If you watched the Faith Forum with Pastor Rick Warren this past weekend, you know that both candidates were asked tough, extremely personal questions that attempted to examine their core values and reveal their fundamental beliefs. In many ways, the forum accomplished its goals. But for many viewers, it most likely solidified their pre-existing opinion about the candidates. I can only speak for myself, but I was not moved by John McCain’s answers. Likewise, I’m sure that many evangelicals were not moved by Barack Obama’s answers. Was anyone surprised by Obama’s compassionate position for the less fortunate or McCain’s pro-life declaration and war stories? My only question is how John McCain was able to exercise enough restraint to refrain from jokes about bombing Iran. I guess he got the memo that the Faith Forum wasn’t the place for his sense of humor.
During the forum, Rick Warren asked, “What’s been your greatest moral failure…and what do you think is the greatest moral failure of America? McCain’s answer: "My greatest moral failing—and I have been a very imperfect person—is the failure of my first marriage. It’s my greatest moral failure."
Since we all have moral failings, there’s no need to judge his particular failing. But I will say this – marriages don’t fail by themselves. In the spirit of full disclosure, he should have been a bit more specific – his habitual adultery had a lot to do with his marriage failing.
Throughout the forum, I found McCain’s answers to be more in line with Republican talking points than with his personal beliefs. I am not saying he didn’t believe everything he said, but he seemed to say what the audience wanted to hear. He also gave some of the most circumlocutory answers I’ve heard in a while. For example, Rick Warren asked him to define “rich.” McCain’s answer: “Some of the richest people I’ve ever known in my life are the most unhappy. I think that rich should be defined by a home, a good job, an education and the ability to hand to our children a more prosperous and safer world than the one that we inherited.”
Well, I have most of the aforementioned. But I am far from rich. I’m not even close. He really was evading the issue of wealth. I wonder if he’d be willing to trade his wife’s jet and hundreds of millions of dollars for simply one home, a good job, an education and the ability to hand his children a more prosperous and safer world than the one he inherited?
Among all of McCain’s answers, there was one answer that struck a nerve and peeled back the layers to reveal how fundamentally different we view the world. When he revealed his talking points on America’s moral failing, I felt like I was listening to “Lies and Rhetoric 101.” McCain said, “I think America’s greatest moral failure has been, throughout our existence, perhaps we have not devoted ourselves to causes greater than our self-interest, although we’ve been the best at it of everybody in the world. I think after 9/11, my friends, instead of telling people to go shopping or take a trip, we should have told Americans to join the Peace Corps, AmeriCorps, the military, expand our volunteers…”
Why not mention the abduction and enslavement of people from their homeland? Why not mention the near eradication of Native Americans and the theft of their land? Why not mention the forced labor, lynchings, and utter terror inflicted on America’s citizens by America’s citizens? None of America’s collective past actions qualify as a great moral failure? You mean to tell me that our great moral failing is not encouraging more people to volunteer or join the military? Give me a break! I love this country, but I am not blinded by an irrational, unrealistic love for this country that proclaims that we can do no wrong. That is just crazy. In an article entitled “The True Revolution of Values,” Michael Eric Dyson writes, “Patriotism is the critical affirmation of one's country in light of its best values, including the attempt to correct it when it's in error. Nationalism is the uncritical support of one's nation regardless of its moral or political bearing.”
I love America. But it is disingenuous to suggest that we have no moral failings greater than encouraging less selfishness. Our mistakes and misdeeds are far more serious and sinister than that.
Crecilla Scott is the founder of Infinity Research, LLC, a social science research company in the Washington DC area. She is the host of a local TV show, "Conversations with Crecilla." She is also a passionate speaker, who has given professional presentations for various organizations and federal agencies. She can be reached at Crecilla@liukarama.com.
Additional Resources
http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/08/16/warren.forum/index.html#cnnSTCVideo
http://monkeycrash.com/2008/08/18/saddleback-forum-transcript/
http://www.beliefnet.com/story/182/story_18298_1.html
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