After The Debate: The Case For Obama (the Marine Corps) and a Culture of Brotherhood

Before my son John joined the Marines I would have laughed at the idea that I -- a life long Republican, white, middle aged "I Want!" kind of selfish guy -- would become a loyal Obama supporter. I would also have thought that Senator Clinton's attacks on Obama (in the PA debate), were just inevitable business as usual, not a gross exercise in immorality...

Before I became connected to my country in a new and deeper way through my son's service, I would have dismissed Senator Obama's eloquent call for us to grow beyond our Red State/Blue State divisions as "just words..."

Before my son proved me wrong I would have doubted that he would be susceptible to hearing a "higher call" and wanting to, "be part of something bigger than myself..." and I never would have predicted that Obama could move so many millions of "apathetic" young people my son's age to involve themselves in politics.

My journey from cynicism to the Obama camp had an unlikely beginning. It began in 1999, when a barrel-chested Marine recruiter showed up in dress blues and bedazzled my son. I did not stand in the way. John was headstrong, and he seemed to understand these stern, clean men with straight backs and flawless uniforms. I did not. I live on the Volvo-driving, higher education-worshipping North Shore of Boston. I write novels for a living. I have never served in the military.

It had been hard enough sending my two older children off to Georgetown and New York University. John's enlisting was unexpected, so deeply unsettling. I was a "pro-military" Republican, but not with my kid! Right?

Besides, I was a snob. I didn't relish the prospect of answering the question, "So where is John going to college?" from the parents who were itching to tell me all about how their son or daughter was going to Harvard. "But aren't the Marines terribly Southern?" asked one perplexed blue blood while standing next to me at the brunch following graduation. "What a waste, he was such a good student," said another parent. One dad (a history professor at Brown), spoke up at a school meeting denounced my son's choice and suggested that the school should "carefully evaluate what went wrong in this case."

When John graduated from three months of boot camp on Parris Island, 3,000 or so parents and friends were on the parade deck stands. We parents and our Marines were not only of many races but were representative of many economic classes as well. Many were poor. Some arrived crammed in the backs of pickups, others by bus. John told me that a lot of parents could not afford the trip.

We parents were white and Native American. We were Hispanic, Arab and African American and Asian. We were former Marines wearing the scars of battle, or at least baseball caps emblazoned with battles' names. We were Southern whites from Nashville and skinheads from New Jersey and black kids from Cleveland wearing ghetto rags, and big white ex-cons with ham-hock forearms defaced by jailhouse tattoos.

We would not have been mistaken for the educated and well-heeled parents gathered on the lawns of John's private school a half-year before. And no one there thought that service and idealism are so foolish that "What went wrong?" is the "answer" to someone who wants to serve. No one was saying that the drill instructors were using "just words" when they spoke of brotherhood, honor and service.

After graduation one new Marine told John, "Before I was a Marine, if I had ever seen you on my block I would've probably killed you just because you were standing there." This was a serious statement from one of John's good friends, an African American ex-gang member from Detroit who, as John said, "would die for me now, just like I'd die for him."

Six years later, when I was researching my novel Baby Jack (about the Marines) I had the privilege of being given free rein on Parris Island's Marine Recruit Training Depot. This time I was there as a writer, not a parent standing on the parade deck stands.

I went "lights to lights" (as they call the dawn to dusk days of intense training) with various platoons of recruits at various stages of their training. I watched as terrified young recruits were transformed into confident Marines. I watched as dedicated to drill instructors fought against their fatigue to lead "from the front" and teach by example. I stood there in awe and I felt the last traces of my cynicism melt away.

Words such as patriotism, honor and service suddenly felt as if they had a real meaning. On Parris Island those words were not political catch phrases being manipulated to get votes but simple rules to live by. And those same values motivated the young Marines who went into combat at my son's side to care for him as if he was their brother.

What I see in Senator Obama is someone who manages to articulate -- and more importantly sincerely believes in and practices -- the brotherhood of selfless service and the unity of the American family. What I sense in Obama is the same moral ethic I saw in those drill instructors.

I also see a Marine-like level of discipline in Obama, as when, for instance, he refused to be drawn into Senator Clinton's nasty web of insinuation during the April 16 debate in Pennsylvania. Obama could have opened a Pandora's Box of scorched-earth counter attack--Clinton's association with communists in her youth, her 108 million and where she got it, her husband's association with dictators as a for profit "consultant"... on and on. But Obama didn't go there.

