Revisiting the Cult of Obama
Justin Katz
File this under "confessions," but I've started putting politically tinged songs on my MP3 player so that, every now and then, amidst the thousands of songs and compositions being shuffled throughout the day, I'll have reason to pause and smirk, laugh, or shake my head. The first such song was the creepy Obama children's choir tune, which I've found myself humming every time I hear another of the mounting stories of national decline and global danger. I recently added Remy's "Going Green with Cap and Trade."
Well, last night I went digging for the pre-election Obamacult "We Are the Ones" advertisement featuring will.i.am and various stars, and this spoken word promise by somebody I don't recognize definitely won the song some megabytes on my non-Apple player:
I think the thing that inspires me most about Barack Obama is that he really is going to be the President of the United States. You know? He's not going to be the President of the top 10% or the President of the most powerful corporations or the President of the most powerful lobbyists. He's going to be our President. He's going to speak for us, 'cause we put him there.
Of course, there's the endearing naiveté — as if the rich, corporations, and especially lobbyists can't declare the "we put him there" claim on his attention to a greater degree than the average voter. But the game that's likely to prove increasingly fun comes with the second "or": He's not going to be the "President of the most powerful corporations"? If we take that as a de facto title, I'd say that bit of hope was misplaced!
Watching the President's brief recent comments on the healthcare debate in preparation for a post that will go up tomorrow morning, it struck me that one cannot address the Barack Obama phenomenon — or figure out a way to arrest his relentless push for national destruction (inadvertent as that result may be) — without realizing that there's a segment of the U.S. population that is involved enough to vote, but not enough to follow policy debates, that doesn't hear a substantive argument when The One orates. What they actually hear is something more like the speech-turned-pop-song "Yes We Can" (which, therefore, is also apt to pop up on shuffle from time to time).
People will continue to support Barack Obama for the same reason that young folks continue to become new smokers. There's a cultural appeal — an image and a storyline — that they find compelling, and even if they know enough to have an abstract understanding of the consequences, like teenagers, they don't believe it'll actually ever come to pass.
In every area of our lives that have any significance except for medical problems and the necessary routines of actually making things work,we have become enslaved by perception over what is real.Controlled by the paradigm of the moment as given to us by media,activists,politicians,and academia.
Medicine and hard science,like engineering are different.What happens there is real.
The other night my old supervisor told me how much he was getting a laugh out of the hysteria over the Governor's executive order,particularly regarding the prison.He observed how we'd been doing all this 25 years ago and no one noticed.Obviously he was referring to law enforcement cooperation between INS and other agencies including the courts,probation/parole,etc.Not the e-verify stuff which of course didn't exist.Not even Steven Brown noticed-he was busy ruining the holidays.
the Sotomayor hearings were a perfect example of theater,but Obama is the ultimate example of it.He is the Schmoo(invented by Al Capp)-he is whatever you imagine him to be to so many people.
One of my cousins said Obama had "delusions of competence".Not bad.
BTW my cousin isn't a pundit or professor-he is a retired USMC pilot who came from the enlisted ranks and after he retired became the inventor of a new type of flight simulator-he actually is competent.
I think Obama is extremely competent and I support him. I think he is brilliant. However, I am really offended by cigarette smoke - I always have been - even as a teenager. So, I'm not sure if Justin's argument is based in fact or more likely to be a projected rationalization emanating from a latent addictive personality disorder.
Robert-I didn't question his intelligence.His IQ is probably off the chart and he IS competent at making himself charismatic.
He doesn't seem to have demonstrated any particular competence as a legislator.He was one of a crowd in the Illinois Senate,a largely undistinguished body.I lived there for 8 years,so that's where that comes from.
He wasn't a groundbreaker as an attorney.He taught constitutional law-a lot of people do.He was a community organizer.Is the community he organized in someplace you'd like to live now?I kinda doubt it.I know the area.Now where he lived-THAT'S nice.
he just hadn't accomplished much.Neither did Bush(2),but I thought he sucked also.
Intelligence and competence are distinct entities and are not always present together.
Smoking is his business.If he wants to die prematurely from smoking related disease,screw him-it's his choice.I chose to quit cigarettes in 1981 and never regretted it.
I am sure he doesn't do it near the kids.
He is out of his depth with nuclear armed hoodlums like Putin(oh,Medvedev-right)who runs Russia despite the trimmings for public consumption.
The Chinese military/industrial complex are really impressed with him too.Even Reagan would have had his work cut out for him with that crew.
See what I'm doing here?I'm making concrete references-not going on feelings or emotion-that stuff is good with people you love.Not in world at large.
