This article provides an overview of U.S. exceptionalism, the rhetorical habit of portraying the United States as God’s chosen city upon a hill, and thus as a nation better than, stronger than, and more righteous than all others. Linking post-World War II reactions to Communism to post-9/11 reactions to terrorism–with a detour through Mark Twain’s critique of the Spanish-American War and John L. O’Sullivan’s celebration of the Mexican-American War–the essay argues that the habit of invoking U.S. exceptionalism encourages a dangerous form of rhetorical absolutism in which political disagreements are escalated into eschatological threats to life itself, thus justifying a recurring pattern of waging war in the name of nation and God. Despite his promises of Hope and Change, the article finds President Barack Obama particularly susceptible to this rhetorical dynamic. The essay closes with common-sense suggestions for how to begin debunking exceptionalism, hopefully creating space for re-thinking America’s role in the world.
AchesonD. (1969). Present at the creation: My years in the state department. New York, NY: W. W. Norton.
2.
Air Force seeks lethal mini-drones. (2011, January3). Retrieved from http://www.upi.com
3.
AmbroseS. (1971). Rise to globalism. New York, NY: Penguin.
4.
AppelbaumR. P.RobinsonW. I. (2005). Globalization and development studies. In Critical globalization studies (pp. 111-120). London: Routledge.
5.
BeanH. (2011). No more secrets: Open source information and the reshaping of U.S. intelligence. New York, NY: Praeger Security International.
6.
BlumW. (1995). Killing hope: U.S. military and C.I.A. interventions since World War II. Monroe, ME: Common Courage.
7.
BostdorffD. (2003). George W. Bush’s post-September 11 rhetoric of covenant renewal: Upholding the faith of the greatest generation. Quarterly Journal of Speech, 89, 293-319.
8.
BromwichD. (2011, July14). Obama: His words and deeds. New York Review of Books. Retrieved from http://www.nybooks.com
9.
BuchananJ. (1844). James Buchanan, Senate speech of 12 March 1844. In The Appendix to the congressional globe, for the first session, twenty-eighth Congress. Washington, DC: Blair and Rives.
10.
BushG. W. (2001, September16). Remarks on arrival at the White House. Weekly compilation of presidential documents. Retrieved from http://www.gpo.gov
11.
ChiversC. J. (2011, October17). Tensions flare as G.I.’s take fire out of Pakistan. New York Times, p. A1.
12.
ColeD. (2010, November18). Obama’s torture problem. New York Review of Books. Retrieved from http://www.nybooks.com
13.
ConleyD. (2010). The joys of victimage in George W. Bush’s war of totality. Cultural Studies ⇔ Critical Methodologies, 10, 347-357.
14.
ConleyD.SaasW. O. (2010). Occultatio: The Bush administration’s rhetorical war. Western Journal of Communication, 74, 329-350.
15.
CooperH. (2010, February1). US arms for Taiwan send Beijing a message. New York Times.
16.
CroweD. (n.d.). Brookings report on drones confirms high civilian death rate. Retrieved from http://returngood.com
17.
DannerM. (2004). Torture and truth: America, Abu Ghraib, and the War on Terror. New York, NY: New York Review Books.
18.
DannerM. (2005, September11). Taking stock of the forever war. New York Times Sunday Magazine. Retrieved from http://www.markdanner.com
19.
DenzinN. (2007). Flags in the window: Dispatches from the American zone. New York, NY: Peter Lang.
20.
EckesA. E.JrZeilerT. W. (2003). Globalization and the American century. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
21.
EngelsJ. D. (2010). Enemyship. East Lansing: Michigan State University Press.
22.
FilkinsD. (2011, September). The journalist and the spies: The murder of a reporter who exposed Pakistan’s secrets. The New Yorker, pp. 48-61.
23.
GardnerL. C. (1991). Architects of illusion: Men and ideas in American foreign policy, 1941-1949. Chicago, IL: Quadrangle.
24.
GoldensohnL. (Ed.). (2006). American war poetry. New York, NY: Columbia University Press.
25.
HamidM. (2011, October22). Why they get Pakistan wrong. New York Review of Books, pp. 88-90.
26.
HartnettS. J. (1999). Four meditations on the search for grace amidst terror. Text and Performance Quarterly, 19, 196-216.
