The audacity of the Obama m.o.
This comment from a thread at Hot Air seems spot on to me:
I noted very early on in O’s presidency that it was clear their tactic was to overwhelm us with previously unthinkable acts, that it was going to be impossible to keep up with their machine gun pace. That’s exactly what they’re doing. I can’t think of a single day where they haven’t done something to be furious and fearful about. Sometimes the hits come on an hourly basis. Even if the mainstream media were paying attention, there’s only so much they can report on in-depth (never mind break through to people who aren’t news junkies and hear very little news).
I noticed this even during the 2008 campaign. I remember that before the election I tried to explain my perception of Obama to friends, and why I distrusted him so (the Alice Palmer incident, campaign finance switcheroo, etc.), and all I got were blank stares. I told them I thought they would see later what I was talking about, but I don’t think they have seen. A person has to be paying very close attention and reading on the right and not just the left, and how many people are?
Obama knows that and counts on it, and knew it from the start.
What you describe is one of the reasons I consistently feel so depressed about the Obama presidency. Not a day goes by without something outrageous happening, and I don’t know how we’re going to beginning turning all of this back, assuming enough people are paying enough attention to vote him out of office this fall. The worst part is that I feel like I can’t discuss it with many people because so few of the folks I deal with in my daily life are paying any attention. If you begin to tell them your concerns, they think you’re a paranoid nut because they just go about their daily business, sometimes tuning into the lamestream media, but mostly not paying close attention to any of it at all.
I have frequently been listening to NPR while driving home from work and thinking, “What? What?” And then never hearing a word about whatever it was again.
AMDG,
Janet
yep.
since Iowa, when, as he mounted the stage for the victory speech and they played “I’ve Got 99 Problems and a Bitch Ain’t One of Them,” I have been wary.
Voters not paying attention is why Obama often asserts blatant lies. Obama knows that we political junkies know he is lying, and he does not care. Exists a larger group of voters who do not know he is lying. Obama can count on make believe media to parrot his lies, without evincing incredulity, into the cultural ether, where this larger group of voters is likely to soak it up. So, Obamacare is described as “not a tax” which will save money and you can keep your doctor. For 28 consecutive months, the Obama Administration can counsel us to not read too much into any monthly jobs report, and no one reports it. And this month’s jobs report is said, with a straight face, to constitute a good step forward. And most voters will NEVER know the difference. And Obama DOES NOT CARE that we political junkies know he is lying. DOES. NOT. CARE.
I’m with Harry Truman, the American public always knows who’s a fraud. In the end they know he’s a gangster from the South Side of Chicago and will act accordingly. Don’t be worried about the election, they’ll come through and kick this bunch out and maybe even do a number on the Democratic party at the national level.
Come September don’t pay much attention to the polls, look at the turnout for campaign events. Personally I think BHO is in big trouble. A few months ago he had an event in Shaker Heights Ohio, a rich Jewish suburb of Cleveland. He couldn’t fill a high school auditorium. He’s toast.
I know I’m beating the proverbial dead horse, but until the MSM fairly reports all that this president and administration lies about about gets away with, a lot of those 50% approvers will remain so. The greatest tragedy of the past six years in my view is how the MSM is nothing more than a US version of Pravda. Baghdad Bob has nothing on these people.
Nobody ever went broke underestimating the American public. Obama is using old fashioned city politics promising each group that he’s their guy. He has the black and Hispanic vote locked up. He has the gays and the feminists. He has the unions. He has unmarried women. Unfortunately, none of these voting blocks are looking out for the long term health of the country so he can promise the moon and spend us into insolvency.
What I find really unsettling is that he has turned a bad economy on its head as an electoral issue. Historically, incumbents have been hurt by a bad economy. This guy has run up food stamps, unemployment benefits, disability, and rent subsidies so high that people are dependent on him to maintain their insecurity. They want a nanny state at this point.
It is true. He could call Romney a white slaver and get away with it. People have just stopped really listening. It is all just some reality TV show to them.
Hate to say, ”I told you so,” but I will, because if you look back over my posts here over the last few years you will see that, even before he was elected, I was warning about how Obama & Co. would overwhelm everybody by the sheer number and pace of the changes that they would institute; far Left think tanks have been drafting and stacking up their wish list of proposals and legislation for years, ready to go. if the opportunity presented itself and, unfortunately, it did. A flood so great, especially a flood —how many 34, Czars busily working away?–of mostly “under the radar” policy changes and regulations that were just not going to be reported, or not reported in any great detail by his Ministry of Truth, the MSM, and if reported, reported as “sunshine and lollypops” and all “for our own good.”
Take, for instance, Cass Sunstein, an advocate of ”Death Panels. ” Of course, not called by that name, but Death Panels nonetheless, since they (and they’ve already been staffed, paid for–that little bit was tucked away in the so called “Stimulus” bill that was only supposed to pay for “shovel ready “ jobs–and in a grave digger sorta way, they are), and are working away, gearing up for action.
They will be able to decide if–in their estimation, and given of your age, and stage of life, productivity, taxpaying status, and value to society, and given your health status, and your statistically likely remaining years –it is worth it to “society,” the collective, to pay up to some prescribed amount each year so that you can receive that critical life-extending operation or medication you need, and thus decree your health or sickness, life or death; to decide your fate if Obamacare stays in place. And if you are, in Sunstein’s very utilitarian and unsentimental view, just an older, non-productive, retired “eater,” forget it, and pick out your burial plot, and the type of coffin you would prefer. Glenn Beck called Sunstein, “the most dangerous man in America.” Well, what has he been up to all these months, anybody seen any reporting on his activities?
Or, how about Science adviser Holdren, who saw nothing wrong with proposals to drastically reduce what he saw as obscenely high U.S. population levels by slipping contraceptive chemicals into our drinking water, or his proposals to do the World and the environment a favor by “de-industrializing “ the U.S.—what’s he been up to?
More troubling, perhaps, is that we don’t even know, for sure, the number and who all of these Czars are, and what their duties might be, and this doesn’t even count all of the regular political appointees Obama & Co. have placed throughout our government, who will be very hard to root out and throw out if Romney wins.
So, yeah, the termites have been quietly working away at the house behind the walls, and it could possibly collapse at any moment, but we wouldn’t know it by the news that the MSM puts out.
Paul in Boston –
“…the American public always knows who’s a fraud.”
