Excellent analysis of the left and Obama :
Ed Driscoll
The Deep Impact of the Obama Asteroid
August 27, 2011 - 1:42 pm - by Ed Driscoll
RD Brewer writes at Ace of Spades blog that “Obama Is the Left’s Chicxulub.”
What? Obama is in the Cthulu Chicks? He’s the second coming of Beetlejuice?
No. Kate McMillan of Small Dead Animals has a long running series of posts she calls “Not Waiting for the Asteroid” on the continuing implosion of the Dinosaur Media. Brewer posits that Obama is the asteroid:
A while back, Ace quoted from an essay by Daniel Greenfield who was critical of ABC’s decision to hire Christiane Amanpour:
Her hiring is only the latest manifestation of a media that is too radicalized to save itself. Bringing in a personality from the sinking ship that is CNN was obviously a bad idea on commercial grounds alone. Amanpour left CNN, for the same reason that Campbell Brown did. And ABC News taking Amanpour in, demonstrates that they share CNN’s bad judgment.
. . .
Lenin called on Communists to seize the telegraph offices, telephone stations and post offices in order to control the means of communication. The American left has seized the means of cultural communication, hijacking the media, the educational system and entertainment, and turning them into vehicles for their brand of political indoctrination. And they’ve managed to badly devalue all three. The American educational system is a shell of what it used to be, the media is imploding and the entertainment industry keeps hitting new lows. Just as in the USSR and Venezuela and everywhere else, what the radical left controls, it also destroys.
(Emphasis added.) Another quick example would be the “No Pressure 10:10” environmental video short, the one that had people exploding in a bloody mess if they didn’t wholeheartedly tow [sic] the reduced carbon emissions line. The makers of that short were completely caught off guard by the negative reaction it generated. They were attempting to increase awareness of what they regard as anthropogenic climate change. Instead, they only increased negative feeling toward their organization and disregard for their point.
There won’t be a point when liberals suddenly change their minds about about big government, no matter what evidence appears before their eyes. Think of all the left-leaning, high-tax, big-regulation, big-government states and countries that are suffering right now. In fact, one would think Obama would be somewhat of a catalyst. He has been busily creating a better, more effective case for smaller government than conservatives could have on their own–and more quickly.
Although Obama is the left’s asteroid, as with Chicxulub, he will not become their “aha!” moment. As we have seen, there are rarely such moments–even when something as clear as a strike by a six mile wide asteroid is revealed. As in the case of the opponents of plate tectonics, the proponents of big government will slowly die out as the evidence slowly accumulates. That’s my statement of faith, anyway. In the short term, cultural inertia, not mere stubbornness, and the philosophical momentum behind socialism is enough for it to weather even Barack Obama’s failure.
It’ll be the president’s problem or the messaging or the packaging, not the philosophy. Never the philosophy. But maybe over time newer generations with less of a stake in big-governmentism will see the Obama failure and move away from it.
As Brewer wrote, “Although Obama is the left’s asteroid, as with Chicxulub, he will not become their ‘aha!’ moment.” Which brings us to Timothy Egan, writing in the Jurassic Times itself, who advises his fellow leftists to “Stop Waiting for Superman:”
And the Superman hype [which Obama was happy to gin up himself --Ed] — that came with the froth of the 2008 campaign, when his words seemed strong enough to break up a storm [perhaps by lowering the oceans -- Ed], and the idea of a black man becoming leader of a nation born with slavery was so potent.
As president, he’s been a sober, cautious, tongue-shackled realist — a moderate Republican of the pre-crazy, pre-Tea Party era. Having failed to come up with a Big Idea to guide his presidency, he will sink or swim now on strengths that don’t lend themselves to large rallies or passionate enthusiasm. Sobriety and moderation, by definition, are boring.
Urban liberals, labor, blacks and Hispanics, environmentalists, the young – the core of Obama’s army in 2008 — are disappointed in the president of August, 2011. They’re right when they say he caved on the debt talks: the evidence is House Speaker John Boehner’s boast that he got 98 percent of what he wanted from the president.
But instead of waiting for an arm-flapping populist to emerge from the genteel summer redoubt on Martha’s Vineyard, the left should focus on the coming ground war, and try to fill Congress with new people who can at least tell fact from fiction.
As opposed to 2007 through 2010, when Democrats controlled both houses of Congress, and beginning in 2009, the White House as well.
The paragraph in bold is the tell. Let’s break it down, starting on the next page, like Oliver Stone staring at individual frames of the Zapruder Film, or Andrew Sullivan and Paul Krugman contemplating the uterus and clip art of a former governor.
