What Is Barack Obama?
Roger L. Simon thinks Obama’s deranged, and Roger’s the son of a good psychiatrist, so he knows what he’s talking about. I don’t doubt that our president has his issues–just look at his nutty mother, consider the impact of being abandoned by dad–but I don’t think that just putting Obama on the couch is the best way to understand him.
Put him in the classroom instead. Because he’s the stereotypical American undergrad at a stereotypical Ivy League college in the age of political correctness.
He doesn’t much like America or Americans, or the “former colonial powers” like Britain. Like so many would-be intellectuals, he admires lefty writers and screenwriters and actors and actresses. He likes the downtrodden, like the Palestinians, but he’s overcome with awe for the occasional cool (non-Western) monarch or emperor (whether Arab or Chinese). He probably has a Che tee shirt tucked away in a drawer, don’t you think?
He doesn’t know much history (he thinks Muslims invented printing), geography (his America has 57 states), or economics (he believes you can reduce health care costs by adding millions to the public rolls).
The most important thing to this president is how you feel and what you say, not all those annoying facts (50 states, the Chinese invented printing, and you increase deficits when you spend more). And, like most students, when the debate goes badly for him, the president makes fun of his critics–when he actually lets them talk a little bit. Remember when he hosted a few Republicans in the White House so he could listen to what they might say about health care…and then talked twice as much as they did?
As a typical undergrad, Obama loves to talk, and loves to talk about peace and justice. You know, the really important things. His new nuclear policy is right out of a college bull session: “Why don’t we just promise not to use them?” Nukes are bad, ugly things. Doesn’t everyone agree that the world would be better off without them?
Well, grownups don’t necessarily agree. It all depends how you get there, and what the others do along the way. We do have real enemies, but our undergrad-president understands their ire and shares their pain. It’s up to us to make things right. And so he apologizes, worrying more about our nukes (about which he has done something) than Iran’s (we haven’t done a thing).
Finally, he doesn’t seem to realize what a mess he’s making. And when he gets his grades, he blames the professors (we the people, in this case) for being unfair.
That’s the sort we’ve been graduating for a generation or more, isn’t it? Did you really think we’d never get one as president?
“Because he’s the stereotypical American undergrad at a stereotypical Ivy League college in the age of political correctness.”
That’s only the half of it. These schools have also significantly lowered their academic standards. Inflated grades are the norm. It is very doubtful if Barack Obama could have been an Ivy League student in the pre-affirmative action era. A very high number of soft science credentials awarded by these universities today are more fraudulent than a three-dollar bill. Only a hard science credential should be normally given immediate respect.
“He doesn’t know much history (he thinks Muslims invented printing), geography (his America has 57 states), or economics (he believes you can reduce health care costs by adding millions to the public rolls).”
Barack Obama is not only poorly read and intellectually shallow—he is also a postmodernist. It’s all relative to him. Getting the facts straight is not deemed to be particularly important. Adherence to progressive ideology is what really matters. Postmodernists are inherently intellectually lazy. One only needs to worry about pleasing the zeitgeist. Everything else will fall into place. Chill out and ride the wave of history.
And don’t forget the “Austrian language” and the “3,000% savings” remarks.
I have come to the firm conclusion that the guy is just a front, and can only function with a teleprompter because he has no idea what he’s talking about, regarding any subject, and not only health care (ex: his “answer” to the woman’s simple question about “too much taxes.”)
Fraudulent degrees in the softer disciplines have become the norm at the Ivy League schools. The stuff hit the fan when grades were inflated to accommodate the affirmative actions students in the mid to late 1960s. The white majority students got their piece of the action by no later than 1975. Think about that for a moment. This means that most graduates who are roughly 53 years old or younger possess unearned degrees in the “humanities”. Well to do parents, for all practical purposes, have been able to financially bribe these academic institutions to provide their children with unearned credentials. Don’t take my word for it. Harvey Mansfield openly admits that he feels compelled to give his own students inflated grades. In any other industry—-the participants in similar scam operations would be sent to prison. Barack Obama merely represents the tip of the iceberg.
mr thompson: many of these kids, like Obama himself, are largely abandoned, regardless of social class. the universities take up where the housekeeper leaves off.
That is mildly interesting—but it does not justify giving Barack Obama an obviously fraudulent degree. The man is poorly educated. He has no idea how to think and follow a logical argument. A major university like Harvard is not supposed to make up for the poor home life of its students. Its core mission is to educate students. Other people have the responsibility to be social workers.
mr thompson: it’s worse than that. our best schools are supposed to be educating an elite.
Not just an “elite” but a “marxist elite.”
People keep referring to “liberals” or “leftists” or “radicals” or “progressives” and all that is fine, but it doesn’t get to the key element of all these terms, which is marxism, from heavy metal marxism to marxism light; but mid-19th century marxism is at the core, nonetheless.
Michael, I invite you to contact Ann Coulter, or Ezra Levant, about what happened at the University of Ottawa when Ann was scheduled to speak.
I put it to Ezra in his comments section, that vouchers be the only source of revenue for universities. If people want to go to places where Islamism, and progressive politics, are never put in a poor light, then by all means go to those places like the University of Ottawa, or Concordia College, where the only speech allowed kowtows to the Sons of Allah.
But, if you want to be prepared for the real world, let
those colleges or universities who view political correctness as the worst trick played upon the world by
the worn out funks who are not interested in what Mortimer Adler, C.S. Lewis, Jacques Maritain, Paul Tillich, Martin Buber, Aristotle, Cicero, et al., have to say – let them welcome the more mature.
For, what is political correctness based upon, other than being thin skinned when someone is being candid, and the offended see they don’t measure up?
I am also well aware that the Ivy League schools like Harvard attract the better students. No outright dummies get into their classrooms. A fairly high I.Q. is required even for the worst of the affirmative action students. The sad thing is that when the so-called elite academic institutions go to hell in a hand basket—the second and third tier schools deteriorate to the point of pure madness. The scandalous situation of Detroit public school board President Otis Mathis is a quintessential example. He is a marginal illiterate who cannot read and write at an eighth grade level. And yet, he apparently obtained a bachelors degree from Wayne State University:
http://theblogprof.blogspot.com/2010/03/another-symptom-of-problem-detroit.html
Mr. Ledeen,
Abandonment is a strong depiction of Obama. Yes, his mother sent him to live with his grandparents while she did her thing, but abandoned? His grandparents gave him a loving home, opportunities most young people would envy, and he was given a stable home to grow up in. I don’t know if you have read his first book but if anything, Obama’s predilection to socialism was instilled in him while he was living in Indonesia with his mom and her second husband. He was further indoctrinated at her knee and at the knee of his grandfather in Hawaii. If abandonment has taken place by anyone, Obama has abandoned the country of his birth, America. He has abandoned America and our traditional allies, friends, and our capitalist economic system.
he was abandoned by his father, wasn’t he?
That plays a role. In an earlier post, I mentioned that the contagion has spread. Take a look at this: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/financetopics/financialcrisis/7564598/Fed-boss-Greenspan-says-no-one-saw-the-crisis-coming.-Really.html and the comments dealing with Afghanistan.
Knowing what happened helps, but that is different than what needs to be done to remedy the situation. Right?
It seems to me that his mother did not have much to do with him either!
As an Emeritus Professor of a large Mid-Western public University let me admit that I know a thing or two about grade inflation. However, the issue here (with BHO as the focal point) isn’t so much grade inflation (or, more accurately, the University as the place where students as clients “purchase” or are “granted” a degree) which is undeliable. It’s the fact that higher education, since the mid to late 1960s has become a beehive of radical, marxist ideology. And because of the various “distribution” requirements, this cuts accross both “soft” as well as “hard” sciences and the humanities. This is the informal albeit primary function now of non-religious, private and public Universities. BHO has obtained (if the records would allow some to verify) a “degree” or a “license” to practice as a good and willing “student” under such indoctrination principle.
Unfortunately it is true that hard sciences and engineering are affected also. I was Electrical Engineering, though changed majors after doing all the match and science. Today’s engineers tend to have less math. Computer Science has even less and forget Humanities, they can barely get through HS algebra.