This is really what it all boils down to. I have pretty much been on the opposite side of this estimation since Obama got elected. I used to believe Truman’s adage, but then, well, we did elect perhaps the biggest fraud even a paranoid conservative imagination would have trouble concocting in its worst nightmare.
My narrative of how it happened doesn’t provide much comfort. The short version is that the left’s propaganda about the omni-malevolence of Bush did manage to penetrate enough of the public mind to make a difference. Enough people were in a place where they believed that never have things been so bad, never have we been so divided, never has there been a more partisan President, never has there been a more incompetent, perhaps never a more mendacious, administration… and so on.
The mentality was: “We are wounded almost fatally, and bleeding out – healing is what we require.” Therapy and care – care is what we need (I’ll come back to that point in a moment).
Given how effective the left’s propaganda was in those years, it’s hard to blame the public for soaking it up – political ignorance has never been a terrible problem before, since most of our candidates have been well within the boundaries of acceptability. Insert an extremist into that equilibrium with a record that is buried and ignored by an activist media, pretending to be moderate – and the old ways suddenly don’t hold up so well.
The facts today are that the public has come down from that sublime state of delusion. The question is whether they have come down far enough.
On the one hand, they have no inkling of any scandal at all in Obama’s administration – as far as they’re concerned, it has been sparkling clean compared to Bush’s. On the other hand, they instinctively dislike Obamacare, regardless of its constitutionality.
On the one hand, they blame Bush for the economy (astonishing, but depressingly true). On the other hand, they know that things have not gotten much better under the Light Bringer.
On the one hand, they really, really like the idea of having a black President who they can pronounce at least competent – virtue feels good, and there’s no congratulation quite like self-congratulation. On the other hand, they’ve already given him one term, and now they are somewhat freer to judge him on his merits – it’s harder to believe a vote against him is racist this time around.
To my mind, commenter T makes the most compelling case for why we should be optimistic: 46% of American voters in 2008 already had he minimal sagacity required in that feverish environment to reject the Light Bringer. We can say with virtual certainty that this percentage will not get smaller. And common sense and observation would suggest that an additional 4 percentage points of people fed up with the stagnation is not unreasonable to hope for.
It’s a good case. Last week on Bill Bennett’s show, the remarkable and astute Yale professor David Gelernter was on for a couple of segments, plugging his new book. At one point, Bennett asked him for his prediction about the election, and Gelernter didn’t even hesitate:
“Obama is finished.”
Bennett was a bit taken aback, given that Gelernter is something of a pessimist. “Wait,” he said, “He’s finished? What makes you say that?”
Gelernter: “Well, look. I think that if you have even a modicum of faith left in the American people, you have to believe that there is no way they will give this man a second term.”
I suppose that’s right, after all. It’s disturbing, then, that I’m still not willing to bet that Obama will lose. Did 2008 damage my faith that much?
It’s fair to ask why I remain so pessimistic, given T’s sound argument and your and Gelernter’s “Truman” argument about the quality of the people’s BS detector.
It comes down to this: Given all of the above “on the one hand, on the other hand”‘s, the tension in the people’s mind, it will take a little bit of courage for them to leap to from the now ingrained psychological comforts of dragooning all of American history into a dialectic between Bush and Obama, into a more realistic appraisal of the state of things.
What I mean is that the psychodrama of Bush-Obama works like a plea of extenuating circumstances – so long as Bush is the worst, the fount of all evil, then no matter how bad Obama is, a large portion of the blame can be allotted to Bush, while the rest can be forgiven as a man hitting some bumps in the road under duress. If Romney is associated with Bush in any way whatsoever, this psychodrama will be activated, and we will revert to our illusory comforts in the arms of the One.
As an addendum: I was reading the comments on some article on yahoo the other day, I think about the Chinese woman who had her teeth ground down to stumps by a fake dentist somewhere in China, and I caught an exchange that went something like this:
Commenter 1: “Welcome to the world of socialized medicine.”
Commenter 2 (replying): “And you think Romney would do anything for this woman? At least Obama would CARE!”
It is that thought – “Obama CARES” – that this campaign of ours needs to burn to the ground and cover with salt. For we can be ground down to stumps, our economy, our job prospects, our standing in the world, our pride – but so long as we feel that Obama CARES, I fear that enough of us will lack the courage to do what another part of us knows is the right thing.
My two pennies!
I don’t think Obama even knows he’s lying.
I detest this man…more than any president we’ve ever had. And I detest the “Bitch he ain’t got trouble with” as well.
To me, BHO looks desperate and on edge. Yes, he has successfully hoodwinked many people, but many people voted for him in 2008 simply because he is AA. I think that in the privacy of the voting booth a majority will not make that mistake again.
He said he was going to “fundamentally transform” America, and he certainly wasn’t lying about that. That is one campaign promise he has kept.
kolnai Says:
July 7th, 2012 at 6:44 pm
About the only way I could respond to that would be to say, “If you think Omama ‘cares’, you’re a damn fool.”
God save us from “caring” voters. They will be the death of us all.
The MSM has failed the Republic.
@Kolnai: I was on that Bennett show.
I’m the guy that pointed out to Bill and Gelernter the Declaration’s counts against King George were just as apt against King Obama, wherein that was discussed for a while.
https://dl.dropbox.com/u/41339180/Ed%20on%20Declaration.mp3
I recently bought a bumper sticker that says THE MEDIA IS LYING TO YOU. It reminds me of the hidden signs that appeared in the science fiction movie “They Live”, after the protagonist put on the special sunglasses.
I wish it would catch on, and the “low information voters” saw it everywhere they looked. Maybe it might cause some people to stop and think. Well, I can dream, at least.
Here’s the Zazzle link. It’s not my site; I’m not making a dime off it.
You can draw a line from the Progressive movement to the New Deal to the Civil Rights movement. My guess is that for many on the left social and political reform is a family tradition. Does it matter to these people that Obama is lying? Probably not, as long as he continues the tradition. Too bad for this lot the reforms are running up against reality. They’re going to be overturn the same as prohibition, a Progressive Era reform.
Ed Bonderenka –
I remember that! My God, what a small world…
Kudos to you, sir.
Kolnai
Thank you.
I’m with Harry Truman, the American public >i?always knows who’s a fraud.
How do you explain the events of November 2008?
Occam:
I hope we sustain that!