Egan wrote, “As president, he’s been a sober, cautious, tongue-shackled realist…”
Tongue-shackled? A president giving speeches questioning the patriotism of his opponents and railing about sippin’ Slurpees and driving cars into ditches and invoking pitchfork metaphors isn’t exactly the second coming of Silent Cal.
“…a moderate Republican…”
That has to be the left’s new talking points mantra on the JournoList Mark II. Because it’s been used in recent months by Ezra Klein, Krugman, Bill Maher, plus other assorted lefties at the HuffPo, Truthdig, etc. Hey, whatever gets you through the night, but that’s a far cry from the heady days of late 2008 and early 2009 when Obama was being compared to FDR by Time magazine. Or James Carville promising a 40-year Democratic rule. Or Newsweek insisting on its cover that “We Are All Socialists Now.”
But then, this sleight of hand is nothing new. Back in 2004, when unemployment averaged 5.5 percent and John Kerry was trying to position himself as a moderate (and getting plenty of help from the now-expected quarters), Ann Coulter wrote:
To the contrary, both parties run for office as conservatives. Once they have fooled the voters and are safely in office, Republicans sometimes double-cross the voters. Democrats always do.
Trying to reposition Obama into being the second coming of Ike or Gerry Ford (both of whom were hated by the left while in office) with the four-trillion dollar paper trail he’s run up seems like quite a challenge, but hey, keep Baracking that chicken, fellas.
“…of the pre-crazy, pre-Tea Party era.”
Back when bankrupting the nation was considered the very definition of sanity.
“Having failed to come up with a Big Idea to guide his presidency…”
Other than passing ObamaCare, nationalizing two-thirds of the American auto industry, and running up the biggest debt in the history of mankind (after telling voters in 2008 that President Bush’s spending was “unpatriotic” because of the debt it would pass on to future generations). And promoting high-speed rail, Sputnik moments, “green” jobs, promising to bankrupt whole industries, raiding others, and super-sizing the entire New Deal/Great Society playbook, yeah, he’s been a do-nothing, reactionary kind of guy. That’s why so many business owners (the people who create jobs) love him so.
True, the original New Deal playbook was similarly a mess, as its own designers would later admit:
Today [in late 2007] many liberals subscribe to the myth that the New Deal was a coherent, enlightened, unified endeavor encapsulated in the largely meaningless phrase “the Roosevelt legacy.” This is poppycock. “To look upon these programs as the result of a unified plan,” wrote Raymond Moley, FDR’s right-hand man during much of the New Deal, “was to believe that the accumulation of stuffed snakes, baseball pictures, school flags, old tennis shoes, carpenter’s tools, geometry books, and chemistry sets in a boy’s bedroom could have been put there by an interior decorator.” When Alvin Hansen, an influential economic adviser to the president, was asked—in 1940!—whether “the basic principle of the New Deal” was “economically sound,” he responded, “I really do not know what the basic principle of the New Deal is.”
But who wouldn’t call the New Deal, or its second coming under LBJ “a Big Idea?” Particularly someone at the New York Times, where FDR still walks on water. But then, as James Taranto recently noted, “Obama isn’t betraying the left, the left is betraying Obama–and they are doing so precisely because he has done what they say they want him to do.”
Taranto would later explore “The Five Stages of Obama” adding that “The New York Times offers therapy for a gravely ill presidency.” Which brings us back to more from Timesman Egan, still doing just that:
“…[Obama] will sink or swim now on strengths that don’t lend themselves to large rallies or passionate enthusiasm. Sobriety and moderation, by definition, are boring.”
So having spent like a drunken sailor (insert the Gipper’s reminder that that’s an insult to drunken sailors here) for three years, now he’ll discover sobriety and moderation?
And something tells me that when it comes to his re-election campaign, sobriety and moderation aren’t going to be the operative words.
By the way, the “Waiting for Superman” analogy is an interesting one. Is Obama pro-school choice?
No, only with his own kids.
But to return back to RD Brewer’s analogy at the start of this post, the asteroid has already struck. At this point, we’re just arguing over how big the destruction and radioactive fallout will be.
Related: Writing on Mort Zuckerman, Obama, “and the imaginary ‘competency crisis,” Karl of Hot Air echoes the observations about the left from James Taranto we quoted above. Linking to the recent anti-Obama op-ed in the Wall Street Journal by the liberal New York Daily News publisher and disillusioned 2008 Obama supporter, Karl writes:
Zuckerman suffers from cognitive dissonance because he backed a progressive ideologue for the presidency in 2008. In nerdspeak, Mort’s complaints are not bugs, but features of a progressive presidency. He is complaining that a shark is acting like a shark.