But hey someone in India or someplace can do all the engineering stuff, we don’t have to it.
David, I have to somewhat agree with you. I went to a Liberal Arts school, albeit not IVY League but almost(my initial inclination was Colgate but opted out). The school had a good track record for churning out Dr.s and Lawyers. (BTW I am 53) I started as a pre-med student but finished with a Mathematics degree. Upon leaving school I took a job with a technology firm, now one of the largest (if not the largest) in the IT market.
My point is that upon returning to the school in 1980 and mingling with wome of my former underclassmates, I was besieged with accusations that I was undermining the working class based on my occupation and was a sell-out (by the social science types). You see, I was promoting technology to acquire data and actually control custom machines built decades earlier. (The PC didn’t come on the scene for a couple more years, but we built and sold minicomputers, small controllers, instrumentation and realtime data acquisition systems.
I guess I was responsible for destroying jobs. I thought I was making life easier for scientists and engineers. That was the mindset of my classmates that had majors like sociology and history…I never could understand why I never did well in those courses. My arguments were good, but I guess I don’t drink enough kool-aid.
“I guess I was responsible for destroying jobs.”
You were destroying jobs! Joseph Schumpeter described the process as creative destruction. This is intrinsically the price that must be exacted to increase the wealth of the overall citizenry. The early auto manufacturers did indeed destroy the livelihoods of most people employed in the horse and buggy industry. Nevertheless, these same victims also benefited from the better transportation and lowered prices of goods. That’s life—and we have to work around it.
A hard scientist cannot take a postmodernist approach to the fact that 2+2=4. Frank Lloyd Wright may have pushed the architectural envelope—but he still had to provide substantial evidence that his proposed building were not going to collapse in a major storm. The idiots gravitate toward the softer disciplines. They prefer to avoid the hard work.
College grade inflation comes from high school. I quit one school (teaching English) after being harassed by admin, parents, and students for giving too many B’s (to C writers who had always gotten A’s).
I share your observation, David. So why not have a little sing-along with Mr. O, shall we not, to the tune of a well-known (ahem, to some concerned party may be not so well-known) song by Cole Porter:
What are these things called facts?
These funny things called facts?
Just who could solve their mystery?
Why should they make a fool out of me?
I’ve heard of them one horrible day
They cooked my brain and blew it away.
This piece gave me a bad headache. Does he really not realize the mess he is creating will get us all in trouble? How about his advisers? Are they undergrads too? Maybe they should wake up and tell this undergrad idiot that his mistakes are deadly.
His advisers?
These czars are the ones who are running this country, and they know precisely what they’re doing. He’s just for the TV cameras.
I agree but I was talking about his national security advisers and SecDef Gates. But you’re right. His czars are the one calling the shots.
Thank you Winston; unfortunately, one can’t see any real influence by R. Gates on military or national security issues in this administration.
Don’t call them Czars (or Tsars). Call them what they are -Commissars,exactly like in the old Soviet Union after the Revolution.To anyone familiar with history,especially if you’ve read “The Great Terror” by Robert Conquest, the parallels are cause for worry.Foe every action a professional politician makes,some should ask “but what is the plan if you are wrong ?”
Reminds me of the front person for C+C Music Factory! She wasn’t the actual person singing but she looked good.
What is Barokeydoke?…the poster boy for cognitive dissonance
You are 100% correct about Obama, except that he was already ripe for what he “learned” at University because of his background.
Way before his election, after a short time of listening to him and getting the gist of where he was coming from, I realized he reminded me of one of those loud mouthed self-proclaimed lefty, “Down with The System” know-it-alls of the 60′s who wanted and needed so much attention that they would never shut up — and never mind their having any facts or any exposure ever to any views other than their own mindless repeating of bromides, Mao-isms, and Marx-isms — Yak, yak, yak. They were so ignorant and annoying. That’s who he is.
Yes, in his way, he actually did answer the woman’s question. She asked if this wasn’t a bad time to be adding more tax burdens on to Americans and the economy. If he wanted to be direct, he would have said:
That doesn’t matter to me. Whether our economy is thriving or people are unemployed is of little importance to me. It’s much less important than that we have the first steps to a Nationalized Health Care system — never mind whether it is even good or not — or actually helps people or their health or keeps costs down — what matters is — not even whether it is actually “fair” — but that it has the “appearance” or “seems” fair. The appearance of “fairness” is what matters. And that “I” in my Greatness and Knowing-It-Allness will be credited with bringing it.
So, instead of saying this so directly, he lectured extensively, repeating himself over and over (including making many ridiculous mistakes and errors of fact), on all the wonderful benefits of His healthcare bill, so that the people who are too dumb to “get it” can finally be reasoned with and be “straightened out” by His Wondefulness.
For confirmation that the appearance of “fairness” is what matters, recall what his answer to Charlie Gibson regarding the fact that the Government gets more revenue when taxes are lower — “… raising the Capital Gains tax for purposes of fairness.” Clearly, his personal version of or the appearance of “fairness” trumps all.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WpSDBu35K-8
[Be sure to also listen to the hypocrisy at 1:45 min.]
He’s completely confident that his “ends” justify any means whatsoever — including, certainly, other people’s suffering, and, of course, their sacrifice (excluding his own privileges, of course). Certainly, outright lies and deception are just “necessary” tools in the grand scheme.
It’s the same childish irrationality that governs all his decisions, including National Defense and Foreign Relations (where it becomes a danger to our safety). No doubt, the main thrust of his youth “spiel” was that America was the cause of most of the world’s problems overseas and the same for the American system at home (which is most likely why we’re not allowed to view his University writings). He’s loyal to his own childish unexamined beliefs.
He’s a self-blinded, fuzzy thinking adolescent, ill-informed ideologue.
The reason Yomama took so long to give his non-answer to the lady’s question is – that was 17.5 minutes of interview time in which he did not have to take any other questions.
He probably has a Che tee shirt tucked away in a drawer, don’t you think?
WELL I THINK HE PROBABLEY HAS SOME PANTY HOES AND A GAURDER BELT TUCKED AWAY IN HIS DRAWER’S, IF YOU KNOW WHAT I MEAN [WHICH I THINK YOU DO] LOL
Please stop. I and I believe others here “get” your act. It’s not funny nor even the slightest bit convincing. I realize getting turned down by Media Matters for that job as a monitor of right-wing “hate” sites was a great blow to you , but you need to move on and find another outlet for your misdirected zeal (and negligible abilities as a writer of satire).
WELL ‘MISTER H’ I AND I HAD NO IDEA YOU WEAR A RASTFARIAN MAN
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_and_i
All this frustrated groping about the nature of Obama on PJM begins to sound like The Six Blind Men of Hindustan and the Elephant. Blind Simon, feeling Obama’s hard head, opines that Obama is very like a nut. Blind Ledeen, hearing the sump and slosh of half-digested information inside the head, insists that Obama is very like a sophomore…
Why are Simon and Ledeen and all the rest of us blind? How is it that more than a year into his presidency Obama remains a cypher? The partisan and degenerate academic and media elites who withheld vital information about Obama from the American public need to answer for their sins.
It wasn’t just up to the academic or media ‘elites’ to enlighten the
American public on the history of Barack Obama. The task of outing the
real Obama should have been undertaken by JOHN McCAIN – REPUBLICAN
CANDIDATE FOR PRESIDENT AND THE REST OF THE REPUBLICAN PARTY
ESTABLISHMENT! The media could not have ignored Obama’s past and what it
meant for our future if McCain had made the former community agitator’s
radical background a central theme of his campaign.
Why should the liberal media carry the Republican’s water?
You are right on about McCain. Watching his woeful campaign was like watching a punch drunk boxer paid to take a dive in the secvond round. He did everything he could to throw the election to Obama. By selecting Palin as his running mate, the weapon of “experience” he could use against Obama could now be used against his VP pick. By suspending his campaign, threatening to cancel the debate, and returning to DC to help pass TARP, he looked buffoonish and betrayed his conservative base. He made it verboten to use Obama’s middle name. He made the issue of Obama’s radical past and likely Marxist inclinations inadmissible and claimed that “Obama would make a great president.”
