Obama an Evil and Dangerous Man?

So far this blog has been generally fair and balanced in commenting on President Barack Obama. While I'm not kidding when I suggest that Obama's social agenda, especially his abortion extremism, will tear this country's soul apart, my posts have been measured and respectful.

So, compare my approach with MacRanger's, "Forget Obama Being the Anti-Christ, He’s the Devil Incarnate. MacRanger cites Dick Morris' essay yesterday, "The Obama Presidency: Here Comes Socialism" (which is a familiar meme from the campaign), and adds this:

None of this is news, you’ve heard it here. In three days he’s already greatly weakened our national security, signed orders to set the terrorists free and signed over more babies to their death through unfettered abortion.

This is an evil and very dangerous man and we’ve only begun to see just how much that is true. So now is the time to begin to act. Now is the time to begin to wrest - through peaceful and legal means - this Country back from those who are about to destroy it.

When MacRanger suggests Obama will "destroy this country," this is precisely the argument I've made all along - that by training, ideology, and inclination, President Obama is not commited to upholding the Anglo-Protestant exceptionalism that has always been the basis for our national strength and the font of our international mission of expansive liberty. Nor is Obama committed to the kind of economic freedom that is the essence of the dramatic tax rollbacks of 2001 and 2003, which were the capstone of 25 years of prosperity dating to the first Reagan administration's tax cuts of 1983. We'll see now under the Obama Democratic-left, as Morris suggests in his piece, the biggest government and non-defense spending regime in the history of this nation.

Obama's executive order on halting trails for Guantanamo detainees gives me deep pause as well. The Washington Post went so far as to announce, upon news of Obama's action, that "Bush's 'War' On Terror Comes to a Sudden End."

There is so much explicit partisanship - no, anti-Americanism - in that title, it's depressing, that with such ease and haste, and the coming of the Obama era, the Bush "war" on terrorism can be jettisoned for the "law and order" approach favored by the appeasement hawks of the pre-9/11 Democratic Party. The Obama mindset is well-represented in leftist foreign policy circles, where the notion that the deployment of Army and Marine infantry units for any land-based military missions, even counter-insurgency, is archaic, and that the U.S. must simply wind down the defense budget and abjure robust ground forces in favor of "cheaper and generally more effective" means.

I can assure readers that these moves are precisely why I opposed Obama's candidacy so vociferously thoughout 2008. No one can say that we didn't know this was coming, or that the leftist media and punditocracy had long been ready to turn the U.S. into a second-rate power, to abandon a vigorous forward posture, in favor of literally coddling dictators, by way of global moral equivalence, and by standing aside where no other great power can act in the face of global danger and injustice.

And of course, more is in store.

This blog reported that in 1996 Obama had declared in writing a comprehensive agenda for the roll back of traditional marriage in favor of the radical same-sex marriage absolutism. Recall too that last July, Obama declared his opposition to the proposed gay marriage ban going on the ballot in California, which was Proposition 8, passed by a majority of the state's voters on November 4th. Prior to that vote, Obama had announced to San Francisco's Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transgender Democratic Club that he opposed "the divisive and discriminatory efforts" to affirm traditional marriage institutions in California and other states.

I am not convinced President Obama will affirm his position announced to Pastor Rick Warren that marriage consists as between one man and one woman. No, as we can see in just three days of governance, the Demcrats in power are not anywhere inclined to bipartisanship or pragmatism. The ascent to power must be truly intoxicated, and it's no doubt corrupting, given the burst of impropriety we've already seen in the Democratic camp, not to mention the leftist media's refusal to report on it effectively.

So, while no, Barack Obama is not an "evil man," his designs for the total oblitertion of Bush administration rules and practices, and his early signals on the push for the most radical social agenda in decades, proves for all to see that the deepest fears on the conservative right were by no means unwarranted.

The Cult Icon as President

There are two outstanding pieces today on the cult of personality surrounding President Barack Obama.

Candace de Russy, in "The Obama Cult of Personality," suggests some elements of the classic personality cult:

The key point about personality cults, as summarized at Wikipedia (italics mine), is that in modern times they occur “when a country’s leader uses mass media to create a heroic public image through unquestioning flattery and praise.” Moreover:

• A cult of personality is similar to general hero worship, except that it is created specifically for political leaders. Generally, personality cults are most common in regimes with totalitarian systems of government, that seek to radically alter or transform society according to (supposedly) revolutionary new ideas. Often, a single leader becomes associated with this revolutionary transformation, and comes to be treated as a benevolent “guide” for the nation, without whom the transformation to a better future cannot occur. This has been generally the justification for personality cults that arose in totalitarian societies of the 20th century, such as those of Joseph Stalin and Adolf Hitler.
• Although more uncommon, democratic societies also have examples of political figures who have been noted to have some traits of a cult of personality [for instance, President John F. Kennedy and Argentina's Juan Perón and his wife Eva].

Here’s hoping and sincerely trusting that Obama will prove not to be an overbearing state-builder, not to have a “tsar” complex. Hopefully the feelings of grandeur that he surely has felt and will feel, as a result of the often unbridled adulation he has received, will not lead him into attempting to institute a personality cult.

Actually, it's an important question as to whether he hasn't already instituted the cult. As Peter Wehner points out, the Obama presidency is already a "phenomenon":

We are in the midst of a political phenomenon. It is fairly extraordinary, and perhaps beyond anything we have seen in our lifetime. Our new president, Barack Obama, is not only the head of government; he has become a cultural symbol with rock-star appeal. I know people - lifelong Republican voters - who at one point viewed Obama with something close to contempt, who began to warm to him a bit during the presidential debates, and who now wish they had cast their vote for Obama. He takes office with his popularity near 80 percent and the political winds at his back.

