what America needs now

Calm, Methodical Obama

vs.

Angry, Ungracious McCain

Friday's unique free-form debate format offered the best insights so far into the vast differences, values and style of Barack Obama and John McCain, and how they would approach the challenges that only a president can decide. It was the stunning contrast in personal behavior, not their answers, that was most revealing.

Given the time spent on the economic crisis, Jim Lehrer had time for only five "lead" questions on national security--on Iraq, Afghanistan, Iran, Russia, and homeland security. Other major issues will have to await later debates. But there was enough time for many intense and revealing exchanges. With a command of both the facts and the underlying issues, and a reassuring manner, Obama convincingly passed the key test of the debate--is he qualified to be Commander-in-Chief? But the real insights came in the revelations about the way each man thinks under pressure, and the way they interacted.

First, note a recurring pattern: With the exception of Iraq, where the disagreement began with Obama's opening sentence, Obama usually began by laying out broad themes, often mentioning instances of agreement with McCain--frequently using phrases like "John is absolutely right"--before going on to stress their differences. This is unusual, and part of what makes Obama a unique leader; I do not recall any previous major party candidate in a debate volunteering so many instances of common ground with his opponent. McCain's response struck me as odd and even ungracious; he has often proclaimed he would work across the partisan divide, but he undermined his own claim by completely ignoring Obama and his comments. Instead, he attacked Obama repeatedly, using phrases such as "Senator Obama just doesn't understand. . ." at least ten times.

The manner in which each man approached problems was strikingly different. McCain understandably emphasized his own personal experiences, but almost never made clear what he thought was the larger purpose of policy. Each problem was treated on its own, and McCain's proposed policies were invariably confrontational. John McCain's world focuses almost entirely on threats. Obama usually agreed with McCain on the nature of these threats, but his proposals for action were more insightful, sophisticated, and comprehensive, and, unlike McCain's, included the use of diplomatic and economic and moral power.

These striking differences were not simply debate tactics; they highlighted differences between the two men that are in their DNA. One is the product of the brawling traditions of the United States Navy, and survival under unimaginable conditions in a Hanoi prison. John McCain has prevailed in life not by seeking common ground (ironically, the most notable exception was his historic voyages of forgiveness to Vietnam). What has kept him energized (and alive) is his enormously combative style, which he proudly calls "maverick," and his quick, sometimes pre-emptive attacks on opponents. It is not a criticism to say that he is a gambler; he said so himself in his memoirs and in the debate.

Although Barack Obama articulates his positions in a calm, methodical, and understated way, he is clearly just as tough as McCain, or he would never have come this far in life, against unbelievable odds. But he thinks about how to solve problems in a manner much more conducive to successful governance than McCain. While he made clear he is ready to use military force if necessary, his life and career embodies the search for common ground between peoples of different backgrounds, different races, different points of view. During the debate he often emphasized the non-military aspects of American power--including diplomacy backed by American muscle, the restoration of respect for the nation, and the direct link between America's economic strength and its national security.

Astonishingly, McCain had virtually nothing to say on any of these issues--yet these are the tools that must be precisely balanced and deployed with skill if the nation is to regain its leadership position in the world.

This difference was reinforced by the much-noted failure of McCain to look in Obama's direction or address him directly during the debate, and by the grim looks that left many viewers with the impression McCain was just plain angry.

The overall effect was exactly the opposite of what McCain hoped to achieve: Obama showed that he could handle the frontal assaults of an aggressive and seasoned senator-war hero in the very area McCain was perceived to be strongest. Obama offered the larger vision for the nation--and a reassuring sense he would approach issues with the seriousness they required. The gambling, brawling style of John McCain has its attractive side to Americans, but it is not what we need in the White House in these troubled times.