But, I disagree that the liberal media should be left off the hook. During the debates, when McCain called Obama “that one”, the MSM was all abuzz with how this may be a racist code word. In the MSM narrative, Obama’s support was a gorgeous mosaic of a multiculti utopia, whereas McCain’s support was as white as a “Nuremburg rally”. The fix was in. A vote for Obama was to “atone for America’s original sin of slavery” while a vote for McCain was reactionary at best, and at worst racist.
Unfortunately the “race” aspects of this election were terribly real and terribly discriminatory in reverse. I know many white people who considered the choices and voted for Obama. However I don’t know a single black person who really considered McCain or who voted for him – especially among the young black voters who were simply bigots in reverse.
Indeed. For me, one of the low points of the campaign was the joint appearance honoring “service” to community. When McCain noted that Obama’s service as a community organizer was “outstanding”, I wanted to wretch.
The article doesn’t contain one iota of political discussion. What purpose does that below-the-belt attack serve?
Why does it need to be?
The major problem with your analogy is that the Obamanation is quite demonstrably NOT a typical American undergrad. He was born in to a very strange family Muslim Father Communist mother and grandparents. His foundation schooling was done as a Muslim in Indonesia and then he was back in the good old USA being mentored by his Communist grandparents and a very very dubious Black Communist “Uncle”. His (scrupulously HIDDEN)College record is that of an Affirmative Action kid but ALWAYS associating with the seemier students the Muslims the Radicals the COMMUNISTS.
So all in all your article could not be further from the truth if say Obama HIMSELF had written it , just like he wrote his books ……………NOT.
This is an outstanding little article. One can speculate forever about what factors in Obama’s personal history influenced him and in which way. As always, regarding individuals, it’s a speculative and largely futile endeavor. How about: like many millions of people in the West and most of the “elite,” he has a lefty worldview. Simple, true, sufficient. And very dire.
The way to oppose the President is by focusing on his policies not on his personality. The way to ‘figure him out’ is to see the actions he takes. I would take each of these one by one.
As I live in Israel the policy which most disturbs me is his discrimination against Israel, his pressuring it while doing nothing to move the Arab and Islamic world towards any kind of real peace with Israel. He is unrealistic about the whole situation.
Obama’s view of the Israeli/Palestinian conflict is the view of the typical American University sophomore. It is entirely ignorant of the history of these people and the region but rather is formed by what is popular and feels good.
Pointing out the immature mentality of Obama is useful and necessary.
Dear Mr. Freedman,
Excellent point. As annoying as his personality may be, his ideas are far worse and much more important.
For what it’s worth, I apologize to you and your countrymen for the actions of the current occupant of the Oval Office. My only excuse is I voted against him.
Good luck, and may you and your country endure and prosper.
Respectfully,
Jeff Perren
Shalom Freedman @ 9
“The way to oppose the President is by focusing on his policies not on his personality. The way to ‘figure him out’ is to see the actions he takes. I would take each of these one by one. As I live in Israel the policy which most disturbs me is his discrimination against Israel, his pressuring it while doing nothing to move the Arab and Islamic world towards any kind of real peace with Israel. He is unrealistic about the whole situation.”
You are right, and for all that, hopelessly wrong.
Your first two sentences, perfect, the third, a perfect approach, the fourth accurate, a perfect example. Your conclusion: He is unrealistic about the whole situation. Why? Because Obama’s actions will not bring about peace, but more likely war, and quite possibly Israel’s destruction. You’re absolutely right.
So, why are you wrong?
Because his intentions are not what you think they are. Obama wants war, and to see Israel destroyed, and all the actions he has taken so far have been to achieve those ends. When seen in that clear light of truth, Obama is quite realistic about the whole situation.
Cold, calculated, logical, practical, diligent, and with malicious intent, that’s Obama.
Mr. Freedman
For once we are seeing a US president who isn’t 100% in the pocket of AIPAC and their ilk. I realize that this must be painful after being spoonfed and mollycoddled for so many years, being brought up to believe that your country really is in the right.
Well, welcome to the real world where we see a spoilt bully stealing its neighbours’ lands and illtreating the original occupants of where you now live.
The US never was a fair broker when it came to Israel and that is why the US is generally despised worldwide.
The truth hurts, eh.
well, ham, there are some pretty odd views of the “real world” out there, including your nasty stereotype.
I’m not sure what label to put on it, But Obama is clearly acting against the interests of the people of the United States.
He is crippling this nation intentionally.
Barrack Obama is dead on target correct about two things.
There are enough clueless, greedy, ignorant, lazy, mindless and stupid American voters to get him elected.
The vast majority of these creeps still kiss and support his ass. In fact, the odds are that is the way they will think until the day they die.
..well YES
“The vast majority of these creeps still kiss and support his ass.”
Less and less each day actually.
http://www.thenewamerican.com/index.php/opinion/steve-farrell/3266-obama-democrats-and-healthcare-approval-rating-spiral-downward
Speaks volumes that so few of us seemed to notice that this guy was gonna be trouble. We were doomed long before he showed up, but there does appear to be a quickening of the pace, no?
As I read all these comments, I get the distinct feeling that they come from bunch of frustrated (and probably old) white men who just can’t get themselves to accept that America has changed and continues to change as a multi-diementional society with varying ideas to make it a better place for all of us. It is his policies and view of the world that you do not agree with. That is just fine, but questioning his background and making comments such as “communist grand parents”, that is just childish.
“Will”: “a better place”, huh? You’re in for a biiiiiig surprise, babe.
Does calling it childish make it any less true?
Will,
I assume you mean “multi-dimensional”, although “multi-demential” perhaps comes closer to the truth. To me, old and pale as I am, the worst of it is that I live in a country where a majority of my fellow citizens thought this sick little puppy would make a good President. We are Sooooo –.
While we are on the subject, why do you think the easily-discovered communist convictions of the people who changed little Barack’s red diapers are not relevant to his views?
How many degrees of separation is one supposed to have from Frank Marshall Davis, William Ayers, Jeremiah Wright etc in order to be President of the United States? Would it be OK for someone to be President if their daddy had been the grand wombat of the KKK or if they spent lots of time just hangin’ with NAMBLA? Just out of curiosity, how many guys like that do you know? I’m not trying to say that you hangout with anti-american scum, what I’m trying to illustrate is the sheer unlikely hood that someone just happens to know that many anti american scum bags by accident.
Mr. Smith, America was a “multi-diementional society with varying ideas” since the day She was born. We don’t need any more lectures by a phony professor-in-chief, or one of his drones. He is not making a America a “better place for all of us”. He is destroying everything that made us great. As for questioning his background, we have every right to do so. Had journalists done their job in the first place, and had Republicans not cowered before liberal race-baiting, Barack Hussein Obama would not be President today and the country would be trillions of dollars less in debt.
“from bunch of frustrated (and probably old) white men”
Bigot.
Who you calling white?
I’m kind of an ochre color, with pink palms and soles.
Will, Will, Will, you are correct I am an old white guy, well, kind of old. Anyway this old white guy is, along with the young ones, going to vote this rotten apple out of office. So, it is, over. Never again will this happen in this country I can assure you of that.
That would explain why Thomas Sowell, Walter Williams, Larry Elder, Deroy Murdock, Michelle Malkin, et al are so despised by conservatives and libertarians.
Oh, wait! That’s the liberals. Never mind.
Gents, let me start off by saying that I am a middle-aged white man myself. So your bigot, racist name calling does not stick. Secondly, just because someone has a different view of making this country better, does not necessitate the relentless questioning of his patriotism. Fact of the matter is that majority of Obama haters (tea partiers, birthers, etc.) are older, male and white. If someone has a different data on that please share it with the rest of us.
OMG, you hit the nail on the head. I especially liked this part: “Finally, he doesn’t seem to realize what a mess he’s making. And when he gets his grades, he blames the professors (we the people, in this case) for being unfair.” Except you left out that the professors are not only unfair but don’t know as much as he does (I’ve actually heard students say that to their profs when they were upset about a poor mark).
