values

Yes, quite a scary title, but stick with me. Hannity is disturbed by President Obama's comments at a town hall event on Friday in Strasbourg, France. Obama called on Americans to stop ridiculing Europe as many have increasingly over the past eight years, while simultaneously calling out Europe's tendency to blame much of the world's woes on the United States. Thanks to Think Progress, here's the rundown of what was said:

That evening, Fox News’s Sean Hannity truncated Obama’s speech, cutting out Obama’s criticism of Europe’s anti-Americanism. Hannity was apoplectic that Obama would “blame America first,” declaring the president was just like the Dixie Chicks. What’s more, he insisted, the speech was proof of Obama’s “deep resentment” of America:

HANNITY: You know, I’m going to — I resent this. When you consider…all we have done just in the last century alone to save Europe from themselves. I resent this. I think it’s outrageous, the media’s ignored it. But don’t you think this is like the Dixie Chicks? […]

HANNITY: But didn’t we see all of this in the campaign? As I was bringing up — didn’t Reverend Wright give us a little insight into his thought process? Didn’t, you know, Michelle Obama, America is a downright mean country. … But I’m thinking, didn’t we get some insight? When you sit on a board and give speeches with Bill Ayers, didn’t this — Do you think he harbors deep resentment that he just hides? Because I believe he does.

As painful as it might be to watch that video (I can't stand Sean Hannity anymore than you can), I think we can get something out of this. Let's first explicate what Hannity said.

We can start with the word "resentment." Webster's Dictionary gives us the definition of "resent": "to feel or express annoyance or ill will at." So Sean Hannity believes that, at best, America annoys President Obama, and, at worst, Obama wishes the United States ill will. Hannity's rhetoric is obviously divisive here. By expressing his belief that the president wishes for America to fail, Hannity telegraphs to us that he believes himself to be in line with America's values. By accusing President Obama of not investing himself in the United States and its long-term health, Sean Hannity is implying that he knows what it takes to make that investment.

The questioning of Barack Obama's patriotism is certainly not shocking given the character assassination John Kerry had to endure from the right in 2004. The conservative machine, fueled by hacks like Karl Rove, Bill O'Reilly, Glenn Beck, and Hannity himself, is disinterested in honest discussions of the issues facing America today (there's not much to work with). Instead, they'd rather discredit the messenger and reap the political benefits, not enjoying widespread support from the American people, but dividing them enough to ensure electoral success, and thus, power. This didn't work for Hannity and Co. in 2008, and so someone's still throwing a hissy-fit in the playpen. But I digress.

I don't believe that simply attacking Hannity for having an opinion is the efficient thing to do here, though it's tempting. We can take Hannity's tirade above at face value and get pissed off, or we can examine what's really being said and represented between the lines. When you do that in this case, things get very interesting.

Like I explained before, in order to make the claim that Obama isn't supporting America enough, Hannity must believe that he has the recipe for the ideal American patriotism. Let's dig in his biography a bit to find out what we all should be doing in order to be the best Americans we can be.

Hannity hosted his first talk radio show in 1989 at the volunteer college station at UC Santa Barbara, KCSB-FM, while working as a general contractor. The show aired for 40 hours of air time; Hannity has since called the show "terrible." Hannity's weekly show on KCSB was canceled after less than a year when management charged him with "discriminating against gays and lesbians." This was after two shows featuring the book The AIDS Coverup: The Real and Alarming Facts about AIDS by Gene Antonio; among other remarks, Hannity told a lesbian caller that "I feel sorry for your child". The station later reversed its decision to dismiss Hannity due in part to a campaign conducted by the Santa Barbara Chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union. Hannity decided against returning to KCSB.

After leaving KCSB, Hannity placed an ad in radio publications presenting himself as "the most talked about college radio host in America." Radio station WVNN in Athens, Alabama (part of the Huntsville market) then hired him to be the afternoon talk show host. From Huntsville, he moved to WGST in Atlanta in 1992, filling the slot vacated by Neal Boortz, who had moved to competing station WSB. In September 1996 Fox News co-founder Roger Ailes hired the then relatively unknown Hannity to host a television program under the working title Hannity and LTBD ("liberal to be determined"). Alan Colmes was then hired to co-host and the show debuted as Hannity & Colmes.

