Thursday, December 1, 2011

Obama, the great teacher

Victor Davis Hansen has written a marvelous essay entitled “Obama 101”, in which he states that we owe Obama “a strange sort of thanks” for showing just how disastrous full-court leftism and narcissistic politics really are when put into practice.
We have learned from Obama that the messianic presidency is a myth. Obama’s attempt to recreate Camelot has only reminded us that JFK’s presidency — tax cuts, Cold War saber-rattling, Vietnam intervention — was never Camelot. We shall see no more Latinate presidential sloganeering (“Vero Possumus”), no more rainbow posters. Gone are the faux-Greek columns, the speeches about seas receding and the planet cooling — now sources of embarrassment rather than nostalgia. Chancellor Merkel won’t want another Victory Column address from someone who ducked out on the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall. Obama himself will not lecture crowds any longer about the dangers of their fainting when he speaks; Michelle will cease all the nonsense about “deign[ing] to enter the messy thing called politics” and finally acquiring pride in the U.S. when it nominated her husband. Even Chris Matthews’s leg has stopped tingling. There will be no more Newsweek comparisons of Obama to a god. Even the Nobel Prize committee will soon grasp that it tarnished its brand by equating fleeting celebrity with lasting achievement.
Savor every word.

10 comments:

Anonymous said...

The Nobel committee hasn't gotten a Peace Prize right in well over a decade...methinks they won't see The Current Occupant's prize as a questionable choice on their part, either.

lavrenti lenin said...

Of course the whole replacing-the-Resolute-desk-with-a-throne thing is still on...

rinardman said...

Reading something like this always reminds me of the old saying: "There are none so blind, as those who will not see."

The lot of Obama's partisans should be declared legally blind.

When the Dick was elected, I thought: four years, and out; he can't ruin the country that quickly, then people will see him for what he is and get ride of him.

I obviously underestimated him.

Spartacus said...

Obama is what you get when affirmative action meets the Peter principle

Yojimbo said...

Not in my name will he receive any thanks!

At what cost was all this done? At what possible non-reversable damage to the Republic?

Just look at the absolute mess and regulatory sprawl and tell me again that was somehow worth it just to show we shouldn't elect nutcakes like this.

Not in my name. No way, no how.

mojo said...

I told ya so! "Mark my words," I said, "there have been signs and portents in the heavens..."

But noooooooo...

Steve Burri said...

Guyssss! He just needs more time! /snark

Anonymous said...

Deborah Leigh said... Hansen failed to mention one of the latest endeavors by Obama. Recently he signed the bill approving horse slaughter for human, consumption. Previously, he had promised to continue the ban. Does the White House chef know how to prepare Flicka?

Also, the use of "The One" and "The Anointed One" are now in disuse. Except for some who like tradition.

Yojimbo said...

To paraphrase Yogi er, sorta, the country came to a fork in the road, and we took it.

Michael Lonie said...

Obama is such a reactionary, why shouldn't he legalize the dietary practices of the pre-pork era? Besides, refusing to eat horsemeat is a Christian dietary prejudice based on the fact that it was popular among pagans back in the days of missionaries trying to convert the pagans of Northern Europe. Jews refuse it for other reasons (not cloven hoofed and doesn't chew cud). So it's a natural for Obama and the modern day liberal/left to advocate it.