Even worse than his daily travesties – the big ones that get all the attention – is what the OTHER HAND is doing while you’re watching this one. The many smaller and unnoticed things that are getting slipped into law.
Electing Romney will brin a lot of it to a screeching halt – going after the unregulated orgs borne of leftist think tanks, that has to come next. The phony ‘grassroots’ new-age con-men and predatory litigants, from Riverkeeper, to MoveOn to the “Working Families Party’ to Code Pink, anything Van Jones is involved in, ACORN and its many permutations – the list is long and insidious. They must be eradicated. If it is not too late.
How else do you make a dictatorship? by acting fast, and watching the people spend their time NOT focusing on the important stuff! ie. everyone acted like they had lots of time, and could discuss endlessly without spending time learning how this all works.
now what? as far as i can tell, other than know things are not well, most have no idea of stuff more than they knew 3 years ago! everything still seems stupid.
and can we go back and find the post where i pointed out:
that what they do is the unthinkable, and since no one wants to believe it, and attacks the messenger on it. they have a clear clean run doing the unthinkable, which is not what they would have operating otherwise.
the population is well conditioned to not accept the unthinkable as possible at all. even if all the parts add up to it as with eugenics and abortion/redistribution. its unthinkable. no?
so guess what? its had free reign because in order to prevent something one must conceive it, and think of it.
is the new healthcare bill Acton T4?
that would be unthinkable, no?
what if feminism is communisms front column?
unthinkable
Soros is calling for UN control of guns… (and if anyone knows the outcome of that, HE does)
Russian bomber intrusion near Pacific coast is second in two weeks…
they keep poking we get desensitized..
unthinkable?
nuclear war and we are unprepared for it as its unthinkable?
by the way…
anyone other than i, realize that such speed and acting could only be done with a plan that existed prior to his achieving presidency?
ie. if one achieved office and had no such plan, the acts that would be unthinkable and one after another would have a different fingerprint
the time to think, once elected, would be small
and could not come up with what to act upon while also making it happen
Nice job, Ed. Good points and well spoken.
I’ve been one who has doubted artfldgr and the way he sees the grand conspiracy behind all that the left does. Obama’s outrageous actions have made me more apt to believe that a conspiracy exists and he is basically the front man. He cares little for the truth or integrity. He’s doing the bidding of, as Wolla Dalbo points out, “all the far Left think tanks that have been drafting and stacking up their wish list of proposals and legislation for years, ready to go.” He’s been a man on a mission to get all that in place. If he can win another term by prevarication or pulling the wool over the “rubes” eyes, that’s just the way he rolls. Winning isn’t just desirable in his eyes, it is the only thing. And he doesn’t care how he does it. He is a much more accomplished and arrogant liar than Bill Clinton ever was.
I just had an experience with a democrat senator (been in office for many, many years.) who is in our state legislature. She came knocking on my door to solicit my support. I questioned her on a number of outrageous state spending bills and why she was for them. She had no trouble telling me with a straight face that she is the most fiscally conservative democrat in the senate and tried to weasel out of my statements about her support for too much spending. She didn’t expect anyone to know how she voted and believed she could hoodwink me. Needless to say, she got nothing but doubt and disbelief from me.
Yep, Art, Obama certainly didn’t think up all this on his own. He is truly a real-life Manchurian Candidate.
“He is truly a real-life Manchurian Candidate.”
I get to fix one for you: He is truly a real-life Soros Candidate. Follow the money.
Aided by the Fourth Estate.
The Fourth Estate has long been the Fifth Column.
I wish I could be more sanguine about the election. I still hope . . . but the fact that so many of our countrymen could vote for this Obamination in 2008 when the damning facts were already there for all to see, just freezes my blood. That anyone could be elected who Promised to “bankrupt the coal industry”!!! Hell, people, that Alone should have sunk this Quisling. And there were so many more outrageous, hateful, dishonorable, racist, loathsome statements of all kinds!
I’m afraid most “Americans” aren’t very American any more. Most of the Dim voters want free loot. Speaking of which: I got a letter from my insurance company today about the “MLR”: part of the Obamacare act.
Medical Loss Ratio information: “The Affordable Care Act [seductive title] requires health insurers … to spend at least 80 – 85% of the premiums they receive on health care services and activities to improve health care quality. This is referred to as the MLR rule or the 80/20 rule.
“If the health insurer does not spend at least 80% of the premiums it receives on health care services and activities to improve health care quality, the insurer must rebate the difference.
“… You are receiving this notice because your health insurer had a MLR for 2011 that met or exceeded the required MLR.”
It also stated that the checks [bribes] must be issued by August 1 of this year for last year’s MLR excess.
Well, isn’t that special. What a business model! My dad was in the insurance line until 20 years ago (C-suite). I’ve asked him about all this, and he said “we had to Compete: that kept our profit margin pretty lean.” Full stop. Now? no need to compete with the Citizens on the hook for any overages.
Ever notice how “citizen” and “nation” are never used any more? It’s all “the people” and “the country.” (Bush also drove me crazy with that.)
Anyway. There’s a Boatload of our fellow “people” who will be mighty glad to get the govt. candy, and will for sure vote for the Candyman come Fall. Brace yourselves. And I bet Soreass has another financial trick or three up his sleeve to help things along, like he did in 2008. (Why doesn’t that old vulture die already?)
Brave New Whirl.
Mom and Dad were standing together. Dad, clutching young Sister, shushed me for fidgiting while Crass was speaking.
He was up there. He was always up there, but He was all around me, too. I accepted all of it the whole of it the truth of it. Mom had wept at the audacity of Crass. Dad had declared no man better. Sure, he said, some things might have been done better, but, he reminded me, you can’t make an omelet without breaking some eggs.
Tomorrow was school. Mom and Dad had taught me how to elbow my way to the front and talk crassly. I silently stated my memorized lines: The American People’s Republic is a genuine workers’ state in which all the people are completely liberated from exploitation and oppression. The workers, peasants, soldiers and intellectuals are the true masters of their destiny and are in a unique position to defend their interests.
Mom saw me practicing. She bent down and picked me up. Your a good little worker she cooed in my ear. Suddenly, we were on the telecam. The crowd roared and Mom lifted me up for all to see. A microphone was in my face and I began to recite.
