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by Daniel Mallock

The first presidential debate, September 26, 2008 was instructive for many reasons. Most importantly however is one comment made by the Democratic candidate, Barack Obama, that is far more revealing of his character and mind-set than Mr. Obama had intended. (Debate transcript available here.)

During the discussion about Iraq and Afghanistan Senator McCain mentioned that he was wearing a bracelet given to him by the parents of an American soldier killed in action in Baghad, and that he wore the bracelet with honor. The mother of this soldier, according to McCain’s telling of the event, implored him to “do everything in your power to make sure that my son’s death was not in vain.”

Not to be undone in such an emotionally charged moment, Senator Obama spoke of the bracelet that he wears for an American soldier killed in action. According to Mr. Obama, the mother of Sergeant Jopeck implored him to make “sure another mother is not going through what I’m going through” which is taken to mean the loss of a son in war.

Both mothers are right and all Americans share in their grief. But the next sentence spoken by Mr. Obama shattered the good feeling and opened the closet of Mr. Obama’s innermost thoughts for all to see.

“No U.S. soldier ever dies in vain because they’re carrying out the missions of their commander in chief. And we honor all the service that they’ve provided.”

This is not a slip of the tongue, in the classic Freudian sense. It is a statement of purpose and belief, clear as day. It is loaded with meaning that is as unpleasant yet as instructive an any of the other disturbing and self-serving statements made by the Democratic candidate throughout the campaign.

Freud in his Introductory Lectures on Psychoanalysis (given 1915-1917 at the University of Vienna, available here) describes a “slip of the tongue” as instructive to the nature and subconscious truth of the person uttering it. The slip of the tongue, uttering something not consciously meant to be spoken demonstrates a clash of “two mutually interfering purposes”.

“One of the two, the purpose that is disturbed, is of course unmistakable: the person who makes the slip of the tongue knows it and admits to it. It is only the other, the disturbing purpose, that can give rise to doubt and hesitation. Now, we have already seen, and in no doubt you have not forgotten, that in a number of cases this other purpose is equally evident. It is indicated by the outcome (italics in original) of the slip, if only we have the courage to grant that outcome a validity of its own.” (p.57)
…
“Do you not feel inclined to object that the information given by the person of whom the question was asked - the person who made the slip of the tongue - is not completely conclusive? He was naturally anxious, you think, to fulfill the request to explain the slip, so he said the first thing that came into his head which seemed capable of providing such an explanation. But that is no proof that the slip did in fact take place in that way. It may (emphasis in original) have been so, but it may just as well have happened otherwise. And something else might have occurred to him that would have fitted in as well or perhaps even better.” (p.58-59)

The two mutually interfering purposes according to Freud and other psychoanalysts is the obfuscation of the person’s truthful feelings by answering with another response that might be more palatable to the listener or less damaging in the telling. This is a common human activity brilliantly identified by Freud. All of us occasionally have a tongue slip or Freudian slip in which we say things we hadn’t meant to say that are closer to our true feeling than we had meant to communicate.

Mr. Obama’s recent slip of the tongue in which he mentioned to George Stephanopoulous that “You’re absolutely right that John McCain has not ahh, talked about my Muslim faith…” (see the film clip of this instructive comment and stunning “slip of the tongue” here.) A responsible and professional journalist would have questioned Mr. Obama with something like “Mr. Obama what did you mean by just saying ‘your Muslim faith’?” Instead Stephanopoulus “corrected” the candidate saying, “you meant your Christian faith”. This was a miserable moment for both men.

This Freudian slip of Obama is potentially very important as it illustrates what is going on in his private unconscious mind, and it shows the ethical bankruptcy of the interviewer. In contrast to the secrets that Freudian slips often divulge quite unintentionally, Mr. Obama’s statement at the first presidential debate that

“No U.S. soldier ever dies in vain because they’re carrying out the missions of their commander in chief. And we honor all the service that they’ve provided.”

is more important in that there is no psychoanalytical confusion involved with it. This is a clear statement of belief on Mr. Obama’s part. There is no debating whether he meant what he said or not (as in a Freudian “slip of the tongue”). It is obvious and clear as steel and as easily understood as any definitive statement made so far in the campaign.

All good and patriotic Americans appreciate the service of our men and women in uniform. All good and patriotic Americans mourn whenever our soldiers, airmen, sailors, marines, or national or coast guard personnel are killed our wounded. Our service men and woman serve with the understanding that they may be called to make sacrifices for their country, and in the service of their country.

American soldiers swear an oath when they enlist (available here and here).

I, (NAME), do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; and that I will obey the orders of the President of the United States and the orders of the officers appointed over me, according to regulations and the Uniform Code of Military Justice. So help me God.

