Greatest Moral Failure

[MrsSpringsteen]

At the Saddleback Forum Rick Warren asked Senators McCain and Obama what they think the greatest moral failure of America is and what their greatest personal moral failure is. How would you answer those questions, about your own country and yourself?



WARREN: OK, all right. Let’s talk about personal life. The Bible says that integrity and love are the basis of leadership. This is a tough question. What would be, looking over your life — everybody’s got weaknesses. Nobody’s perfect — would be the greatest moral failure in your life? And what would be the greatest moral failure of America?

OBAMA: Well, in my own life I’d break it up in stages. I had a difficult youth. My father wasn’t in the house. I’ve written about this. You know, there were times where I experimented with drugs. I drank in my teenage years. And what I traced this to is a certain selfishness on my part. I was so obsessed with me and, you know, the reasons that I might be dissatisfied that I couldn’t focus on other people. And I think the process for me of growing up was to recognize that it’s not about me. It’s about –

WARREN: I like that. I like that.

OBAMA: Absolutely. So — but look, you know, when I — when I find myself taking the wrong step, I think a lot of times it’s because I’m trying to protect myself instead of trying to do god’s work.

WARREN: Fundamental selfishness.

OBAMA: So that I think is my own failure.

WARREN: What about America?

WARREN: I think America’s greatest moral failure in my lifetime has been that we still don’t abide by that basic precept in Matthew that whatever you do for the least of my brothers, you do for me, and that notion of — that basic principle applies to poverty. It applies to racism and sexism. It applies to, you know, not having — not thinking about providing ladders of opportunity for people to get into the middle class. There’s a pervasive sense, I think, that this country, as wealthy and powerful as we are, still don’t spend enough time thinking about the least of us.


WARREN: Well, this one isn’t any easier. We’ve had a lot of leaders, because of their weaknesses, character flaws, stumble, become ineffective, are not even serving anymore, serving our country. What’s been your greatest moral failure, and what has been the great — what do you think is the greatest moral failure of America?

MCCAIN: They don’t get any easier.

WARREN: No, they don’t get any easier.

MCCAIN: My greatest moral failing — and I have been a very imperfect person — is the failure of my first marriage. It’s my greatest moral failure.

I think America’s greatest moral failure has been. Throughout our existence, perhaps we have not devoted ourselves to causes greater than our self-interest, although we’ve been at the best at it of everybody in the world.

I think after 9/11, my friends, instead of telling people to go shopping or take a trip, we should have told Americans to join the Peace Corps, AmeriCorps, the military, expand our volunteers, expand what you’re doing — (APPLAUSE) — expand what you’re doing, expand the current missions that you are doing, that you are carrying out here in America and throughout the world, in Rwanda. And I hope we have a chance to talk about that later on.

And you know — a little pandering here. The first words of your very successful book is “this is not about you.” you know what that also means? Serve a cause greater than your self-interest.

 

[bonoman]

The greatest moral failure of my country is the way that natives have been treated since we invaded their country and stripped them of their way of life.

My greatest moral failure, thats a really hard question! There are plenty, but the one that sticks out is my selfishness of leaving my girlfriend, after she was in a car accident, to travel the world. Did'nt relize how much she needed me at that point but after talking to her years later and seeing that she was depending on me in her time of need, I then saw how self important I was. Do I regret it, no. But I do still think about how I let down the woman I was to marry and changed the course of my life in doing so.

This is depressing...

 

[MrsSpringsteen]

I don't think it's depressing to face your personal moral failures and be honest about them/admit them. What's depressing is to do the opposite.

 

[bonoman]

I know, but it can be depressing thinking of some of the stupid things I've done over the years. I don't live in a world where I can go to a friend to tell him/her what my moral failures are. I live in a world where men don't talk about such things to eachother, you know. I can't say I've ever sat down and thought about my moral failures. And now its all I'm thinking about. Maybe its not depressing to you but for some reason it is to me.

 

[UberBeaver]

Is McCain taking a dig at Obama with that last sentence?