"He observed how we'd been doing all this 25 years ago and no one noticed.Obviously he was referring to law enforcement cooperation between INS and other agencies"
Is that true, Joe? Very interesting.
Justin
Who in hell are you to call into question the motivation of those that voted for (you can actually say his name ) Obama. You came of age in the Bush years. How old were you when H.W. Bush was elected? You have grown up at the height of the modern conservative movement. The original score was by the John Birch Society. Barry Goldwater was the conductor for the movement. Reagan kept the beat for a while before dementia and then the junior Bush's band played off key and the notes fell flat. You had better get used to the fact that the music that's being played has changed.
By the way the first post on this thread authored by "phil" is not mine. Although I am not in disagreement with that post, I would like to clarify that that phil was not me. That phil was not philling in for me either. I would not go as far as to charge that phil is a phalse phil though.
As always please pheel phree to phind phault phor no other reasan than phun except for Tom Wah Wah who can go phuck himself.
Oops The post I mentioned was Wasn't This Guy Supposed to Be Smart, Moderate, and Temperate? My bad. It's just that they are all so depressingly similar.
joe bernstein,
Congratulations on your competent cousin. I know of someone who was born of mixed race, raised by a single parent, lived in poor circumstances, won a scholarship to an Ivy League school, was the first black man to serve as editor of a prestigious law review, turned down lucrative job offers to work as a community organizer in a large mid-western city, was elected to the U.S. Senate and became the first black president of the United States; but again, congratulations to your competent cousin.
OldTimeLefty
OTL-I didn't mention it because it wasn't germane,but my cousin also received the Distinguished Flying Cross in Vietnam while flying an A4 for wiping out an enemy force surrounding a Marine infantry unit after his aircraft was hit by over 70 rounds of ground fire.
I don't think Obama or most people would've done that,so go F**K OFF with your cheap sarcasm.
My cousin became an officer after being a corporal in the artillery-he had not a college credit at the time.
My military record was much more undistinguished-I was a mechanic in Vietnam.When Obama's programs crash of their own financial irresponsibility,we'll see how competent he's considered.I don't even want to consider foreign policy.
Monique-yes,it's true
Phil-stick to analyzing the left wing-the John Birch Society wouldn't piss on George W.Bush if he were on fire.They strongly opposed his Iraq adventure.
They despise his father also.
Reagan is a different story.
I really liked Barry Goldwater.
OTL-one more thing.DO NOT try to pawn off Obama as sharing any comparable experience to a young inner city Black kid raised by a single parent.
First off,his mother and father wound up getting married.The father booked.Shame on him.She then remarried an Indonesian and they had a family together of which Obama was a part.What's with the single mother bullcrap?
When things got tough for her,she sent him to the grandparents where he was enrolled in an exclusive school.
Are you following this?He went to college on a sholarship.He was a law review editor that never wrote a major article in it.
It was a hell of an accomplishment for a Black man to get elected President.he knows how to work the crowds.
His record in the Senate is pedestrian.
You like to read off other people here with your smartass remarks,but on this you're so full of crap you ought to move to Fields Point.
He was only a state legislator for a short time, then went to Washington for yet, another short time as a senator, missing many votes. I certainly don't think any of our state delgation is up to the challenge of being the president, they are ruining this state as it is. Just look at our president, not ready for primetime. Our whole country is going down, just like our state, with leadership from the legislature that is clueless.
The need to curtail illegal immigration prompted Congress to enact the Immigration Reform and Control Act (IRCA) of 1986. The IRCA toughened criminal sanctions for employers who hired illegal aliens, denied illegal aliens federally funded welfare benefits, and legitimized some aliens through an amnesty program--EXCEPT THESE LAWS NEVER WERE ENFORCED. The real enigma lies in the wording of the 1986 law? The IRCA toughened--CRIMINAL SANCTIONS--for employers who hired illegal aliens, DENIED ILLEGAL ALIENS FEDERALLY FUNDED WELFARE BENEFITS. Neither the federal government, nor state county have denied most benefits to illegal immigrants.
That is why one state--California--is involved in a monstrous budget deficit? AS Always--Everything in the way of enforcement that actually--WORKS--is either eliminated, tabled or weakened so it was never meant to do the job? That goes for E-verify? But public outrage that fell upon the conspirators in Washington and state capitols, was mollified by the out-reach calls that descended upon them like the demons of hell. E-Verify must be a federal mandated tool, for everybody whose in the workplace. Old-timers and new employees. Otherwise is not going to work correctly?
It's a very simple misleading trick, to add an amendment, or author some other new enforcement tool, to divert the American peoples view of yet another deconstruction of a powerful model to confuse us? America can never have a Universal health care, until we remove illegal immigrants from the system?
