My column today is on Barack Obama’s disgusting effort to cajole Americans into falling in line and marching in step. President Bush was a fascist, we were told, because he wanted to impose democracy in unfree lands militarily in large part to ensure the long term safety of liberty here at home. Here’s President Obama openly fantasizing of using the military as a model for how we could do away with democracy in the land of the free.
No I don’t think Obama wants to turn America into a police state, he just likes to day dream about what a great place this would be if everyone would shut up and listen to him.
Something I couldn’t get into in the column, however, needs to be mentioned. Obama’s State of the Union Address was doggerel. All States of the Union have their problems thanks to the modern tradition of making them into laundry lists of dumb-but-popular proposals. But this was high school level stuff at best. I won’t even touch his spilled milk joke.
“This nation is great because we worked as a team. This nation is great because we get each other’s backs.”
Really? First of all, this doesn’t even qualify for a Successories motivational poster. Second of all: this is the rhetoric of the greatest orator since Cicero? This is barely half a notch better than “If we all work our hardest we can make this the best yearbook ever.”
Third: It is so unbelievably not true. Sure, Americans have done some great things when we’ve worked as a “team” — loosely defined. But is America more team-oriented than, say, France? China? Belize? I don’t know because it’s a meaningless sophomoric way to talk about things. We do get each others’ backs, but Obama wants to redefine that as an excuse for government expansion when historically we help each other not through government but in spite of it. Meanwhile, only a fool looks at the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution and says “America: It’s all about the teamwork.”
What offends me about Obama’s speech, beyond the militarism and anti-democratic yearnings, is his continued belief that this is a lofty, compelling or interesting form of argumentation. I think the key to understanding this running theme in Obama’s rhetoric is not that he secretly yearns to be a strongman (he doesn’t) it’s that he has a basic contempt for the intelligence of the American people who don’t already love him and believes that the only way to break through to the bitter clingers is to speak in martial metaphors. “Maybe if I explain it using Navy Seals, they’ll shut up and let me do my job.” In other words, it’s disgusting if he believes this garbage and it’s insulting if he doesn’t.
Yo, Barack! You think what makes the United States great is that the American taxpayer has Chrysler's back. I want the United States to stay great by getting the government OFF my back
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseBingo, Jonah.
The left is completely schizoid about the military: on the one hand, they fear it, don't understand it, and (except, apparently, for homosexuals) certainly would never want to join it. But on the other hand, they'd like our free civilian society to be just like it. Totally el nutso.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseSo in your mind, these are the facts?
1. Liberals don't join the military
2. Liberals want civil life to be more militant.
Ergo, Liberals are 'el nutso.'
In my opinion, you (and many Conservatives) have built a pyramid of assumptions so high that even though they probably started out pretty reasonably, they've now added absurdity after absurdity until the things you write are incomprehensible. Not very long ago, I understood Conservatives and occasionally agreed with them. Now, you and Goldberg have become surprisingly representative.
Bingo, indeed.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI think the key to understanding this running theme in Obama’s rhetoric is not that he secretly yearns to be a strongman (he doesn’t) it’s that he has a basic contempt for the intelligence of the American people who don’t already love him and believes that the only way to break through to the bitter clingers is to speak in martial metaphors.
Contempt for the people is a requirement of liberalism. I dare you to find a liberal that displays a reverence for or trust in the people. Such a person would be so riddled with contradictions they would end up in a psyche ward. The corner stone of all left-wing movements is the believe that order must be imposed upon the people.
The thing to remember with Obama is we're not dealing with a sterling intellect. This is not a well read or introspective guy. The reason his speeches are mostly gibberish slathered with sanctimony is he lives inside the liberal movement, a perpetual feedback loop. He simply says what gets the oohs and ahhs from the other members of the movement.
The mistake made on the right for a century now is to confront Liberalism on intellectual terms. That's like trying to convince someone to become a Catholic by explaining the seating arrangements at the Diet of Worms. Liberalism is purely an emotional appeal, as is true of all mass movements. Obama's speeches are best seen as echolalic babbling, intended to strike soothing tones for the the adherents and potential adherents.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse"Meanwhile, only a fool looks at the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution and says America: It’s all about the teamwork.'"
This argument is wasted on Team Obama. For them, only a fool looks at the Declaration and Constitution. Period.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseLiberals can never truly be honest. "Look, of course we have total faith in government's ability to take care of everyone, and we really don't believe in individual freedom and responsibility because... well, frankly people are just too stupid to take care of themselves, especially if you belong to one of the myriad of victim groups out there. The debt? Oh come on, that doesn't really mean anything. It's just money, and besides any debt problem can be solved if we would just force the wealthy to pay their fair share. And please don't talk to us about adverse effects of government programs such as creating dependency, and losing the sense of personal responsibility and the work ethic. The programs are well-intended, and that's all that matters. Anyway, government dependency ensures that those horrible, mean, racist, bigoted conservative wing-nuts will NEVER win elections again."