If Obama & Co. believe that they might lose, I’d expect that right about now they are arranging for a lot of their political appointees to do what is known in Washington as “burrowing in” i.e. changing the Civil Service status of easily fired “political appointees” to that of virtually un-firable “regular Civil Service.” A practice that most administrations are guilty of but which, in the case of highly ideological, far left Obama & Co. appointees, would leave their “Fifth Columnists” in place to do their mischief, to protect Obama & Co. programs, and to do their best to thwart, delay, and water down any new Romney initiatives.
Remember, each incoming President only gets to appoint his people to a limited number of jobs-see what is known as the Plum Book (see http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/GPO-PLUMBOOK-2008/content-detail.html) for a list of these jobs, but the number is usually somewhere around 700-800 or so.
So, the President gets to appoint the members of his Cabinet and the head of each agency, and then perhaps one or two other “political appointees” in each one of the most important agencies to advocate for and to try to see to it that the President’s policies are carried out by that agency; two or three people atop an organizational pyramid that might consist of tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands, or even millions of employees, and basically almost totally dependent on their “underlings” for faithful execution of the President’s agenda.
Around Washington the view in some agencies–the State Department springs immediately to mind–is that Presidents come and go, but the Department and its career bureaucrats remain, and will still be working at their desks long after any particular President —and his policies–have come and gone. That is one of the reasons why many agencies–the State Department and the CIA come immediately to mind–have their own agendas and even “Foreign Policies,” that are often at odds with that of the current President, and so they often go their own way rather than follow exactly what the President orders. Or, perhaps, there might be section or a division within an agency that is particularly resistant to Presidential orders, and a new President’s policies and priorities, and how he wants things done.
Well, as I see it, the more highly ideological and committed Obama & Co. burrowers there are, the worse things will be for Romney.
I also think that it will be hard for Romney to do the customary thing and ask for the resignations and fire all of the far left attorneys that have been hired on in Holder’s DOJ–particularly in the supposed “Civil Rights” division. You might remember that it was formerly routine for such a changeover with each new administration–everyone sent in their resignation letter and the new administration usually fired most of the attorneys, and replaced them with their own people. Well, when Bush tried to do this the Left, Democrats, and the MSM made a huge stink and tried–pretty successfully– to portray this as somehow unusual and unfair, and I expect that they will put up the same kind of stink should Romney want to clean house at DOJ.
P.S.–So, realistically speaking, whether or not a particular President’s policies are truly carried out, and the extent to which they are carried out by an agency depends on that agency’s existing composition and “culture,” and from my admittedly limited experience, I’d guess that most Federal agencies are packed with liberals who are already resistant to the policies of conservative Presidents. Why work for the Federal government unless you believe government to be the solution to most problems?
Adding Obama & Co. ideologues into the mix will only stiffen their resolve in many agencies to” dog it” on any Romney initiatives.
Book, you were so right. I remember how completely overwhelmed & frightened I felt only a few months in to Obama’s presidency.
Obama’s known for “throwing people under the bus”, but look at who has refused to abandon: Holder, Napolitano, Sebelius, Lisa Jackson, Chu, Salazar (sure there’s more). With cooperation from the MSM, he has kept in place people who would have been let go by any normal politician who actually cared about public opinion or the Constitution.
For example, Holder has politicized DOJ beyond recognition, including dropping the case against the Black Panthers, releasing the Bush admin’s torture memos (i.e. telling the world our interrogation tactics), attempting to move terrorist trial into civilian courts, deciding to just not enforce laws he doesn’t like, harassing states over immigration and Voter ID laws, and his TBD involvement in Fast and Furious. Not only should he have been fired, he likely should face prosecution for his Fast & Furious involvement.
And why does Napolitano still have a job? How can the actions of the TSA be justified? How many wheel-chair bound grannies and toddlers must be molested, or air travelers robbed, before someone decides this is outrageous?
I could rant about every one of them, how they’ve acted lawlessly, and with the full support and approval from Obama, but THIS is a big reason why he’s been able to accomplish so much. Not only was there a road map, but there’s been a leader & and a complicit media who have allowed these radicals the room and support to do things that never before have been tolerated. It makes me sick just thinking about it.
Occam’s Beard Says:
July 7th, 2012 at 10:33 pm
“I’m with Harry Truman, the American public >i?always knows who’s a fraud.
How do you explain the events of November 2008?”
Truman had a huge problem with Four Star General and WWII hero Douglas MacArthur during the Korean War. Eventually he had to fire him for insubordination. MacArthur came back to the US to a hero’s welcome and was even invited to give a speech to a joint session of Congress, his famous “old soldiers never die, they just fade away” speech. At that point Truman’s popularity was so low he couldn’t have been elected dog catcher anywhere in the US. Six weeks later MacArthur was heckled mercilessly when he attended a Yankees game. He was done as a hero. (He was not done as a general. He and Eisenhower advised Kennedy not to get into a land war in Asia. Our oh so smart President–see a pattern here about who the MSM calls smart–ignored their advice and got us into Viet Nam. But that’s another story entirely)
People just got caught up in the hype in November of 2008 and were sick of Bush and the Republicans for whatever reason. With the Great Recession dragging on into its fourth year and the much hated health care bill now the law of the land according to the Supreme Court, I don’t think the public is still fooled by the stagecraft of 2008. People see what’s going on and don’t like it but there’s not much they can do day to day. Being a polite people they don’t carry on much about it either. And being a sensible people they spend their time doing better things than worry daily about politics.
Think about the Tea Party for a minute, especially the huge march on Washington against the health care bill. In my lifetime it’s unique as a the only mass march by conservatives (anywhere in the world!). There have been lots of them by the left, the biggest ones were the anti-Viet Nam marches of my youth, but never anything by conservatives until now. What’s even more interesting is that they showed up once, crushed the Democrats in 2010 and then “disappeared”. They’re still there, back at work doing better things than politics, but still upset and with no illusions about the Light Bringer if they had any earlier.
Come November I think there’s going to be a big surprise. Romney is going to win in a landslide because the public can’t be fooled twice.
Brave New World is not quite the right idea to describe Obama’s MO. Those people at least believed there was a better alternate world being denied them.
Obama and his machine only have hate and anger. Their postmodern world recognizes the triumph of capitalism and classical political liberalism. Their social utopia will not work and they know this, but it is better to live in a destroyed world than our world.
