The president shapes this nation’s story. As no other philosopher, statesman, artist or celebrity can, the president gives voice to national consciousness. That’s why there rages a perpetual firestorm of criticism and support around a president’s words, even beyond the political powers the office confers.
When former President George W. Bush is shown as Satan or when President Barack Obama is drawn as Hitler, the anger in caricature is clearly about more than tax cuts or health care policy. The president stands in synecdoche; a stand-in for American politics. He is referred to as “Mr. President;” his identity is subsumed in the institution. And as we are a political nation, the president becomes a projection of our own identities. Supreme Court justices, senators and Joint Chiefs of Staff members wield enormous power, and we want them to act in our interest. But we don’t want the president to support our interests — we demand that he embody our aspirations and ideals.
And so the State of the Union address is not a report card on the country’s legislative and financial performance in the past year. There is no reason for the entire nation to spend an hour and a half listening to the State of the Union Today — what could be less needed than a recap of the sad events already filtering 24/7 through the news? No, the address is the State of Tomorrow’s Union. It’s the designated time for the president to restate a vision of American ideals and the matching plan for action, which is exactly why his vision of the outside world was so disappointing.
According to a recent Pew survey, nearly half of all Americans say the United States should “mind its own business internationally.” Obama didn’t sound much different, painting a zero-sum picture of the world in which either we win, or they do. “There’s no reason Europe or China should have the fastest trains or the new factories that manufacture clean energy products,” he lamented. “Well, I do not accept second place for the United States of America.”
Elsewhere, Obama’s combative tone was invigorating. It was a declaration that America would punch through the sludge of gridlocked partisanship. But we need to be fighting special interests, not the rest of the world.
You don’t have to look far for the right approach: While our commander-in-chief enviously eyes the Chinese companies building bullet trains, the Maryland International Incubator, known as MI2, just up Route 1, is working to establish mutually beneficial relationships with them. MI2 offers foreign companies research and networking opportunities, while drawing money into the state’s economy and providing students and instructors a chance for intellectual and cultural exchange — an across-the-globe win-win.
It seems like Americans are teetering on the brink of isolationism at the moment in history when retreat from the world would be most costly. At this university, we’re surrounded by reminders of the infinite benefits of global engagement. How many of your professors and teaching assistants are either foreign-born or first-generation Americans? How much more brilliance is brought to your classroom when the best are chosen not just from the state, but from the entire globe? I hope Obama presents a better vision of prospects beyond our borders. In the meantime, I hope we can shape public opinion the old-fashioned way: from the ground up.
Mardy Shualy is a senior government and politics and linguistics major. He can be reached at shualy at umdbk dot com.