One other thing: Obama, like much of the generation of college students this decade and last, has immense self-esteem based on nothing. Not hard work, not accomplishment, but a life-time of being told how wonderful they are.
Laura @ 14
“I especially liked this part: ‘Finally, he doesn’t seem to realize what a mess he’s making’.”
I’m afraid Obama realizes very well what a mess he’s making. Please see my reply @ 9.
This article seems to absolve Obama of the responsibility for his actions, as in “he’s too dumb.”
I think this article – written by a psychiatrist – says it better, and hold him directly responsible for his barbaric behavior:
http://www.americanthinker.com/2010/04/the_rape_of_america_1.html
Is Obama stupid, naieve, misled, etc? Not a bit. This is a well planned attack on our way of life. Next time, VOTE!!!!!
Michael Ledeen & others – I would beg to differ. POTUS is not deranged; he is simply anti-American. Don’t you think attending the “Reverend” Wright’s church for 20 years didn’t affect him? Don’t you think paling around with the like of Lew Ayres’ & Bernardine Dohrn didn’t reveal his true colors? Dosn’t having a Palestinian Arab who is anti-Israel cue you in to this POTUS’ true inner feelings? No, not deranged, but someone who will ultimately derange the West. We have a tough 2 and one-half years ahead.
For the sake of accuracy, Obama’s terrorist pal is Bill Ayers. Lew Ayres
was the hollywood actor who starred in the 1930 version of ‘All Quiet on
the Western Front’. Good movie (now somewhat dated) and a great book.
Now if he were impeached and thrown out of office in 2011….
Correction – It should have been Bill Ayres, not Lew Ayres.
Ayers.
I can only think of three reasons for ‘the smartest President ever”s college transcripts and test scores to not be revealed:
1)Mediocre grades, at least clearly not worth him getting pulled from Occidental up into the big leagues (which would then scream AA — or reveal grade inflation at the Ivies).
2)Pretty good grades in known softball courses.
3)A transcript loaded to the hilt with embarrassingly hard-left courses (postmodernism, marxist this-and-that, third world studies, african-american studies etc), perhaps with a fondness for the most radical profesors on campus.
Ah, but you forget the most important tidbit I’d love to see from his college records: that little box you check if you are an American citizen. Note that I do not even need to broach the subject of where he was born. I’d just like to see, given all the uncertainty about possible change of or dual citizenship, what HE said he was.
Chuck
Barry Soetero was admitted into Occidental as a foriegn student. He is either guilty of felony fraud or not eligible for POTUS.
ALBATROSS:
Very befitting name. Obama should adopt it.
I for one never thought he was well spoken or intelligent.
he actually comes off like a bully and/or thug depending on who is in front of him. he cannot even control his ugliness
that was just a main stream media myth …propagated by the likes of John McCain and other RINO’s who were to PC to call a spade a spade.
great essay Michael
Obama has been very perceptive, consciously or unconsciously, in one key area. He has stumbled on to the realization that his very emptiness, his lack of depth or substance, is a positive virtue in the world he has chosen to live. Essentially he has realized that he is not a person but a “vessel” that those around him can fill with their individual hopes and desires and see reflected in him what they want to see. As a biracial leftist with a pleasing exterior and compelling backstory he is whatever his progressive allies in the media, the universities and the entertainment world want him to be. Facts mean nothing and his acolytes have been very candid that the normal rules that apply to any discussion of a political leader most emphatically do not appy to Obama. In a way it’s like the “Monty Python” sketch where a couple lives in an apartment building which is really the figment of someon else’s imagination. It only stays up if you continue to believe in it.
Your statement — that Barack Obama is an empty vessel into which people pour their own hopes and dreams — was precisely the point that I was making to people during the 2008 campaign and after the election. I noticed the disturbing trend of people who should have known better (such as the commentator Juan Williams) beginning their sentences with, “When I look at Barack Obama . . .” The actual person is evanescent; in fact, the best way to consider him is as a Shape-Shifter, who becomes what the observer wants him to become.
You are still missing the point. It doesn’t matter who Obama is any
more than it mattered who Charlie McCarthy was. What matters is who
the ventriloquist is; who writes the script for his teleprompter;
who’s behind the curtain pulling the levers.
Obama’s election is the biggest political scam in our history. He’s
winning his fight for power because too many are looking at him and not
at the ones who put him there.
“…And when he gets his grades, he blames the professors (we the people, in this case) for being unfair.”
Solid B+. Even without the affirmative action.
I think his formal education is an incident of his political career, not its driver. At the current pace of transformation, 18 months from now we will all look back and clearly see that the purpose of Obama’s policies was to restructure America, or to put her almost irrevocably on the path of restructuring. They know they cannot change America in 4 or 8 years, but they radically advance the project. I think it takes far too much expertise for us to be able to credit them with ignorance on the strategic effect his policies will have. I appreciate the comparison with the typical undergraduate & etc. but honestly I think that’s not much more than a convenient cover. Just my opinion.
By the way, I never really realized how snide and vindictive Obama basically is until recently. He’s kind of a dick, isn’t he?
I don’t disagree with the article, except to note that Obama has been billed, repeatedly, as a really smart guy.
Why hasn’t this supposedly really smart guy learned from his mistakes — including the mistakes highlighted by the campaign season, when his associations and off-the-cuff dismissals of capitalism were what told most heavily against him? Why does he continue to put forward socialist ideologues, with backgrounds that confirm their anti-American bias, for high and important positions?
Could it be that he isn’t really that smart?
Mr porretto, you got it baby.
Bingo! You are starting to get it. Barack Obama obtained a fraudulent degree from Harvard. This is no big deal. Unearned soft science credentials are the norm at our nation’s so-called finest universities.
No one who can believe Karl Marx is that bright.
“Why hasn’t this supposedly really smart guy learned from his mistakes — including the mistakes highlighted by the campaign season, when his associations and off-the-cuff dismissals of capitalism were what told most heavily against him? Why does he continue to put forward socialist ideologues, with backgrounds that confirm their anti-American bias, for high and important positions?”
He doesn’t see these as “mistakes”, except for the campaign slip-ups like Joe the Plumber’s “spread the wealth” moment. That was a slip-up in that it exposed where he was coming from before he was in power. Now that he’s been elected the only thing that matters is getting as much “spread the wealth” legislation and policies passed as possible in the belief that it can’t or won’t be undone. Obamacare had nothing to do with healthcare costs; it was about making sure that everyone has health care that doesn’t factor in capitalistic principles like risk and reward, it will wind up costing more or result in rationing. Cap and trade has nothing to do with energy policy or even environmental policy. Polluting companies will just move to China or India with worse consequences for the global environment. Cap and trade is mostly concerned with moving wealth from the developed world to the third world. These would only be mistakes if he was worried about being reelected, I don’t think reelection is as important to him as ideology.
it will get worse
I knew a kid like Barrack who would screw up every task assigned to him just so no one would ask him to do anything again.
Darkest before the dawn. America has been lazy and complacent. Obama is the wake-up call for people to engage – I pray.
I’ll bet Air Force One has a COEXIST sticker on the bumper.
That glow on the horizon isn’t sunrise. It’s the glow of the cities that will burn when the parasites get told “the rich” have no more money for them to steal.
But, at least we know that Barry has excellent self-esteem. And that, of course, is more important than knowledge or wisdom.
#13 Will Smith says: “that America has changed and continues to change as a multi-diementional society” “a multi-diementional (sic) society”. Kind of says it all, doesn’t it?
That’s kinda what I thought. From a melting pot to a centrifuge. LOL
I disagree with all of you ! He’s a genius !
WE JUST WON THE WAR ! Obama has just ordered “Islam” and “islamic extremism/radicalism” to be DELETED from the next document about national security.
WAM !
He wiped off our enemies !
They have disappeared !
A genius !
/sarc
13. Will Smith,
Ah, I see you are an Obama Zombie. The undead giveaway was the way you slowly shuffled over your keyboard and coughed up the word “multi-diementional.” I also loved the way you moaned and stammered ghoulishly about how remarks on his grandparents’ communist leanings are “childish.” It would be childish were it not for the fact of his grandparents’ communist leanings. Now, stumble along and rot elsewhere.