Wehner continues by noting that one progressive pundit called forth images of Jesus in describing Obama's inaugural address as the moment when the "Word became flesh," an echo of the Gospel of St. John.

As one who is surrounded daily by college students, I can attest that the younger generation - at least my sample of it from the greater Long Beach area - is fully invested in the Obama cult of personality. I heard students this week, while discussing the inauguration crowds, chanting "na na na na, na na na na, hey hey-ey, goodbye ... " That was kind of creepy, actually.

Wehner warns against outsized expectations, and of the likely fall to earth for Obama, the mere mortal that he is - a point I've made repeatedly during classroom discussions.

The Netherlands at the Crucible of Liberty or Slavery

The decision by the Netherland's Court of Appeal in Amsterdam to prosecute filmmaker and legislator Geert Wilders for "incitement to hatred and discrimination" is a blow to Western ideals of liberty and tolerance. Wilders is being silenced for speaking the truth in his short film, "Fitna." Here's this from Melanie Philipps, "A Defining Moment":

This is a defining moment for Europe. It is when people have to decide what side they are on. All those ‘human rights’ supporters who tell us endlessly that we can only defend our society against terror if we remain true to its values now must decide whether they are going to defend Geert Wilders against the attempt to criminalise him for exercising his freedom to speak in defence of life, liberty and western liberalism - or whether they are going to run up the white flag in the face of Islamist totalitarianism enforced by its already enslaved western dupes.

Kirsten Gillibrand Caves to Left's Gay Rights Extremism

What does it say about queer-rights political correctness and the Democratic Party that TPM is reporting that Kirsten Gillibrand has already flipped her position on same-sex marriage? Apparently Gillibrand spoke with Empire State Pride Agenda, a New York homosexual rights lobby, and has indicated that she now supports full marriage equality:

Last night likely Senate pick Kirsten Gillibrand spoke to Empire State Pride Agenda Executive Director Alan Van Capelle about issues important to New York’s lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) community.

“After talking to Kirsten Gillibrand, I am very happy to say that New York is poised to have its first U.S. Senator who supports marriage equality for same-sex couples,” said Van Capelle. “She also supports the full repeal of the federal DOMA (Defense of Marriage Act) law, repeal of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell (DADT) and passage of legislation outlawing discrimination against transgender people.

As I noted this morning, the likely nomination of Gillibrand created a firestorm yesterday and this morning among 5th column netroots activists and extreme-left members of Congress. Now with her appointment, and the expected primary challenge in 2010, we'll see Gillibrand further kowtow to the extremist agenda of today's hardline Democratic Party base.

As I've said many time, the No on H8 ayatollahs and International ANSWER cadres have hijacked the Democratic Party's platform, pulling the party ever closer to the statist secular progressivism that is the de facto ideology in power today.

Abortion Politics and the Soul of the Nation

President Barack Obama is expected to issue an executive order overturning the "global gag rule" on U.S. funding for international abortion groups. With this move, shortly after the 36th anniversary of the infamous Roe v. Wade decision, this administration will position itself as the arbiter of abortion extremism worldwide, and it will guarantee that its domestic and international social policies will polarize the nation and complete the destruction of the moral fabric of this country.

As Robert George notes, in "Our Struggle for the Soul of our Nation," the ungodly legacy of the American left over the past 36 years is the 50 million victims of a national feticide of genocidal proportions. The United States, with the Democratic administration in power, faces a moral reckoning today that is a potential breaker of nations:

Abortion and embryo-destructive research are at the heart of the divide between the nation’s major political parties ....

The Republican Party’s support for the unborn has brought into its ranks many disaffected rank-and-file Democrats, including a large number of Catholics and Evangelicals. I am one. Indeed, it overstates the matter only a bit to say that, as a result of the conflict of worldviews that began with abortion, the Republicans have become the party of the religiously engaged, while the Democrats have become the party of liberal secularists. Barack Obama is trying to win over religiously serious Catholics and Evangelicals, without altering in the slightest his support for abortion, including late-term and partial-birth abortions, the funding of abortion and embryo-destructive research with taxpayer dollars, the elimination of informed consent and parental notification laws, and the revocation of conscience and religious liberty protections for pro-life doctors and other healthcare workers and pharmacists. He will ultimately fail. We must see to it that he fails.

In this project, Obama is being served and abetted by a small number of Catholic and Evangelical intellectuals and activists who have been peddling the claim that Obama, despite his pro-abortion extremism, is effectively pro-life because of his allegedly enlightened economic and social policies will reduce the number of abortions. This is delusional. The truth is that Barack Obama is the most extreme pro-abortion candidate ever to serve in the United States Senate or seek the Office of President of the United States. The revocation of the Hyde Amendment, the Mexico City Policy, funding limitations on embryo-destructive research, informed consent laws, parental notification statutes—all of which Obama has promised to his pro-abortion base—will dramatically increase the number of abortions, and will do so for reasons that have been articulated by the abortion lobby itself. It is the pro-abortion side that tells us that the Hyde Amendment alone has resulted in 300,000 fewer abortions each year than would otherwise be performed—and that is why they so desperately want it to be repealed. Yet the putatively pro-life Obama apologists claim that the man who pledges to repeal it is going to reduce the number of abortions. Let me say it again: this is delusional.