What liberal can ever get elected on that kind of honesty? So, of course they have to speak in general, meaningless platitudes that don't mean anything. That's all that they can say.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse"Liberals can never truly be honest." Last time I checked your two leading contenders, Romney and Gingrich, have been proven as liars. Both are no strangers to platitudes.
No doubt you can demonstrate that the republican party has had nothing to do with the current state of affairs in this country. I know, you'll respond that those republicans were never "real" conservatives, just like the party faithful have washed their hands of George W. Bush. I guess it's like Mr. Gingrich's contention that god has forgiven him--no one should question the born-again virgins that are the "true" conservatives.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseRight. And BHO is a moderate freemarket Democrat.
When do we start the revolution?
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseYeah, it's a calculated play to the cheap seats. But I think Obama himself shares in the ignorance he presumes in other Americans.
Remember the flooding a few years ago around the Red River in, what was it, North Dakota? Yeah, there was a lot of the usual government response -- but mostly there was a community response. Good old spontaneous order by a bunch of mind-your-own-business citizens -- something the statists just don't get.
To the Dems, an association of people is only legitimate if it is run (hijacked?) by dues-paying Dems. That's the rule. Apply it to everything Obama says and suddenly the SOTU makes a lot of sense. Scary sense.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI've come to the conclusion that he just doesn't care. It doesn't even register in his mind that what citizens think of him is something that matters. The SOTU is just another punch the time card on his way to doing whatever it is that does register in his mind as important.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse'It doesn't even register in his mind that what citizens think of him is something that matters.'
That's what elections are for. If more people disagree with him he loses. If not he wins.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseDemocracy......get used to it.
There were so many things about that SOTU that I found insulting, that it was physically difficult to actually sit there and listen to it. There was one thing however, that's stuck to my mind, and that was the whole deal with Warren Buffet's secretary's taxes.
We are a nation of easily duped fools.
Obama's entire rhetoric on taxes is designed to foster anger from "the little people" toward "the rich", and it works as millions demand that taxes on "the rich" be raised.
But, if Warren Buffet's secretary paying less taxes than Buffet is such an unfair thing, why isn't the obvious solution to lower her tax rate?
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbusePerhaps 18th and 19th Century Prussia and not Sparta would serve as a better model.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseJonah understates the threat to liberty from people like Obama when he states that Obama doesn't want to be a fascist dictator of a police state. I think Obama, and Democrats in general, have the same view of the Hugo Chavez's and Mussolini's of the world as "moderate" Muslims have of the "radical" Jihadists. That is the same way that a Christian might view a hermit. They have no objection in principle, they may even have a little respect for their devotion, but they have no conscious desire to be one. The problem, though, is that when Obama feels pressure and gets stressed, his natural and unrestrained instinct will be to move towards those very ends.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseYes it was insulting. Our great orator is still community organizing and thinks the entire country will fall for the demonization, blame, and lies that worked on the uninformed, poorly educated, indolent, and entitled that he pandered to in his previous life. He hasn't grown--he simply projects what he has always felt onto those he holds in contempt. The only difference is that now he has a larger stage and a larger audience and the media has his back.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseBingo! Great point! If you look at the whole 'the military works together and gets things done and so should we" speech in this light, it makes perfect sense.
I'm surprised that at the end he didn't holler, Belushi-like, "Who's with me!?!" and go running down the aisle...
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseGood stuff posted here -- thank you Jonah and all.
The MSM will be providing covering fire once again for BHO but the American people are figuring this guy out.
How?
Every time he speaks for himself he gives the game away. So let’s have more BHO speeches, press conferences, campaign stops! Get this guy out there each and every day.
The MSM can't spin what they can't control.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseWinston churchill described his political rival Clement Attlee as a "modest man with much to be modest about." Obama, on the other hand is an arrogant man with much to be modestabout
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseAs others pointed out in comments on the column, Jonah cherry picks quotes to pretend sections of he speech aimed clearly at members of Congress are aimed at the entire American people. Thus does he fill this week's column quota by pretending Obama's utterly run-of-the-mill argument against partisan rancor is some sort of vision for a Spartan-Korean police state. G.J. Jonah, now go back to sleep.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseRedfate, spare me. When the Democrats had both Houses of Congress and the WH, they told the rest of us and the Republicans that "they won" so basically Shut Up. And they pushed through whatever they wanted without any consideration that the people didn't want it.
Now that the Republicans hold the House, the Dems want to "work together".
Take your "calls for bipartisanship" and shove it where the sun don't shine.
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