Later that year Hannity left WGST for New York, where WABC had him substitute for their afternoon drive time host during Christmas week. In January 1997, WABC put Hannity on the air full-time, giving him the late night time slot. WABC then moved Hannity to the same drive time slot he had filled temporarily a little more than a year earlier. Hannity has been on WABC's afternoon time slot since January 1998.

Hmm... anything else?

Conservative Cal Thomas and liberal Bob Beckel, in their book Common Ground, describe Hannity as a leader of the pack among broadcasting political polarizers, which following James Q. Wilson they define as those who have "an intense commitment to a candidate, a culture, or an ideology that sets people in one group definitively apart from people in another, rival group."

Ah, right - you have to be divisive as well. To be fair, Mr. Hannity is part of one initiative for the Freedom Alliance Scholarship Fund:

Hannity has hosted country music-themed Freedom Concerts since 2003, billed to help benefit the Freedom Alliance Scholarship Fund, a charity created by Oliver North to provide college scholarships to children with a parent severely disabled or killed in military action. Appearing artists have included Sara Evans, Martina McBride, Lee Greenwood, LeAnn Rimes, Montgomery Gentry, Darryl Worley, Charlie Daniels, Larry the Cable Guy, and Michael W. Smith.

The Freedom Concerts were held annually in the Northern Star Arena at the Six Flags Great Adventure in Jackson, New Jersey through 2006. In 2007, the annual concert was expanded to a summer series held at five locations across the United States, culminating with the September 11 event in New Jersey marking the sixth anniversary of the September 11, 2001 attacks.

Speakers at the September 11, 2007 concert included Oliver North, Newt Gingrich, Rudy Giuliani and several conservative talk show hosts from WABC Radio.

This analysis demonstrates the values that Sean Hannity believes to be requisite in being a sincere American. Apparently, loudmouth, conservative bigotry is the name of the game. Yet, remember -- Hannity was criticizing our president. For shits and giggles, let's take a look at his formative years.

Of his early childhood, Obama recalled, "That my father looked nothing like the people around me—that he was black as pitch, my mother white as milk—barely registered in my mind." He described his struggles as a young adult to reconcile social perceptions of his multiracial heritage. He disclosed that he used alcohol, marijuana and cocaine during his teenage years to "push questions of who I was out of my mind". At the 2008 Civil Forum on the Presidency in 2008, Obama identified his high-school drug use as his "greatest moral failure".

Reflecting later on his formative years in Honolulu, Obama wrote: "The opportunity that Hawaii offered—to experience a variety of cultures in a climate of mutual respect—became an integral part of my world view, and a basis for the values that I hold most dear."

Following high school, he moved to Los Angeles in 1979 to attend Occidental College. After two years he transferred in 1981 to Columbia University in New York City, where he majored in political science with a specialization in international relations and graduated with a B.A. in 1983. He worked for a year at the Business International Corporation and then at the New York Public Interest Research Group.

After four years in New York City, Obama moved to Chicago, where he was hired as director of the Developing Communities Project (DCP), a church-based community organization originally comprising eight Catholic parishes in Greater Roseland (Roseland, West Pullman and Riverdale) on Chicago's far South Side. He worked there as a community organizer from June 1985 to May 1988. During his three years as the DCP's director, its staff grew from one to thirteen and its annual budget grew from $70,000 to $400,000. He helped set up a job training program, a college preparatory tutoring program, and a tenants' rights organization in Altgeld Gardens. Obama also worked as a consultant and instructor for the Gamaliel Foundation, a community organizing institute. In mid-1988, he traveled for the first time to Europe for three weeks and then for five weeks in Kenya, where he met many of his paternal relatives for the first time. He returned in August 2006 in a visit to his father's birthplace, a village near Kisumu in rural western Kenya.

Today's Republican Party sees its vision for America crystallized in Sean Hannity, who talks a lot, is divisive, and eventually came up with one idea that significantly helps some Americans. Meanwhile, Democrats have Barack Obama to symbolize their values, someone who is a product of multiculturalism, someone who learned tolerance from a young age, someone who turned down a likely six-figure job to improve the quality of life of others', and yes, someone who happened to experiment with drugs more than 25 years ago.