Reflecting that the left's abandonment of the Constitution's call that all shall be guaranteed the equal protection of the laws, Professor George concludes:

We are called to account for the national sin of abortion. Like Thomas Jefferson reflecting on the evil of slavery—an evil in which he was personally complicit—we must “tremble for our country when we consider that God is just.” Like Abraham Lincoln, whom President Obama invokes but does not emulate, we must pray that God, in His mercy, will not abandon us, but will rather restore us to the true and lofty moral ideals of our founding. Even at this dark hour for our movement, let us here highly resolve to hasten the day when this nation, under God, will be truly and fully and finally dedicated to the proposition that all are created equal.

Closing Gitmo: "There's Something Not Right With That"

Here's an i Report, "Closing Gitmo," from CNN:

Predictable video comment-thread is here.

Kirsten Gillibrand is Left's Blue Dog Nightmare

The news that New York Governor David Paterson will appoint Congresswoman Kirsten Gillibrand to Hillary Clinton's seat in the U.S. Senate has generated the usual outrage on the hard left.

The New York Post indicates that the Gillibrand pick has Democrats "howling" in disgust.

The Gillibrand appointment is one more indicator that secular progressives couldn't care less about political moderation and pragmatic policy responses to national crisis. We have a radical litmus test in place for the new administration, and, again, the leftist pull in Congress and the netroots fever swamps will raise one of the most important political challenges to Barack Obama's leadership.

The Village Voice reports that Gillibrand boasts a 100 percent rating from the NRA and:

Gillibrand has described her own voting record as "one of the most conservative in the state." She opposes any path to citizenship for illegal immigrants, supports renewing the Bush tax cuts for individuals earning up to $1 million annually, and voted for the Bush-backed FISA bill that permits wiretapping of international calls. She was one of four Democratic freshmen in the country, and the only Democrat in the New York delegation, to vote for the Bush administration's bill to extend funding for the Iraq war shortly after she entered congress in 2007. While she now contends that she's always opposed the war and has voted for bills to end it, one upstate paper reported when she first ran for the seat: "She said she supports the war in Iraq." In addition to her vote to extend funding, she also missed a key vote to override a Bush veto of a Democratic bill with Iraq timetables.

Gillibrand's record naturally inflames Allison Kilkenny at the Huffington Post:

Gillibrand is a Blue Dog Democrat, which is the name moderate Democrats gave themselves so people stopped confusing them with Republicans. Gillibrand is a pro-gun, fiscally conservative "Democrat." Blue Dog Democrats are the people who cower at the word "liberal," and fail to acknowledge that the only gains we - as a country - have made regarding civil rights were because of those dreaded, damn liberals.

And considering that gay marriage extremism has become a marquee cause of secular progressives since the November election, expect Gillibrand to come under fire on homosexual rights (via the Politicker):

On the issue of gay rights, Gillibrand received an 80 out of a 100 rating from the LGBT advocacy group the Human Rights Campaign. That was the lowest score out of New York’s Democratic representatives. According to the Human Rights Campaign, she voted against the repealing of “Don’ Ask, Don’t Tell” legislation, opposed legislation that would grant equal tax treatment for employer-provided health coverage for domestic partners, opposed legislation to grant same-sex partners of U.S. citizens and permanent residents the same immigration benefits of married couples and opposed legislation to permit state Medicaid programs to cover low-income, HIV-positive Americans before they develop AIDS.

Dose of Reality on Guantanamo Detainees

Listen to this from the New York Times:

The emergence of a former Guantánamo Bay detainee as the deputy leader of Al Qaeda’s Yemeni branch has underscored the potential complications in carrying out the executive order President Obama signed Thursday that the detention center be shut down within a year.

The militant, Said Ali al-Shihri, is suspected of involvement in a deadly bombing of the United States Embassy in Yemen’s capital, Sana, in September. He was released to Saudi Arabia in 2007 and passed through a Saudi rehabilitation program for former jihadists before resurfacing with Al Qaeda in Yemen.

His status was announced in an Internet statement by the militant group and was confirmed by an American counterterrorism official.

“They’re one and the same guy,” said the official, who insisted on anonymity because he was discussing an intelligence analysis. “He returned to Saudi Arabia in 2007, but his movements to Yemen remain unclear.”

The development came as Republican legislators criticized the plan to close the Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, detention camp in the absence of any measures for dealing with current detainees. But it also helps explain why the new administration wants to move cautiously, taking time to work out a plan to cope with the complications.

Almost half the camp’s remaining detainees are Yemenis, and efforts to repatriate them depend in part on the creation of a Yemeni rehabilitation program — partly financed by the United States — similar to the Saudi one. Saudi Arabia has claimed that no graduate of its program has returned to terrorism.

“The lesson here is, whoever receives former Guantánamo detainees needs to keep a close eye on them,” the American official said.

You think?

But check out the Wall Street Journal's lead editorial today, in any case, "Obama and Guantanamo":

Campaign promises are so much easier to adhere to when they're strictly hypothetical, as Barack Obama is discovering. The then-President-elect said 10 days ago on ABC that while he still plans to close Guantanamo, "it is more difficult than I think a lot of people realize" and that "many" of the enemy combatants are "very dangerous."

Merely for gesturing at this reality, Mr. Obama suffered the blunt-force trauma of his left-wing allies, and the panicked transition leaked new details on the Administration's intentions last week. On Tuesday the Pentagon halted military commissions at Guantanamo for 120 days, and reports as we went to press yesterday said Mr. Obama would sign an executive order today that the base be closed within a year. This was after he told the Washington Post that closure might take even longer. Isn't responsibility fun?

