The moral year one of Obama the one

November 3, 11:27 AMSpiritual Life ExaminerRabbi Ben Kamin

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Even he likely did not know how different the presidency would be from the campaign to be president.  When it came to inspiration, there was no one like him—which was a worthy attribute in itself, though strangely derided by both his Democratic primary rivals and then in the general election itself.  Franklin Roosevelt and Winston Churchill may have inspired western civilization to stave off the fascists with their unforgettable rhetoric at the outset; Barack Obama is not necessarily either one of them yet, nor is the world—as bad as it feels sometimes—at that dangerous a precipice as it was at the brink of World War II.

The one who lifted our hearts, who redeemed the dreams of Martin Luther King by making race all but irrelevant to the presidential process, who brought young people back to the voting booths, and restored skillful language and speech to the national podium, is now making grueling decisions about assassinating people with Hellfire missiles in Pakistan.

To his great credit, he has avoided spiritual self-righteousness, applying no badge of religious crusade to his deliberations, from abortion to Afghanistan. 

Like every other president, he has had to deeply compromise with declared principles, diverting billions of taxpayer dollars to corporate leeches in order to stabilize a seismic disaster (that he did truly inherit); by remaining inert on the sufferings of gays in the American military; by the still gaping open wound of Guantanamo Bay; and (probably to his own dismay) selling out for congressional votes in order to come up with a much-less-than true and clean and morally uncompromised national health care insurance plan for every American.

But he is not, as one commentator has suggested, “merely Bush with panache.”  To his great credit, he has avoided spiritual self-righteousness, applying no badge of religious crusade to his deliberations, from abortion to Afghanistan.  The bail-out has cost him politically, and it has a very bad aroma, but it seems to have been necessary, and our economy slowly recovers—though too many Americans still endure terrible stress and hardship and too many kids live off government food stamps.

Bush and Cheney were about unilateral impetuousness; Obama and his team appear to invite international dialogue.  The image of the United States is dramatically improved around the globe.  Our “cool” and deliberative and post-denominational president may yet, we pray, have the wisdom to avoid yet another American morass and tragedy in the lethal, tribal, and unforgiving mountains of Afghanistan.

We made him into a god.  We do that in America.  Then we get disillusioned when people are actually normal and flawed.  Barack Obama will continue to be himself, which makes him a spiritually sound president so far.

www.benkamin.com