David Hoppe

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:: Obama's story

Speaking truth to Hoosiers

By David Hoppe

We Hoosiers have a fondness for storytelling. The stories we like best are those that help us feel good about ourselves.

So when Barack Obama told a group of his supporters in San Francisco about people he met campaigning through small towns in the Midwest and Pennsylvania, "It's not surprising that they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations," some of us took offense.

Bitter? Us? Clinging? Us?

Where could Obama have gotten such ideas?

Maybe he noticed that while we're always complaining about the quality of our educational system, we keep electing the same Superintendent of Public Instruction, Sue Ellen Reed, to one four-year term after another. Reed's finishing her sixteenth year in the job. "We didn't get into this mess last night," she said not long ago in describing Indiana's failing schools. She should know.

Or perhaps Obama was looking at our environment. The quality of our air and water is rated among the bottom three states in the country. But rather than cleaning things up, Gov. Mitch Daniels seems determined to let corporate polluters off the hook. He says that's good for business.

The trouble is business hasn't been good in most of Indiana since the late 1970s. If you doubt that, take a look at the condition of many Hoosier towns. You'll see that we're fourth in the U.S. in bankruptcies - up 38 percent from last year. Over a third of our counties are declining in population.

People who have made careers for themselves by telling Hoosiers the stories we're used to hearing, let Obama have it. One was Sen. Evan Bayh. Bayh, who won his first term as governor by attacking John Mutz for supporting a tax increase for public schools, told Hoosiers life was good while our social safety net crumbled. For this Hoosiers rewarded him with a seemingly permanent residence in Washington, D.C.

Former Indiana Speaker John Gregg said Obama hasn't spent enough time in Indiana. "We believe this is the best place to raise our kids and call home," said Gregg. Of course our housing values are so low, it's hard to move anywhere else.

Obama's rival for the presidential nomination, Hillary Clinton, said she was "taken aback" by what Obama said. She called him "elitist" and "out of touch."

We've loved the elitist story since Ronald Reagan told it in the 1980s. It goes something like this: It's those elitist know-it-alls in Washington who make life miserable for the rest of us. A variation on this theme has to do with running the government like a business because democracy is really just a big market - a place where whatever sells, by definition, is good for all of us.

This story has turned out to be tremendously profitable for our richest citizens. The people who own and run our biggest corporations and financial institutions have seen exponential increases in their compensation. Meanwhile, real wages for working stiffs have been flat since the 1970s.

Sen. Clinton said that Obama's remarks were "not reflective of the values and beliefs of Americans," who, she said, "are fair-minded and good-hearted people." She extolled the virtues of embracing faith and hunting. This was a story intended to make people feel ok about who they are, regardless of whether or not the choices they've made when voting for state representatives, or school superintendents, governors, or senators have made their lives better. What she said, in other words, amounted to good entertainment.

The difference between art and entertainment is that art might actually change you a little bit. True artists, while calculating, aren't just trying to congratulate you for being who you are. They are trying to take you somewhere you've never been. A successful work of art may be inspiring, but it can also be difficult or off-putting.

Entertainers have a different goal: They want you to feel good about yourself now, today. Seeing a great entertainer is like getting a pat on the back. An off-putting entertainer is annoying.

When he talked about campaigning in the Midwest, Barack Obama told a story about what he's seen here. It was not a story people are used to hearing, though there was nothing in it most of us couldn't recognize. That's turned out to be a problem for Obama. But it could also be a definition of leadership.