Years from now, historians may regard the 2008 election of Barack
Obama as an inscrutable and disturbing phenomenon, a baffling breed of
mass hysteria akin perhaps to the witch craze of the Middle Ages. How,
they will wonder, did a man so devoid of professional accomplishment
beguile so many into thinking he could manage the world's largest
economy, direct the world's most powerful military, execute the
world's most consequential job?
Imagine a future historian examining Obama's pre-presidential life:
ushered into and through the Ivy League despite unremarkable grades
and test scores along the way; a cushy non-job as a "community
organizer"; a brief career as a state legislator devoid of legislative
achievement (and in fact nearly devoid of his attention, so often did
he vote "present") ; and finally an unaccomplished single term in the
United States Senate, the entirety of which was devoted to his
presidential ambitions. He left no academic legacy in academia,
authored no signature legislation as a legislator.
And then there is the matter of his troubling associations: the
white-hating, America-loathing preacher who for decades served as
Obama's "spiritual mentor"; a real-life, actual terrorist who served
as Obama's colleague and political sponsor. It is easy to imagine a
future historian looking at it all and asking: how on Earth was such a
man elected president?
Not content to wait for history, the incomparable Norman Podhoretz
addressed the question recently in the Wall Street Journal:
To be sure, no white candidate who had close associations with an
outspoken hater of America like Jeremiah Wright and an unrepentant
terrorist like Bill Ayers, would have lasted a single day. But because
Mr. Obama was black, and therefore entitled in the eyes of liberaldom
to have hung out with protesters against various American injustices,
even if they were a bit extreme, he was given a pass.
Let that sink in: Obama was given a pass -- held to a lower standard
-- because of the color of his skin. Podhoretz continues:
And in any case, what did such ancient history matter when he was also
so articulate and elegant and (as he himself had said)
"non-threatening," all of which gave him a fighting chance to become
the first black president and thereby to lay the curse of racism to
rest?
Podhoretz puts his finger, I think, on the animating pulse of the
Obama phenomenon -- affirmative action. Not in the legal sense, of
course. But certainly in the motivating sentiment behind all
affirmative action laws and regulations, which are designed primarily
to make white people, and especially white liberals, feel good about
themselves.
Unfortunately, minorities often suffer so that whites can pat
themselves on the back. Liberals routinely admit minorities to schools
for which they are not qualified, yet take no responsibility for the
inevitable poor performance and high drop-out rates which follow.
Liberals don't care if these minority students fail; liberals aren't
around to witness the emotional devastation and deflated self esteem
resulting from the racist policy that is affirmative action. Yes,
racist.
Holding someone to a separate standard merely because of the color of
his skin -- that's affirmative action in a nutshell, and if that isn't
racism, then nothing is. And that is what America did to Obama.
True, Obama himself was never troubled by his lack of achievements,
but why would he be? As many have noted, Obama was told he was good
enough for Columbia despite undistinguished grades at Occidental; he
was told he was good enough for the US Senate despite a mediocre
record in Illinois; he was told he was good enough to be president
despite no record at all in the Senate. All his life, every step of
the way, Obama was told he was good enough for the next step, in spite
of ample evidence to the contrary. What could this breed if not the
sort of empty narcissism on display every time Obama speaks?
In 2008, many who agreed that he lacked executive qualifications
nonetheless raved about Obama's oratory skills, intellect, and cool
character. Those people -- conservatives included -- ought now to be
deeply embarrassed. The man thinks and speaks in the hoariest of
cliché's, and that's when he has his teleprompter in front of him;
when the prompter is absent he can barely think or speak at all. Not
one original idea has ever issued from his mouth -- it's all
warmed-over Marxism of the kind that has failed over and over again
for 100 years.
And what about his character? Obama is constantly blaming anything and
everything else for his troubles. Bush did it; it was bad luck; I
inherited this mess. It is embarrassing to see a president so willing
to advertise his own powerlessness, so comfortable with his own
incompetence. But really, what were we to expect? The man has never
been responsible for anything, so how do we expect him to act
responsibly?
In short: our president is a small and small-minded man, with neither
the temperament nor the intellect to handle his job. When you
understand that, and only when you understand that, will the current
erosion of liberty and prosperity make sense. It could not have gone
otherwise with such a man in the Oval Office.
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