My own reflections on Michael Walzer’s Dirty Hands

As the 2008 Presidential Election already begins ramping up like a campaign financier’s opiate dream, I look at the contenders and feel a strange satisfaction. Among the bizarre (the Vegan), the knavish (another son from Hope), and the quietly charmed (the Mormon), I note an alarming trend. Rather than straightforward politicians, in this primary’s field, I am seeing human beings with clear moral principles, and maybe, just maybe, the personal fortitude to stick to their guns on the issues. There is a smooth-talking New Yorker, who loves New York for all the right reasons. There’s the boy who grew up in poverty, who is driven to reshape policy and create some kind of economic equity. There’s the woman who stands for gumption, and resilience—who knows what she believes and cannot be quieted. There is a man who suffered as a prisoner of war, whose legacy includes a protection of all people, particularly soldiers, when they are defenseless and in the hands of the enemy. Then there is Obama.

Obama nearly shimmers on screen. In person, he is honest (seeming), passionate, distressingly charismatic, and speaks about hope like a wonderful hybrid of Bobby Kennedy, Martin Luther King Jr., and Moses. Sun-beams effervesce from his smile (God bless the orthodontists, the make-up artists, the photographers). Brilliance drips from his rhetoric. And, in the ill-timed (and questionably worded) terms of his opponents, that Obama—he certainly is clean.

Here, this term is not meant as an assessment of race relations, or of black politicians. The shimmering Colgate clean of Obama is a qualifier few others (no matter their situation, place in history, or dental hygiene) could muster. He does not strike the average citizen as a typical politician. We expect, for better or worse, that our political leaders from time to time find themselves between a rock and a legislative hard place. They back-room deal; they lie; they swindle; they cheat and backstab—but they do it all for us. So long as they do not seem to enjoy all of that necessary evil, we shake their dirty hands, let them kiss our babies, and thank them for their time.

Whether or not Obama’s soul is as astringently clean as it appears, what he represents is an anomaly. The good politician. He’s Jimmy Carter…He’s old what’s his name with the apple tree. He must either be sweet but ineffectual, or a mythical beast from our national imagination. If the usual standards hold, it will only be a matter of time.

Looking more to what a character like Obama will likely face, imagine the idealistic, moralistic political leader. Sooner or later the backbone of the moral politician is broken. He will be faced with a dilemma. The dilemmas of states’ craft being what they are, this will be no simple lesser-of-two-evils situation. The good politician will have to choose between his own moral standards (kill only in self-defense, for example) and the protection of the people he serves. If he is too good (and clings to his own moral standards), he fails us. If he becomes too lax with his morality, we learn to loath him, fear him, and bless the day when we can be rid of him. The only path is that of reasonable guilt. He must dirty his hands. He must know when to bend and do what he knows is wrong, what as a citizen he would never do, and bear the weight of that evil, for he is our (civil) servant.

If he remains too good, his morality makes him selfish, and he is condemned. If he loses his goodness, we shall condemn him moreover. If he does what he must, he condemns himself.

Of all the political crimes charged against George Bush in the last few unpopular months, the most heinous for most of us is this: his moralism got in the way. Bush’s ideals about terror, the axis of evil, about what was right—this became more important to him than what we felt was necessary for us. According to his own code of ethics, he was willing to do whatever he must for what he felt was right—he was too good, in his own way. He dirtied our hands for his own morality—thus inverting the trajectory to which we have grown accustomed.

I think ahead to spring, and then November. I consider this field of worthy souls (many reasonably good human beings on both sides)—and I worry about my culpability as a voter. What am I really willing upon the candidate that I select?

You who shine with hope, with brilliant policies, with valiant pasts and plans for our tomorrows—do you realize the weight of what you will undertake? There will be days when each one of us will hate you, tolerate you, perhaps some will love you—but none of us can forgive you for being too principled. None of us can allow for your hands to be clean. You are running your conscience on this ticket—and we, those who bother to show up, will decide if you are worthy of being both good and bad enough.