27.
HartnettS. J. (2002). Democratic dissent & the cultural fictions of antebellum America. Urbana: University of Illinois Press.
28.
HartnettS. J. (2006). Globalization and empire: The U.S. invasion of Iraq, free markets, and the twilight of democracy. Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press.
29.
HartnettS. J. (2006, May). Globalizing Abu Ghraib. Left Curve30, 10-18.
30.
HartnettS. J. (2010). Executing democracy. Vol. 1: Capital punishment and the making of America, 1683-1800. East Lansing: Michigan State University Press.
31.
HarveyD. (2003). The new imperialism. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.
32.
HenniganW. J. (2011, February17). It’s a bird! It’s a spy! It’s both. Los Angeles Times. Retrieved from http://articles.latimes.com
33.
HershS. (2004). Chain of command: The road from 9/11 to Abu Ghraib. New York, NY: HarperCollins.
34.
HodgsonG. (2009). The myth of American exceptionalism. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.
35.
HyltonW. S. (2011, October26). How ready are we for bioterrorism. New York Times Sunday Magazine.
36.
IvieR. (2005). Savagery in democracy’s empire. Third World Quarterly, 26, 55-65.
37.
IvieR. (2007). Fighting terror by rite of redemption and reconciliation. Rhetoric & Public Affairs, 10, 221-248.
38.
IvieR.GinerO. (2007). Hunting the devil: Democracy’s rhetorical impulse to war. Presidential Studies Quarterly, 37, 580-598.
39.
JamesonF. (1981). The political unconscious: Narrative as a socially symbolic act. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.
40.
Jeffrey SmithR. (2010, November3). In new memoir, Bush makes clear he approved use of waterboarding. Washington Post. Retrieved from http://www.washingtonpost.com
41.
JezerM. (1982). The dark ages: Life in the United States, 1945-1960. Boston, MA: South End Press.
42.
JohnsonC. (2004). The sorrows of empire: Militarism, secrecy, and the end of the republic. New York, NY: Metropolitan Books.
43.
JonesJ. M. (1955). The fifteen weeks. New York, NY: Viking.
44.
JonesM. (2010, February3). The drone/civilian casualty equation. Retrieved from http://Change.org
45.
KellyJ. (2011, October). Afghanistan officials “systematically tortured” detainees, says report. The Guardian. Retrieved from http://www.guardian.co.uk
46.
KeranenL. B. (2011). Concocting viral apocalypse: Catastrophic risk and the production of bio(in)security. Western Journal of Communication, 75, 451-472.
47.
KolkoG. (1968). The politics of war: The world and United States foreign policy, 1943-1945. New York, NY: Random House.
48.
LawrenceD. H. (1961). Studies in classic American literature. New York, NY: Viking Press.
49.
LippmannW. (1952, December2). Morale and discipline. New York Herald Tribune.
50.
MadisonJ.HamiltonA.JayJ. (1987). The federalist: A collection of essays written in favor of the new constitution. New York, NY: Penguin.
51.
MannM. (2003). Incoherent empire. London: Verso.
52.
McFaddenR. (1991, November14). Hanson Baldwin, military writer, dies. New York Times. Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com
53.
McLarenP. (2009). Rehearsing disaster’s rehearsal: The election and its aftermath in Obamerica. Cultural Studies ⇔ Critical Methodologies, 9, 803-815.
54.
MedhurstM. J. (1990). Rhetorical portraiture: John F. Kennedy’s March 2, 1962, speech on the resumption of atmospheric tests. In MedhurstM. J.IvieR. L.WanderP.ScottR. L. (Eds.), Cold war rhetoric: Strategy, metaphor, and ideology (pp. 51-68). New York, NY: Greenwood Press.
55.
MitchellG. (2000). “Placebo defense: Operation desert mirage? The rhetoric of Patriot Missile accuracy in the 1991 Persian Gulf War. Quarterly Journal of Speech, 86, 121-145
56.
MurphyJ. M. (2003). Our mission and our moment. George W. Bush andSeptember11th. Rhetoric & Public Affairs, 6, 607-632.
57.
MyersS. L. (2011, October21). U.S. officials deliver blunt warning in Pakistan over extremists. New York Times, pp. A1 + 16.