layering on brick by brick

writing a 5000-word paper is like building a wall, you come up with a good stable structure upon which to hold your ideas and structure them into a coherent argument, but you're always a little unsure and open to shifting parts of the structure in order that you change the face of your architecture to be a little more indestructible. a constant low-level trepidation tugs at you to stretch yourself a bit further intellectually; to consider tearing down the structure as you go along to consider more factors like weather-proof metal and noise-canceling devices to insert into that structure, or in more dramatic instances to uproot those structures to build a firmer foundation first.. and yet you must come to a point when you decide in your heart that enough improvisation and improvement is enough and you will now concentrate your efforts to start layering on the bricks one by one. because, the most sturdy structure will always remain nothing more than an awe-inspiring structure at best and until you overcome your sense of inadequacy to step out and start on the next process of labouring, your learning cannot be complete and your skills unsharpened. When you finally end the laborious work at the end of it, you will then go away with a full appreciation that a wall is meant to provide a tangible fortress within which your ideas can stand for eternity.

study of war

Amidst lingering fatigue and a shroud of uncertainty, i continue the dance of my fingers across the keyboard. I am happily working on my Study of War essay, comparing the relative priority assigned by Clausewitz and Sun Tzu to the role of intelligence and information in preparation for war. I am pleased to say that it looks set to be an engaging and exciting paper; am going to discuss The Korean War (1950-1953) and the role of propaganda as a "non-lethal" weapon, amidst other case studies. The more i dive into the wealth of research, the more intrigued I am by the role of communications in warfare.

perhaps it's my own inclinations that determined the course of my Study of War essay, but i'm 1/2 hoping that this is the Lord's way of showing me that my thesis can be an extension of the level4k essay i am working on now. Talk about chronic laziness. bah.

I am still in labour pains with regards to trying to deliver my baby thesis idea. only few words (not concepts or ideas mind you) floating around: communications and media, politics, north korea. I am officially daunted by my first wild idea of positing the link between democracy and media in North Korea because data and information don't seem to be readily available.The silence of God and non-progress of my thesis research is deafening, in contrast to the bustle of those around me, all set to go with their topics. I'm not particularly striving to write a thesis, honestly! I think i will be quite happy to give it up if God will just tell me. But it is the lingering sense that perhaps God does have a topic for me to write on and i am to wait patiently even as i go about doing literature review.

God has been reminding me OVER and OVER and OVER these past months that He will provide water for me from a rock in the midst of the desert. It has been happening in many "small" ways like getting my modules and even orchestrating Putterman's 2 week hiatus with my paper writing for Study of War. Like how i can feel so unsure before the paper presentation but Dr Chong saying that it's a superb presentation with a good argument after that. I nearly broke down right there and then knowing that my God fought that battle for me. but I get this hunch that "the big break" is yet to come. He's going to fight even more amazing battles for me and i know i will literally just "stop and stare".

i so badly want to be right smack in the middle of God's will. I hope that's where i am. I know there's where I am :) i just wait for God to lead.

On being young and idealistic.

Everyone's young days are a dream, a delightful insanity, a sweet solipsism. Nothing in them has a fixed shape, nothing a fixed price; everything is a possibility, we live happily on credit. There are no obligations to observe; there are no accounts to be kept. Nothing is specified in advance; everything is what can be made of it. The world is a mirror in which we seek the reflection of our own desires. The allure of violent emotions is irresistible. When we are young we are not disposed to make concessions to the world; we never feel the balance of a thing in our hands - unless it be a cricket bat. We are not apt to distinguish between our liking and our esteem, urgency is our criterion of importance; and we do not easily understand than what is humdrum need not be despicable. We are impatient of restraint; and we readily believe, like Shelley, that to have contracted habit is to have failed.

