President Haters

American Thinker ^ | July 19, 2010 | J.R. Dunn

[neverdem]

"I'll make those f*ckers glad to mutate." 
  -- Franklin D. Roosevelt in Roosevelt after Inauguration by William Burroughs

William Burroughs will never be an icon of the conservative movement. A proud junkie, an aggressive homosexual, a leader of both the Beat movement and the Counterculture, a man who shot his wife by "accident" while playing a party game, Burroughs was if anything the polar opposite of the conservative ideal.

But there was one element of Burroughs' thought not altogether alien to conservatives: his opinion of Franklin D. Roosevelt. Relatively late in his career, Burroughs published a short piece titled Roosevelt after Inauguration, which featured FDR swaggering around Washington (this is fiction, remember) wearing a purple toga and accompanied by a gang of killer baboons whom he sends after his enemies. The story climaxes with the massacre of the Supreme Court by the baboons, whereupon FDR gazes contemplatively across the Potomac at the country now lying at his feet and utters the line quoted above.

What inspired Burroughs to embark on this exercise in nastiness remains unclear. He himself claimed that he was promised a high position in the St. Louis sewer department only to be denied it by New Deal do-gooders, but this may be only part of the legend. Whatever the case, Roosevelt after Inauguration remains one of the purest expressions of political hatred ever put into writing. If every foul attack made over the years against Nixon, Reagan, Gingrich, Bush, Cheney, and Palin were rolled into one, the result would not match a single paragraph. Roosevelt after Inauguration is a masterpiece of political scurrility.

Which brings us to Barack Obama.

Two weeks ago, the White House informed the state of Oklahoma that it could expect no federal aid to help deal with the damage caused by recent flooding. There was no explanation, no expression of sympathy, no offer of alternatives.

Last week, it was revealed that NASA's new mission will be centered on making Muslims "feel good" about their scientific achievements of roughly a millennium in the past. This comes right on the heels of the cancellation of the Constellation program, which employed tens of thousands and promised to put the U.S. back into space in a big way.

At roughly the same time, J. Christian Adams, a former Department of Justice attorney, revealed that the voter harassment case against the New Black Panthers had been dropped for purely racist reasons, and that the word had come down to "never bring another lawsuit against a black or other national minority, no matter what they do."

While this doesn't match killer baboons, it'll do until Obama gets his pack trained.

Consider these actions. If anyone during the 2008 had implied, or even speculated, that Obama was capable of anything of the sort, he'd have been dismissed as a demagogue, a hater, even a lunatic. But today, after his abandonment of the state of Tennessee (also wracked by flooding), his betrayal of the Georgians, his pulling the rug out from under the Poles and Czechs, his dragging and cold response to the Gulf blowout, his insults to the UK, the GOP, the Supreme Court, Benjamin Netanyahu, and the Dalai Lama, it scarcely raises a shrug. That's Obama. That's how he acts -- with arrogance, superciliousness, and indifference. We can search the entire roster of American presidents, and we will not find a match. This is not the behavior of an elected chief executive; it's the conduct of a divine right monarch, and a pretty inadequate one as well.

Conduct of this sort inevitably produces a reaction -- contempt from equals, and hatred from victims. Obama has created a lot of victims in eighteen months of power, and that reaction has been growing. In plain fact, Obama is on his way to becoming the most hated president of the modern epoch. More so than Roosevelt, more so than Nixon, more so than Bush -- keep in mind that W. was truly hated only by the hard left. With steady and unrelenting pressure over a period of six years, the left did succeed in planting doubts and discomfort in the country as a whole. But never extending to actual hatred.

Obama is different. In part because of the way he was so relentlessly hyped during his ascension to office, and the way he played along with it, toying with the public's expectations and transparently enjoying his status as demigod. But he is no longer the godling of legend, the Illinois messiah here to lead us to a left-wing Eden. He is merely a community organizer in over his head. The blowback triggered by disappointments of such depth can be ferocious. FDR was never foolish enough to make promises on this level (listen to his 1933 inaugural speech), and it served him well over three full terms. Obama was, and now he must pay the piper.

Obama is hated for a good reason -- for causing unnecessary suffering to no purpose. A president must cause grief and pain; in this fallen world, he has no choice. He must and he will make decisions that hurt people. Hard decisions, decisions that kill. This is one of the reasons that presidents age so swiftly. The classic case here is Lincoln. No president caused more bloodshed and sorrow than Lincoln. No president suffered more for it, as much as it was done in a good and transcendent cause. The result is apparent in his photographs, the somber but healthy figure about to take office transformed into the wraith of 1865, with his haunted eyes and skin stretched parchment-tight across the bones of his face.

But the suffering generated by the reign of Obama is unnecessary and uncalled for, as any short examination will reveal:

The economy - Obama has made the same errors as FDR in his first term, without FDR's charm and earnestness to make up for it. Without even grasping that they were errors, for that matter. Of course, giving most of the stimulus money to the same financial industry that kicked off the crash was a brilliant ploy. We have to admit that worked.

The Border - A state under siege attempts to reimpose order through accepted legal means and Obama's response is to unleash Eric Holder, the only person in the country (possibly even the galaxy) more arrogant than he. This is going to haunt him.

      

Health care - Even now, the chicks are coming home. The system is starting to go, four years before anything will be ready to replace it. A former colleague of mine was told this week that her doctor will longer accept Medicare. She lives in New York City, not friendly to Medicare patients in the best of times. She is understandably distraught. That story is being repeated across country in thousands -- perhaps hundreds of thousands -- of cases. And what is O's Plan B? You tell me.

