At Last

In 2005 — and several times again over the next years — I wrote Barack Obama’s name on the board in my classroom, first in Sardis, Mississippi, and later in Jackson, when one or another of my students declared that there would never be a black president. In the three years I lived in Mississippi I had something like 500 students (just one of them was not black) and many expressed something like this sentiment at some time or other — at least one in almost every class, probably.

The first time I saw Barack Obama — the first time I heard his name, I think — was when he addressed the Democratic National Convention in 2004. And I liked Kerry more than a lot of Democrats did, but I wished then that Obama was running in his place, and I believed then that he would one day be the President of the United States.

I have followed his career these last four years. I was excited for my students when, in June of last year, we got word that he was quietly coming to Jackson for a fundraising event, and several of them got to shake his hand. I spent hours in line last March waiting for his appearance at Jackson State University. I have have been excited about his candidacy since it was first announced, and since it was called unlikely.

During the 2004 election I lived in Buenos Aires, and everywhere I went, whenever anyone heard I was an American, I was attentively cast as a representative of my country; and after that election, everyone, it seemed, was upset at the result, and everyone was asking me to explain it. As I struggled in awkward Spanish to explain American politics to late-night taxi drivers, and as I read the baffled and the angry editorials, I felt alienated from my country and I wished I knew it better. (And I decided, then, to go teach in Mississippi rather than following other opportunities.)

In 2005 I thought he probably wouldn’t run in 2008, that he would defer to our collective expectations of a Hillary Clinton candidacy, that he would finish a term in the Senate. I put his name on the board and I told my students not to forget it; I told them that, if Clinton wins in 2008, she will be up for re-election in 2012 and Obama will run in 2016; that if she loses in 2008, he will run in 2012; and that in either case, there will be a black president, and soon.

Tonight I am happy to have been partially wrong, and I am proud, and I am excited for my country, and I wish our new President-elect good luck in the very difficult tasks he has before him.

November 5, 2008 · Changes, History, Politics · 3 comments

Han Fei Tzu

It is obvious that, under normal conditions, water will overcome fire. But if a kettle comes between them, the water will bubble and boil itself completely dry on top, while the fire goes on burning merrily away underneath, the water having been deprived of the means by which it customarily overcomes fire. It is just as obvious that government should be able to put an end to evil in the same way as water overcomes fire. But if the officials whose duty it is to uphold the law instead play the part of the kettle, then the laws will be clear only in the mind of the ruler alone, and he will have been deprived of the means by which to prohibit evil.

Judging from the tales handed down from high antiquity and the incidents recorded in the Spring and Autumn Annals, those men who violated the laws, committed treason, and carried out major acts of evil always worked through some eminent and highly placed minister. And yet the laws and regulations are customarily designed to prevent evil among the humble and lowly people, and it is upon them alone that penalties and punishments fall. Hence the common people lose hope and are left with no place to air their grievances.

(Translated from the Chinese by Burton Watson.)

October 22, 2008 · Government, Law, Literature, Politics, Quotations · (No comments)

Symbolism

The first presidential debate of the election season will be hosted next Friday at Ole Miss. Dr. Mullins, Executive Assistant to the Chancellor (and who I believe has been some sort of university liaison for the event), told us in the Teacher Corps about the possibility of the University’s hosting a debate at least a couple of years ago. The planning has been enormous, and they’re expecting something like 3,000 journalists. I hear the place is already filling with reporters, and getting more attention than it’s gotten in a very long time.

I’m sure the symbolism of Obama’s participation will not be missed: the debate will be only a few days shy of the 46th anniversary of James Meredith‘s becoming the first black student to enroll at the school, and the accompanying riots that cost two lives (including that of an international journalist) and caused dozens of injuries. Bob Dylan wrote a song about it, and the bullet holes are still in the main administrative building.

 

Following the attention to symbolism, I remembered a small project conceived while still in Mississippi: mississippeponymy.

There are only two entries, and I’m not sure now that there will ever be more. But if you have suggestions (they need not be in Mississippi), do submit them.

September 19, 2008 · Friction, Politics, The South · (No comments)

Watching the RNC

Watching the Democrats last week, I sometimes heard the crowd chanting O-ba-ma, O-ba-ma, but overwhelmingly more often it was Yes-we-can, Yes-we-can. With the Republicans this week, it was sometimes Drill-baby-drill, Drill-baby-drill, or a few others, but overwhelmingly U-S-A, U-S-A. A few conservative blogs have commented on this, expressing their preference for it, insinuating that it says something about the parties.

I don’t object to that chant in the Olympics, or in other international competitions, but in intranational ones, at a political party’s convention — whichever political party’s — the implication that this one and not the other is the party of America, the party of patriotism, is not merely tasteless but deeply offensive to me.

And when a war protester disrupts the event, holding up peace signs and yelling, “End the war,” I don’t object to her being removed. But when her shouts for peace are drowned out by a mob chanting U-S-A, U-S-A, I am not merely offended, I am horrified.

September 5, 2008 · Politics · 1 comment

Dissonant Synchronicity

Reading about restrictions in Beijing, and also about King Li of the Chou (or Zhou) dynasty, who reigned in the 9th century B.C.E.:

The king acted cruelly and extravagantly.  The people in the capital spoke of the king’s faults.  The Duke of Shao remonstrated, saying: “Your people can no longer bear your orders.”  The king was angered.  He found a shaman from Wey and had him watch for criticism.  Whomever he reported was killed.  The criticism subsided. [But] the feudal lords stopped coming to court.  In the thirty-fourth year [of his reign], the king became even more stern.  No one in the capital dared to say a word, but only glanced at each other on the roads.  King Li was pleased.  He told the Duke of Shao: “I was able to stop the criticism.  Now they dare not speak.”  The Duke of Shao said: “This is [merely] blocking up criticism.  To block peoples’ mouths is worse than blocking a river.  When an obstructed river bursts its banks, it will surely hurt a great number of people.  People are like this, too.  For this reason, those who regulate rivers dredge them and let them flow; those who regulate people broaden [channels] and let them talk.  Thus, when a Son of Heaven presides over the government, from dukes and ministers [down] to [high-]ranking patricians, he makes them offer poems, [he makes] the Blind Musician offer songs, the Scribe offer records, lesser tutors offer admonitions, the blind offer rhapsodies or recitations, the hundred officers offer remonstrations, the common people pass their messages [to the king], close subjects present their corrections, and relatives amend or look into [the king's mistakes].  After the Blind Musician and the Scribe have given their instructions and the elders have ratified them, then the king deliberates on them.  Because of this, things can be put into practice without opposition.  People having mouths is similar to the land having mountains and rivers, from which the daily needs are drawn; and [it is also] similar in that there are highlands, lowlands, swampy lands, and irrigated lands, from which clothes and food are produced.  When mouths are made to express words, [both] good and degenerative [ideas] will arise.  To put the good ones into practice and to guard against the degenerative ones are the ways to make daily necessities, food, and clothing abound.  As people have thoughts in their minds and express them through their mouths, if [the ideas] are constructive, you should finish them and put them into practice.  If you gag their mouths, how many of them would support [you]?”  The king would not listen.  Then no one in the capital dared to say a word.  Three years [later], they joined each other in rebellion, and attacked the king.  King Li fled to Chih.

Ssu-ma Ch’ien (Sima Qian), The Grand Scribe’s Records, Volume I: The Basic Annals of Pre-Han China (ed. Nienhauser), Shiji 4 (142).

August 11, 2008 · China, Culture, Politics, Quotations · (No comments)

← Older entries