The first practical question is where to transfer Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and the 245 or so other remaining Gitmo prisoners. Dangerous enemy combatants can't simply be released into the streets. The Obama camp says that after reviewing the classified files, it will try to repatriate as many as safely possible. But 60 already cleared for release remain because they may be persecuted by their home countries. And even Mr. Obama's vaunted diplomacy is unlikely to convince rights-protecting countries to resettle people he believes are too dangerous to release in the U.S. -- and the more willing Mr. Obama is to release prisoners, the more difficult this problem will become.

One suggestion is moving the remaining prisoners to Kansas's Fort Leavenworth, but state politicians are already sounding a red alert. The military base is integrated into the community and, lacking Guantanamo's isolation and defense capacities, would instantly become a potential terror target. Expect similar protests from other states that are involuntarily entered in this sweepstakes.

In any event, this option merely relocates Guantanamo to American soil under another name. The core challenge is not a matter of geography but ensuring a stable legal framework for detaining and punishing fighters engaged in unconventional warfare against the U.S.

There's more at the link.

The Journal makes the interesting point that now that Obama's in office, he's the one dealing with the brainless leftists who have no clue as to the next steps on Guantanamo detainees. This includes even hysterical "experts" like Glenn Greenwald, who's been harping about the "criminal" anti-terror policies of the Bush military commissions all week, while alternating between praise and poised-condemnation of Obama's "promising" actions on the "corrosive" lawlessness of the Bush administation's policies on Guantanamo, military commissions, "black sites," and who knows what else.

Sometimes the right thing to do (the Bush program) is so intuitively obvious that the warped opposition of the netroots hordes signifies nothing less than abject Bush derangement and the pursuit of raw nihilist power.

Another Democrat Skips Out on Taxes

I haven't written about Tim Geithner's "mistake" of failing to pay payroll taxes, and my sense is this issue should disqualify him as Treasury Secretary. But the Democratic-controlled Senate Finance Committee approved him for the post anyway, so he'll soon be joining President Obama to work on the White House's economic recovery program.

When he gets there he'll join Chief of Staff Rahm "The Knife" Emanuel, who was alleged earlier to have skipped out on property taxes at his Chicago home (and then perhaps even used his political muscle to harrass the free-speech rights of the blogger who pulled the scoop from Cook County records). Of course, Emanuel, as well as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, failed to disclose their official roles on the boards of family charities in violation of congressional ethics laws. That's interesting, since some have suggested that Emanuel's personal charity, the Rahm Emanuel and Amy Rule Charitable Foundation, was apparently listed as a primary residence to avoid paying property taxes (although, again, these tax allegations were denounced on the left as "smears").

The Democrats and taxes? What is it with these folks?

No one should be surprised, it seems, that the child of Camelot, that tireless public advocate, Caroline Kennedy, has withdrawn her name from Senate consideration because of tax and nanny issues?

Nope, not at all:

Problems involving taxes and a household employee surfaced during the vetting of Caroline Kennedy and derailed her candidacy for the Senate, a person close to Gov. David A. Paterson said on Thursday, in an account at odds with Ms. Kennedy’s own description of her reasons for withdrawing ...

Boy, it hasn't even been two full days and the Democratic "culture of corruption" is picking up a new head of steam. And just think: This is a Kennedy we're talking about here! Who would've thought the daughter of JFK would be just another two-bit Democratic tax-cheat?

This really is something.

Middle East Studies and Israel's Gaza Incursion

Here's a sample from Cinnamon Stillwell's essay today, at FrontPage Magazine:

Strip away the clichés and the vacuous newspeak blaring out across the servile media and its pathetic corps of voluntary state servants in the Western world and what you will find is the naked desire for hegemony; for power over the weak and dominion over the world’s wealth.

This quote is from Jennifer Loewenstein of the Middle East Studies Program at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Cinnamon Stillwell links to Lowenstein's essay, "If Hamas Did Not Exist: Israel Has No Intention of Granting a Palestinian State," published at the extreme left-wing and anti-Semitic newsletter Counterpunch.

See the full article at FrontPage Magazine, "Hamas’s Academic Cheerleaders."

President Obama's First Day

A new chief executive's not going to solve the world's problems on "day one," but President Barack Obama seemed somewhat undistinguished on his initial day in office.

Just hours after a long day of inaugural ceremony and celebration ended, President Barack Obama took up a pressing schedule on Wednesday, his first full day in office.

From retaking the oath of office, to reining-in Vice President "Loose Lips" Biden, President Obama looks to be ironing out some move-in kinks over the first couple of weeks. Perhaps that's natural, although Obama's predecessor, President George W. Bush, had spent lots of time around the White House during the presidency of G.H.W. Bush, and in some sense he seemed especially "fit" for the job.

I noticed also that Obama is returning some informality to the Oval Office. Unlike President George W. Bush, who steadfastly maintained a coat-and-tie rule for visitors to the oval office, and who himself always wore a suit when working there, President Obama took off his jacket while sitting at the president's desk yesterday, in essence rollling back the button-down mannerism of his predecessor.

When I started at LBCC, I always wore a coat and tie for lectures. For various reasons I am dressing more casuallly now, although I miss dressing up, and I'll be going back to more formal dress at some point (I need some new clothes mostly, but also my mood and teaching style has been more casual).

There's something to that professionalism that is meaningful. Dress signifies seriousness and decorum. When Bush came in with his crisp White House style, a corporate élan, it was a stark difference from the Bill Clinton years, where it was reported that early in that term, young White House staffers would address senior U.S. military commanders visiting the president with a "What's happening, bro?" or some other casual greeting to that effect.

We'll see how things turn out, and change is good and refreshing, but that's another thing that I always admired about President Bush. His style and graciousness is something that I'll never forget.

Socialist Hopes for the Obama Presidency

Today's Wall Street Journal features a roundup of commentary from folks like Alaska Governor Sarah Palin and ex-con junk bond-king turned philanthropist Michael Milken.

