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First of Many Disagreements to Come
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(In The Kut) In picking Reverend Rick Warren to deliver the invocation at the inaugural, President-elect Barack Obama earned the ire of the liberal left. It’s a reaction that surely team Obama must have foreseen, but one that may be difficult to quell, at least in the short term.
Joe Solmonese, President of Human Rights Campaign, a pro-gay rights group, called the invitation “a genuine blow to LGBT Americans.”
At The Nation magazine Sarah Posner writes, “… the choice of Warren is not only a slap in the face to progressive ministers toiling on the front lines of advocacy and service but a bow to the continuing influence of the religious right in American politics.”
Greg Levine of Firedog Lake said, “I will add that if Barack Obama wants to invite different voices to a discussion, fine, but that is very different from having a known homophobe give a speech at what is likely to be one of the highest profile events in recent US history. That’s not a dialogue—that’s a signal.”
Warren has been an outspoken and vigorous supporter of banning gay marriage, compared abortion to the Holocaust, thinks evolution is a fiction, and is ardently anti-stem cell research. To many on the left, he is a culture warrior in the mold of James Dobson or Pat Robertson even if the best-selling author supports such causes as global poverty reduction, containing the spread of AIDS and HIV, and combating climate change. All of which are areas of Obama more than likely will want to enlist Warren’s support.
But no one wants to any of that to be done at the expense of their right to marry, sexually reproductive rights, or scientific freedom. While inviting Rev. Warren to deliver the invocation will not automatically usher in the dark ages, it does suggest something that Obama is a little too conciliatory toward the very same people who will try to tear him apart in a few months. At the same time, some worry that its an indication of the very conservative instincts people fear Obama managed to conceal thus far.
Other political observers see a stroke of opportunistic genius involved. MSNBC’s First Read said, “As for the pure politics of this, when you look at the exit polls and see the large numbers of white evangelicals in swing states like North Carolina, Florida and Missouri, as well as emerging battlegrounds like Georgia and Texas, you’ll understand what Obama’s up to. “
For his own part, at his press conference on Thursday Obama said:
Nevertheless, I had an opportunity to speak, and that dialogue, I think, is a part of what my campaign’s been all about, that we’re never going to agree on every single issue. What we have to do is create an atmosphere where we can disagree without being disagreeable, and then focus on those things that we hold in common as Americans. So Rick Warren has been invited to speak, Dr. Joseph Lowery — who has deeply contrasting views to Rick Warren about a whole host of issues — is also speaking.
During the course of the entire inaugural festivities, there are going to be a wide range of viewpoints that are presented. And that’s how it should be, because that’s what America’s about. That’s part of the magic of this country, is that we are diverse and noisy and opinionated. And so, you know, that’s the spirit in which, you know, we have put together what I think will be a terrific inauguration. And that’s, hopefully, going to be a spirit that carries over into my administration.
Disagree without being disagreeable might not cut it with after the fallout over Prop 8 in California. Too many feelings are still raw about that loss. Plus, given how there are thousands of activists about to descend on DC on January 20th, we could see spontaneous protests take place just as we saw in around the country in the aftermath of the passage of Prop 8.
Most people who voted for Obama assumed that they would not agree with him on every single issue, but they do hope to be on the same wavelength on big issues that have a certain visceral dimension to them. And when that is not the case, the President-elect should expect a barrage of criticism, which I am sure he will be able to handle.
So simply chalking up the criticism as mere difference of opinion, especially when it’s described as noisy and such probably will strike many his supporters as dismissive. As David Corn noted on CQ, “But Warren’s opposition to gay rights is more than a mere policy dispute. It is an act of bigotry. Sure, Warren does not believe he is being discriminatory. But that’s what it is.”
By the same token, liberals have to understand that the culture wars don’t mean as much to Obama as they do to his Democratic predecessors. He thinks those issues are designed to keep Democrats in the losing column, electorally speaking. So, he will not hesitate to aggressively court evangelicals on issues where they and liberals share common ground. Doing so, will probably involve at least some symbolic gestures before effectively prying lose the Republican grip on that segment of the voting population as he fulfills his quest to redraw the political map and maintain widespread support for certain issues.
In the final analysis, I am not sure if having Rev. Warren at the inauguration is worth the political headache of angering the liberal base. I realize that the favorability ratings are high and that Obama feels as if he could take at hit now, but I would be reluctant to spend hard won political capital on something that would pose the most activist and partisan segment of my base against me on the last day of the honeymoon.
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