To be young, is not to be disposed to be a conservative. He could have said it in a succinct sentence but no, Oakeshott lapses into his own nostalgic musings on being young. The first time i read his "On Being Conservative" i was bored by his longwinded illustrations of each point he was making. A second attempt at deciphering his conservative mind was much smoother as i picked out a gem of a passage which i liked. All it takes is a slice of apt writing to perk me up. Likewise for the "basic" political science-y piece by Max Weber:

Politics is a strong and slow boring of hard boards. It takes both passion and perspective. Certainly all historical experience confirms the truth - that man would not have attained the possible unless time and again he had reached out for the impossible. But to do that a man must be a leader, and not only a leader but a hero as well, in a very sober sense of the word. And even those who are neither leaders or heroes must arm themselves with that steadfastness of heart which can brave even the crumbling of all hopes. This is necessary right now, or else men will not be able to attain even what is possible today. Only he who has the calling for politics who is sure that he will not crumble when the world from his view is too stupid or too base for what he wants to offer. Only he who in the face of all this can say 'In spite of it all!' has the calling for politics.

In class, i disagreed with Prof Pellerin over Weber. I saw this is an inspirational text to budding young politicians, while he saw it as Weber writing a cautionary passage as pouring a cold bucket of water over the heads of political science students; that their flames of romantic idealism about politics must go. Much as I can see Pellerin's very poignant point, my personal response is that of being inspired, whether or not i have the calling for politics. But of course, that might be because i'm too young and too idealistic and am still walking around with my rose-tinted glasses over my rose-tinted contact lenses. The prerogative of being young.

political theory

I do not believe in the absolute determinism of history. On the contrary, I believe that all life, and consequently, the life of hstory, is made up of simple moments, each of them relatively undetermined in respect of the previous one, so that in it reality hesitates, walks up and down, and is uncertain whether to decide for one or other of various possibilities. it is this metaphysical hesitancy which gives to everything living its unmistakable character of tremulous vibration.

"The Revolt of the Masses" Jose Ortega y Gasset

this is my life. The life of a political theory student labouring under the force of contemporary ideas of what public life means. It is intellectual acrobatics and it is labour, but the consolation is that these ideas are rejuvenating even at this time when i'm re-reading them and trying to fit them into a coherent paper. The greatest gift of work to me, is to be continually inspired by what i'm learning and processing.

March 27, 2008
U.S. PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATES
A choice of past, present or future
By Kishore Mahbubani

DEMOCRACY can be magical. When it works well, the wishes of the electorate can express the soul of the nation. America has done this by whittling the presidential campaign down to three candidates, each of whom expresses different mainstream aspects of the American soul.

Much of the world is relieved that extremists like Rudolph Giuliani and populists like John Edwards have been eliminated. Senators John McCain, Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama are choices other nations around the globe can live with. Each represents an aspect of the American soul that has worked well in realms of foreign policy.

Mr McCain represents the past. But what a glorious past it has been.

America has done more good in the past five decades than any other nation. At the end of World War II, when America was at the peak of its power, it rejected the European impulse to colonise and dominate. Instead it chose to work towards liberating much of the world, delivering political freedom to billions. It launched a rules-based world order that enabled nations to emerge and prosper - from Japan and Germany in earlier decades to China and India more recently.

Without the open trading system America engineered with the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, the precursor to the World Trade Organisation, East Asia could not have succeeded. This American-designed world order has delivered more peace and prosperity than the European period of global domination of previous centuries.

Mr McCain, rather than President George W. Bush, symbolises this glorious past. His commitment to honour and decency and his belief that America must remain a moral beacon remind the world how good America once was.

His steadfast opposition to the use of torture shows his awareness of how much the Bush administration's cavalier treatment of human rights issues has damaged America's standing in the world. Despite its free media, few Americans are aware that Amnesty International has described Guantanamo as 'the gulag of our time'. The moral authority America lost through its use of torture in Guantanamo and in the Abu Ghraib prison scandal was far more precious than the scarce intelligence that torture has provided. Virtually all intelligence experts know that torture does not work. Mr McCain knows this personally. He was tortured as a prisoner of the North Vietnamese.