Michael, your article shows that in your heart you are still an idealist. Remember the Dutch movie director, who told his killer “Can we discuss this?” Comrade Obama cannot be changed by “education” – he is not 16 years old. His views of the world may be childish, but his determination is the one of an adult (the image of a suicide bomber comes to mind). You cannot persuade him, you cannot reason with him, you cannot change his mind. Obama is the force of nature – and he cannot be schooled in Austrian economic theories or Biblical Truth.
i love it when you talk dirty. actually i don’t expect to change his mind, i’m just fighting for my own soul.
Article is spot on. Thanks to the zombie GOP party we got this jerk for POTUS. I’m holding out hope that the country has not completely gone daft. (maybe we’ll see some reason and responsibility in the upcoming national election) Maybe the pubbies will come to their senses enough to run an actual candidate in 2012 instead of an old fool. I have not completely given up hope but if we continue on this path after 2010 and then 2012 I’m going to join the first decent secession movement that gets going in Texas. I won’t be rebelling against the US. It won’t be America any more if the Left continues in power. It isn’t really America any more as it is.
For the 1000th time we get to hear David Thomson rant about Ivy League Humanities degrees. I wonder where the smart people actually DO go now.
Who was our last Ivy League President? Hmmm, GWB.
Is Barack Obama a flawed human being? For sure. But what we are completely lacking here is any kind of balanced analysis. What are his strong points and weak points (after one year) when compared to Carter, Reagan, Bush I, Clinton, and GWB? Instead we get mindless bluster. What we hear essentially is, I know that I hate him, and here is my latest creative reason.
Here’s why I hate him:
-He won’t use drones or surges to kill the enemy.
-He refuses to even consider nuclear or new drilling.
-The only people he appoints to his cabinet are radicals like Bill Ayers and Rev Wright.
– He won’t take on teacher’s unions or problems in under-achieving black culture.
-He is an embarrassment to the country when he opens his mouth, much worse than GWB or Palin in just the ignorant way he sound.
I hate him, I hate him, I hate him. He is the worst President EVER!!!
Oh gosh, I am guilty as sin. We must repeatedly point out the lowered academic standards in the softer disciplines since no later than 1975. Many Americans are unaware of this fact—and that is a major reason why they naively voted for Barack Obama. Needless to add, George W. Bush also attended Harvard and that helps explain his infatuation with big government solutions.
My real schooling started on Paris Island – where all the childish stupid was knocked out of me. Besides clearing my thinking, the experience left me able to detect BS from great distances – I had Obama pegged as a Junior Senator.
Later I was in the Army. I used to get new Radio Operators – us NCO’s had to knock sense into them quick and hard so they didn’t kill themselves and me.
Now I work in an office and have summer interns to (more figuratively) knock sense into. Working for a living isn’t as sexy as academia. (And these are motivated engineering and finance students)
Unfortunately, Obama never had a father, NCO, or boss who knocked the stupid out of him. Instead, the Ivy League schools, leftist activists, and half the American electorate encourage and reward idiocy.
Old Soldier, you nailed it. In 40 yrs. of driving truck I learned early on that stupid mistakes are not easily forgiven I’m afraid Dear Leader will soon learn the same.
Please be there in New York on May 14, 2010 . Lets start the process of “taking America back”.
http://atlah.org/atlahworldwide/?p=7196
http://www.TeaPartyRevolution.com
http://www.TeaPartyExpress.com
The reason Obama does not love this country or thinks like everyday run of the mill American is he was brought up in a foreign country(Indonesia)up to the age of ten or so. These are the important formative years when one forms biases based on the surrounding social and family structure. Did Indonesia ever like or love US , and specially at the time when Obama spent his formative years there??? I don’t think so. Muslim culture embedded in his mind can’t simply be obliterated by becoming a Christian(and that too with Rev. Wright) later in life for political expediency!! This very well explains his behavior towards Muslims, and Muslim Kings(bowing), loving the sounds of Quran call in the morning, removing any reference to religion(Islam) while our diplomats talk about terrorism, pressuring Israel and India to “give in” to Palestinian and Pakistani demands respectively(notice the Islamic thread in both Pakistan and Palestinians), unilaterally announcing not to use a nuclear option even if we are attacked by WMDs(excluding nuclear) and on and on.
Getting educated at Ivy schools and then spending 20 years with Rev Wright will certainly do wonders to somebody’s anti-American thoughts. Obama’s actions and policies are very well explained by this theory!!!
By trying to analyze Obama, you are missing the point. He is an Avatar/Surrogate/puppet of a constellation of leftists who could not get elected on their own, among them:
white street-agitating communists like Bill Ayers
Afro-Maoists like Rev Wright
Race hustlers like Sharpton
Radical Islamists
One world global governance UN apparatchiks
Socialist EUrotrash bureaucrats
Ecofascist environmentalists
Obama is the best Manchurian candidate ever to bring down this country. By virtue of his being half-black, anyone who criticizes his policies will be marginalized as a “racist”, a label akin to being called a heretic in the middle ages.
I think you have hit it right on the head. We reap what we sow as the old maxim tells us and perhaps after the American public has had their fill of Obama’s cake, we can return to having the adults run things again.
Congratulations Will Smith, In your first sentence you manage to establish that you are both ageist and racist. Before one attempts to communicate even vapid thoughts, one should at least learn to construct his words correctly. Signed: A frustrated, “dimensional”, old, white man.
Finally, he doesn’t seem to realize what a mess he’s making.”
Sorry… that statement is simply incorrect, on every level. Not only does he realize it… he actually revels in it, and depends upon the mess he is making. It is his intended legacy for this nation for which he has no respect. Trust me, there are no cataracts covering his eyes, or wax deposits drowning his oversized ear drums!!!! And clearly no American hands stuffing cotton down his throat.
With Obama’s multitude of lies and ludicrously mistaken statements, there is no need to drag out the old “57 states” item. First of all, here is what he said during the campaign:
“Over the last fifteen months, we’ve traveled to every corner of the United States. I’ve now been in 57 states, I think — one left to go. Alaska and Hawaii I was not allowed to go to … my staff could not justify it.”
So if you take it literally, it’s 58 (one left to go) or 60 (57 + “one left to go” + Alaska and Hawaii). But the bottom line is that he was referring to a total of primaries and caucuses, which do exceed 50. Obviously it was a mistaken statement, and he was probably exhausted at the time. But I don’t think it’s any fairer to use it than to claim that Bush thought that “misunderestimate” was a word, when he undoubtedly must have started to say “misjudge” or some other “mis-” word, changing in mid-word to “underestimate”.
So let’s choose other Obama quotes that are more interesting and fairer. Many to choose from that are not just verbal mistakes but more seriously lies and evidence of derangement. My “favorite”, that was ignored during the campaign, was when he was pitifully trying to establish credibility as an achiever. He referred to a Senate Banking Committee sanction against Iran, calling it “my committee”. Guess what — he wasn’t the chair — he wasn’t even on the committee!
The problem, as I see it from the cf bleachers, is not that Obama isn’t intelligent. He seems to be able to retain information and he has a skill at persuasiveness (albeit, one that dissipates with overexposure).
He can grasp certain issues and bull session on them with an oratorical flair.
What I think Michael is saying (I don’t deem to speak for him, he’s eloquent enough on his own…but, rather…what my interpretation of the essay means) is that Obama has been not educated in the classical sense, he’s been indoctrinated in the post 60′s hippie dippy weatherman sense.
The difference between education and indoctrination rears its ugly head repeatedly, in the manner in which virtually every issue in modern America is filtered through our corrupt entrenched media. I call it the morning bagel approach.
Apply first heat, then smear.
Rather than seriously engaging in a thoughtful processing of information, the “indoctrinaires” and their one note choir…simply rage with fire at ANY opposition to their playbook, and then smear the opponent with distortions and innuendo.
Obama is their invention. Dr. Frankenhope. The multicultural, raised by CPUSA wolves, lived abroad, views religion as an artifact and a tool, ivy pedigreed, able to leave a soundbite in a single bound…super-candidate.