Obama answered Clinton's insinuation (that he is guilty-by-association and because of people he knew, or talked to or met, or heard of...) but refused to be drawn into the pissing contest that she was trying to start--with a big assist from the insanely petty moderators. Obama was calm under fire to a degree that was truly extraordinary.

Obama's idealism, and articulate calm inspires young men and women to join in his campaign for the same reason the Marine Corps inspires recruits: Obama (like the Marines) calls us to be part of something bigger than "me" and offers a purpose in life that adds up to more than just one more consumer choice -- just another "I want."

Obama and the Marine Corps' moral ethic is: I AM my brother's keeper. And against all odds this USMC/Obama ethic is now resonating with millions of Americans, particularly young Americans who are thronging the Obama "movement." We should rejoice. We should be grateful for a man who has broken the chains of cynicism.

John is back from war and out of the Marines. But he connected me to my diverse country in a way that has stuck. I was too selfish and insular (too typically white, Republican and affluent!) to experience this connection before. But somehow his idealism rekindled mine. John's service opened my heart so that I could hear Obama call all Americans to the sort of change and dedication my son found.

We have a choice in this election between the old cynicism and a new hope, between the mentality that meets calls for idealism with a knowing sneer, a "what went wrong?" or "it's only words" or "but what about your pastor's inflammatory remarks?" -- or the spirit I found on Parris Island and that resonates in Obama's speeches and his life of service to community, not to mention his self-control when under even the most unfair attacks.

We can listen to Obama and work with him. Or we can miss this once-in-a-lifetime chance and follow Hilary Clinton into the swamp of power for power's sake, connection for profit (108 million of profit!) and business as usual.

The choice between Obama and his opponents is clear. Hillary Clinton is a poster child for the grasping selfish America of the main chance. Her words say one thing, her 108 million dollar fortune -- earned by cashing in on the Clinton's connections--says something else. She and her husband have abused the trust the American people put in them. They talk service. What they do is greed and power at any cost, even at the cost of trashing Obama and risking our ability to change course.

The spirit that the Clinton's actions represent could not be further from that of the underpaid overworked drill instructors on Parris Island. And it couldn't be farther from the 20 years of community service Obama has lived. So the Clinton's are reduced to trying to distract us by a smear-by-association tactic: who Obama knows, or met or once talked to or went to church with...

John McCain has also sold his soul for his presidential ambition. He supports a war he knows is wrong and that he and Clinton voted for. He has curried favor with the Religious Right that he once rightly denounced as "agents of intolerance." He too wants to fight a war and lower taxes at the same time. McCain lacks the ethic of truth telling.

Inspiration is what Obama offers. A true and good life backs up his words. The presidency is a symbolic position as well as a powerful one. The nation's leader must be able to inspire. Obama does that. His life and words match. And his ability to draw all those young people to him is what leadership -- in the Oval Office or on the parade deck at Parris Island -- is. Obama is worth fighting for.

Frank Schaeffer is a writer and author of "KEEPING FAITH-A Father-Son Story About Love and the United States Marine Corps" and, "CRAZY FOR GOD-How I Grew Up As One Of The Elect, Helped Found The Religious Right, And Lived To Take All (Or Almost All) Of It Back"

Comments

[Wiam]

What a beautiful and inspirational article. I sent it to my dad to help him understand why I support Obama. As a middle aged mom, I won"t vote for Hillary Clinton or McSame and watch my country wallow in plutocracy propped up by false morality diversions for another 8 years. Like Obama, many of us find ourselves in the middle seeing the validity of both sides of today"s issues, but realize that the way we go about solving our problems is the real key to success. I"m glad parenting brought you to a path of wanting to truly make this country better, not tear it apart with dirty politics. Remember, the Obama campaign is more about us taking our government back than it is about his presidential race. Yes We Can.

[Emmaboverry]

Thank you for this beautiful piece. I deeply respect and thank your son for his service. So many of us have been transformed in so many ways--the ability of a great leader is to move people to move beyond themselves. A great leader taps into the deepest and best of other people.

Such a leader who can be found drilling marines or coaching little league or mentoring at-risk-youth. It's a boon that we have a great leader in Obama who is also a fine politician and scholar Obama knows this race is not about him, but about us, coming together as you did with all those parents from all those different worlds, as your son did with his comrades, and working to build a better world. I always thought stuff like that was "just words."

To awaken spirit, character, willingness, and hope in others is a gift. I believe as you do that Obama has that gift and is awakening people to the real meaning of our constitution and to our duty to do better for the world. I also believe he will not let fine young men like your son down; he will not take such service lightly or use it for his own greed and vanity.