Before these morons in the beltway decommission or rescind something, keep the other enforcement law on track. The SAVE ACT is a law, but its already being readied for the scrap heap. The puppets of big business in Washington need to know, that they--WORK--for us--the voters? The NO MATCH letter was never given a chance to work, because the anti-sovereignty groups, the ACLU--raised its ugly head and filed against it in court. In the long run the E-Verify extraction system, backed up by a very large force of ICE inspectors, would soon have the illegal immigrants running to the border, or to board a jet plane home.
That is why Governor Arnold Schwarzeneggerrefuses to sign any legislation for higher taxes, in a collapsing economy that was a financial icon for the whole of America. Bright lights are on at night in the Democratic-Liberal assembly building in Sacramento and has so far failed to pass any budget agreement. I wish them luck as they try to find relieve from the crushing pressure of $24.5 billion dollars, that they have imposed on themselves from the tax and spend politicians that infest the state capitol. City manager Andronovich demonstrated to the people of Los Angeles county, that $11 billion dollars went to underwrite the impoverished, considerable numbers being illegal alien families. ONLY BY CONTACTING YOU SENATOR OR CONGRESSMAN, WILL WE STOP ANOTHER AMNESTY OR ENFORCE E-VERIFY? 202-224-312 NUMBERSUSA, AMERICANPATROL for the raw details.
joe
I am shocked, shocked at the vituperative response my comments elicited from you. I was in no way casting aspersions on your cousin. I have one who is still lying in a field in Belgium and a brother in law who sleeps eternally in Italy. I knew both men who gave "to the last measure of their devotion"; one might have shared your views, the other's would be much closer to mine. I do not feel that it is reasonable to offer either man's view as "the real one".
You began by stating that, "we have become enslaved by perception over what is real". On this I will agree with you, but then you imply that your perception is somehow more real than most of the electorate. You might be right, I doubt it, but you might be. However, the burden of proof is on you.
Also, your "by the way, my cousin isn't a professor" might be an interesting comment, but it does nothing to elevate his point of view.
I like you joe. You have some soul. Please calm down a bit. It's much better for your health.
OldTimeLefty
OTL-my health?ha ha ha-I'm circling the bowl,to be honest-how much worse can it get?Actually I function pretty well,but it's only because I'm too miserable to give in easily.
Sorry about your relatives.
I know when we were growing up,the idea of a Black president was unheard of.Nice to know it no longer is.
I'm just saying this man's life story wasn't written by Horatio Alger.
I don't know if I have better perception than most of the electorate,but if I do,it's only because I read things,I learn about things before I digress about them,and I don't get my talking points(horrible term)from asswipes on cable tv.
Talk radio is interactive-that's a whole different situation.
If my perception is better,it isn't because I'm some inspired genius,it's just that I took the time to find things out.Even if I'm wrong,I can argue from a rational basis.
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In every area of our lives that have any significance except for medical problems and the necessary routines of actually making things work,we have become enslaved by perception over what is real.Controlled by the paradigm of the moment as given to us by media,activists,politicians,and academia.
Posted by: joe bernstein at July 18, 2009 8:14 PMMedicine and hard science,like engineering are different.What happens there is real.
The other night my old supervisor told me how much he was getting a laugh out of the hysteria over the Governor's executive order,particularly regarding the prison.He observed how we'd been doing all this 25 years ago and no one noticed.Obviously he was referring to law enforcement cooperation between INS and other agencies including the courts,probation/parole,etc.Not the e-verify stuff which of course didn't exist.Not even Steven Brown noticed-he was busy ruining the holidays.
the Sotomayor hearings were a perfect example of theater,but Obama is the ultimate example of it.He is the Schmoo(invented by Al Capp)-he is whatever you imagine him to be to so many people.
One of my cousins said Obama had "delusions of competence".Not bad.
BTW my cousin isn't a pundit or professor-he is a retired USMC pilot who came from the enlisted ranks and after he retired became the inventor of a new type of flight simulator-he actually is competent.
I think Obama is extremely competent and I support him. I think he is brilliant. However, I am really offended by cigarette smoke - I always have been - even as a teenager. So, I'm not sure if Justin's argument is based in fact or more likely to be a projected rationalization emanating from a latent addictive personality disorder.
Posted by: Robert Balliot at July 18, 2009 9:06 PMRobert-I didn't question his intelligence.His IQ is probably off the chart and he IS competent at making himself charismatic.
Posted by: joe bernstein at July 18, 2009 10:19 PMHe doesn't seem to have demonstrated any particular competence as a legislator.He was one of a crowd in the Illinois Senate,a largely undistinguished body.I lived there for 8 years,so that's where that comes from.
