The Imposter President Gets Caught

During the 2008 presidential campaign, the New York Times ran an article on what psychologists call the "impostor phenomenon." To measure it, they ask test subjects questions like, "At times, I feel my success has been due to some kind of luck" or "I can give the impression that I'm more competent than I really am."

Although the article had nothing to do with Barack Obama, he would surely have scored off the charts had he answered those questions honestly. He was a reasonably bright guy but not the "brilliant" author and savant white liberals thought him to be. His "luck" derived from the fact that he grew up almost exactly as those liberals had but in the body of a black man. Hearing him they heard themselves. Seeing him say what he said surprised them, validated them, delighted them with its very whiteness. Although they would be the last to admit it, they suffered conspicuously from what George Bush has called "the soft bigotry of low expectations."

In speaking of Obama in early 2007, Joe Biden framed those expectations with dunderheaded clarity. "I mean you got the first mainstream African-American presidential candidate who is articulate and bright and clean and a nice-looking guy." Not to be out-patronized, Senate majority Leader Harry Reid found comfort in Obama's having "no Negro dialect." The always-observant Shelby Steele summed up the phenomenon, "Blacks like Obama, who show merit where mediocrity is expected, enjoy a kind of reverse stigma, a slightly inflated reputation for 'freshness' and excellence because they defy expectations."

Throughout his ascendancy, Obama has had to fake something else besides competence, namely a belief in America. This trumpery was on full display during Tuesday night's Syria speech.

If the article was not about Obastard, then who was it about?

OK. I checked.

The article doesn't mention any candidate by name and isn't about politics. It's just pop-psychology fluff. Zero comes up exactly once in the 183 reader comments, but the comment (#172, by sgo) does not cite him or his primary opponent as examples of the syndrome:

I feel like a fraud when I pretend to agree about a political candidate. But in some circles, if you tell people you're voting for a certain someone and that you dislike the other candidate, watch out, it can get ugly! Especially today...people feel VERY strongly about Obama/Clinton....
Recommended by 3 Readers

Here's something to chew on as Hillary salivates over 2016.

Behold what 'smart power' hath wrought: Obama's careening and incomprehensible handling of the Syrian crisis. One unsparing reviewer concluded that Obama has demonstrated himself to be naive and isolated (in short, Putin ate Obama's lunch).

Not to forget then-Secy of State Hillary's part in the debacle.

The Democrats' 'Smart Power' Lies in Ruins
National Review | Sept 3, 2013 | Jim Geraghty / FR Posted by kristinn

Democrats Suddenly Realize What They Miscalculated About the World: Everything

As we await Congress’ decision on authorizing the use of U.S. military force in Syria, Democrats are suddenly realizing that their foreign policy brain-trust completely misjudged the world.

Being nicer to countries like Russia will not make them nicer to you. The United Nations is not an effective tool for resolving crises. Some foreign leaders are beyond persuasion and diplomacy. There is no “international community” ready to work together to solve problems, and there probably never will be.

You can pin this on Hillary Clinton, John Kerry, Susan Rice, but most of all, the buck stops with the president. Those of us who scoffed a bit at a state senator ascending to the presidency within four years on a wave of media hype and adoration are not quite so shocked by this current mess.

We never bought into this notion that getting greater cooperation from our allies, and less hostility from our enemies, was just a matter of giving this crew the wheel and letting them practice, as Hillary Clinton arrogantly declared it, “smart power” (and fronted Time magazine cover).

(These people can’t even label a foreign policy approach without reminding us of how highly they think of themselves.)

They looked out at the world at the end of the Bush years, and didn’t see tough decisions, unsolvable problems, unstable institutions, restless populations, technology enabling the impulse to destabilize existing institutions, evil men hungry for more power, and difficult trade-offs.

No, our problems and challengers were just a matter of the previous hands running U.S. foreign policy not being smart enough. (Excerpt) Read more at nationalreview.com ...

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