You put the case eloquently. This election year is not about the politicians--it's about the promise in us and our country.

I hope to God we can bring your son's friends home soon.

[BlackMagicWoman]

Welcome aboard, Frank! Great piece.

[betch]

This is the best post sitting on huffpo right now. Great stuff, Frank. Many thanks.

[bluevillage]

You have captured exactly what I feel about Obama's campaign. Thank you for taking the time to publish your thoughts.

[winkster]

I can attest to the patriotism you feel when you go to Parris Island. Two of my sisters were Marines and when I went to the graduation, I felt pride swell in my whole being that never left me. The Marine Corp does it right and now when I see Obama I see that discipline too. He is a man of his word and he IS dedicated to all of us. The dedication I saw between my sisters and their fellows at Parris Island was so inspiring. Our nation is a brotherhood, a sisterhood. Obama is bringing people together. Together we can change our country!

[konastephen]

Well Franky,

The one thing you got right about yourself was the selfishness you mentioned.

You can't take your cues from your friends in CapeTown, Uncle, and expect to rightly understand the truth about America. Just as in the same way you can't expect Orthodoxy, the religion of dictatorships and tyrannies to teach the truth about the Reformation. Clearly your new perspective in life is some sort of attempt to differentiate yourself from your namesake at the expense of Truth.

The truth is that Obama is the next step between the new police state created by the last three regimes and a dictatorial and totally corrupt regime. America has yet to experience that kind of wholesale pillage from within. Despite his good looks and boyish charm Obama has yet to be honest with us about exactly what kind of "change" he wants to bring.

We caught a glimpse of it this past weekend when he promised to permanently change the character of small town America. He has not learned from history that government is not God and when we try to make it so, all we produce is oppression and injustice.

You, Franky, have not learned that lesson either, as evidenced by your support for ideologies that have empowered dictatorship and tyranny throughout the 20th century.

I pray that you wake up out of this fog of deception into which you have fallen so completely.

[kamenwati]

Pray for yourself konastephen. Your inarticulate and rambling comments didn't make a rhetorical dent in anything Frank Schaeffer said in his post about his son's service and his own political transformation. Pray that you spend more time in thought before allowing your fingers to touch the keyboard.

[konastephen]

kamenwati, PlantGod and b,

Before you dismiss my analysis, maybe you should review your 19th and 20th century world history and also consider your own heritages.

Perhaps none of you has anyone in recent generations of your own family who lost everything to a communist government or were betrayed (by Eastern "Orthodox" neighbors) to communist state apparatchiks and carted off to die in the Gulag. None of you probably have grandparents who risked their own lives to save thousands otherwise destined to perish. None of you probably have any family who trekked through a thousand miles of mud and wartorn chaos to save themselves and their only remaining daughter and escape the pillage and plunder and horror created by war in their homeland.

I'd bet that your greatest struggle with "the Man" has been in the safety and security and peace of America.

I'm quite sure that none of you has devoted your lives to studying the reasons dictatorships and tyrannies take hold in societies or achieved post graduate level degrees in the course of that study. But if you have, maybe you've also spent more than half of your lives attempting to help communities and nations rebuild in places that were devastated by dictatorship and tyranny last century. Maybe you've even done that on four different continents like I have.

If any of you do have that same perspective that I've just described then I'll take your mockery and your criticism to heart.

[PlantGod72]

What an utter waste of cyber-print! Good God, could you be any more paranoid?

Take your meds like a good boy....and say goodnight.

[b2008]

I pray that you wake up period. Being cynical is a trait held by those who CANNOT see beyond their eyelids. You and many like you are parasites of despair, holding onto delusion at any cost. If goodness smacked you in the face, you would swear it was the wind. People like you will try to keep good people down forever. You speak for the wrong God. That's why you will never have peace within your soul.

[EspritDeVoltaire]

Another great piece, Frank. We need to stop this thing now because it will only get worse.

Having become experienced with the military in the age of The Draft, I learned a lesson or two about honor in spite of not wanting to go.

1. Politicians with no honor, send better men than themselves to die for foolish causes.

2. Any and every man who actually picks up a gun is 10 times the man of any yellow-bellied cheerleader safely at home on their sofa supporting the war.

Absolutely nothing in the entire world sickens me more than someone who beats the war drum when they know they won't be going themselves. This is the true nadir of depravity and cowardice.