He wasn't a groundbreaker as an attorney.He taught constitutional law-a lot of people do.He was a community organizer.Is the community he organized in someplace you'd like to live now?I kinda doubt it.I know the area.Now where he lived-THAT'S nice.
he just hadn't accomplished much.Neither did Bush(2),but I thought he sucked also.
Intelligence and competence are distinct entities and are not always present together.
Smoking is his business.If he wants to die prematurely from smoking related disease,screw him-it's his choice.I chose to quit cigarettes in 1981 and never regretted it.
I am sure he doesn't do it near the kids.
He is out of his depth with nuclear armed hoodlums like Putin(oh,Medvedev-right)who runs Russia despite the trimmings for public consumption.
The Chinese military/industrial complex are really impressed with him too.Even Reagan would have had his work cut out for him with that crew.
See what I'm doing here?I'm making concrete references-not going on feelings or emotion-that stuff is good with people you love.Not in world at large.
"He observed how we'd been doing all this 25 years ago and no one noticed.Obviously he was referring to law enforcement cooperation between INS and other agencies"
Is that true, Joe? Very interesting.
Posted by: Monique at July 18, 2009 11:24 PMJustin
Who in hell are you to call into question the motivation of those that voted for (you can actually say his name ) Obama. You came of age in the Bush years. How old were you when H.W. Bush was elected? You have grown up at the height of the modern conservative movement. The original score was by the John Birch Society. Barry Goldwater was the conductor for the movement. Reagan kept the beat for a while before dementia and then the junior Bush's band played off key and the notes fell flat. You had better get used to the fact that the music that's being played has changed.
By the way the first post on this thread authored by "phil" is not mine. Although I am not in disagreement with that post, I would like to clarify that that phil was not me. That phil was not philling in for me either. I would not go as far as to charge that phil is a phalse phil though.
Posted by: Phil at July 18, 2009 11:29 PMAs always please pheel phree to phind phault phor no other reasan than phun except for Tom Wah Wah who can go phuck himself.
Oops The post I mentioned was Wasn't This Guy Supposed to Be Smart, Moderate, and Temperate? My bad. It's just that they are all so depressingly similar.
Posted by: Phil at July 18, 2009 11:38 PMjoe bernstein,
Posted by: OldTimeLefty at July 18, 2009 11:43 PMCongratulations on your competent cousin. I know of someone who was born of mixed race, raised by a single parent, lived in poor circumstances, won a scholarship to an Ivy League school, was the first black man to serve as editor of a prestigious law review, turned down lucrative job offers to work as a community organizer in a large mid-western city, was elected to the U.S. Senate and became the first black president of the United States; but again, congratulations to your competent cousin.
OldTimeLefty
OTL-I didn't mention it because it wasn't germane,but my cousin also received the Distinguished Flying Cross in Vietnam while flying an A4 for wiping out an enemy force surrounding a Marine infantry unit after his aircraft was hit by over 70 rounds of ground fire.
Posted by: joe bernstein at July 19, 2009 6:21 AMI don't think Obama or most people would've done that,so go F**K OFF with your cheap sarcasm.
My cousin became an officer after being a corporal in the artillery-he had not a college credit at the time.
My military record was much more undistinguished-I was a mechanic in Vietnam.When Obama's programs crash of their own financial irresponsibility,we'll see how competent he's considered.I don't even want to consider foreign policy.
Monique-yes,it's true
Phil-stick to analyzing the left wing-the John Birch Society wouldn't piss on George W.Bush if he were on fire.They strongly opposed his Iraq adventure.
They despise his father also.
Reagan is a different story.
I really liked Barry Goldwater.
OTL-one more thing.DO NOT try to pawn off Obama as sharing any comparable experience to a young inner city Black kid raised by a single parent.
Posted by: joe bernstein at July 19, 2009 12:46 PMFirst off,his mother and father wound up getting married.The father booked.Shame on him.She then remarried an Indonesian and they had a family together of which Obama was a part.What's with the single mother bullcrap?
When things got tough for her,she sent him to the grandparents where he was enrolled in an exclusive school.
Are you following this?He went to college on a sholarship.He was a law review editor that never wrote a major article in it.
It was a hell of an accomplishment for a Black man to get elected President.he knows how to work the crowds.
His record in the Senate is pedestrian.
You like to read off other people here with your smartass remarks,but on this you're so full of crap you ought to move to Fields Point.