But Katrina vanden Heuvel's opening essay is a socialist eye-opener:

Mr. Obama has a mandate for change. People support reconstruction of America's crumbling physical infrastructure, and of our society. Here are a few steps I hope Mr. Obama will take: Reverse our deepening economic inequality by using this country's still immense wealth to assure that all Americans have the health care, housing and education they need; re-engage the world with wisdom and humility about the limits of military power; cut billions from wasteful defense budgets that empty our treasury without making us more secure; tackle the deep corruption in a financial system that consistently favors corporations over workers; respond with urgency to the climate crisis with an Apollo-like project to make America a clean-energy innovator; restore our tattered Constitution; protect a worker's right to organize; define a new spirit of sacrifice and service; clean up our elections; and reaffirm his campaign-trail commitment to end not just the war in Iraq but also "end the mindset that took us into" that war. Do not endanger the promise of this administration by escalating militarily in Afghanistan, further draining resources that are vital for rebuilding here at home.

Obama Retakes Oath of Office

President Obama has retaken his oath of office after the flubbed delivery seen at the video:

Obama and Chief Supreme Court Justice John Roberts had both seemingly stumbled over the 35-word oath during Obama's swearing-in as president on Tuesday, leading some to question whether he had properly committed the Constitutionally-mandated speech act that made him president of the United States.

A president is required by the Constitution to say: "I do solemnly swear that I will faithfully execute the office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States."

At the inaugural, Roberts had mixed up the words, saying instead: "...that I will execute the office to President of the United States faithfully..."

And so, at 7:35 p.m. today, according to the White House pool report, Roberts re-administered the oath in the Map Room of the White House.

"We decided it was so much fun -- " the first time, Obama joked while sitting on a couch.

Obama stood and walked over to make small talk with a reporter as Roberts donned his black robe.

"Are you ready to take the oath?" Roberts asked.

"I am, and we're going to do it very slowly," Obama replied.

Obama raised his right hand, leaving his left at his side.

The private swearing-in ceremony, sans Bible, took 25 seconds.

After a flawless recitation, Roberts smiled and said, "Congratulations,
again."

"Thank you, sir," Obama replied, to a smattering of applause.

Now, who messed up the oath? Watching the video it looks like Obama was pre-ejaculatory.

Initial reports have Obama jumping ahead of Roberts, for example:

Separated by a Bible used by Abraham Lincoln at his first inaugural, Roberts asked Obama: "Are you prepared to take the oath senator?"Obama indicated he was, and Roberts started reciting - and Obama repeating - the 35-word oath that is prescribed by the Constitution.

But at one point early on, Obama paused, as if grasping for the next words. Roberts helped him over the brief awkward moment, repeating a few words to get Obama back on track.

Later news stories reported Justice Roberts as having flubbed, for example, "Obama, Chief Justice Roberts Stumble in Recitation of Presidential Oath."

In watching the video above - which is provided by the secular-left news outlet and Obama propaganda organ - it's looks like Obama jumped the gun. Roberts did misstate the "faithfully execute" portion, but the iteration could have begun with Obama's halting first attempt to recite "I so solemly swear..."?

Obama's Un-Lincolnesque Inaugural Address

Barack Obama's inaugural address was far below expectations, as I noted briefly in this morning's post. So I find in interesting that William Safire, the great American expert on language and former Nixon speechwriter, has given Obama's address a mediocre review:

Our 44th president’s Inaugural Address was solid, respectable, uplifting, suitably short, superbly delivered, but — in light of the towering expectations whipped up that his speech might belong in the company of those by Lincoln, F.D.R. and Kennedy — fell short of the anticipated immortality.

It’s for others to cover the majesty of this inaugural moment, the happiness and pride that swept through the unprecedented throng, and the impact of being present in person or through television of a genuinely historic moment. My assignment is to consider the speech itself.

After the first stumbling presidential oath-taking I can recall — as much the fault of the Chief Justice as the incoming president, but it’s not something they can rehearse — President Barack Obama properly reminded us at the start that he was taking office in the midst of a crisis. He used the phrase “this generation of Americans,” reminding some of J.F.K.’s “torch has been passed” line or Roosevelt’s following phrase “has a rendezvous with destiny,” but today’s speaker showed no sign of its resonance. Late in the speech, he said that “the spirit of service” was “a moment that will define a generation,” but the two thoughts were unconnected.

Obama was wise not to blame only the capitalists for the sinking economy, as F.D.R. angrily had done; instead, he called it a “consequence of greed and irresponsibility on the part of some, but also our collective failure to make hard choices.” That was an unexpectedly tolerant note, but which he stepped on with an imperious, lecturing pointer phrase about meeting challenges: “Know this, America.” That get-this tone is better directed to the Russians.

He got into a good rhythm with a cheer-up paragraph, reminding us of America’s productive workers and inventive minds, our capacity undiminished, setting up his warning against “standing pat.” (I once wrote a line for Nixon, “America cannot stand pat,” which got a glare from the First Lady — we never used that phrase again.) Obama topped that passage with a warmly familiar metaphor: “Starting today, we must pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off, and begin again the work of remaking America.” That worked.

He was not above using the old straw man “those-who” device, scorning “some who question the scale of our ambitions” and “what the cynics fail to understand.” He skirted the controversy about harsh interrogations with a facile “As for our common defense, we reject as false the choice between our safety and our ideals” — when there are times when that painful choice cannot be “rejected.” Obama followed that soon enough with a paragraph appealing to hardliners, promising to “responsibly leave Iraq to its people” — hawks can hope the operative word is “responsibly” — and “forge a hard-earned peace in Afghanistan,” which is a dovish way of saying he may have to risk the doves’ charge of “Obama’s war.” A soundbite that will echo is “We will not apologize for our way of life, nor will we waver in its defense” followed by a tough message to terrorists: “You cannot outlast us, and we will defeat you.”

