How to offend everyone to the left of Attila the Hun:Rick Warren is still all over the blogosphere -- man! are people pissed off. I'm not as furious as I was yesterday, which is maybe a good thing, and I'm sort of over it at this point: to reiterate, I've never had that much confidence in Obama because I think he's an operator, although I'm willing to entertain the idea that his heart, ultimately, is in the right place. On this one, though, I'm basically appalled.
Glenn Greenwald has an interesting take on the choice and the reasoning:
But there is one aspect of the worldview of many Obama supporters that I find genuinely difficult to understand. These supporters insist that by symbolically including and sometimes compromising with even those on the Right with whom he vigorously disagrees, Obama will be able to chip away at the partisan hostilities and resentments, and erode the cultural divisions, that have inflamed and paralyzed our politics. People on the Right may disagree with him, claim these supporters, but they won't be wallowing in rage, suspicions, and hatred towards him. Instead, they'll feel respected and accommodated. They therefore won't be distracted by petty sideshow controversies. As a result, he'll encounter less reflexive resistance to implementing the key parts of his progressive agenda. A New Politics will emerge: one of respectful and civil disagreements, but not consumed by crippling partisan and cultural hatreds.
The one question I always return to when I hear this -- and we've been hearing it a lot to explain the Warren selection -- is this: in what conceivable sense is this approach "new"? Even for those who are convinced this will work, isn't this exactly the same thing Democrats have been doing for the last two decades: namely, accommodating and compromising with the Right in the name of bipartisan harmony and a desire to avoid partisan and cultural conflicts? This harmonious approach may be many things, but the one thing it seems not to be is "new."
And let me add that not only is it not new, it's been disastrous. I, like so many other people who concern themselves with the nefarious activities of the anti-gay right, hate to sound like a broken record (remember records?), but Warren was quite clear on his willingness to compromise:
And Warren says "there is no need to change the universal, historical defintion of marriage to appease two percent of our population." As Warren puts it: "This is not a political issue -- it is a moral issue that God has spoken clearly about."
That was, of course, part of his comments on Prop 8, in which he also lied about its effect on freedom of religious expression and free speech.
However, Obama is a much more complex man than Bush -- we've gotten used to a nonfunctional frat boy in the White House, and there are other aspects to this that Obama's seeing but not talking about. I found this comment from this post at Mahablog illuminating:
The significance isn’t as much that Obama invited Warren, but that Warren accepted.
Just two years ago, Warren was getting slammed in evangelical circles for inviting Obama to take part in his church-sponsored AIDS conference, with Obama even back then being called “the anti-Christ” and inherently un-Biblical and anti-American, which in evangelical-speak is basically calling someone satanic. Warren stuck to the decision, weathered the claims that he was endorsing The Beast, and remains huge in the evangelical world today–while pushing evangelicals to move past cultural issues to focus more on world health and poverty.
The point is not to convert the diehard, right-wing, functionally theocratic evangelicals to a progressive agenda, or to win their votes for Obama in 2012. The point is to drive home the message that those folks can no longer define evangelicalism. (Right now the movement is mostly on poverty and the environment, but attitudes towards same-sex marriage and civil unions are changing also).
So, is Warren better than Dobson or Reed? Marginally, overall, but not at all on gay issues, reproductive choice, and the like. He's still a snake-oil salesman, when it comes right down to it.
(Sidebar: Chris Crain seems to have his head stuck in something, as this obvious misreading of Warren's rhetoric demonstrates:
One thing they cite is how supposedly "compared" or "equated" gay marriage to incest and polygamy in explaining his support for Prop 8 in California:
I’m not opposed to [gay marriage] as much as I’m opposed to the redefinition of a 5,000-year definition of marriage. I’m opposed to having a brother and sister be together and call that marriage. I’m opposed to an older guy marrying a child and calling that a marriage. I’m opposed to one guy having multiple wives and calling that marriage.
This is neither "comparing," nor "equating." In fact, Warren specifically draws a distinction between that which he does not oppose -- gay marriage -- and the parade of horribles he thinks opening up redefinition of marriage will lead to -- incest, pedophilia and polygamy.
Let's leave aside that polygamy has been an integral element of that "5,000-year definition," with Biblical validation; that "child bride" is not a new concept by any means; and that the marriages of Egyptian royalty were routinely incestuous (and they were not alone, and it would be interesting to hear how Warren classifies the Biblical injunction that a man marry his brother's widow); and any observations that Warren is no more constrained by factual accuracy than any of his peers. However, I think I'm justified in pointing out that Crain is doing some "editing" here. Jim Burroway provides some context:
Rick Warren: But the issue to me is, I’m not opposed to that as much as I’m opposed to the redefinition of a 5,000-year definition of marriage. I’m opposed to having a brother and sister be together and call that marriage. I’m opposed to an older guy marrying a child and calling that a marriage. I’m opposed to one guy having multiple wives and calling that marriage.
Steven Waldman: Do you think, though, that they are equivalent to having gays getting married?
Rick Warren: Oh I do. …
I'm not going to accuse Crain of intellectual dishonesty here. I'll let you draw your own conclusions.
Updated: Jeremey Hooper also noticed that little truncation.)
Back to the main thread: As I noted, I think Obama is playing a deeper game than most people are seeing, but the fact remains that most of us are taking this at the very least as indicative of the relative weight gay interests are going to carry within the Obama administration, which I'm reading as "light" to "inconsequential." Frankly, that's pretty mainstream: much as we may hate to admit it, we're not on most people's radar. On that score, Prop 8 and Rick Warren may give us a boost: if we can sustain the energy, we're going to be more visible, and if we're more visible, more people are going to be forced to realize that there's actually something going on here. It's up to us to harness that.
I've seen some objections to the furor based on the idea that this is simply a "symbolic gesture," but that slides past a very important point: we are a symbol using species. Symbols have weight and meaning, and we as a species are very sophisticated in their use. (That's one reason marriage is the issue it is right now: in addition to being a community ritual, which is a symbolic event in itself, it is a potent symbol of community acceptance.) Update: Ezra Klein addresses this issue briefly and makes an important point:
I'd endorse Matt's comments on "symbolism" here, and suggest that calling the Warren issue "symbolic" is just a method of marginalizing minority discontent. Warren is not a symbolic figure. He's a religious leader who mobilizes his flock and leverages his public influence in order to affect electoral outcomes.
I'd like to point out, thought, that this is not an either/or proposition: Warren himself is an instrumental figure; the importance of the symbolism of handing him the spotlight at the inauguration, however, can't be denied. Do read the post by Matthew Yglesias that Klein links to -- it's brief and he gets it.
So, wither Warren? Frankly, I was totally outraged, and I'm still fairly pissed off, as much at the sheer thoughtless ineptitude as the insult -- and it is an insult. Now, it's just giving me heartburn: in spite of his "passionate" words, I don't expect Obama to deliver, except maybe as a second-term kind of thing, if the climate is right.
I still have a review to finish this morning, and it has to be this morning. At this point, if you want to see differing points of view on this, it's all over the blogosphere. And frankly, I think the outrage is a good thing.
Later.
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