This makes their task easy. They do not have to build anything. Just destroy. And it is very easy. Do it by accusation. From this stance comes their machine gun pace. Have you ever known someone who is truly evil and has nothing to live for? Probably not. But we know a few from their actions. The Columbine murderers come to mind.
But a much more common example presents. The embittered divorcee. In no time at all, what had taken half a lifetime to build, all the friends and property, all family and extended family, all are jettisoned if ones does not agree with their purpose of revenge.
It comes natural. Viciousness. The cold heart. Perhaps you’ve seen them in the betrayed person. The person whose very life’s purpose and therefore life was taken away. It really does appear that a good chunck of those who call themselves Americans feel a sense of betrayal. They don’t call themselves post modernists or deconstructionists or nihilists. They don’t call themselves anything that describes transcendental purpose. But their lives lack reference, faith, and strength. Hence their vague but powerful sense of betrayal, a sense focused and set upon those whose life does have purpose and whose love for life is genuine. They hate that because they really believe it is your delusion and they must educate you.
Like the destructive movements of the past, this one has the inner circle truly devoted to destruction and all the other useful sheep whom they hate with as much hatred as everything else they hate because their hatred is all consuming and complete.
The sheep are without a Shephard because so far no Shephard has agreed to appear where He is denied.
The last paragraph of Stephen R. C. Hicks book, “Explaining Postmodernism” offers this answer:
The Enlightenment was based on premises opposite to those of postmodernism, but while the Enlightenment was able to create a magnificent world on the basis of those premises, it articulated and defended them only incompletely. That weakness is the sole source of postmodernism’s power against it. Completing the articulation and defense of those premises is therefore essential to maintaining the forward progress of the Englightenment vision and shielding it against postmodern strategies.
Hmmmm.
There are some built in defenses. One, how much money you have in your bank account and how secure you feel can’t be ignored; and two, even if people are sheep, they can sometimes figure out who the real betrayers are:
http://www.desmoinesregister.com/article/20120708/NEWS09/307080024/Battling-for-every-Iowa-vote?Frontpage&gcheck=1&nclick_check=1
JJ: Obama’s outrageous actions have made me more apt to believe that a conspiracy exists and he is basically the front man. He cares little for the truth or integrity. He’s doing the bidding of, as Wolla Dalbo points out, “all the far Left think tanks that have been drafting and stacking up their wish list of proposals and legislation for years, ready to go.”
Rickl: Yep, Art, Obama certainly didn’t think up all this on his own. He is truly a real-life Manchurian Candidate.
Parker: “He is truly a real-life Manchurian Candidate.”
I get to fix one for you: He is truly a real-life Soros Candidate. Follow the money.
I couldn’t agree more with these sentiments. Obama didn’t think of any of this himself. He’s not bright enough, ruthless enough, or driven enough to do that. He’s the spokesmodel for hard left elements who are, basically a duskier version of a frat boy who just wants to swan around, party, play golf, and be lionized. All he has to do is read what his masters put on the teleprompter. They insist that he use it because they’re aware that he’s a dullard, and they’re afraid that, left to his own meager intellectual devices, he’ll start opining on ways to keeping islands from capsizing and blow the whole thing.
The hard left probably has/had a whole stable of prospects just like him, assorted by race, sex, ethnicity, and sexual orientation, so that a generation later they could dust off whichever one fit the grievance group profile that had the best chance, in their estimation. With the financial resources available to them (*cough* Soros and his ilk *cough*) and the aid of sympathizers in place (*cough* academia and the press *cough*) it’d be easy to maintain a hothouse (what I’ve termed a Red farm system) of such prospects, and to provide them with sufficient credentials and honors to make them plausible candidates. (Whitaker Chambers, IIRC, detailed how the CPUSA members used to orchestrate awards and honors for each other for just this purpose.)
Why do I think this? Because, if I were a Red, it’s what I would do.
I just LOL’d big when I went to Ace’s site a few minutes ago. There’s a picture there that expresses the sentiments of several of our commenters perfectly.
The picture is of a billboard which has a picture of King George III and it says “Miss me yet? – King George III”.
OB said:
“They insist that he use it because they’re aware that he’s a dullard, and they’re afraid that, left to his own meager intellectual devices, he’ll start opining on ways to keeping islands from capsizing and blow the whole thing.”
This is why I can’t wait until the debates start. Lordy, I hope Romney doesn’t blow that opportunity. He should go after Obama viciously with facts and figures. **HE** should replace the lame stream media moderator’s softball questions with his own questions like “Mr. President…why did you place first priority on passing a health care program that only a few people want and that will bankrupt our economy instead of getting our economy back in shape so jobs could be created?”
Then when Obama answers that the health care bill will reduce costs, Romney should say “There ya go again – lying about what the facts are. The American people aren’t as dumb as you think they are.”
Sometimes (and will I be put on a list for this, well juc you then-notice how I subtly put in the “j” for “f” and left out the “k.” Aha, catch that Mr. Cathcher of pro-life-anti-Obama-must-be-white-supremist-terrorist? Thinkin man arnst I?) when I see Obama’s picture or especially when I hear him use the word “folks” in a sentence combined with “you’d think they would be grateful,” I get this charged feeling in my arms, particularly in my biceps, and if I’m standing, I assume a forward pose for striking, and together both these events with the non-event of closure, tells me at what a visceral level, not even counting the cerebral, I am offended.
I second especially the comments of Wolla @9:26AM, and those of Arfldgr.
I add that it is delusional to discuss the upcoming election while overlooking what I fear is probable: Massive vote fraud. Vote fraud is a Democratic staple-see Chicago, LBJ/JFK in TX as examples. But there will be unprecedented vote fraud this November, and in the future….That is why Soros has funded Dems in state Sec. of State elections; those are in charge of the election/vote count processes.
As Stalin observed, “It’s not the vote counts that matter, it is who counts the votes.”
Whittaker Chambers, upon converting from communism to conservatism some 50-60 years ago, told his wife, “We’re joining the losing side.”
2008 revealed a shift in how Americans can be lead to put people in power, by simply using the media and tying the political ideas to the world of pop culture fashion.
This is powerful stuff. To cement in a persons mind what ideas they’re for, based on perceptions of themselves being hip in embracing one set of ideas and very unhip should they embrace the ideas of another. And the kicker being, they don’t even know what the basic ideas are.