To his oratorical credit, the president did not strain for quotable quotes. “A nation cannot prosper when it favors only the prosperous” was a nice insertion with an eye toward Bartlett’s, and I liked “the lines of tribe shall soon dissolve,” though it is not in the league with “the mystic chords of memory.” Obama’s “know that you are on the wrong side of history” message to Muslim extremists concluded with “we will extend a hand if you are willing to unclench your fist”; that is quotable if it is original, but I think I’ve seen it before. His “this winter of our hardship” is a well-turned phrase about discontent, even if not as Shakespeare punned it, “made glorious summer by this sun of York.”

I've been thinking about this "quotable quotes" meme all day. As noted, I watched the speech in full early this morning and thought it impressive. Yet, at this rate, Abraham Lincoln's under no threat of being knocked off the pinnacle of American presidential oratory.

Obama's a campaigner. If his actually governing reach rises to half the level we saw in his near-Biblical campaign speeches - ALL HAIL THE GREAT OBAMA! - we'll be practically born-again as a people.

The jury's still out for now though.

So Much for Live Streaming the Inauguration...

Yesterday wasn't my best day.

I started out feeling the history of the moment. I am one for history, and the pageantry of America's traditions is unmatched in the modern world. I did not vote for Barack Obama, but as I've said before, he is my president. Thus I wasn't so pleased with Grace's comment, nor was I that happy about Tim's digs about the "partisanship of hate" at this blog. What really bummed my morning was the darned live streaming online. I should have known better. At first I thought it was just my classroom. But my colleagues told me that servers and video feeds were overwhelmed by demand, so watching the inauguration speech online didn't work. That's what it is. I hadn't planned on making a big deal out of it anyway, but as the morning came and the hour of the oath of office approached, the weight of history was crushing. I had the live feed for my 7:30 class and Representative John Lewis was being interviewed by Brian Williams on MSNBC. As one who stood with Dr. King, and as one who was beaten as a civil rights demonstrator, it's hard to find more authenticity on the subject of overcoming our oppressive history. It was a great learning moment for the students. The 9:00am class wasn't so lucky. The live video wasn't working on any of the big websites. We got a couple of snippets of Barack Obama's speech, and then I shut it down and started my regular class.

I'd say next time I'll get a TV setup for the room, but there won't be a next time like that. We just don't see that kind of mass participation in politics. And if Barack Obama energizes a new generation to engagement in civic life, that alone will be an accomplishment not achieved in either Democratic or Republican administrations in the last 30 years.

I watched Obama's inaugural speech this morning, the whole thing, on C-Span, so that's better. I needed just to sit down and take it in. It was good but not great. He offered a few lines that reaffirmed our exceptionalism, but the address was far from Lincolnian, so perhaps the analogies to Abraham will cease.

Last night, I had to run errands before picking up my youngest son, and I watched a little news before I helped my boy with his homework. So, it was disjointed news day all around. By bedtime, reading online, I was disturbed by the reports of the tremendous disrespect shown to President Bush. And so these last gasps of Bush derangement must really be seen as setting the table for the next four years. Here at my blog and at the nation's capital, folks did not heed Obama's call to transcend the bitter discords of our partisanship. Now that the celebrations are over and the hard work of governing is to begin, folks can jettison the simplistic platitudes of brotherhood and focus on the realism of governing and opposition.

It's the idealism in me that seemed to suggest, by my sense of right, that folks would put rancor aside for the day. But folks were just wicked. The chants of "na na na na, hey hey, goodbye," mocking President Bush, reportedy accompanied by one-fingered salutes, indicate that transcendence is not on the menu for the left's hardliners. Indeed, Code Pink's Medea Benjamin and Desiree Fairooz, sat within 100 feet of President Obama as "The One" delivered his address. How would the most disrespectful protest celebrities, those who disrupted the states of the union and flashed bloody hands in front of Secretary of State Rice be allowed so close to this new president? Members of Congress scored them tickets, it's being said. And for all of those who keep telling me that hardline leftist "don't represent the base of the Democratic Party," we'll ... you can just kiss my ass on that one.

The big lie is over. The nihilist left has their man in the White House now. Racial recrimination got a reprise in the Reverend Joseph Lowery's benediction, said to be "hardly the sort of post-racial note Obama could have wanted." My jaw dropped yesterday while watching Howard University's Professor Daryl Scott on C-Span, who said that President Obama would "grind down" the terrorists like President Bush had not. The reference was to Obama's remark that "for those who seek to advance their aims by inducing terror and slaughtering innocents, we say to you now that, 'Our spirit is stronger and cannot be broken. You cannot outlast us, and we will defeat you'." Where was the leftist solidarity on "grinding" down our enemies when President Bush spoke over and over again of the long struggle before us in defeating the scourge of radical Islam? The grinding down began in 2001, when the Bush administration took the fight to the enemy in Afghanistan, and finished the work of the international community by toppling the murderous regime of proliferation in Baghdad. The left and their historians will try to rewrite the Bush years, but it's not going to work. I won't let it. People of tradition and perspective won't let it. The time to ante up is now, and those who for so long have demonized the conservatives aren't ready to quit, so I say, we'll join you in the arena of partisanship, if that's your play, if that's what you want. The recuperative powers of the nation will work their healing ways irrespective of Barack Obama's accession. He is the great facilitator at this piont, but this nation is too strong and too proud to let the window dressing of black authenticity march as the true source of healing and rebirth. It has to come from within all of us, to move past this second civil war of the last decade. So far the left isn't ready for it.

