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Photo courtesy NBC News, Augusta, GA

In today’s New York Times ^[2], William Kristol suggests that John McCain fire his entire campaign team because of the recent firestorm regarding McCain’s rallies and his shifting positions. Kristol writes,

“McCain should stop unveiling gimmicky proposals every couple of days that pretend to deal with the financial crisis. He should tell the truth — we’re in uncharted waters, no one is certain what to do, and no one knows what the situation will be on Jan. 20, 2009. But what we do know is that we could use someone as president who’s shown in his career the kind of sound judgment and strong leadership we’ll need to make it through the crisis.”

However, there is a deeper problem regarding the trajectory of both campaigns: they have become religious. Americans are expecting too much from both of Obama and McCain. As a result, both candidates have a profound Messiah complex ^[3]. Kristol is right to highlight the uncertainty of America’s future which should be a cry for the virtue of humility instead of god-like visions of, “I know what to do! Vote for me. I can solve everything! Put your faith and trust in me as your president.” People of faith have realistic views of the human person and recognize that putting our faith and trust in a presidential candidate to make the world a better place is silly.

Both men are trying to convince us that he can single-handedly fix America. Some have argued that Barack Obama and John McCain are confused because they seem to think that by winning this election they will become like a king, or chief magician, or god-like figure for the nation. Edicts, magic spells, divine-presidential-commands from heaven, and so on, will bring about widespread change and instantly make things better for “the middle class.” Sprinkle a little religious magic dust on Social Security—that’ll fix it! The president simply needs to rest his divine spirit on healthcare! Whew, that was easy!

Americans strangely have messianic visions about the office of president in these tough times: “He will heal our land and make us prosperous.” Too many of us have been drinking from the weird Kool-Aid again.

Don’t believe the hype! Neither candidate can deliver their messianic promises to fix the world. There’s a three-ring circus called Congress that will serve as the reality check on the candidate worship many Americans have been duped into practicing lately.

In the end, if we’re honest, we recognize that most of America’s problems are the result of the growing absence of the moral formation necessary to make our republic work. Any government or economic system led by people who are not pursuing a life of moral virtue ends in corruption, greed, abuse of power, and oppression.