He was only a state legislator for a short time, then went to Washington for yet, another short time as a senator, missing many votes. I certainly don't think any of our state delgation is up to the challenge of being the president, they are ruining this state as it is. Just look at our president, not ready for primetime. Our whole country is going down, just like our state, with leadership from the legislature that is clueless.
Posted by: kathy at July 19, 2009 10:13 PMThe need to curtail illegal immigration prompted Congress to enact the Immigration Reform and Control Act (IRCA) of 1986. The IRCA toughened criminal sanctions for employers who hired illegal aliens, denied illegal aliens federally funded welfare benefits, and legitimized some aliens through an amnesty program--EXCEPT THESE LAWS NEVER WERE ENFORCED. The real enigma lies in the wording of the 1986 law? The IRCA toughened--CRIMINAL SANCTIONS--for employers who hired illegal aliens, DENIED ILLEGAL ALIENS FEDERALLY FUNDED WELFARE BENEFITS. Neither the federal government, nor state county have denied most benefits to illegal immigrants.
That is why one state--California--is involved in a monstrous budget deficit? AS Always--Everything in the way of enforcement that actually--WORKS--is either eliminated, tabled or weakened so it was never meant to do the job? That goes for E-verify? But public outrage that fell upon the conspirators in Washington and state capitols, was mollified by the out-reach calls that descended upon them like the demons of hell. E-Verify must be a federal mandated tool, for everybody whose in the workplace. Old-timers and new employees. Otherwise is not going to work correctly?
It's a very simple misleading trick, to add an amendment, or author some other new enforcement tool, to divert the American peoples view of yet another deconstruction of a powerful model to confuse us? America can never have a Universal health care, until we remove illegal immigrants from the system?
Before these morons in the beltway decommission or rescind something, keep the other enforcement law on track. The SAVE ACT is a law, but its already being readied for the scrap heap. The puppets of big business in Washington need to know, that they--WORK--for us--the voters? The NO MATCH letter was never given a chance to work, because the anti-sovereignty groups, the ACLU--raised its ugly head and filed against it in court. In the long run the E-Verify extraction system, backed up by a very large force of ICE inspectors, would soon have the illegal immigrants running to the border, or to board a jet plane home.
That is why Governor Arnold Schwarzeneggerrefuses to sign any legislation for higher taxes, in a collapsing economy that was a financial icon for the whole of America. Bright lights are on at night in the Democratic-Liberal assembly building in Sacramento and has so far failed to pass any budget agreement. I wish them luck as they try to find relieve from the crushing pressure of $24.5 billion dollars, that they have imposed on themselves from the tax and spend politicians that infest the state capitol. City manager Andronovich demonstrated to the people of Los Angeles county, that $11 billion dollars went to underwrite the impoverished, considerable numbers being illegal alien families. ONLY BY CONTACTING YOU SENATOR OR CONGRESSMAN, WILL WE STOP ANOTHER AMNESTY OR ENFORCE E-VERIFY? 202-224-312 NUMBERSUSA, AMERICANPATROL for the raw details.
Posted by: Brittancus at July 19, 2009 10:55 PMjoe
I am shocked, shocked at the vituperative response my comments elicited from you. I was in no way casting aspersions on your cousin. I have one who is still lying in a field in Belgium and a brother in law who sleeps eternally in Italy. I knew both men who gave "to the last measure of their devotion"; one might have shared your views, the other's would be much closer to mine. I do not feel that it is reasonable to offer either man's view as "the real one".
You began by stating that, "we have become enslaved by perception over what is real". On this I will agree with you, but then you imply that your perception is somehow more real than most of the electorate. You might be right, I doubt it, but you might be. However, the burden of proof is on you.
Also, your "by the way, my cousin isn't a professor" might be an interesting comment, but it does nothing to elevate his point of view.
I like you joe. You have some soul. Please calm down a bit. It's much better for your health.
Posted by: OldTimeLefty at July 20, 2009 12:58 PMOldTimeLefty
OTL-my health?ha ha ha-I'm circling the bowl,to be honest-how much worse can it get?Actually I function pretty well,but it's only because I'm too miserable to give in easily.
Posted by: joe bernstein at July 20, 2009 7:12 PMSorry about your relatives.
I know when we were growing up,the idea of a Black president was unheard of.Nice to know it no longer is.
I'm just saying this man's life story wasn't written by Horatio Alger.
I don't know if I have better perception than most of the electorate,but if I do,it's only because I read things,I learn about things before I digress about them,and I don't get my talking points(horrible term)from asswipes on cable tv.
Talk radio is interactive-that's a whole different situation.
If my perception is better,it isn't because I'm some inspired genius,it's just that I took the time to find things out.Even if I'm wrong,I can argue from a rational basis.