A commenter at Sister Toldjah's place, Carol, noted this in response to Jeremy Lott piece yesterday at the Guardian:

I’m already tired of people saying we should “give our new president a chance”. I believe President Obama is either a total liar or the best con man ever. Either way the hatred will never stop for President Bush and I’m not going to sit back and keep my mouth shut as proof I’m not just like them. I’m not like the Bush haters. It’s hard to put faith in a man who only cares about polls, not the welfare of this country. Only time will tell who is honest and patriotic. I know I am. Is Obama?

I'm not going to "shut up" either. I will be respectful, and I'll never call for the execution of my president for fighting with all his powers to defend the nation against all enemies, foreign and domestic. But the new era is here - a day of history and wonder now gives way to years of work. Part of that work, that mighty load we bear as conservatives, is to hold our new leadership to the majesty and responsibility of their stations. This country deserves no less.

Photo Update: Tigerhawk.

Barack Obama: 44th President of the United States

Considering how President-elect Barack Obama has strained the comparisons between himself and Abraham Lincoln, I'm tempted to post a picture of "The Audacity of the Dope."

But I too am caught up in the monumental importance of the day, so out of respect for the president-elect, who will be sworn in today, I am posting the new president's official White House portrait:

Consider this post an open thread. Please share your thoughts on the historic importance of the day.

Our Unavoidable Impatience

I read last night before going to bed, and I prayed. I prayed to God for my friends and family, and for our country as we embark on this new era of politics. I said a prayer too for the people of Israel, and also for the loved ones of readers to this blog who have struggled with illnesses. I want people to be well, and I hope our country remains strong.

I read last night from Martin Luther King's "Letter from Birmingham Jail." I didn't quite finish. More reading tonight. I closed the book at this passage, and decided to post it here for folks to think about if they by chance visit my blog on today's historic day:

We have waited for more than 340 years for our constitutional and God given rights. The nations of Asia and Africa are moving with jetlike speed toward gaining political independence, but we still creep at horse and buggy pace toward gaining a cup of coffee at a lunch counter. Perhaps it is easy for those who have never felt the stinging darts of segregation to say, "Wait." But when you have seen vicious mobs lynch your mothers and fathers at will and drown your sisters and brothers at whim; when you have seen hate filled policemen curse, kick and even kill your black brothers and sisters; when you see the vast majority of your twenty million Negro brothers smothering in an airtight cage of poverty in the midst of an affluent society; when you suddenly find your tongue twisted and your speech stammering as you seek to explain to your six year old daughter why she can't go to the public amusement park that has just been advertised on television, and see tears welling up in her eyes when she is told that Funtown is closed to colored children, and see ominous clouds of inferiority beginning to form in her little mental sky, and see her beginning to distort her personality by developing an unconscious bitterness toward white people; when you have to concoct an answer for a five year old son who is asking: "Daddy, why do white people treat colored people so mean?"; when you take a cross county drive and find it necessary to sleep night after night in the uncomfortable corners of your automobile because no motel will accept you; when you are humiliated day in and day out by nagging signs reading "white" and "colored"; when your first name becomes "nigger," your middle name becomes "boy" (however old you are) and your last name becomes "John," and your wife and mother are never given the respected title "Mrs."; when you are harried by day and haunted by night by the fact that you are a Negro, living constantly at tiptoe stance, never quite knowing what to expect next, and are plagued with inner fears and outer resentments; when you are forever fighting a degenerating sense of "nobodiness"- then you will understand why we find it difficult to wait. There comes a time when the cup of endurance runs over, and men are no longer willing to be plunged into the abyss of despair. I hope, sirs, you can understand our legitimate and unavoidable impatience.

Thank You President Bush

I've been formally studying politics for twenty-five years, but I truly came of political maturity during the G.W. Bush years of 2001-2008.

To my great pride as a blogger, I have published an essay today, President Bush's last full day in office, at Pajamas Media: "George W. Bush’s Legacy: Moral Vision."

Readers can read the essay at the link, and the comment thread is certainly an interesting case of Bush derangement syndrome.

But for the present post, let me share the letter to the president by Eric at Tygrrrr Express, "Dear President Bush" (cited here at midstream):

I could spend hours praising your 2001 and 2003 tax cuts, in addition to your many fine qualities in terms of how you treated every day human beings.

Yet to me you will always be the man that kept us safe. I will always see you through the prism of September 11th, 2001. I will always well up with emotion when I think of you standing with that firefighter on September 14th, three days after the attacks. I still hear your voice exalting Americans. “I hear you, the rest of the world hears you, and pretty soon the people who knocked down these buildings will hear from all of us!” They heard us loud and clear.

I will go to my grave believing that the Iraq War was the legally and morally right thing to do. Reconstruction has been tough, but Saddam is gone. The world is absolutely better off for this. The collateral effects included Khadafi of Libya voluntarily giving up his weapons programs. This was a direct result of your leadership. You labeled Iran, Iraq, and North Korea as the “Axis of Evil.” You were right, and one of those three is no longer led by a dictator out to threaten the world. When your critics declared that the Iraq War was lost, you doubled down, ordered a surge, and brought in General David Petraeus. Not only did you hire the best and brightest, you let them do their jobs, and get those jobs done right.

On September 20th, 2001, you told us that America, “would not falter, and would not fail.” You let us know in January of 2009 that we “did not falter and did not fail.”