58.
NacosB. L.Bloch-ElkonN.ShapiroR. Y. (2011). Selling fear: Counterterrorism, the media, and public opinion. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
59.
NyeJ. (2004). Soft power: The means to success in world politics. New York, NY: Public Affairs.
60.
ObamaB. (2009, December10). Remarks by the president on the acceptance of the Nobel Prize.
61.
ObamaB. (2011a, March28). Remarks by the president on college affordability. Retrieved from http://www.whitehouse.gov
62.
ObamaB. (2011b, March28). Remarks by the president in address to the nation on Libya. Retrieved from http://www.whitehouse.gov
63.
ObamaB. (2011c, 22June). Remarks by the president on the way forward in Afghanistan. Retrieved from http://www.whitehouse.gov
64.
ObamaB. (2011d, 30August). Remarks by the president at 93rd Annual Conference of the American Legion. Retrieved from http://www.whitehouse.gov
65.
ObamaB. (2011e, September8). Address by the president to a joint session of Congress. Retrieved from http://www.whitehouse.gov
66.
ObamaB. (2011f, October21). Remarks by the president on ending the war in Iraq. Retrieved from http://www.whitehouse.gov
67.
Open letter to President Bush. (2011, September20). In SifryM. L.CerfC. (Eds.), The Iraq war reader: History, documents, opinions (pp. 222-224). New York, NY: Simon & Schuster.
68.
O’SullivanJ. L. (1845, August). Annexation. United States Magazine and Democratic Review, 17(85), 7.
69.
PearR. (2011, October26). It’s official, the rich get richer. New York Times, p. A20.
70.
PearceR. H. (1969). Historicism once more. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
71.
PhilpC. (2009, October10). Mixed response to Obama’s Nobel. London Times, p. 5.
72.
President John F. Kennedy, “News Conference.” (1963, November 14). Retrieved from http://www.jfklibrary.org
73.
PrestowitzC. (2003). Rogue nation: American unilateralism and the failure of good intentions. New York, NY: Basic Books.
74.
PriestD.WilliamA. (2010, July19-21). A hidden world, growing beyond control,” “National Security, Inc.,” and “the secrets next door. Washington Post. Retrieved from http://projects.washingtonpost.com
75.
RestonJ. (1947, March14). Bewildered Congress faces world leadership decision. New York Times, p. 2.
76.
RossiterC.LareJ. (Eds.). (1963). The essential Lippmann. New York, NY: Random House.
77.
RubinA. J. (2011, October). UN report says Afghan agencies torture inmates. New York Times, p. A1.
78.
SchmidleN. (2011, August8). Getting Bin Laden. The New Yorker, pp. 34-45.
79.
ShankerT. (2011, October14). In and from Congress, calls to limit Pentagon cuts. New York Times, p. A17.
80.
SingerP. W. (2011). Wired for war: The robotics revolution and conflict in the twenty-first century. New York, NY: Penguin.
81.
StangerA. (2009). One nation under contract: The outsourcing of American power and the future of foreign policy. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.
82.
TrumanH. S. (1947). Recommendation for assistance to Greece and Turkey (80th Congress, 1st Session). Washington, DC: White House.
83.
TrumanH. S. (1956). Memoirs by Harry S. Truman. Vol. 2: Years of trial and hope. New York, NY: Doubleday.
84.
TrussellC. P. (1947, March13). Congress is solemn. New York Times, pp. 1, 4.
85.
TuckeyJ. S. (1966). The devil’s race track. Berkeley: University of California Press.
86.
UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. (2011). Treatment of conflict-related detainees in Afghan custody. Kabul, Afghanistan: Author.
87.
U. S. Department of State. (1950). Foreign relations of the United States, 1950: National security affairs (Vol. 1). Washington, DC: Author.
88.
War Resisters League. (n.d.). Where your income tax money really goes. Retrieved from http://www.warresisters.org
89.
WilliamsW. A. (1956). The tragedy of American diplomacy. New York, NY: Dell.
90.
WillsG. (2010). Bomb power: The modern presidency and the national security state. New York, NY: Penguin.
91.
WilsonS. (2009, October10). Nobel for Obama brings praise, ire: Surprise award may prove mixed blessing. Washington Post, p. A1.