Sometimes we criticize the right-wing lunacy automatically, without analysis. And sometimes that is necessary. (We can't always be dismantling every assertion spewed from the conservative machine -- it'd take forever.) But sometimes thinking through these illogical rants is quite helpful because they illuminate precisely what we're fighting for. With the largest generation in America's history coming of age and espousing values identical to those found in President Obama's story, it's clear that it's Obama's brand of citizenship and view of America that is ascendant. Unfortunately for Mr. Hannity, Fox News, and the GOP, they're going to get lost in the shuffle until they recalibrate their idea of America.

I've got two, semi-connected threads in my head at the moment that I'm mulling over that have to do with how younger voters are/might influence the Republican Party. The first has to do with what we normally think of as "moral values," and how young evangelicals might reshape the debate.

Over at Revolution in Jesusland, Zack Exley points to some very interesting data from the Pew Center on Faith and American Life:

Of all the people who say moral values are very important in deciding how to vote, less than a third (30%) are referring to the candidates’ positions on issues, with by far the largest number (14%) referring to abortion. In addition, they mention gay rights (3%), that marriage is between a man and woman (3%) and gay marriage (3%). A few, but only a very few, mention homosexuality (1%), and stem cell research (1%).

The greatest majority (78%) of these voters mentions personal characteristics of the candidates including their honesty (28%), integrity (11%), ethical values (8%), and someone who does the right thing (8%), is trustworthy (7%), truthful (6%) or keeps his/her word (6%).

So there's that - a clear opening to recapture the meaning of "values" in our public debate. I don't have statistics, but I'm willing to bet that this is reframing of values would play especially well among younger evangelicals, whose support for Bush, and the Republican Party, has dropped significantly in recent years, even as Bush has been very supportive of Christian Right culture-war issues like gay marriage, stem cells, and abortion.

Instead, of supporting that agenda, what we've seen so far is young evangelicals supporting Mike Huckabee, a candidate who preaches something of an anti-poverty agenda, and wants us to be "good stewards of the earth," by 2 - 1 among young Republican voters. These young, conservative evangelicals don't seem to care about culture war issues the same war their parents/elders in the church do. Rather, they are much more interested in a different conception of faith in public life, particularly what it means in a social justice context.

The second strand is that this isn't limited in scope to young evangelicals. The 2006 American Freshman survey (pdf) revealed that there is considerable support among young conservatives for traditionally liberal positions on a number of issues:

This has tended to manifest itself in two ways, I think. First, in the support of young people for the candidacy of John McCain in New Hampshire, where 27%, a plurality of young voters chose his candidacy, and in the creation of new organizations like the Republican Youth Majority, a newish GOP youth group supporting a pro-choice, pro-environment, fiscal conservative platform.

It's important to note that prior to Huckabee's surge in December and McCain's resurgence post-Iowa, Rudy Giuliani was consistently the favorite choice among young conservative voters (pdf). Now that Huckabee has gained some traction and media attention, and is actively courting younger voters, and John McCain is perceived to be back in the race, Giuliani's support among younger voters seems to have dried up.

So here's a thought - could the Millennial Generation conservatives move the Republican Party to the center/left? Probably not anytime soon; with young voters choosing Democrats by a 2 - 1 margin, there are far too few of them to be all that influential right now. But it will be interesting to see how they shape the GOP as they grow into power.

Thoughts? I don't have this worked out yet - not by a long shot - and this is probably an oversimplification of a number of trends among conservative youth and evangelical youth. I'm interested in seeing/hearing people reinforce or tear down this idea.

James Durbin at Tech Republican and Stuart Rothenberg are both up in arms about Rock the Vote and it's "liberal" message this week. Durbin is concerned that Republicans aren't reaching out appropriately to young voters - evidenced by the lack of conservative partners listed on the Rock the Vote website and the predominance of "liberal" messages on MySpace. Rothenberg is flailing about somewhat wildly, both upset that Rock the Vote talked about the draft in its 2004 campaign while simultaneously saying that fear of a draft is a losing message with diminishing returns for Democrats (who Rothenberg also equates with Rock the Vote).

I actually agree with Durbin - Republicans are dropping the ball online among young people just as much as they're losing the money and organizing war online against the progressive blogosphere. Rothenberg has a few valid points, though he misses the extreme contradiction inherent in the conservative position on the draft - the Bush/Republican strategy for the war requires more troops and a draft is the only way to get enough of them without breaking the military beyond repair. If conservatives don't want a draft, they're ultimately unserious about supporting the troops and "winning" the war. If they do want a draft, they energize young voters and the parents of young voters against Republicans. It's a lose-lose situation for them.

