Democratic Convention, day three: Barack Obama’s ‘unprecedented’ move
One part of former President Barack Obama’s speech to the Democratic Convention today was completely unprecedented in US history.
COMMENT
Most of the speakers at the Democratic National Convention this week have been hurt by the total absence of a crowd.
The coronavirus pandemic has forced everyone to address the convention virtually, or in Kamala Harris’s case, from a lectern in the middle of a cavernous, empty auditorium.
It’s a weird situation for these career politicians, who are used to playing off a live audience. And it feels equally strange to watch.
In Barack Obama’s case though, it actually helped.
The former US president has always been a little better than most of his peers at using silence as a weapon.
Where another politician might rush through their script, he routinely takes long pauses, giving his points time to sink in. The result is that each sentence gets a little extra punch.
Today, that effect was amplified. Mr Obama’s speech simply would not have worked the same way without the near-oppressive silence around him. A partisan crowd cheering after every line would have thoroughly ruined it.
But there were no cheers. Just Mr Obama, a couple of cameras, and a museum display on the US Constitution serving as a backdrop.
The setting was sombre and serious. So was the speech.
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RELATED: Read Obama’s full speech to the convention
And that was as it should be. It is no small thing for a former US president to attack the current occupant of the White House in the manner Mr Obama did today. In fact, it has never been done before.
Unlike most things I write, this isn’t just some random Australian armchair critic talking crap.
It’s the same conclusion reached by experts in the US, among them presidential historian Michael Beschloss, Politico’s chief political correspondent Tim Alberta, and senior NBC anchor Andrea Mitchell.
No former President has ever attacked his incumbent successor at a convention like Barack Obama tonight, or even come close.
— Michael Beschloss (@BeschlossDC) August 20, 2020
This isn't just the sharpest criticism Obama has made of Trump. This is the sharpest criticism a former president has *ever made* of a sitting president.
— Tim Alberta (@TimAlberta) August 20, 2020
.@BarackObama DNC speech is an unprecedented takedown of a President by predecessor, even more remarkable because until the John Lewis funeral, Obama avoided responding to @realDonaldTrump attacks on him and his legacy. No more. He believes the future of democracy is at stake
— Andrea Mitchell (@mitchellreports) August 20, 2020
There is an unwritten rule in American politics, a sort of pact between the small group of men – and yes, they are still all men – who know what it is to be president.
Former holders of the office refrain from explicitly criticising their successors.
I grant you, that tradition seems rather quaint from this side of the Pacific, where barely a week goes by without former Australian prime ministers sniping at each other.
The US is genuinely different.
Which is why Mr Obama’s scathing condemnation of the Trump presidency was such a serious step for him to take. Like so much that has happened since Donald Trump took office, it was not normal.
You got the distinct sense, watching Mr Obama’s speech, that he resented Mr Trump for forcing him to give it. That he never wanted to be the guy throwing rhetorical bombs at his successor from retirement, but felt Mr Trump had left him with no other choice.
The characteristic Obama composure was still there, but it failed to mask a quiet anger simmering beneath the surface.
RELATED: The other time Obama broke America’s unwritten rule
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Mr Obama spoke about the responsibility that comes with holding the one office under the US Constitution whose occupant is elected by all Americans.
“At a minimum, we should expect a president to feel a sense of responsibility for the safety and welfare of all 330 million of us,” he said.
“We should also expect a president to be the custodian of this democracy. We should expect that – regardless of ego, ambition or political beliefs – the president will preserve, protect and defend the freedoms and ideals that so many Americans marched for, went to jail for, fought for and died for.
“I have sat in the Oval Office with both of the men who are running for president. I never expected that my successor would embrace my vision, or continue my policies. I did hope, for the sake of our country, that Donald Trump might show some interest in taking the job seriously.
“That he might come to feel the weight of the office, and discover some reverence for the democracy that had been placed in his care. But he never did.
“For close to four years now, he has shown no interest in putting in the work. No interest in finding common ground. No interest in using the awesome power of his office to help anyone but himself and his friends. No interest in treating the presidency as anything but one more reality show he can use to get the attention he craves.
“Donald Trump hasn’t grown into the job, because he can’t. And the consequences of that failure are severe – 170,000 Americans dead. Millions of jobs gone, while those at the top take in more than ever. Our worst impulses unleashed, our proud reputation around the world diminished, and our democratic institutions threatened like never before.”
HE SPIED ON MY CAMPAIGN, AND GOT CAUGHT!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 20, 2020
WHY DID HE REFUSE TO ENDORSE SLOW JOE UNTIL IT WAS ALL OVER, AND EVEN THEN WAS VERY LATE? WHY DID HE TRY TO GET HIM NOT TO RUN?
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 20, 2020
Why is it that for so long, American presidents have avoided criticising one another? The tradition isn’t written down anywhere. There’s no actual rule to follow.
And why have presidents from opposing political parties been known to form deep friendships? The late George H.W. Bush was famously close with Bill Clinton, the guy who beat him in the 1992 election. George W. Bush is a warm friend of the Obamas, who spent much of the 2008 campaign trashing his record.
The answer to those questions is, quite simply, the respect that comes with shared experience.
So few people on the planet truly know the weight of responsibility a US president must feel. It’s what Mr Obama described, in the lengthy quote above, as “the weight of the office”. That kind of shared burden would bond most people.
There’s a reason presidents all seem to age so dramatically during their time in office.
This is a job that involves giving the order to kill people. Taking out a terrorist leader with a drone strike might mean inadvertently murdering a dozen civilians. Any order sending US soldiers overseas will likely result in some of them dying. Domestically, failure to contain a pandemic might cause thousands of deaths.
These dilemmas would keep most normal people awake at night, and inspire terrible feelings of stress and guilt.
After leaving office, Mr Bush was known to paint portraits of soldiers who were physically or mentally wounded after he sent them to Iraq and Afghanistan – an expression of guilt and remorse if ever I’ve heard of one.
And yet, it has been abundantly clear since day one of Mr Trump’s presidency that he does not feel the same burden, or even seem to understand it.
RELATED: Trump’s ‘very odd’ answer to QAnon question
A few hours before Mr Obama’s speech, Mr Trump was asked for his opinion on QAnon, the unhinged online conspiracy theory movement which the FBI has concluded poses a domestic terrorism threat. His answer was incredibly irresponsible.
“During the pandemic, the QAnon movement appears to be gaining a lot of followers. Can you talk about what you think about that, and what you have to say to people who are following this movement right now?” a reporter asked.
“Well I don’t know much about the movement, other than I understand they like me very much. Which I appreciate,” Mr Trump replied.
“But I don’t know much about the movement. I have heard that it is gaining in popularity.
“And I’ve heard these are people that love our country.
“So I don’t know, really, anything about it, other than they do supposedly like me.”
Any regular president would have recognised their responsibility to disown the fringe group. Mr Trump responded by encouraging it, because he had heard that the lunatics in question “like me very much”.
It’s been many months since the coronavirus pandemic started, but the President still hasn’t recognised his responsibility to protect Americans from it. He continues to insist the country’s epidemic is under control, even as it records tens of thousands of infections each day.
That is what fuelled the fury behind Mr Obama’s words. His critique was not about Mr Trump’s policies. It was about his failure, after all this time, to grasp the seriousness of the job entrusted to him by the American people.
When Mr Obama finished his speech, there was, of course, no applause. The silence hung uncomfortably in the air.
And that was the perfect conclusion. This might have been a triumphant moment for the Democratic Party’s political strategists, but it was a mournful one for the country.
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