In the barren tundra of Trump’s America, Obama brings the spirit of giving.Clad in street clothes and a Santa cap, and lugging a sack of presents on his back, Barack Obama paid a surprise visit to the Children’s National Hospital in DC, which Michelle Obama used to visit during their years in the White House. The Magi themselves could not have done it better, bringing the gift of joy without the pomp and trappings of power. Usually, a visit by a political celebrity to a hospital is revealed to be a visitation by some malignant entity out of The Living Dead, featuring high-handed official bumbledom and leaving in its wake patients denied treatment and their relatives in a frenzy of despair. Obama’s visit was anything but that. In images that spread across the internet in minutes, he is seen to be the only visitor. The paraphernalia of security is nowhere to be seen.
Obama’s visit was like the aurora borealis in the tundra of Donald Trump’s America. Indeed, only Obama could have pulled it off. The gesture needed a largeness of heart and faith in the future that recalls his inaugural address from a decade ago. Trump, a man who prefers to scold rather than to praise, could never have turned this trick. Neither could the dour leaders who are at the helm of the other significant democracies of the world.
All too soon, we have forgotten that it was the perceived duty of governments and their leaderships to spread joy. The equitable redistribution of pain and anxiety was never on the agenda, except in the last half-decade. That’s a minor blip in a long history, and perhaps Obama’s gesture is a timely reminder to the political leadership that it isn’t too late to go back to the old ways.