Combat voter fraud.
http://www.truethevote.org/
Romney should say “There ya go again — lying about what the facts are. The American people aren’t as dumb as you think they are.”
It might be more effective to elicit information from Obama, so as to underscore his intellectual and policy deficiencies and to undercut the soaring rhetoric pap that he favors.
“Mr. Obama, you claim that Obamacare will ‘bend the cost curve downward,’ whatever that means. Can you give the American people one example where socialized medicine has actually done this?
Would you hold out Medicare as an example of what you wish to impose on the American people?
Do you seriously think the American people will want all healthcare to resembe Medicare?
We all know that the Federal government is broke. Mr. Obama, how much of the national budget does Medicare consume?
Is Medicare a program that you’re seriously proposing to extend even further? How are we ever going to pay for an expanded program, when we can’t even pay for what we have now?
Mr. Obama, if we adopt your socialized medicine model, what incentive would the government have to keep alive sick and elderly people who can no longer work?
(When he responds with the altruism rubbish, follow up with “You may be aware that when East Germany built the Wall to keep in its citizens, it allowed – indeed, encouraged – the sick and elderly to leave. Why do you think the sociaists did that?”)
Mr. Obama, why do you think that people from countries with socialized medicine come to the US for medical care? How do you explain that?
My fanatasy Romney line in a debate would probably be…”Mr Obama wants you to think the richest country in the world was a failure until he showed up to make it very much poorer”.
“kiss my ass obama” day.
you know, it’s hard not to hate all the idiots that put that idiot in charge.
but there are levels. there’s the tb’s and then there’s people who just don’t seem to know. i know several. and its them that perturbs me the most. you try and tell them. you get the facts. your ready with the points. but horror of horrors you find not even presentation changes their minds. they don’t believe your facts and your points don’t penetrate their minds.
so, they become not quite the friends they were.
“The worst part is that I feel like I can’t discuss it with many people because so few of the folks I deal with in my daily life are paying any attention.”
And the liberals I know who are paying attention approve of everything that Obama has done–proving that “liberal” has become synonymous with “fascist”.
you know, it’s hard not to hate all the idiots that put that idiot in charge.
I live in California.
Pity me. I get it in stereo.
“”proving that “liberal” has become synonymous with “fascist”.””
pst314
Basically bullies that harp on their uber tolerance. I had no idea smart people could be so stupid.
Out of 49 comments on this issue not one of you deep thinkers has declared that he is going to actively work for Romney’s election
Data Sclepper, and you sir do nothing for stray or homeless puppies, as is obvious since you didn’t mention it.
Nor has any of us asserted that we won’t eat dogs, like Boy God-King, so I guess by liberal logic Fido is on our menu.
Sheesh. What a stupid – not to mention off-topic – comment you made. And to think you people get to vote.
Occam’s Beard Says:
““Mr. Obama, you claim that Obamacare will ‘bend the cost curve downward,’ whatever that means. Can you give the American people one example where socialized medicine has actually done this? ”
Depends on how you slice it. Socialized medicine does often cost less than ours (say as a percentage of GDP spent on medical)… but it is for a lower level of care with waits, rationing, and more things totally unavailable no matter what (want a crt defib unit; bummer.. NO). But; if by bending the cost curve down while also keeping the same level of care; you’re correct it does not. But that won’t be the answer a leftist gives unless you clarify the second part about same level of care (apples to apples). Even then they’ll lie and forget the second part but then you can proceed to nail their scalp to the wall…
Boy, you guys jumped on Data Schlepper quick.
Nevertheless his point has merit. For the past week, or two, the “True Conservatives” have been attacking Romney with nearly the same level of vehemence that they attack Obama. It is truly disgusting.
This election will not be won by intramural carping about Obama. We have an alternative candidate; only one alternative. We better get behind him, or be prepared for four disastrous years.
Wish I saw more threads and more comments correcting the pure BS that is being put out about Romney. His response to the SCOTUS ruling was brilliant; but, the MSM and the Dimocrats completely distorted what he said. Precious few have stood to correct this travesty.
To review, he said (paraphrasing) that as a consequence of the the SCOTUS ruling, Obamcare was a tax, because the prior Obama fiction that it was a penalty was no longer legal. He challenged BHO to declare which interpretation he now supported. If our side had taken up the mantra it could have been embarrassing to the Liar in Chief. Instead it was portrayed as a Romney weakness
I read somewhere that a lady asked something like “tell my why I should fall in love with Romney.”
What? Someone just shut her up. Please.
Romney will just keep doing what he has shown so far: winning. He’s up in the polls, he’s up in the money, and he’s got a hard enough task to win not mentioning reconciling the GOP elite and the Tea Party.
There are so many organizations to help. I like the Liberty Council and Campaign to Defeat Barack Obama. The latter will take your money or a signature on their petition. They are mounting an effort in four very important swing states and announce the following latest poll results:
We have exciting poll numbers to share with you for these 4 targeted swing states – remember, in 2008 Barack Obama won each of these states. Here are the latest poll results in the 2012 campaign:
WISCONSIN (Source: Rasmussen Poll)
Romney: 47% – Obama: 44% [Romney leads by 3%]
MICHIGAN (Source: We Ask America Poll)
Romney: 45% – Obama: 43% [Romney leads by 2%]
OHIO (Source: Real Clear Politics Poll Average)
Romney: 43.6% – Obama: 46.2% [Obama leads by 2.6%]
NEVADA (Source: Real Clear Politics Poll Average)
Romney: 44.0% – Obama: 49.3% [Obama leads by 5.3%]
http://www.campaigntodefeatobama.com/
Whingeing about Romney is a luxury we don’t have, friends. The stakes in this one are stratospheric. Even if Romney does win AND does everything we hope, our nation’s situation will be grave indeed. The effort to undo the damage the Left has done will be monumental; it may already be too late.
In such straits, even buying time is worth fighting for.
I agree that our constant analyzing of Obama isn’t what is needed to win the election. BUT, I can’t help it. I am a few chapters into the Maraniss book, and all I read is a multigenerational dysfunctional family incapable of raising a healthy kid. Grandfather Stanley was a big talker and small doer who kept getting fired from his jobs as furniture salesman. Remember when he told Obama that his grandmother said the harassing guy at the bus stop was black? That is like telling the kid his granny is a racist, but I am pure. He was pure–pure BS.