He is their Madison Avenue creation, slick packaging, placed on the throne and exalted…not as a person…but as an ideal. The human golden calf. The first King of the United States since Garfield Goose.
It’s not him, it’s the idea of him…that fills their hearts and tingles their legs.
He is the effect…beware the cause.
We want to see the grades, the financial info, the papers written, ALL OF IT…there is a damm good reason it’s being kept under lock and key..isn’t there….why wouldn’t the worlds “smartest” black man want us all to see his staggering thought process while in the Ivy League …..?????…..I’ll tell you why..like i have to..he is a dyed in the wool Marxist….he would NEVER have even been elected to the Senate if those papers were disclosed..never…this cover-up is so massive…i just want to hurl
Dr. Ledeen,
I fear that your explanation of Barack Obama is far too benign. Most intelligent people approaching 50 have long since left behind the mindset of a college co-ed. If you seek an explanation for Obama’s conduct in office,I suggest you think of the historical role-model with which you are so familiar in the Iranian context: the revolutionary.
The fundamental attribute of the revolutionary is that he wants to take over the government he hates of his own country in order to use the state power to further the (revolutionary) ends which motivate him and which are generally completely at odds with the ends of the ancien regime. By definition, the successful revolutionary, once in power, will define the interests of the country he leads in ways different – often even antithetical – from the definition of national interests which will have guided the ousted regime. The negative examples are clear: the foreign and domestic policies of Robbespierre, Lenin, Mao and Khomeini were totally at odds with those pursued, respectively, by Louis XVI, the Romanoffs, The Kuomintang and the last Shah of Iran.
On the up-side, Presidents Vaclav Havel and Lech Walesa defined their countries’ national interests in ways diametrically opposed to those of the previous Communist regimes. The same will likely be true of the new regime in Iran, if the current revolution there succeeds and Ahmadinejad ends his career hanging by his heels from a lampost. (Ken, Yehi ratzon!)
Don’t be deceived by the fact that Obama got into office through constitutional elections. So did Hitler and Moussolini. But they used their power to destroy the prior constitutional order. (If il Duce had been as thorough about it as Hitler, he wouldn’t have been deposed in 1943!). Obama can’t destroy the constitutional order in the United States, but he brings the revolutionary’s mindset to his office, and that mindset will impell him to use his office to remake America according to his ideology to whatever extent he can get away with.
Uzi, you hit the nail on the head!
Wow! That is an unbelievably accurate assessment of of Obama and the situation we have gotten ourselves into here in the US.
Obama’s race exacerbates the situation. Thomas Sowell recently quoted a black Ivy League graduate as saying: “Being a black student nowadays is to be praised extravagantly for the most inconsequential accomplishments.”
That explains Obama’s monumental ego.
There is really nothing radically new about our President. He follows in the footsteps of the Democratic Party. His foreign policy doesn’t seem radically different from that of Bush. His domestic policy is traditional Democratic claptrap. Clinton had a health plan. The regulatory regime is not new. You can read the future in the latest book by James Kenneth Galbraith or if you prefer in that of his father the famous and fatuous John Kenneth Galbraith. James has written a book entitled The Predator State. In it he propose national planning, wage and price controls, income redistribution and much more. If you think that this is simply one individual’s radical opinion, on the back jacket the book is highly recommended by the Nobel Prize winning Joseph Stiglitz, the former secretary of labor Robert Reich, and even the former conservative Michael Lind (to cap a climax). These proposals have been the stock in trade of the Democratic Party throughout the last century. The only difference is that the American People have voted in such a way as to cripple, perhaps forever, the Republican Party so that the Democrats will now try out their ideas. They tried when Mondale ran in 1984; they tried with Clinton until he was cut short in 1994; the way is clear now. President Obama has the Democratic Party behind him and is enacting what their economic theorists have been preaching since Wesley C. Mitchell, John Maurice Clark, and Thorstein Veblen. As a matter of history Adam Smith was arguing against the Democratic Party ideas in 1776. The book “The Wealth of Nations” is an argument against Mercantilism (or government control) which was the reigning ideology of his day.
Albatross & Will Smith:
Your reactions to the above article confirms what I have observed:
If you want to anger a conservative – lie to them.
If you want to put a democrat/liberal/socialsit/progressive into a full blwn hissy fit – tell them the truth.
Dr. Ledeen, this description of POTUS the spoiled brat college student is close to the money. I have seen a lot of Ivy League students behaving as you describe.
But even more accurate: BHO is more like a professor who now has control, power and cannot be fired.
Think–>Faculty politics.
And I have known a ton of faculty like this guy, naive and collegial until you cross them, then vindictive and a long memory without mercy. The foolishness of Bertell Ollman and a vicious mind lined with long knives.
That is my theory. What do you thin? Better?
I for one 100% believe obama is the biblical anti-christ of Revelation. The anti-christ will control most of the world, he will control transportation, the media, medical care, he will have his thugs watch the citizens 24 ours a day. banking, the food industry, he will rule education, housing, he will decide who lives and dies by his obamacare program. he will control ever aspect of our lives from the time we get up in the morning until we go to sleep at nighthe will make deals and treaties with almost every other country in the world he will finally become the one who strongarms the other countries to take control of their countries(through the UN) he won’t be able to trust his own government so he will rule by the authority of the UN & NATO. do you see the pattern here yet?
Obama is not evil enough to be the “antichrist”, or at least he is not good enough at evil. But he certainly could be the forerunner or the catalyst that paves the way for the true Beast.
My 2 cents worth – the true Antichrist will be the first leader of the third Caliphate, which has yet to be created. But its creation is inevitable regardless of Obama. Obama’s influence is only on the exact timing and sequence of events.
Smart people tend to become academic liberals. Therefore, if you are an academic liberal, you are a smart person. Obama is an academic liberal. Therefore, he is a smart person.
If this seems logical to you, you may be an academic liberal.
That sounds suspiciously like this fallacy: I am a reasonable person, therefore anyone who disagrees with me is unreasonable.
Mr. Ledeen, a very perceptive essay! And many of these comments in response are on point as well. I also wouldn’t choose “deranged” as adequately descriptive of Obama’s mental aberrations in his lack of comprehension of reality — I do think, however, that he fits quite well the criteria for being assessed as “narcissistic” and further as “sociopathic.” On that last score, the key proof characteristics are that there’s the fact he’s utterly devoid of shame at his multiple serial lies and he’s completely cold toward any particular individual human beings he meets (and especially toward those who disagree with his political views and objectives). Individuals are useful to Obama only as props for his rhetorical case or as political tools. He displays his “compassion” only for the massed collective of faceless humanity, and that only in the abstract and as a method of gaining the upper hand politically. But then, as you say, Obama is merely an extreme exemplar of the kind of mis-educated Leftist turned out by Ivy League schools — that was serendipity that his malformed psychology matched up so well with the malformed Leftist politics rewarded in the Big U higher education system.
LOL, Senator Blutarsky!
If only Obama had read the plaque at the bottom of the statue of Emil Faber, “Knowledge is Good” and then tried to live by it to even a small degree…
When he gets his grades he blames the professors??? A+ is bad?? Tell me where a college professor today will give him the deserved F and I will send my kids there.
The contagion has spread: http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20100407/gadhafi_stopover_100407/20100407?hub=QPeriod
Would you expect anything different?
Little Barry’s “education” didn’t start at the undergrad level. You know the story he loves to tell about his mother getting him up at 4:30am to teach him about America before he went off to his Indonesian school? I can just imagine what red diaper baby Stanley Ann Dunham Obama Soetero had to say on that subject. No doubt it was right out of Zinn’s People’s History (which, yes, I know, hadn’t been published yet, but you get my drift). And then mom handed him over to grandpa who handed him over to Frank Marshall Davis. By the time he got there, he was well groomed for the life of an Ivy League undergrad.
“We do have real enemies”
Dear Michael, in fact, America’s real enemies ARE in the White House!!!
Michael, the Obama’s blind administration won’t stop Iran or any other rogue states from pursuing nukes.But it will accelerate the proliferation of other weapons of mass destruction. This blind mad administration is indeed increasing international instability and the risks of future conflicts, because, “without the deterrence making conflict more likely.”