But all of this is irrelevant. Here's the thing that both Durbin and Rothenberg alike are missing: As so many Conservatives and pundits alike are fond of saying, this isn't about one tactical decision or another, this is about our values as Americans. And right now, the values of the Millennial Generation are heading in the opposite direction of the values of the Republican Party. Let me remind readers of the recent findings by Democracy Corps:

On issue after issue, in poll after poll (see here and here), young voters are aligning more with Democrats than Republicans, and those are value-based decisions. Millennial voters support a multilateralist foreign policy, we support policies that protect the environment and civil liberties. Not even mentioned in this Democracy Corps chart are cultural wedge issues like choice and gay marriage, both of which are supported by more younger people than not. Just to twist the knife in a little more, let's remember the fact that Millennials are the most diverse and tolerant generation in American history - two things that don't mesh well with the GOP base.

This is why Durbin is missing the point with his tactical discussions about "going where the youth are," and Rothenberg's commentary about the draft misses the forest for the trees. Just as the tens of millions of dollars the conservative machine dumps into youth outreach and bench-building each year aren't winning them any converts among Millennials (conservatives outspend progressives about 5-1 on youth outreach), showing up on MySpace or partnering with Rock the Vote isn't a panacea or Republican ills and it doesn't matter one whit whether or not Rock the Vote or Democrats play the draft card. It's the values, stupid. It's your policies.

(On a side not - despite Durbin's claims - you can't wait until these kids get older and "age into conservatism." That doesn't really happen. Partisanship is a habit (pdf). Lose them now, and chances are you've lost them for the rest of their voting lives.)

This is why the most interesting thing that I see happening right now on the GOP side of the aisle in youth organizing is Republican Youth Majority, a pro-choice, pro-environment, fiscally conservative organization that is trying to rebuild the Republican brand among Millennial voters. Tactics aside, if the Republicans are going to retain any semblance of competitiveness among this new generation of voters, they're going to have to realign themselves on a number of issues to be more in touch with the values of the Millennial Generation. It's going to be a long, hard slog as they've got 8 years of a Bush Presidency and a campaign/policy apparatus that is fundamentally at odds with those values, but I think that if they can become sustainable, this is the group to watch over the next couple years for hints of a Republican revitalization among young voters. Personally, I'd be thrilled to see the next generation of Republicans move left on these issues.

Instead of focusing on our side of the aisle, I'd like to take a moment and note some youth focused efforts on the Conservative side.

Through the nominally "unaffilliated and non-partisan" Black America's PAC (the group is supporting Ken Blackwell in OH, Lynn Swann in PA, and Michael Steele in MD), Herman Cain, former CEO of Godfather's Pizza (you can't make that up), is spending $1million on radio ads to convince african american youth to "vote their values" and embrace pro-life candidates.

“More and more African Americans are pro-life," Cain said in a statement LifeNews.com obtained. “Our message to African Americans is simple -- it's time you vote for candidates who support our values."

Cain will underscore that message with a $1 million advertising campaign in key states and congressional districts targeting black radio programs and urban radio stations young African Americans enjoy. Some of the ads focus on abortion.

The campaign is a second go-round based on a highly successful Ohio campaign in 2004 that helped President Bush garner 17% of the African American vote in the Buckeye State – double his vote total from the 2000 presidential race.

I wasn't sure how seriously to take this (and I'm still not 100%), but the article goes on to quote Donna Brazile about the effectiveness of this program in the past:

The ads are funded by Americas PAC, a Cain-backed organization, which former Al Gore campaign manager Donna Brazile said did a great job in turning out black pro-life votes.

Americas PAC's African American radio strategy “hampered our ability to expand the off-year electorate in 2002," Brazile said.

The new campaign should resonate again with black voters as polls show African Americans are more pro-life than Americans as a whole.

Normally I don't agree much with Donna Brazile, but she does know her stuff when it comes to old media and campaign tactics. So if the quote is reliable (it is, after all, coming from lifenews.com - not exactly an impartial source), its all the more reason to work harder and not assume that all our upward momentum among young voters will necessarily hold.