In
the context of his usual call for “engagement” (rather than war) with
nations who harbor “suspicion and fear” of America, President Obama in
his inaugural speech of January 21 called for “peace in our time.”
Since it is hard to
believe that any literate person, with or without Ivy League degrees,
can fail to recognize the irony that has surrounded these words ever
since Neville Chamberlain uttered them in September 1938 after signing
the Munich Agreement with Hitler, just what did the president intend by
them? Is it possible, even in these dark times, that neither the
president nor anybody around him in his large cadre of speech writers
and advisers, reviewing the speech before its delivery on such an
occasion, took notice of them? With the single exception of Jennifer
Rubin in the Washington Post, no prominent representative of
the chattering classes noticed them either. Not even the normally astute
Charles Krauthammer, who is not only a relentless critic of the
president but a certified psychiatrist conversant with and presumably on
the lookout for, “Freudian slips,” thought to ask whether Obama had
here committed a grievous error in speech and memory because of some
unconscious, subdued wish or train of thought.
Let me venture a few
possible interpretations, if only as aids to further reflection. They
are a distillation of conversations I’ve had with several of my fellow
septuagenarians, every one of whom, I should perhaps add, was jolted by
hearing Obama’s call for “peace in our time.”
Interpretation One:
This may have been an instance of what is sometimes called “The
Ignorance of the Learned.” Recall, for example, that Obama used to make
a habit of scornful references to the doctrine of “American
exceptionalism” without having the faintest idea of what that term has
traditionally meant, from Alexis De Tocqueville to Werner Sombart. On a
far less exalted plane, in July of 2009, while proclaiming himself a
dedicated Chicago White Sox fan he referred to the team’s long history
in “Kaminsky Field” (previously known to all Chicagoans as Comiskey
Park).
Interpretation Two:
Obama is tone deaf to language, so that these four words pregnant with
ironic meaning for people with a sense of history, were for him nothing
more than another slogan. The same holds for his advisers and
speechwriters. They may possess very expensive degrees, but their
professors in Cambridge and New Haven and Morningside Heights probably
lectured (if they did so at all) in blue jeans and sweatshirts, showing
less respect for their work (and clients) than the ordinary shoe
salesman at Macy’s does for his.
Interpretation
Three: Obama’s call for peace in our time was indeed a Freudian slip,
in which the speaker, quite unconsciously, reveals far more than he
intends. That is to say, Chamberlain’s words emerged from the deepest
unconscious recesses of Obama’s mind without his having any intention at
all of recommending appeasement of Iran or al-Qaeda or the Islamic
Brotherhood.
Interpretation Four:
Obama meant exactly what he said, expected people to recognize
Chamberlain’s words and understand that Barak Obama still believes that
Chamberlain was right, and Winston Churchill wrong. Had the Washington
weather been worse, he would have opened an umbrella.
Interpretation Five:
Perhaps #4 gives Obama’s scant knowledge of Europe’s twentieth
century history too much credit for relevant content. He certainly
holds views similar to those of Neville Chamberlain , so he naturally
falls into the use of Chamberlain-like expressions; but he hasn’t the
slightest inkling of the actual Chamberlain who first uttered them. And
it goes without saying that he has no room in his head for Winston
Churchill’s verdict—and history’s—on the appeasement policy. Churchill
told the House of Commons, while much of the British nation, including
King George and the dowager Queen, were still cheering peacemaker
Chamberlain: “England has been offered a choice between war and shame.
She has chosen shame, and will get war.” And who was right?
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