 

[Dreadsox]

Is this a thread we are supposed to answer the question in?

WARREN: OK, all right. Let’s talk about personal life. The Bible says that integrity and love are the basis of leadership. This is a tough question. What would be, looking over your life — everybody’s got weaknesses. Nobody’s perfect — would be the greatest moral failure in your life? And what would be the greatest moral failure of America?

 

[anitram]

I'm not quite sure how to define a moral failure. I sure have about a million personal failures of various sorts but I don't really see them as moral in character (more like bad judgment, etc). I guess the closest thing would be that I only saw my grandparents once in the last 10 years. For a good chunk of that time, I simply couldn't afford to go see them (didn't have $2000-3000 lying around), but for a good chunk of that time I also elected to spend my money on travelling and seeing the world. It is one regret that I do have.

Greatest moral failing of my country? I've lived in 4, they all have theirs. I think with Canada it is definitely the native issue. I don't so much pass judgment on what happened 400 years ago because there isn't much we can do about it, but the relatively recent residential schools, the poverty-stricken north, etc - there is no excuse for that.

 

[BonosSaint]

Personal: I shut down when someone shows me emotional need. I can handle it some when it is not in person, but I cannot handle emotional need in person, on the phone. I shut down or walk away or grow cold, but almost invariably handle it badly. If I can be empathetic on a forum like this it is because it is words on a screen. There is minimal discomfort for me. This is a continuous moral failing for me cause I cannot truly be there for some of the people who mean the most to me.

Country: My government lies too often. We don't really have informed consent. As a citizenry, we puff up at the idea of America and too often close our eyes to some of the realities of it. We love the big gesture. We're not so fine on the followthrough.

We don't provide enough protection for the most vulnerable. We pay lip service, but we are indifferent. We always find a reason not to protect them.

 

[bonoman]

Personal: I shut down when someone shows me emotional need. I can handle it some when it is not in person, but I cannot handle emotional need in person, on the phone. I shut down or walk away or grow cold, but almost invariably handle it badly. If I can be empathetic on a forum like this it is because it is words on a screen. There is minimal discomfort for me. This is a continuous moral failing for me cause I cannot truly be there for some of the people who mean the most to me.

Sounds just like me...

 

[Dreadsox]

The greatest moral failure of my country is that we are still not color blind. I think that we are too driven by economic interests at times. When the economic tends to line up with the moral, we are more inclined to act.

My greatest moral failure is that I can tend to shut out my loved ones and put up barriers when I am angry. When the anger is gone, the barriers are still there causing other issues.

 

[Irvine511]

the greatest moral failure of my country is it's materialism.

my greatest moral failure is my tendency to underestimate other people.

 

[yolland]

My greatest personal moral failing would probably be never having forgiven my mother for the way things were in our family after my father died. For 20 years afterwards I hardly spoke to her; things did thaw out a little after that but I never really came to terms with it, which was made crystal-clear to me when I unexpectedly became her guardian after she was permanently brain-injured in a freak accident earlier this year. You want living proof that it's ultimately yourself you fuck over the most when you can't find it in yourself to truly forgive, well, . I think one way or another the tangle of resentment, guilt, selfishness and at times hatred resulting from all that is probably at the root of most of my other major personal shortcomings.

It's often said that slavery and its continued social legacy is the "first" or "primordial" "sin" of the United States, and I'd largely agree with that, not just in the sense of how evil those acts were in their own right but also in the sense that it's like all the other hypocrisies, the arrogance, the rationalizing of what can't be rationalized for the sake of self-interest, the failures of nerve we collectively fall into writ large. That said, like Canada, we also inherit an even older wrong than slavery in terms of what was done to this continent's indigenous peoples in order to get our system established in the first place, and unlike with slavery it may well be too late to really heal the legacies of that tragedy.

 

[MrsSpringsteen]

I think I would say that the greatest moral failure of my country is arrogance/lack of humility. I think that's at the root of so many of our other moral failures.

My own, well there are many to choose from. Maybe letting too many others determine who I think I am, for starters. If that's a moral failure. And inability to forgive.