He also understands what 'responsibility' means. To argue against 'ditch and run in Iraq' may win him few votes in America but much support outside the US. If he is elected, the world will hope for an era where America regains the respect it once enjoyed. \

Mrs Clinton represents the present. Many Americans still remember Mr Bill Clinton's administration as one of the happier chapters of recent US history. The end of the Cold War produced a huge sigh of relief that nuclear terror had finally ended, explaining why, in American memories, the 1990s appear to be a sweet patch of history.

Mr Clinton made some foreign policy mistakes, from Rwanda to Bosnia. But he introduced fiscal discipline, kept the global economy growing and oversaw a stable world order. The American nostalgia for this era is understandable. Similar nostalgia is also found in the rest of the world. Hence, Mrs Clinton's message of 'experience' resonates with many outside America. The competence of the Clinton administration contrasts sharply with the incompetence of the Bush 43 administration.

It is fair to compare the happy Clinton era with the nightmarish Bush era. Both 9/11 and the folly of the Iraq War have made Americans feel more insecure. Mr Bush deserves a large part of the blame for this. But Osama bin Laden began planning the attacks long before Mr Bush was elected. In his own way, Mr Clinton was also asleep while new forces were brewing. He had a golden opportunity to fashion a new world order when the Cold War ended. He failed to seize it. Hence, despite Mrs Clinton's experience, few outside America believe that she can recreate the happy 1990s unless she understands how much the world has changed.

The powerful economic resurgence of Asia and the new peaks of anti-Americanism in the Islamic world are new forces the US has to deal with. The world has changed dramatically since Mr Clinton left office. Sadly, Mrs Clinton's rhetoric seldom mentions these new realities.

This is why many outside America are cheering for Mr Obama. He represents the future.

More than any other presidential candidate in recent history, he has a unique capacity to listen to other voices around the world, perhaps in part because he lived outside America as a child (and may well become the first American president with some knowledge of Bahasa Indonesia, which he learned in his childhood in Indonesia).

His Foreign Affairs essay reveals this capacity to listen:

'In the case of Europe, we dismissed European reservations about the wisdom and necessity of the Iraq War. In Asia, we belittled South Korean efforts to improve relations with the North. In Latin America...we failed to adequately address concerns about immigration and equity and economic growth. In Africa, we have allowed genocide to persist for over four years in Darfur and have not done nearly enough to answer the African Union's call for more support to stop the killing.'

As we move from a mono-civilisational world of Western domination to a multi-civilisational world, the world needs an American president who understands intuitively and intellectually that we are dealing with a new phase of human history. America must learn to listen to new voices. Mr Obama can teach it how to do that.

His election would also destroy immediately half of the massive anti-Americanism in the world. Having travelled to all corners of the globe, I have first-hand experience of how different regions think.

Africans will celebrate. The sight of a son of an African father occupying the most powerful office in the world will boost their self-esteem and give them hope that Africans too can succeed. The 1.2 billion Muslims will also marvel that American society elected a Christian with 'Hussein' as a middle name despite right-wing efforts to suggest that he might be Muslim.

The support for Mr Obama comes not just from the poor and the dispossessed. An Indian billionaire also asked me to root for Mr Obama. He said: 'With Obama, what you see is what you get. With Hillary, you get a new mask every day.'

Mr Obama's authenticity has clearly struck a positive chord outside America. He has convinced many Americans that the time for 'change' has come; and 3.5 billion Asians know that change has already come for them. The Asian century has begun. At no time in recent centuries have young Asians been more optimistic about their future. They are looking for an optimistic young American to connect with. Mr Obama could not have come at a better time.

American leaders will have to surf new waves of history. Only Mr Obama seems to have this surfing agility. If the world could vote, most would vote for him. Former United Nations secretary-general Kofi Annan spoke for many recently when he said: 'I think an Obama presidency would be inspirational, an incredible development in the world.'

The writer is Dean of the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy, NUS. His latest book, The New Asian Hemisphere: The Irresistible Shift Of Global Power To The East, appeared last month.

Copyright: New York Times Syndicate