And then there is Mommy raising a kid in Indonesia while telling him how crappy America is. Same Mommy dumps him when he is 10, and apparently Obama didn’t really care.
We are talking about someone who was denied the fundaments of normal emotional development. Maraniss sees his lies as trying to (and succeeding at) coming to grips with his own blackness. He sees the Obama book as a journey that ends in Obama finding himself as a black man in America. I disagree. Obama uses the black man meme to avoid dealing with his family’s dysfunctionality. All of Obama’s lies and evolutions are the same as his grandfather’s job applications–dancing around the holes in his self. His caring for Lily Ledbetter and Trayvon Martin is phoney, but he has learned that it plays well on a resume. ACA is no more than his grandfather’s schemes for increasing furniture sales. And his participant observer take on American blacks is invalid because Obama really can’t walk in anyone else’s shoes. His own feet never touch the ground. How can he know how it feels to walk.
When we get to the African side of his family, there is no there there. It simply provides a basket full of myths that he can use at will. And the socialist stuff is simply his ticket into the world of cool and elite. It is his default philosophy, not something formed by true experience and testing. To sum this up, Obama has no core. His next action will always be prompted by what is needed to save his a**. If that involves destroying us, so be it. This is the man some want to have his finger on the nuclear button. I wouldn’t trust him to feed my cat.
If anybody was paying attention:
This past Friday the White House website released official documents stating a new executive order for President Obama.
fta:Overall the EO will allow a branch of governance to gain communications power around the country, under the guise of providing relief during a disaster.
We are talking about someone who was denied the fundaments of normal emotional development.
I’ve wondered about how the emotional impact of repeated pointed rejections – by his father, as an infant, then by his mother, no less, as a preteen – manifests itself in his psyche. It’s amazing that CSIs aren’t taping off the crawlspace of his house.
Expat, excellent observations. Those agreed with Texexec observation that Obama doesn’t realize he’s lying. Recall Obama’s claim that he is the best president in foreign affairs with four “possible” exceptions and it’s inescapably clear he’s delusional. Why so many choose to overlook or rationalize this tidbit of information would make an interesting study.
Occam, remember there are big blank spaces in his history, we may see CSIs checking out his digs yet, not that it would effect his poll numbers in the slightest.
This guy is a pathological liar, and one who assumes that his audience is always composed of a bunch of chumps and rubes who are uninformed, and too stupid to realize that they are being lied to and conned.
News reports about some remarks Obama made several days ago in Poland, Ohio, right after the release of the horrible June 8.2% unemployment and miniscule 80K jobs gain report, have Obama trying to somehow justify today’s economic situation by putting a nostalgic gloss on hard times in the past (and saying in effect that, well, given lemons we should make lemonade and, at least, we had “family” and “togetherness”), and reminiscing about “the best vacation he ever had” as a child of 10 or 11 –vacations were not the usual thing and “maybe you’d take a vacation once in a while, and “not to some fancy resort”–but traveling around the country on the Greyhound bus and by train with his mother, and granny, and sister.
Obama portraying himself as having had a relatively hardscrabble childhood, as compared to the supposedly “richey-rich” childhood of Romney. Obama reminiscing about how, at age 10 or 11, he would travel with his Granny, mother, and sister on Greyhounds and trains, stay at Howard Johnsons, and how much he looked forward to the fact that they often had swimming pools, and ice and, “Oh, my Gawd” even vending machines ( see http://nation.foxnews.com/president-obama/2012/07/09/obama-i-vacationed-howard-johnsons-took-greyhound-bus and full text here http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/07/06/1106869/-Remarks-by-President-Obama-at-Poland-OH-campaign-event-July-6-2012).
Many commenters on one website I looked at were not accepting this load of crap, and laid out some rebuttals.
First, Obama lived in Jakarta, Indonesia from ages 6 through 10, so no Greyhounds and no Howard Johnsons there.
Then, moving on to Hawaii at age 10, he lived in Honolulu–which some people noted was like being on permanent vacation at a high end resort–where his grandmother–that “typical white person”—worked at a bank as one of its Vice Presidents, and Obama attended the very expensive and exclusive Punahu private school. Obama’s mother–who dumped Obama on her parents–was perpetually overseas doing field research in Indonesia–so it’s unlikely she would have been around to join in those lovely “family vacations.” And posters from Hawaii claimed that, in those days, Greyhound didn’t operate in Hawaii.
So, apparently another patented, made up, “composite” Obama “Dreams From My Father” fantasy.
And posters from Hawaii claimed that, in those days, Greyhound didn’t operate in Hawaii.
And certainly no trains, and no HoJo’s that I recall when I lived there in the mid- to late sixties.
Unless this merry band traveled back to the mainland for these adventures, his whole story is of a piece with his claim that Stan met Barack Sr. on the bridge at Selma, a meeting that led to little Barack Jr. Apparently this is the only time in medical history that someone gave birth to a four year-old. No mention of a star in the East.
“I read somewhere that a lady asked something like “tell my why I should fall in love with Romney.” ”
See, this is part of a big problem. Too many women don’t know exactly what they’re voting for. And I speak as a woman.
Long time ago women seemed to vote for President. When it comes to The One, they don’t vote for President: they vote for Fantasy-Bodice-Ripper-Hunk-Boyfriend!
(“Fall in love with Romney”? Only Ann Romney has the right to do that!)
See, this is part of a big problem. Too many women don’t know exactly what they’re voting for.
STOP! You’re inflaming my long-standing doubts about the wisdom of the 19th Amendment.
Sure, there are sensible women, lots of them. But there are some sensible high school students too. It’s just that the proportion is disturbingly low.
Paradoxically, I have no problem with women in political office, since we get a chance to pass judgment on their sagacity on an individual basis. But a blanket, across the board endorsement that includes every ding-a-ling mewling about adopting idiotic policies “for the children,” and sporting a moronic “Coexist” bumper sticker on her Prius? No good can – or has – come from that. I suspect the problem is that, being more socially oriented, a lot of women are highly susceptible to social pressure (seen most acutely in the high school context), and hence easily stampeded. /ducks, but still thinks this.
Obama does discuss a bus trip across the US in Dreams From My Father.