This blind administration should understand that the real fight is to stop the real weapons of mass destruction from falling into the hands of evil regimes. The Nuclear Bombs now available in Pakistan, India and other countries starting in the Nuclear Weapons playing field. The nuclear capability of Pakistan could be taken over by the Taliban and Al-Qaeda.
Iran is developing secretly nuclear weapons and threatening to use them against the USA and Israel which most likely “that dirty weapons will be into hands of the terrorist group.”
This stupid administration should understand that the neutral opportunists (Russians and Communist Chinese), seek to marginalize the United States and its allies. The Russians continue to build ever more advanced ballistic nuclear missiles, supply Iran with the necessary technology and expertise to develop such weapons so that destruct the United States and also to wipe Israel from the map. Moreover, the Russian bear continues to build malignant alliances overseas with your regional adversaries like “Chavez of Venezuela, Castro of Cuba and other of enemies of America in Latin continent”, and also with Israel adversaries in the Middle East such as Syria, and even they building alliances with your very close allies in the Middle East whose are in the same time are your ” underground enemies” as “Saudi Arabia, UAE”.
((This Eccentric President is risking in the U.S. National Security and signaling a weakness of America to its enemies.))
My dear friends, Can you support please?! PLEASE VOTE for the New7Wonders of Nature. Thank you!
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God Helps the USA!!!
Jassem Othman, was/Syrian, the land of Holocaust, Poland.
Ledeen, you are a commie yourself so your criticisms ring hollow. Its typical that your criticism of Obama would come in the one area that he is not growing the government.
“We do have real enemies”
Dear Michael, in fact, America’s real enemies are in the White House!!!
the Obama’s blind administration won’t stop Iran and other rogue states from pursuing nukes.But it will accelerate the proliferation of other weapons of mass destruction. This blind mad administration is indeed increasing international instability and the risks of future conflicts, because, “without the deterrence making conflict more likely.”
This blind administration should understand that the real fight is to stop the real weapons of mass destruction from falling into the hands of evil regimes. The Nuclear Bombs now available in Pakistan, India and other countries starting in the Nuclear Weapons playing field. The nuclear capability of Pakistan could be taken over by the Taliban and Al-Qaeda.
Iran is developing secretly nuclear weapons and threatening to use them against the USA and Israel which most likely “that dirty weapons will be into hands of the terrorist group.”
This stupid administration should understand that the neutral opportunists (Russians and Communist Chinese), seek to marginalize the United States and its allies. The Russians continue to build ever more advanced ballistic nuclear missiles, supply Iran with the necessary technology and expertise to develop such weapons so that destruct the United States and also to wipe Israel from the map. Moreover, the Russian bear continues to build malignant alliances overseas with your regional adversaries like “Chavez of Venezuela, Castro of Cuba and other of enemies of America in Latin continent”, and also with Israel adversaries in the Middle East such as Syria, and even they building alliances with your very close allies in the Middle East whose are in the same time are your ” underground enemies” as “Saudi Arabia, UAE”.
((This Eccentric President is risking in the U.S. National Security and signaling a weakness of America to its enemies.))
My dear friends, Can you support please? PLEASE VOTE for the New7Wonders of Nature. This Passover-Vote for the Dead Sea “The Jewish Agency for Israel”. Thank you.
http://www.new7wonders.com
God Helps the USA!!!
Jassem Othman, was/Syrian, Poland.
Smart academic liberals make terrible presidents.
“55. Dave H
Smart people tend to become academic liberals. Therefore, if you are an academic liberal, you are a smart person. Obama is an academic liberal. Therefore, he is a smart person.
If this seems logical to you, you may be an academic liberal.”
I don’t trust anybody who presents himself as wearing a halo. I see the Obama campaign of 2008 to be classic imperialism where Americans are portrayed as the “natives” and Obama portrayed as a god coming out of the heavens. It was bad enough in “Triumph of the Will”. We don’t need a sequel to that movie.
I think President Obama is a bigot. And he is now forcing the rest of the world to react to his shallowness and his blatant racism. I also regard him as culturally Indonesian. I see him as contemptuous of American culture.
Barack Hussein Obama is culturally Muslim. His father was a Muslim. His stepfather was a Muslim. He grew up Muslim. If he were honest about that, that’s one thing. But he wasn’t. Saying the word “Hussein” was portrayed in 2008 as “Islamophobic”. Excuse me, but Hussein is Barack Obama’s middle name. There is nothing wrong with that, but if he wanted to reassure people about being Christian, he could have changed his name to a Christian name. He didn’t.
I don’t see President Obama as a “typical undergraduate”. Far from it. Most undergraduates aren’t like him at all. No, Barack Obama comes from a certain subculture of obsequious toadies who take the left-handed path to power – usually a bachelor’s degree in political science and a law degree peppered with telling professors what they think the professors want to hear. These are the kinds of people who want power but lack the maturity to use it wisely. Such students generally monopolize student organizations, especially student government. Barack Obama appears to be a Marxist version.
One of the sad fates of political science professors is to see undergraduates like Barack Obama. But please! Most undergraduates are nothing like this. Many undergraduates go into engineering, science, or the fine arts. Even in the social sciences, some students try to learn facts first and theory later – they often gravitate toward the history department.
So, sir, please don’t put undergraduates into the same basket! Little Fausts can be spotted a mile away, and leftist Faustians are no exception.
Those who want to use power responsibly need to pace themselves. Getting too much power too soon can lead one to act like a Sorceror’s Apprentice, and that is never good. It’s better to get power a little at a time to gain the maturity and judgment necessary to handle the responsibility. Handling power isn’t easy, but it can be done with practice. One shouldn’t be too proud to ask for help, but beware of those who would use your authority to push their own agendas unless, of course, you tacitly approve their agendas.
It is a mantra on the Left to attack American imperialism but act as though no other imperialism exists in the world. Is Venezuelan imperialism really an improvement? Russian imperialism? Chinese imperialism? Iranian imperialism? Saudi imperialism? Indonesian imperialism? Aztec imperialism? Think about it. Whatever leftists say about America, the United States has served as an empire of liberty, and that is much better than an empire of tyranny.
We should be honest about ourselves, neither succumbing to mindless triumphalism nor mindless self-flagellation. More than being merely an ideal as President Obama would claim, the United States of America is a reality with real people. We should not embrace the ideal espoused by Benito Mussolini that the nation is a construct of the state – and that our people can be gerrymandered to become whatever the Leader decides for us.
After the uprising of the 17th of June
The Secretary of the Writers Union
Had leaflets distributed in the Stalinallee
Stating that the people
Had thrown away the confidence of the government
And could win it back only
By redoubled efforts. Would it not be easier
In that case for the government
To dissolve the people
And elect another?
Bertolt Brecht wrote this poem in 1953. He was a Marxist playwright. Yet, I think he has something to say to us now, especially about amnesty for illegal immigrants.
Dr. Ledeen:
Why should we think that Ivy League schools are the best schools? Maybe they aren’t.
Perhaps the natural elite is not necessarily attracted to the most elitist schools, but rather to the best education. Elitist schools attract those who seek power at the expense of legitimacy. Yet, the best education seeks legitimacy toward which power will gravitate.
The school that sets the model creates the elite. Where are the model schools?
To find the natural elite, we need to widen the pool of leadership we are willing to consider for high offices. Relying upon a small group of groomed leaders from elite academies can lead to promoting men such as St. John Philby and his son Kim.
So, what should be the education for the next generation’s elite?
China doesn’t have an emperor. Obama bowed to Emperor Akihito of JAPAN.
Danger!
I was tired of the “Bush is stupid, he’s a sock puppet for Rove” for eight years. Please don’t go there again.
I did not think it was true for Bush and I don’t think it is true for Obama.
Yes the advisors have more or less power depending on the interest and focus of the president at any given time. But I don’t yet believe that a hollow suit can be elected to the presidency.
Chris: I think I understand your sentiment, but please how much more proof do you need to see and realize that the O is either: a) willfully ignorant of what he is doing to our nation, which means he IS an empty suit being lead by Soros and his gang, b) masterfully brilliant but determined to destroy our nation and force marxism on us all, or c) both. It has to be one of the three and I am betting on c.