National Guard (Army or Air) personnel also swear to be obey the orders of their respective state governor.

Mr. Obama’s statement that American soldiers killed in war have not died in vain because they have obeyed the orders of their Commander in Chief (the President) is a fundamental misunderstanding and mischaracterization of the relationship between America’s armed forces and its government and its leadership (in the person of the President, most specifically).

American soldiers serve and sacrifice in the defense of the nation itself and in defense of the Constitution upon which the nation is built and the freedoms which are derived from it. While soldiers in combat often make extreme sacrifices and show extreme bravery and courage and selflessness for one another, their overall sacrifices even to the sacrifice of their lives are not validated nor given value because, as Mr. Obama believes, they have carried out the “missions of their commander in chief”. Duty to country, to the Constitution, and to American freedom are the motivators of those who serve in the American military. The sacrifices of our soldiers are not validated due to obedience to orders of one person, the commander in chief.

Lincoln said, in the Gettysburg address (available here):

“We are met on a great battlefield of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field as a final resting-place for those who here gave their lives that this nation might live.”

A recent article (available here) about the history of African-Americans in the United States military summarized the motivations of American soldiers as follows:

“Since the birth of America, African-Americans have been fighting and dying alongside their countrymen as the United States has struggled for freedom and peace at home and abroad. “

American soldiers fight and die to uphold the Constitution, secure the country, and for freedom and peace at home and abroad. American soldiers do not fight for their “commander in chief”.

The President is the “commander in chief” of the Armed Forces of the United States. As the United States is not a dictatorship, nor a tyranny, but a democracy and a representative republic our military fights for the country and the ideals of democracy and freedom upon which it was founded. In the military sense, the commander in chief’s orders are to be obeyed but such orders and obedience to same do not in themselves legitimize or explain the sacrifices of our soldiers, as Mr. Obama believes. The foundational ideas of freedom and democracy are what brings us to war and brings our men and women to take up weapons in our country’s defense.

Mr. Obama’s misunderstanding and mischaracterization of why American’s fight and for what reasons Americans die in war is disturbing. The President is the commander-in-chief of the military, but he/she is not the embodiment of the state or nation itself. The oath that our soldiers take upon enlistment is clear on this point. The oath of enlistment is not an oath to the person of the President, but rather acknowledges the position of the President as leader of the nation, and leader of the military forces protecting and defending the nation.

The President of the United States is not the state nor an embodied symbol of it. However, there have been recent examples of countries in which the leader was considered the embodiment of the state and, in such cases, the state itself. The most telling and instructive example in recent history is Germany during WW2.

All German soldiers were required to take an oath of obedience to Hitler (available here) personally-not to the German state or nation but to Hitler himself. The Fuhrer was the state. So, when German soldiers died in battle it is accurate to say that they “did not die in vain because they had carried out the mission of their commander in chief” (to paraphrase Mr. Obama).

The Wehrmacht Oath of Loyalty to Adolf Hitler, 2 August 1934

“I swear by God this sacred oath that I shall render unconditional obedience to Adolf Hitler, the Führer of the German Reich, supreme commander of the armed forces, and that I shall at all times be prepared, as a brave soldier, to give my life for this oath.”

Americans do not take oaths to their commander in chief. Americans serve their country and their fellow Americans. The commander in chief has a four year mandate (renewable for another four, if re-elected), given to him/her through elections by the people of the country. There is nothing divine about them, nothing in our democratic representative form of democracy that would suggest that anyone give a personal oath to the President.

Mr. Obama’s goal is to become the Commander-in-Chief. His recent comment that demonstrates his misunderstanding of the relationship between the President and those who wear the uniform of the United States is deeply troubling. Mr. Obama’s belief is out of context with American history; it clearly demonstrates a profound lack of understanding about how the American political system functions and most importantly about the relationship between the Executive and the military.

But for Mr. Obama himself, he is perfectly in context. This disturbing megalomania precludes Mr. Obama from high office.

Addendum: The mother of Sgt. Jopek mentioned above had asked Barack Obama to not wear Sgt. Jopek’s bracelet at any public forum after the bracelet was given to him in Green Bay, Wisconsin recently, and Sgt. Joepek was mentioned in Obama’s speech there.  According to the Sgt.’s father (now divorced) in a story posted on ABC News “Political Punch”:

“She had told me that in an email that she had asked, actually asked Mr. Obama to not wear the bracelet anymore at any of his public appearances.”

It is not mentioned in the story how Mrs. Jopek made her request to Mr. Obama or if he acknowledged it. Needless to say, Mr. Obama’s mentioning this brave heroes death, the wearing of his bracelet, and the subsequent statement upon which this blog post is based has opened a new line of national discussion and soul searching that Mr. Obama would likely have preferred remained closed. (See story here.)