If anybody wants evidence that America is still a beacon for the world to admire and emulate, just look at your successor. Only in America could his election be possible. As expected, your graciousness and kindness towards him and his family is sincere. Some say you were a divider and not a uniter. This is totally false. You reached out to your critics, and they never accepted your hand of friendship. Your political enemies were the ones who polarized this nation. Your successor mentioned the other day that he thinks you are a good person. His critics need to hear this over and over again. Despite their obsession with division, you remained kind to the end, and were able to unite people that were willing to let decency override partisanship.

Read the whole thing here (and leave a nice word or two in the comments).

Eric makes clear as well that this administration's record in black political inclusion and support for AIDS eradication in Africa, among other areas, is unsurpassed.

Thank you President Bush. You will be deeply missed and our country is better off for having you.

Photo Credit: Wordsmith at Flopping Aces, "8 Years of 'Failed Policies'."

More Americans Joining Military Amid Jobs Downturn

The New York Times reports on the trend in armed services recruitment, with more Americans "joining the military, lured by a steady paycheck, benefits and training."

Well, the daughter of one of our good blogging friends, Dana at Common Sense Political thought, is among the numbers of new enlistees. This has triggered some understandible emotions at the Pico residence:

Well, Autumn’s big day is coming: her recruiter is coming tomorrow at 1100 to pick her up for transport to the Harrisburg Military Entrance Processing Station. We had thought this would occur on the 20th, but her actual processing starts early on the 20th, so the Army is transporting her up on the 19th. As it happens, I had a couple of vacation days to use, and I took off tomorrow and Tuesday, so the change won’t be a problem for me.

After processing, she’ll be on a plane to Fort Jackson, South Carolina, for nine weeks of basic training ....

So, she leaves in about 14½ hours for the biggest, hardest test of her life. We’re all really proud of her.

I really admire folks like Autumn. My hat's off, thanks all around, and good luck!

See also the interesting discussion from "xbradtc," "Recruiting in tough times ... ":

I recall a meeting at the Indianapolis War Memorial ... Our battalion commander ... reminded us that the nation’s people did not exist to serve in the Army, but rather that the Army existed to serve the nation. The whole point of the service was to help the nation achieve peace and prosperity. “If I catch you hoping for a recession, I’ll nuke you into next year!” T’was a lesson I took to heart.

More than once, I found potential recruits who were wholly qualified, but had no great desire to serve. If that young man or woman had a solid plan, they had my best wishes. Often, when you spoke to a young man or woman, they would immediately tell you, “I’m going to college.” Fair enough. But a few probing questions would soon tell you that they had no idea what they were going to college for, what they wanted to study, how that major would help them, how they planned to pay for school or pay off student loans. Those were the folks that I would recruit.

A Final Gasp of Bush Derangement

PrivatePigg's posted an outstanding essay on the noxious Bush derangment on the ideological left, "Bush Says Farewell: One Final Round of BDS:"

You know, I have plenty of friends on both the right and left side of the aisle, and most of them are pretty great people, pretty level headed, and pretty reasonable, even when I disagree with them. But I can name probably one or two people who can only be described as … out there. Based on my own human experience and interaction alone, I’d say these people are a minority of the population. However, when one ventures over to the left side of the blogosphere, an unusually high number of bloggers seem to fall into that second group of people: out there. And I don’t mean “out there” because I disagree with them, but “out there” because they have a seemingly impossible time keeping even the slightest bit of perspective in their political outlook. It’s one thing to make a point, it’s another thing to simply write a post so full of over-the-top hyperbole that you can’t help but picture some weirdo at his computer furiously typing away while completely flipping his shit over some non-event. Meanwhile the Earth still rotates, America still exists, and tomorrow will be nearly identical to today for roughly 99% of the American populace. One can’t help but picture said blogger being really pleased with himself once he has released his pent-up fury, feeling as if he’s really “zinged!” the President with his prose, when, in fact, he’s more-or-less regurgitated the bare outline of someone else’s talking points, filling in the gaps with inane adjectives to describe Bush, the White House, or the US itself - adjectives that have no business being used outside of discussions about the Holocaust, Stalin’s purges, etc. The blogosphere must surely be unrepresentative of liberalism today, I tell myself.

It's a long, long post, but PrivatePigg does a great job of demonstrating that the trend he sees is not "unprepresentative of today."

The other day, when the New York Times came out with a final survey on President Bush's dismal public approval ratings, there was an eruption of huzzahs! across the leftosphere, as those numbers obviously confirmed the leftist wet dreams of "the worst president in history."

Down With Tyranny! had this:

Republican ideology is failed ideology. Even as he prepares to finally leave the office he first stole in 2000, Bush is loathed by the overwhelming majority of Americans. Even a third of confessed Republicans think he did a lousy job. The Republicans in Congress are held in even greater contempt. Greed and selfishness is not a valid philosophy of governance. The precise economic policies espoused by the Republican Party that drove this country into Depression with the consecutive terms of three clueless Republican hacks - Warren Harding, Calvin Coolidge and Herbert Hoover (1921-1933)- are a mirror image of what has been served up by Reagan, Bush I, Clinton and, worst of all, by far, Bush II.

Actually, this is even more than BDS, for when Bill Clinton's administration is thrown into the mix, we're looking at a brief for the proposed progressive-socialist agenda that's being hammered constantly by the denizens of the uncleansed netroots fever swamps.

These people are not "fringe" elements of the Democratic Party. This is the party's base. The great test for the Barack Obama administration this next four years will be not so much whether he fixes the economy or reinvests in society (these things will happen), but how well he resists the demands of secular-progressives for the institutionalization of godless socialism in the United States.