[OrionGal]

Wow - what a beautiful and inspirational piece of writing this is! I hope more people read this.

[cemlo2]

FS writes "Obama and the Marine Corps' moral ethic is: I AM my brother's keeper. And against all odds this USMC/Obama ethic is now resonating with millions of Americans, particularly young Americans who are thronging the Obama "movement." We should rejoice. We should be grateful for a man who has broken the chains of cynicism."

To say all that you say and ignore the Marine ethics and charge of Rev. Wright, as pastor, to watch over his flock...the combination of ethics and charge is immense. If you know the scandalous nature and acts of the Clinton clan, what 'beast' allows the American masses to ignore their lies and personal conspiracy against the American public, while bastardizing 'Isaiah-like' sound-bites of the former Marine, Rev. Wright. At what point did Wright stop being a Marine?

When you are your brother's keeper, you may on occasion fight a battle, stand-in for, or take risks your brother may not condone, nor think wise; but, you know that your conduct is for the benefit of your brother (sister). If Rev. Wright, a former Marine, is bastardized because his oration offends, yet, is more truthful than the Clinton's' (neither having served in the US military), FS, your entire analysis falls apart if you cannot answer...At what point did Wright stop being a Marine?

[NorVaGal]

Mr. Schaeffer: I am a johnny-come-lately to your recent writings. Your politics and mine diverged many years ago as I was disgusted with the way you upheld and propagated the narrow and divisive veiws of the religious right at every opportunity. I felt that they (and you) had nothing to do with being religious and your spin certainly contained no elements of being right. I simply had no respect for you, and, your very name was enough to insure that my interests were always elsewhere engaged.

In the last few weeks, however, I have been extremely surprised by your comments. At first, I was intrigued, but very distrustful. Your post today brought tears to my eyes-- I finally thought, "He really does get it. It's not a sham, an okie-doke to reel us in and then deliver the fatal blow. Omigosh. Who woulda thunk it???"

I admire your son and the many others who truly do demonstrate their love for our country by making the greatest sacrifices it is possible for humans to make. So often, the children really do lead.

Thank you for sharing your experiences with us. I am sure that you take incoming fire (sniper flak?) from your conservative cohorts. However, you are making new friends who admire and respect your courage. Best of luck. God bless.

[iCANread]

FS writes "Obama and the Marine Corps' moral ethic is: I AM my brother's keeper
But.......the BIG question is:
is he MY brother?

[b2008]

We are all brothers in God's eyes. For you to ask that question means you believe in the wrong God.

[ljsfolly]

I am glad that we have people waking up to their idealism that has long been dormant as you have said. I look back at my "hippie" years and how we thought love would save the world. Wrong kind of love maybe but we were idealistic enough to look past the different and see the same in the people around us. Now I look at these very same people now many republican and many democrat and we lost the ideas along the way of what "could be" and just have seen what is. Now we have a chance to change the world maybe with our votes and while some look at where we are and see no ability to change it, we could be a part of the change. I am not making Barack Obama the end all be all answer but I am saying we can continue to do with a Clinton or McCain the same as we have been doing which will not work or we can take the vision and hope of a young man who wants all of us to have a better life. I want to participate in my future not be told what someone else wants my future to be.

[msunnafr]

In order to help assure future debates focus on issues of importance (to most of us) we need to send a strong message. May is a sweeps month for television ratings, ratings that determine what advertisers pay to air ads. Boycott ABC News AND entertainment for the entire month. If enough of us do it and ratings drop the debates in the general election may be more focused on what matters to most in the electorate.

[Vige]

This is the first time that I have read one of your articles and it will not be the last time. Your article brought tears to my eyes and heart.

I am sliced, diced and dissected into that older woman demographic that is suppose to be the Hillary group. I do not support Hillary Clinton because of who she is as a person. A person that feels so entitled that it is her time and her right to be the next President.

Each evening I say a prayer that tomorrow I will be a better person than I am that day. Obama gives me hope that tomorrow we will all be better than we are today.

Thank you for your post.

[Donise]

Beautiful story...brought tears to my eyes to read your personal transformation...what a courageous son that you've raised!!

To the heart of the matter at what Obama calls "the fierce urgency of now" is the essence of what I and soooooooooo many others see in Obama--"I AM my brother's keeper".

He truly does lead by example and he truly embodies the kind of moral and common sense leadership which has been missing for so very long for Americans and others around the world.....

Thanks...

[simplify]

Excellent piece.