To be fair, jilted lovers in New York often feel like they’ve got a dead shark on their hands.
Filed under: Bobos In Paradise, Capitalism, the Unknown Ideal, Liberal Fascism, Oh, That Liberal Media!, The Making of the President, The Memory Hole, The New Puritans
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21 Comments, 17 Threads
1. Lin W
Excellent, Ed. This administration reminds me of a bunch of people watching a geriatric citizen struggling to remain upright on glaze-ice. The onlookers then praise the un-heard (and non-existent) music that the frantic elder must be dancing to. *Help* that poor, struggling person? Why? ::sigh::
August 27, 2011 - 4:24 pm Link to this Comment | Reply
2. HUSKY
“He has been busily creating a better, more effective case for smaller government than conservatives could have on their own–and more quickly.”
THAT my friend is exactly the point. Who would have thunk it?
August 28, 2011 - 1:53 am Link to this Comment | Reply
Marc Malone
Me. I thunk it. I have posted this concept before. I stated it in my opposition to choosing another RINO. In our desperation to choose anyone but Obama, we could get a guy from the Republican establishment who completely undermines Conservatism. When a Republican enacts the Leftist agenda, it becomes permanent by legitimizing it. Far better in the long run to re-elect Obama than to elect a Romney-the-RINO.
Of course, that means a lot of pain and destruction short-term, but people get the kind of government they deserve. They just have to learn the lesson. The beatings will continue until thinking improves.
I will not vote for a RINO. I want to be able to say, like a poster in another article, “I didn’t vote for these clowns.”
August 28, 2011 - 10:43 am Link to this Comment | Reply
3. artcohn
This essay omits Obama’s biggest failures. His foreign policy,that is perverse or capricious. We have had no effective policy to stop the Irani Mullahs from making A-bombs. We have insulted our friends, while bowing down to our enemies. Obama has had a consistant foreign policy in only one aspect: his promise to form a Palestinian State. George W. Bush announce the same goal, but he put a number of conditions on it, including that the Palestinians stop their terrorism against Israeli civilians. They did not, and have not. Abbas’ Fatah ressurected their Al-Aksa terrorist arm 1n 2009,and are now in the midst of joining with the Hamas terrorists. But this means nothing to Obama, who is hanging on to his goal of forming the Palestinian Nation no matter what they do. Simultaneously, he has been relentless in attacking the Israeli government of Netanyahu.
August 28, 2011 - 3:41 am Link to this Comment | Reply
4. PattyMor
“He has been busily creating a better, more effective case for smaller government than conservatives could have on their own–and more quickly.” Yes, I agree, but the REAL job is to get the majority of Republicans to believe it.
So onward and upward to defeat not only Democrats and the whole lot who voted in Obamacare, but also liberal Repubicans like Lugar and Snowe. So the rebellion continues, pass the Tea and Crumpets.
August 28, 2011 - 5:45 am Link to this Comment | Reply
5. 1389AD
The downfall of the former Soviet Union happened when the failure of the system to sustain itself became so obvious that the system’s own enforcers could no longer continue to believe in it.
The left, in the US, saw that failure from afar, and instead of learning from it and abandoning their failed ideology, simply made excuses for it and went on with their work of corrupting the US.
August 28, 2011 - 5:58 am Link to this Comment | Reply
Sparky
It’s inevitable that our Western leftists didn’t learn from the example of the Soviet Union. The only True Believers among Leftists were the ones who never lived under Communism, such as Americans, Brits, and so forth.
Some of them still believe that Marxism would actually work if only they were in charge. People who’ve lived under Communism learned how oppressive it was and either loathed it or joined the Communists so that they could get their share of the spoils. True Believers were _extremely_ rare in the Communist countries. People joined the Party to advance themselves, not to better mankind.
August 28, 2011 - 11:37 am Link to this Comment | Reply
6. Cabeza de Vaca
I think it is spelled ass-teroid
August 28, 2011 - 6:17 am Link to this Comment | Reply
Snarky
And the “teroid” part is also misspelled. It should be “hole”.
August 28, 2011 - 11:32 am Link to this Comment | Reply
7. Cybergeezer
“HOPE” is making a comeback.
HOPE he’s prevented from enacting any more legislation;
HOPE he’s unable to appoint any more czars or create any more “Departments”;
And HOPE he’s not getting re-elected.
(Sorry for any duplicate postings; I kept getting an error message trying to post.)
August 28, 2011 - 7:33 am Link to this Comment | Reply
8. ricpic
Considering the mind boggling costs of Obamacare won’t seriously begin to hit until 2013, we still haven’t felt, not remotely, the repercussions from the Obama asteroid strike.
