Posted on 01/22/2013 5:59:01 AM PST by Kaslin
He swore his oath of office on Abraham Lincoln's Bible. He has asked to give the State of the Union address on Lincoln's birthday. He rode to Washington in 2009 on a train route similar to Lincoln's in 1861. He has compared his critics to Lincoln's critics. He confides to admirers that he likes to read the handwritten Gettysburg Address that hangs in the Lincoln Bedroom.
Barack Obama is inviting the world to compare him not just to good presidents but to the greatest in American history.
There can be majesty in invoking past presidents and the Founding Fathers. But Obama's quotations and allusions in his inaugural address served only to highlight the flatness of his own prose. "We hold these truths to be self-evident," he intoned, repeating the echoing words of the Declaration of Independence. What followed was: "Today we continue a never-ending journey to bridge the meaning of those words with the realities of our time. For history tells us that while these truths may be self-evident, they've never been self-executing." Clunk. "Self-executing" is a word best left to legal documents. It has as much poetry as a filing cabinet. As for "never-ending journey," it's a phrase that belongs in the juvenile fiction section -- if there.
Obama's second inaugural poached lines from Lincoln's speeches. The effect was like inserting snatches of Mozart into a Mariah Carey song. Obama said: "Through blood drawn by lash and blood drawn by sword, we learned that no union founded on the principles of liberty and equality could survive half-slave and half-free." He was paraphrasing two Lincoln quotes -- one from the Cooper Union speech and this one, from the second inaugural: "Yet if God wills that it continue until every drop of blood drawn with the lash shall be paid by another drawn with the sword, as was said 3,000 years ago, so still it must be said: 'The judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether.'"
Obama's speech also seemed to allude to Lincoln's message to Congress before signing the Emancipation Proclamation. Lincoln said: "The dogmas of the quiet past are inadequate to the stormy present. ... As our case is new, so we must think anew and act anew. We must disenthrall ourselves, and then we shall save our country." Obama, able to wring banality from the best material, said: "But we have always understood that when times change, so must we, that fidelity to our founding principles requires new responses to new challenges, that preserving our individual freedoms ultimately requires collective action." Clunk.
Bounding from bromide to platitude, Obama alighted on his true theme -- to excoriate his opponents and to deny that choices must be made between providing lavish welfare state benefits and ensuring the prosperity of future generations. Deploying well-worn campaign themes, he slashed away at straw men: "We do not believe that in this country, freedom is reserved for the lucky or happiness for the few." And: "We, the people, still believe that enduring security and lasting peace do not require perpetual war." And: "For our journey is not complete until our wives, our mothers and daughters can earn a living equal to their efforts."
In the midst of the worst crisis the United States ever faced -- with hundreds of thousands of soldiers already dead, thousands more wounded and the outcome uncertain -- Lincoln found it within himself to be charitable and humble. Of the contending sides in the Civil War, he said: "Both read the same Bible and pray to the same God, and each invokes his aid against the other. It may seem strange that any men should dare to ask a just God's assistance in wringing their bread from the sweat of other men's faces, but let us judge not, that we be not judged."
Though he could have been excused for a certain moral superiority -- he was fighting the slave power, after all -- Lincoln instead proclaimed, "With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in, to bind up the nation's wounds ... to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace, among ourselves and with all nations."
Lincoln did not strut. He was too wise. Obama's attempt to lasso Lincoln's legacy for his narrow partisan ends reveals that he doesn't even understand Lincoln's greatness, far less partake of it
Lincoln worked to preserve the union, Obama is working to destroy it.
What better way to stage jihad in the US? His fetish for Lincoln may be a platform for him to define “war”, and sets him up to be THE resolution. DEE-LOOO-ZHUHN-ELLL
Symptoms of Narcissistic Personality Disorder
In order for a person to be diagnosed with narcissistic personality disorder (NPD) they must meet five or more of the following symptoms:
Has a grandiose sense of self-importance (e.g., exaggerates achievements and talents, expects to be recognized as superior without commensurate achievements)
Is preoccupied with fantasies of unlimited success, power, brilliance, beauty, or ideal love
Believes that he or she is “special” and unique and can only be understood by, or should associate with, other special or high-status people (or institutions)
Requires excessive admiration
Has a very strong sense of entitlement, e.g., unreasonable expectations of especially favorable treatment or automatic compliance with his or her expectations
Is exploitative of others, e.g., takes advantage of others to achieve his or her own ends
Lacks empathy, e.g., is unwilling to recognize or identify with the feelings and needs of others
Is often envious of others or believes that others are envious of him or her
Regularly shows arrogant, haughty behaviors or attitudes
Anybody check out his usual arrogant pose yesterday when Beyonce was singing? Go to around 1:28 in this video...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qGDH18R7GfA
Somehow I think if the camera was lower, we would see his arm extended waiting for his hand to be kissed.
0bama is most like that guy Mayhem on TV -— recalculating....
I wonder if bronco bama read the WHOLE Lincoln book; does he know how it ends?
Obama comparing himself to Lincoln is like Pee Wee Herman comparing himself to Mike Tyson.
Obama's attempt to lasso Lincoln's legacy for his narrow partisan ends reveals that he doesn't even understand Lincoln's greatness, far less partake of it
Why do so many writers have the most important line last? It should be like the military - BLUF - bottom line up front. I think jimmah cattah is elated. He won't be the worst president ever.
Warning**************WARNING********************WARNING
We must think anew and act anew
You have a list, Doogle, of matters which describe Obama in every detail. But the American people are equally culpable for allowing themselves to be so manipulated.
Better not coin that penny just yet.
Chances are Abe would not approve of Obama's dream of a tax-funded "US govt civilian security force." In 2008 candidate Obama's own words: “We’ve got to have a civilian national security force that’s just as powerful, just as strong, just as well-funded as the US military.”
Whoa----first Obama better confiscate all the guns----b/c the citizenry might not like having their neighborhoods patroled by gun-slinging tax-funded "US govt security forces."
Heck, gun confiscation is a MUST----b/c the citizenry might be tempted to fire a few rounds upon seeing a tax-funded "US govt civilian security force" slinging tax-funded guns in their neighborhoods (/snix).
70% can’t spell it
40% can’t say it
Appropriate for Zerobama and Slick Willie.
obama has been lifting lines from lincoln even since history stopped to notice him.
um... first of all Lincoln was NOT the greatest president in history.
He was a power hungry war criminal who got what he deserved.
And if there is any justice in the world one day Obama will be exposed to the world for the fraud and miserable failure that he is.
Any reputable psychiatrist will tell you that this man is very very ill.
Mr. Obama loves his props. Since the first time he ran, his campaign advisers have been using props to make him appear “presidential”. The Lincoln bible is just another prop.
What Mr. Obama is trying to do is appropriate American history to advance his own agenda. If you followed his speech yesterday, that is what he was doing. He was claiming that what was good for him was part of American tradition.
Mr. President... You are no Abraham Lincoln.
[...without apologies to Lloyd Bentsen]
Not even close.
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