In yesterday's New York Times, columnist Stanley Fish weighed in on the "guilt by association" game that's played itself out again and again this political season, and found it lacking:
In politics, and in much of the rest of life, being held responsible for your own words comes with the territory. Once you've opened your big mouth, others have a perfect right to ask, "Do you really mean that?" or "What did you mean by that?" or "If you say that, would you also say...?" (a question that usually has you frantically disassociating yourself from Hitler). But why should you be held responsible for words spoken by someone else, even if that someone else is a person you work with or share a bed with? I frequently say things that make my wife cringe, but whatever blame attaches to my utterances certainly should not be extended to her, and it would be entirely inappropriate to ask her to denounce me or to fault her if she didn't.
To Fish, the whole matter boils down to media-driven political theater, that takes time away from issues of import:
This denouncing and renouncing game is simply not serious. It is a media-staged theater, produced not in response to genuine concerns - no one thinks that Obama is unpatriotic or that Clinton is a racist or that McCain is a right-wing bigot - but in response to the needs of a news cycle.
I think he has a point, by and large, though it's not always true that questions of associations lack substantive context. For example, while McCain's embrace of figures like John Hagee may disturb some because of the toxic and bigoted things Hagee has said, I think that perfectly reasonable people have disagreed on whether McCain is, himself, a toxic bigot. What is of substantive interest, though, is that McCain has, in eight years, transformed himself from a candidate who once specifically rebuked the support of "agents of intolerance" to a candidate, and presidential nominee, who actively seeks out the support of same. The flip-flop is of interest, because it speaks to a pattern of flip-flops.
Nevertheless, if work of renouncing and denouncing is nothing more than a game, it's a game for which modern presidential candidates should be well prepared. By and large, Clinton and Obama have done as much as they could be expected to handle the crises that have come up where their associates are concerned, but a comparison of flaps is nevertheless instructive.
When Hillary Clinton had to distance herself from Geraldine Ferraro's "lucky to be black" comments, she had two key advantages. The first is the most obvious: Ferraro's comments weren't nearly as incendiary as the brief passages from Jeremiah Wright's sermons that were widely played on the air. But secondly - and critically - is that Ferraro stepped forward and allowed the media to confront her directly. She didn't leave Clinton to "be held responsible for words spoken by someone else." By putting the bullseye on her back, the story shifted - quickly - from a judgement of Clinton's choice of confederates to a judgement of Ferraro alone. Plus, as an added benefit, Ferraro got to keep advocating for Clinton on her own terms.
The difficulty for Obama, where Reverend Wright is concerned, is not just that he's got Wright's comments casting doubt on his candidacy - it's that Obama is left holding the bag as the guy who is "responsible for words spoken by someone else." He can't just present his case, and his contrasts, on the matter, he's got to stand in as the defender/spokesman for his church and his pastor. That's one guy, doing damage control at a threefold expense. And Wright's cost Obama indirectly as well. His "A More Perfect Union" speech in Philadelphia deserved the plaudits it received, but imagine how much more revolutionary it would have been if there had been no redolent tinge of political expediency.
Of course, all of the raises a question. It seems to me that if there's one person remaining who can stand up and definitively separate Barack Obama from Reverend Jeremiah Wright, it's Reverend Wright himself. Obama proved himself to be a stand-up guy for the pastor, defending him at enormous expense to himself. It may be that Obama has asked Wright to stand down, but still, it puzzles me greatly that as of now, Wright hasn't stepped up to return the favor.