August 28, 2011 - 8:17 am Link to this Comment | Reply
9. proreason
The most frightening thing of all is that we only see the tip of the iceberg.
In the bowels of the big-government bureaucracy, the real work of destroying the country continues at pace. They don’t even need to be ideological. The mere fact that their job, by definition, is to regulate and control is enough. People do the job they were hired to do. If some mid-level bureaurate were to say “hey, this is insanity. We gotta stop putting all these roadblocks and IEDs in front of American businesses”, that bureaucrat would accomplish the near impossible. He would get fired from a civil service job.
August 28, 2011 - 8:58 am Link to this Comment | Reply
10. Diana
Thinking a man with Black Skin will heal is as stupid as a multi-millionaire thinking he is loved by a younger woman for ‘who he really is’….and Obama to top it all off is not even an African-American Black Man. He is a mixture of some radical cultures and listened for years to an idiot filled with hate for America.
Black people do not realize slavery is over. Anyone (any color) who has problems and continuously uses justification of history and even their childhood for their failure is sunk in identification. If we don’t pay for something it is documented it has no real value. There are some black people and other ethnicities that do know they must reach their own individuation; it won’t be by scapegoating and playing the victim card. It is a Hell to live this way.
August 28, 2011 - 9:41 am Link to this Comment | Reply
11. rollzone
hello. early on, just wanting the celebrity to act more Presidential was the bar. now that the child in office likes playing recklessly with government toys, he will have to be sent to stare at the corner. we can dump cement over his asteroid, but we can not allow his plutonium to ignite. he is going to try harder to create a crisis, and then be our hero. beware this fool and his money.
August 28, 2011 - 10:03 am Link to this Comment | Reply
12. Ozzy
I love my country. I love my country no matter who ( or which side ) criticizes her.
It was never bad with Bush regardless of what the Idiots say, and it is not bad with Obama regardless of what the Morons say.
USA all the way.. :: ))
August 28, 2011 - 11:23 am Link to this Comment | Reply
13. johnt
“Sober, cautious, realist”, “a moderate Republican” if you want lunacy in a few words, that’s it. Timothy Egan, back into your padded cell. As a description of Obama it leaves a few thousand harsh words to be said. Short of a police state, what would be not moderate to a leftist? Not that they wouldn’t want to control it.
Having got Obama and all the rest of the statists to drop their guard, we should recognize that they have created the need and existence of the now vital Tea Party and exposed the danger that is their real leftist identity. Thanks O for your stupidity and greed.
August 28, 2011 - 11:25 am Link to this Comment | Reply
14. Rev. Reggie Bacon
Thanks Ed
Another illuminating piece. You are a genius.
August 28, 2011 - 12:24 pm Link to this Comment | Reply
Ed Driscoll
Thanks. Loved you in Bonfire, BTW.
August 28, 2011 - 12:30 pm Link to this Comment | Reply
15. Libertyship46
“It’ll be the president’s problem or the messaging or the packaging, not the philosophy. Never the philosophy. But maybe over time newer generations with less of a stake in big-governmentism will see the Obama failure and move away from it.”
FAT CHANCE! Newer generations with less of a stake in big-governmentism will see the Obama failure and move away from it? Obama went out of his way to make people more dependent on “big-governmentism” and making the federal bureaucracy not only bigger, but more expensive too. And when will newer generations have less at stake? They are already horribly in debt and if we don’t do something about it now we WILL look like Greece in a few years. No, the whole liberal mentality and philosophy is to get people hooked on government as well as unions, and if Obama does get another four years we really will be sunk, because you will have millions of more people more dependent on government, not fewer. Conservatives need to win in 2012, not only to end this cycle, but to give future generations a chance to lift themselves off the public dole and away from government subsidies.
August 28, 2011 - 2:15 pm Link to this Comment | Reply
16. T. T. Thomas
The astroid struck 45 years ago! Since then, its been the nations playground!
The nation will never begin to put its pieces back together UNTIL it begins to point its finger in the right direction…back at themselves and not some president or congress!
August 28, 2011 - 2:21 pm Link to this Comment | Reply
17. Buck O'Fama
“The makers of that short were completely caught off guard by the negative reaction it generated.”
No self-awareness whatsoever. No concept of how their “arguments” sound, alternative ways of how their words might be taken and above all no brooking of disagreement or other points of view. Just pure, unadulterated self-rightouesness and self-absorption. Just like the effing dinosaurs.
August 28, 2011 - 3:42 pm Link to this Comment | Reply
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