one listens. one learns
Every single day during his presidency, Barack Obama read ten letters. He committed to this on his first day of office, becoming the first president to undertake such a rigorous, continuous, on-going daily conversation with the people of the US. Late each afternoon, the ten ‘representative’ letters, drawn from the often 10,000 pieces of correspondence the White House received from all manner of American citizens, would be taken away by Obama and personally read, and answered, that very evening.
‘Representative’ meant exactly that and no filter or further instruction was applied: the gist of the day’s hot topics and whatever was on their minds, and in their lives, came flooding through: I’m being deported; I am gay and need to tell someone; the bank is taking away our house; WTF are you playing at, Mr President?; Iraq has broken me; Look at my high school grades and can I have a job with you? Here’s a specific example:
“After 23 years as a land surveyor and nearly two years unemployed, I miss my career and my old hands. I kneel nights and clutch new hands together, praying we all can recover what seems lost. May God guide your hands to mould our future. Thank you for listening to the Citizen I am.”
And the President’s handwritten response:
“Thank you for your powerful letter. I’m working as hard as I can to make sure those hard-working Americans like you have the opportunities you so richly deserve.”
Now, you may consider this as nothing more than a platitude, a political sop, as, even after reading and responding, those individuals still didn’t have a job, or a house, or money to pay the health insurance, and they probably still thought Obama a Muslim radical planted by Saudi Arabia, but it’s the act of listening that’s important here. Over time, it’s too easy for an individual, or for that matter an electorate, to feel invisible, almost irrelevant, and the fact that every communication was acknowledged in some way at least makes them feel, potentially, less alone in their personal struggles. It’s vital for democracy that everyone has the opportunity to feel listened to, to be heard, so that even if a decision’s made that they don’t agree with, then at least they can console themselves with the fact they said their piece, got it off their chest and were heard. A better future is not preordained, it’s worked at and earned.
The smooth running of the Office of Presidential Correspondence was ensured by a staff of 50 and up to 300 volunteers. The then staff secretary, Fiona Reeves, recounts the 20 minute meeting she had with President-elect Trump’s counterpart and was left with ‘I’ll get back to you for more information’. Needless to say, she’s still waiting and I think we can all guess how many such letters have subsequently been read as this is a President who views communication, conversation, dialogue as weakness.
Tiny Hands Trump’s modus operandi is that of the mafia boss, the ‘Don’ in more ways than one and the constantly revolving White House door (Sean Spicer, Steve Bannon, Anthony Scaramucci, James Covey, John Brennan, Omarosa Newman et al) shows it’s ‘my way or the highway’. He is an ‘omerta’ following autocrat cut from the same cloth as Putin and Jinping, from Turkey’s Erdogan and the Philippines’ Duterte. Not since the ‘McCarthyism’ of the 40s & 50s and Nixon’s ‘enemies list’ have we seen such personal slights and scores openly settled in a brutal, public display of knee-jerk aggression. Listening? Nah, I don’t reckon so.
One president listened, learned and claims the process informed every decision he was to take whilst in office. One doesn’t, can’t and won’t.
