Lexington
A bitter pill
Apr 17th 2008
From The Economist print edition
Barack Obama has ignited a fiery debate about class
BARACK OBAMA has a magic way with words; but when the magic deserts him it deserts him big time. April 6th saw Mr Obama making the worst verbal gaffe of this seemingly endless campaign. He told a group of fat cats in San Francisco that the reason why he is finding it hard to appeal to blue-collar voters in Pennsylvania is because they are “bitter”. They have suffered from so many broken promises that they prefer to “cling” to God, guns and xenophobia rather than reaching out for a helping hand from the government.
The resulting cacophony has drowned out everything else. (Did anybody notice that the Democratic candidates engaged in a substantive debate on religion on April 13th?) “Elitist, out of touch and, frankly, patronising,” says Hillary Clinton. “Out of touch with average Americans,” echoes the McCain campaign. Conservative radio hosts have been bellowing 24/7 about how Mr Snooty knows nothing about the real America.
And no wonder! Mr Obama has always been in danger of coming across as an elitist. He was educated at Columbia University and Harvard Law School. He not only reads books but writes them. He once urged a group of Iowa farmers to check out the price of arugula (rocket) in Whole Foods—an upmarket store that has no branch in the entire state. His Ivy League-educated wife—who is paid nearly $300,000 a year for providing “community outreach”—is in the habit of telling audiences how difficult it is to afford ballet classes for their daughters.
The war between “ordinary people” and “condescending elites” is one of the great themes of American politics. “Ordinary people” are real Americans: they worship God, revere America and love their families. “Condescending elites” are crypto-Europeans—the sort of people who eat arugula, do sissified jobs in offices and universities, and scheme to ban guns and legalise gay marriage. Mr Obama not only put himself firmly on the “wrong” side of this great cultural divide; he implied that “ordinary Americans” are the victims of “false consciousness” for not falling in love with him.
But this pandering to “ordinary Americans” is annoying in all sorts of ways. Isn't America supposed to be a meritocracy? Two-thirds of Americans reject the idea that people's chances in life are determined by circumstances that are beyond their control, a far higher proportion than in Europe. Almost 90% say that they admire people who have got rich through hard work. Yet whenever elections come around politicians treat the people at the bottom of the heap as the embodiment of American values. And aren't Americans supposed to believe in self-reliance? America's farms are some of the country's biggest subsidy hogs. Many small towns—Congressman Jack Murtha's Johnstown in central Pennsylvania is an egregious example—are kept alive only by federal pork. As for family values, America's small towns and rural havens suffer from higher rates of marital breakdown and illegitimate births than the degenerate big cities.
But pander the politicians feel they must. This week Mrs Clinton downed a shot of Crown Royal whisky in Bronko's Restaurant and Lounge in Crown Point, Indiana. She also entertained America with stories about how her father taught her to shoot. But does anybody believe that Mrs Clinton spends her days shooting and her evenings throwing back the whisky? Mrs Clinton is a graduate of Wellesley College and Yale Law School. The Clintons' joint income since 2000 was $109m. Mrs Clinton joined the million-mom march against gun violence. Back in the mid-1990s the Clintons both went on a Wyoming rafting holiday because Dick Morris, their pollster, told them that it would go down well with “the folks”. They were soon enough back at Martha's Vineyard.
The same is true, perhaps even truer, on the conservative side of the aisle. John McCain—son and grandson of four-star admirals, husband of a woman who is worth $100m and owner of several houses—follows in a long tradition. George Bush senior mocked Michael Dukakis for his Harvard Yard liberalism. But “Poppy” went to Yale (where his father was on the board of directors) and was once nonplussed by a supermarket scanner. Bob Dole, who liked to boast that his father wore overalls for 42 years, made millions and married a fellow all-star politician. And as for George Bush junior...
The hypocrisy extends to the commentariat who have been busting their cheeks blowing their populist trumpets. Rush Limbaugh and Bill O'Reilly make millions out of championing “the folks” against “the elites”. Bill Kristol and John Podhoretz are the Ivy-educated sons of famous parents who are based, respectively, in Washington, DC, and New York City.
How bad for Barack?
The big question, of course, is how much this will hurt Mr Obama's election hopes. However hypocritical it may be, this style of elite-bashing politics has had a remarkable track record since at least the Vietnam war. The Nixon campaign eviscerated George McGovern as the candidate of “amnesty, abortion and acid”. Mr Bush senior reduced Mr Dukakis to the candidate of card-carrying liberal elitists. Mr Bush junior pulverised John Kerry as a French-speaking windsurfer.
But whether it will continue to be so potent is less clear. Mr Obama is a more skilful politician than most of his predecessors. Mrs Clinton's “We're not bitter” populism is already beginning to grate (when she told a crowd in Pittsburgh that she found his comments condescending, there were loud cries of “No”). And polls suggest that people are much more interested in addressing issues such as economic insecurity and inequality than refighting old battles against the liberal elites. Perhaps this election is not just about who wins the White House, but about whether an entire political era is drawing to a close.
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