I think Ledeen is right on target here. I have a doctoral degree from an Ivy and teach at a public university, and Obama reminds me of some of the Ivy undergrads I dealt with when I was a teaching assistant, as well as many of the undergrads I now teach. I suggest that Obama’s education has convinced him that ‘construction’ is all. What matters is not real world conditions but solely how we ‘construct’ them. This may account for Obama’s inordinate love of talking rather than acting. He’s learned that the guy who spins things best wins. This approach often does carry the day in graduate seminars but fails massively in dealing with most of the major issues facing an American president today. Note that Obama only talked about bipartisanship–it sounded good in 2008–but had no idea, once in office, about how to make it happen. His first year will be labeled a year of total failure by historians. His skills are forensic, not substantive. He does not understand the art of the deal, and that makes him a largely incompetent president.
One thing Obama is not correct about and that is that working Americans who pay most of the taxes like me (not the 47% parasites / leeches who don’t pay any taxes and still manage to get refunds even though they don’t pay anything to begin with) will revolt and quit working hard (I’m considering it now – either through taking disability or getting myself laid off so I can become a parasite too and collect unemployment and help collapse the system sooner). I hear many doctors will retire earlier than planned if Obama care isn’t repealed or massively revised. The idiots who passed this stupid economy destroyer haven’t gotten the math to add up how with the current doctor / nurse shortage, with more “boomers” retiring and requiring more care, adding 20 million new uninsured into the system will make health care not get any worse and actually will cost less. This is just more of the democrat / government super Ponzi scheme (e.g., social security) to push the exploding social security deficits / debt off a few years so they can continue to rob from the American people and flow our wealth to their liberal causes (forcing now our great grand kids and their children into indebtedness for their illegal and immoral actions).
Michael,
I’d say this was right on the bull’s-eye. May I add one more contemporary Ivy undergrad point of view shared by our President? He exhibits has a : complete unfamiliarity with and disdain for the military as an institution, servicemen (except as victims), military history, military culture and military values. For them, a service member is no different than a bus driver or garbage collector. He’s just a guy in a uniform who (from their perspective) does a low class, unfamiliar and unpleasant task to make them comfortable. It’s sort of the same view that Prof. Gates had of Sgt. Crowley.
Regards,
MarcH
Excellent Michael…kind of “Elementary, my dear Watson”.
He reminds me of the character of the President in the book I wrote “REVOLT” (www.revoltthebook.com). This is a bad thing. That president attempted to “remake” the nation and when that didn’t work quickly enough, tried more aggressive methods.
There is no doubt in my mind now Obama fits the traits of that leader who said that losing twenty million in exchange for the revolution to succeed was worth it. (Mao)
He could easily justify all of the damage his efforts are causing America and any fall out that hurt the citizens as necessary collateral damage for the good of the “revolution”. Shoot, he already has.
I’m amaze at the depth and scope of poison some of you guys spit out against this great president who won in a landslide.
Yet, many of you, with NO BASIS, just like Ahmadinejad don’t like him—actually I sense more hate than simple policy disagreement in a democratic system.
I now sense similar language and bitterness that Hezbolah people in Iran show against he majority. Some of you disguise your Hezbolah tendencies under flashy wording, but deep down you are very much the same. Oh God protect our president at ALL TIME against evil forces and venomous language. Silent majority loves him, while noisy minority has taken over cable TV and radios to spread lies and hate against him.
52.9% of the popular vote is a respectable victory. It is not a landslide. Richard Nixon received 60.7% of the vote, as opposed to 37.5% of the vote for George McGovern. Now, that was a landslide.
I think Barack Obama is acting too much like Richard Nixon. Many Obama supporters are acting too much like Nixon supporters, equating any dissent with treason. It was Richard Nixon himself who popularized the term “silent majority” against the counterculture of his era.
Please note that I come from a family of McGovern voters, so I have some idea of what it is like to grow up on the other side of a political landslide. I also notice strong similarities between the hippy counterculture and the modern counterculture of the “Tea Party” – both represent a strong libertarian streak in American politics.
Seriously, Iran will never progress beyond medieval politics until Iranians learn to respect and tolerate loyal dissent. It would be nice if Iranians had a real republic, not one that replaces the hero worship of one man with the hero worship of another. And replacing the idolatry of Ayatollah Khomeini with the idolatry of Barack Obama won’t do Iranians any good and will continue to imprison Iran within the shackles of monarchy.
In 2008, Barack Obama’s presidential campaign depicted Barack Obama wearing a halo. Do you know who else uses that propaganda technique? Hezbollah! Try looking at a propaganda poster of Hasan Nasrallah, and you will see precisely the same use of the halo. I don’t like the demonization of Barack Obama, but he brought it upon himself by portraying himself as a saint, angel, messiah, or a god. He who depicts himself as an angel should expect his critics to partly agree with him – and see him as a fallen angel.
Using a halo on any living person is presumptuous. I regard it as blatantly idolatrous. It is also dangerous. If you don’t want to a man to be vilified, don’t depict him with a halo! (Please note, I am saddened when the followers of any living Eminence stoop to depict him wearing a halo. However well meaning such a gesture may appear, a true Eminence doesn’t need a painted halo on his picture. His spiritual leadership speaks for itself.)
Barry Goldwater showed considerable courage in refusing to support President Nixon during the Watergate impeachment hearings. If only more modern Democrats had the courage of Barry Goldwater to withstand the power of the modern presidency.
“He probably has a Che tee shirt tucked away in a drawer, don’t you think?”
Michael, I believe strongly that President Obama also has a turban and the revolutionary Arafatic keffiyeh in his drawer from the loved leaders to Mr. Alireza!!!
Undoubtedly, President Jimmy Carter also has the same things in his drawer!?!
As for Secretary Mr. Robert Gates!
Michael, I think it must be terrible for Secretary Gates to accepting such terrible policy which went into effect on his watch.
Mr. Secretary Gates, YOU are “a great American and loyal and faithful to the US Greatness”. It is BETTER FOR YOU to resign before bringing “SHAME” to YOUR SELF FOREVER!!!
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Jassem Othman
At best as you say…at worst: Al Qaedaesque…
I think you were far to kind
I worked with a woman, a black woman, years ago who reminds me of the President; the resemblance (in behavior) is uncanny.
She was apparently intelligent, clever and able to get her own way, bold, and utterly contemptuous of virtually every other human being on the planet. Other people existed for her use, and when questioned about her behavior she simply dismissed the question. She operated as though she lived on a different planet. She had a vacant stare even when looking directly into your eyes that made me think she was mentally unstable, in a freakish and unexplainable sort of way. She was, as you might have guessed on your own, a screaming hard leftist.
Whether due to his upbringing, his education, or his work as a whatever in Chicago, the President reminds me of her. He’s so completely removed from the reality of events around him that it’s almost creepy. I want to tap him on the side of the head and ask him “where are you?”
#75 called Obama’s election a “landslide”. Nonsense. It was a squeaker, and if the Republicans had run a better candidate (Duncan Hunter would probably have been my first choice), they would have had an easy victory.
In fact, given the incredibly poor popular perception of the Bush administration (not that I agree), winning by that close a margin should have been understood as downright embarrassing for the Democrats. They should have been able to run a table lamp against *any* Republican candidate and win by fifteen points. (Shameless plug: I wrote a longer article about this, with more jokes, right after the election: http://zirbert.blogspot.com/2008/11/post-election-hooptedoodle-us-edition.html)
Back to the point: the word “landslide”, in the context of elections, means something. It doesn’t just mean “win”. Personally, I don’t think that “landslide” should be used if the margin is less than 2-to-1 (i.e., 66.7% to the winner). Your mileage may vary, but it’s pretty clear that using it for a six-point win just demonstrates poor language comprehension.
-Zirbert, The Irritable Saint
Aw, it was a really great post. Theoretically I wouldd like to write like this also ?C taking time and real effort to make a good article?- but what can I only say – I procrastinate alot and not seem to get something done.