There is an inaccuracy in his recall. The summer of 1972 would have been when Obama turned 11. While the Watergate break-in was in June 1972, hearings on Watergate did not take place until 1973. Howard Johnson’s was not that low-rent. My family took a lot of road trips from the East Coast to the interior of the country. We didn’t stay at Howard Johnson’s because they were too expensive- and my father was a professional with a postgraduate degree. An indoor pool in a Chicago motel sounds rather ritzy to me.
His description of the shrunken heads sounds contrived. What say you, Billy Boy?
By the way, Mr. President, how many “just plain folks” get all their US education at exclusive private schools?
Occam’s,
After they leave high school, many women exercise the social pressure through book clubs, theater subscriptions, etc. I avoid such things like the plague. Of course, no one here in Germany understood why I had serious (though mildly expressed) doubts about Obama. I must be puzzling because I understand things like evolution and genetics, which red neck conservatives are supposed to be ignorant about.
I understand things like evolution and genetics, which red neck conservatives are supposed to be ignorant about.
Understand. I get the “you must be anti-science.” Always makes me smile inwardly.
The sexes’ susceptibility to social pressure cuts two ways, of course. Womens’ greater susceptibility makes them stick with the herd, but it makes them less troublesome and better suited to social living. Mens’ lesser susceptibility to it makes them more independent-minded, but more prone to criminality and other anti-social behavior.
Gringo–You mean to say that he said something truthful?
Wolla Dalbo, a stopped clock is right twice a day.
But precisely what was truthful and not truthful about his childhood bus trip to Chicago- only Bill Ayers knows for sure.
🙂
I wonder if any enterprising journalist ever asked Obama’s grandmother to verify his stories in Dreams. I doubt it.
To tell you the truth, its not a conspiracy…
its not hidden, its not only in the shadows
what it is, is the knowlege that certain acts are unconscionable to the common good person…
as i tried to use several parts of history to show this… from the democratic fairs vs their murdering people in the parishes… to Germany… to Russia… to here in the US… to even the ideas of what we are familiar with… to even the fact that the person that switches sides from leftist to the not left, does so by not changing… but by being true to their values, and only realize that they were being used by them, not being given their realization
I am sorry that i am not a great orator who can put these complicated ideas in a way that shows that they are quite basic and easy to get.
i covered history, repeating examples, what to focus on, what not to focus on… even the fact that they have always spoken in codes…
but speaking in codes sounds so conspiratorial. which might be true if it wasnt in the open… the whole idea of a mass movement beingt the disconnect between those giving orders and pushing, and those being pushed.
this allows for the inane excuse that a person is not part of the cause if a person is not directly connected to it!! so kennedys assasins soviet worship is ignored (despite actual hard connections)… as is obamas connections to such… ted kennedies connections… or even the major who decided to do a mumbai attack on an american base
so there is no conspiracy of the sort that people imagine… except at the core and planning areas of the people that use people.
a person who reads a book and decides to do something for the cause is connected. just because the inspiration is not direct and under command doersnt mean they dont serve
but what about the coded language?
its always denied…
after all, all that crap is inconscionable, and its discovery would require action, and acceptance… (vanity wont let women even consider that anything they have done is anything but positive. from electing hitler when they saw the big strong man who would defnd their inner world, to the police requirement that they are safe at the expense of those they are paid to no longer protect. etc)
how about people who write books to make it easier for those who dont get it, to get the messaging thats hidden?
its taken years for many people to figure out that i am not a crank or crackpot. i never ever ever send anyone to any crank website for secret facts. just historical notes from common sources.. or paper articles. etc.
few realized that the idea of conspiracy theory was created in the 60s… prior to that mass beleif, we understood conspiracy was the norm. (was there ever a time that great men or women advertised their actions behind closed doors and out of sight of others?)
after they normalized that as being impossible and so forth… we could no longer as a public conclude that there ARE such things, and that we should watch out for them. that people DO collude, and can collude outside of the state.
want to know what key thing changed during my life time that no one noticed? when i was a kid, leaders were never allowed to discuss things alone and in private… the public did not trust closed doors after molotov
but now… we have it common that world leaders can sit and talk in private and collude and conspire… and only open mikes catch it… but the fact is too unconscionable to believe.
[edited for length by n-n]
from the dictionary…
communism: is the political belief that all people are equal and that workers should control the means of producing things.
oh… so the push for equality from feminism, and all those things is communism
too bad the women didnt care to know that and supported it for all its vanity ego stroking, its backing of irresponsiblity, its enabling to destruction, and so on..
this is why they were not in politics…
every country in which they do enter politics and so on (and it has happened before in history), they destro the state.
like a bad wife who does not listen ot her husband and who cant cut her off, she proceeds to believe that money will fix everything. ie. women want money to make their nests and worlds. when they are in the public sphere, they want the peoples money to do the same.
this is the first experience of women in mankinds history that they will have to pay for the things they voted for!
ie. the women are taking over the work, and so are minorities.. unlike the men, they are hypergamous and so wont take care of their male mates, their own children, or even themselves in terms other than acquisitions of what others tell them they should have.
ie. they don’t have minds of their own – and so look to others to complete them and tell them what is right, and so forth
and as long as they dont accept it, the state will fall… which is the beauty of the whole thing. the egoists will not drop it and so the state will fall once it adopts it.
ergo, the soviet states removed it early on and only have a token fake front of it…
it was the women who destroyed western civilization… by believing they were powerless when they had all the power…
like slaves stay home and choose their own days work and time… have doors opened for them.. have masters rise when they enter the room. are celebrated on family pedestals…
all ya had to do was get them to be suckered the way Tom Sawyer suckered the kids into painting his fence!!!
http://www.pbs.org/marktwain/learnmore/writings_tom.html
the leftists were very open that they were to move womens work into industry so that their labor in freedom could be taxed…
care to read the quotes?
and women were way too stupid not to fall for it, becauuse they told them they were smart for believing it, and stupid for not believing it.
not wanting to be stupiod, they did he stupid thing and accepted the doyens mssives that for doing so, they were so smart!!!
you know…
someone who openly despises family, the country, freedom, and all that…
might have been lying to women… no?
but would women be skeptical, smart enough, and analytical enough, standing up for actual moral outcomes against such social manipulations?
hell no!
which is why the US is falling to an unopposed pre industrial third world based religion…
the smart women are protecting it…
and the young men? they are learning that if they sign on to islam and communism, they can win back their old place… no?
does progressive feminist america promise a place for the men who defend her?
hell no
[edited for length by n-n]