

[cemaphonic]

that it instantly brought to mind an 18 year-old (18 years - really?) speech that I haven't read in over a decade.

President Vaclav Havel's Inaugural speech from 1990:

" My dear fellow citizens,
For forty years you heard from my predecessors on this day different variations on the same theme: how our country was flourishing, how many million tons of steel we produced, how happy we all were, how we trusted our government, and what bright perspectives were unfolding in front of us.

I assume you did not propose me for this office so that I, too, would lie to you."

This outright refusal to cheerlead and sugarcoat is so deeply weird from a political leader that I chalked it up to him being a playwright who suddenly found himself president. Havel talked to people as if they could actually see the world around them, instead of what the propaganda organs told them, "and they respected and loved him for it.

Obama is right. People don't trust the government or either political party to improve their lives. This is why our greatest electoral weakness as Democrats is not guns, nor abortion, nor gay marriage, nor any other social wedge issue but the simple fact that half the population cant even be bothered to show up to vote. This is why the notion that "Private business can do anything better than government agency" still holds such force in the face of countless evidence to the contrary. Time will tell whether or not Obama can overcome this deep distrust, but talking to us like we are actually aware of the many problems facing our nation is not a bad place to start.

As to the argument that "sure WE understand what Obama meant, but just think of how it will sound to all the rubes out there," Havel has this to say:

When I talk about the contaminated moral atmosphere, I am not talking just about the gentlemen who eat organic vegetables and do not look out of the plane windows. I am talking about all of us. We had all become used to the totalitarian system and accepted it as an unchangeable fact and thus helped to perpetuate it. In other words, we are all - though naturally to differing extents - responsible for the operation of the totalitarian machinery. None of us is just its victim. We are all also its co-creators."

We do not have to accept sound-bite politics. Every Democrat should be proud of Obama for actually speaking directly and honestly to people's fears instead of using them to manipulate.


I encourage everyone to read Havel's speech in its entirety. Aside from being the best political speech in MY lifetime (sorry, Obama's Race Speech:)), he addresses a number of topics that are as relevant to America in 2008 as they were to Czechoslovakia in 1990 - Economic dislocation, environmental and infrastructure degradation, the role of propaganda and political ideology in reducing creative and industrious people to cogs in an an economic machine that wore them down and spit them out broken, and yes, hope that by engaging people out of political apathy, that these things can be improved.

http://old.hrad.cz/president/Havel/speeches/1990/0101_uk.html

[bhikkhu]

1. Thanks for that. K&R

[90-percent]

2. vaclev

Vaclev was friends with Frank Zappa during this time. He appointed Frank to a ministry of trade or commerce position and James Baker nixed it. This after Frank took on Baker's wife (and Al Gores wife Tipper) at the PMRC hearings and record rating debate.

Zappa was apparently really big in the repression days behind the iron curtain. Something that came to light only after the wall came down.


-90% Jimmy

[cemaphonic]

8. Zappa in Eastern Europe

They cast a bronze bust of Zappa in Vilnius, Lithuania. Eastern Europe seems to have a real affinity to absurdist art, what with Kafka, Ionesco, and Havel himself.

As for Havel, there is no living politician and few dead ones that I respect more. He was in a unique position to be a president who did not seek, and did not want the job, but accepted it out of a sense of civic responsibility.

[bklyncowgirl]

3. Obama's willingness to treat voters like adults and try to make them think is one of his best traits

Modern American politics has for all too long been based on two principals. The first is the reflex response that people have to certain very deeply held and passionate stands on issues that while important, are not the key issues of war and peace and above all who gets to prosper in our society.

We all know the list: guns, abortion, gay rights, race. Whenever these things pop up politicians can count on voters to react like Pavlov's dogs at the sound of a bell. In case any voter happened to miss it then along comes the second part--the drumbeat of pundits and politicians and these days bloggers pounding away at these wedge issues.

Obama seems to take a different tack. He actually talks to voters as intelligent human beings. Yes his latest speech was a response to attacks from his rivals for what may have been an overly glib comment about how working class people have lost faith in government and cling to guns and religion but the way he's turned the issue back on his attackers is something we've seen before. He did it successfully with his speech on race and now he seems to be doing it again with the core issues of joblessness and the resignation that many people feel. Obama is betting that former coal miners now doing double shifts at McDonalds are going to understand his arguments.

This is the opposite of being condescending. Condescending is thinking that these poor rubes can't get past their cultural blinders and see what's really happening. This attitude is the prevelent one in political circles in this country, used by both parties to rally the faithful and blind ordinary citizens to the fact that they are being ripped off big time.

It will be interesting to see if he can pull it off. He's straying into forbidden territory here and I don't know if as many mainstream media pundits will be as friendly to him on this issue as they were on race.

[Bongo Prophet]

4. Can we handle a politician who speaks to us like adults? Some think it's time.

I like your quote that Havel "talked to people as if they could actually see the world around them"--that just about says it.

Some would rather pander, to tell them how "good" they are and how "hard they struggle"...well, they already KNOW that.

I some ways, this is a choice between "make me president and I will FIX it for you good humble people - here is what I will do (followed by a list of market researched goodies)" and "if you elect me, we can work on these issues together, starting with an honest assessment of reality."

[goclark]

5. It's time

:patriot:

[cemaphonic]

10. Havel makes this point in his speech too.

"Let us not be mistaken: the best government in the world, the best parliament and the best president, cannot achieve much on their own. And it would be wrong to expect a general remedy from them alone. Freedom and democracy include participation and therefore responsibility from us all."

[Berry Cool]

6. You guys have all nailed it right on the head.

K&R

[Arkana]

7. People aren't used to hearing the blunt truth

from their politicians--and it's refreshing to hear a Democrat just come right out and say it. As great as Gore and Kerry are now, their campaigns hamstrung them so badly that they had no sharp edges at all.

[TragedyandHope]

9. Thanks for sharing!

These moments in history are so rare that they can hard for us to recognize, even while we are living through them.