The Gulf - during the worst ecological disaster of the era, as all levels of his administration repeatedly fumbled the ball, Obama golfed, partied, listened to Paulie Beatle, and went on vacation no less than three times. Let them eat cake!

In direct consequence of these actions and countless others, Obama has become a hated man. That hatred will only grow.

What would the prudent man do? He'd put away his purple robes, give up his grand schemes, cease the bullying and arrogance, and simply try to get through the next two years without civil disorder or other forms of ugliness. But Obama is not a prudent man. Nor are the members of his personal baboon pack -- Emmanuel, Axelrod and the rest.

So to avoid a state of permanent crisis, it will be necessary to dismantle the Obama presidency while it still exists. The new Congress will put a halt to much of the programs already in motion, and must also move to assure that the levers of power are moved out of Obama's reach. The Supreme Court will step in regarding a number of questionable decisions and programs. The sheer pressure of democratic checks and balances, so blithely ignored by Obama up until now, will begin to squeeze like a vise.

His own cronies, with no honor among them, will peel off as the downward spiral becomes evident. They will move to save themselves -- cut their deals, make their testimony, cop their pleas. We will learn a lot we don't now know about why certain decisions were made. The collapse will accelerate.

Thanks to the Gulf blowout, we know that Obama's crisis mode is to retreat. And retreat he will, until he can retreat no further. Eventually he will become a ghost in his own White House, querulous and isolated, afraid to go out among his own people. In the end, he may well become the first president forced to live in foreign exile. And this is the best he can expect. 

It will not be an easy period. The Iranians, the Chinese, and the Jihadis will take what advantage they can. All the figures Obama has so assiduously courted, everyone he bowed to, will simply stand aside. Contempt felt for a ruler extends as a matter of course to his country, and we cannot avoid that. Regaining international respect will take time, and it will not happen under this regime.

But it's far from hopeless. Those of us who lived through Watergate are aware that this country prevails even when the leadership is derelict. America is resilient, Americans at their best amid crises. America's "decline" is situational, not permanent. We can look forward to a period of renewal when it's all over and we've cleared away the Styrofoam columns. A lot of illusions will be dead, a lot of worthless ideas exposed. Those who hold them will be have to come to terms with the fact that no, Americans will never be glad to "mutate".

And who will be Obama's Burroughs? Who will be the one to define him for all time with a few well-chosen, vicious words? We may have to wait -- it took Burroughs himself nearly forty years. But we can be sure of one thing -- a lot of people will be trying. I'd give it a shot myself, but you know... I'm not sure I'm enough of a hater.

J.R. Dunn is consulting editor of American Thinker and editor of the forthcoming Military Thinker.

[Ronbo1948]

Mega Ditto, FRiend!

This Obama Regime will end badly and earn an infamous chapter in American history... Comrade Obama may replace Benedict Arnold as the greatest traitor.

[Osage Orange]

Great quote...........

[Osage Orange]

Never happen.

Wanna bet...$?

[Osage Orange]

He's not your friend...

I'm serious.....

[CedarDave]

Thanks for the ping. I can’t say I hate Obama; that personalizes it. I don’t like him, his arrogance, his elitism, etc. but that does not translate into hate for me. And saying you hate the president comes very close to the edge where those that hate plan to take personal, violent action which in their own mind will resolve that hate. And the country does not need that; we must at all costs avoid making our first (half) black president a martyr.

However, I do hate his administration and what they are doing to the country with increased government control and bureaucracy in all areas; loss of freedom to chose, increased taxes and a debt that is rapidly making us a third-world bankrupt economy.

We need a leader like Reagan that will inspire us, lift us up, make us proud again, have us believe in ourselves again. And assist us by rolling back government programs and taxes. It will take time, but if we don’t do it, we will not survive as a nation.

[brytlea]

It’s why Carter loves him. He’s now one step up from worst President ever!

[thulldud]

we must at all costs avoid making our first (half) black president a martyr.

Spot on. As someone has observed, if your enemy is destroying himself, just let him.

(I have naughty thoughts of kicking him after he's down, though.)

[rdb3]

It won't take a hater. My guess, it'll be the lady who defeats him, Sarah Palin and she won't have to use vicious words, just the simple truth and she'll define him during her campaign.

I certainly hope so.

[JMJJR]

bookmark bump

[KC Burke]

We should share with Mr Dunn that it is just revenge rather than "hate" which is required to be called forth in proper castigation for such actions as have been encountered.

Burke spoke of the nature, purpose and nobility of revenge, so let's see if historical purpose and social analysis does a better job than drama:

If it should still be asked why we show sufficient acrimony to exact a suspicion of being in any manner influenced by malice or a desire of revenge, to this, my Lords, I answer, because we should be thought to know our duty, and to have all the world know how resolutely we are resolved to perform it.

[We}...are not disposed to quarrel with the Divine Wisdom and Goodness, which has moulded up revenge into the frame and constitution of man. He that has made us what we are has made us at once resentful and reasonable.

Instinct tells a man that he ought to revenge an injury; reason tells him that he ought not be a judge in his own cause. From that moment revenge passes from the public to the private hand; but in being transferred it is far from being extinguished. My Lords, it is transferred as a sacred trust to be exercised for the injured, in measure and proportion, by persons, who feeling as he feels, are in a temper to reason better than he can reason. Revenge is taken out of the hands of the original injured proprietor, lest it should be carried beyond the bounds of moderation and justice. But, my Lords, it is in its transfer exposed to a danger of an opposite description. The delegate of vengeance may not feel the wrong sufficiently: He may be cold and languid in the performance of his sacred duty. It is for these reasons that good men are taught to tremble even at the first emotions of anger and resentment for their own particular wrongs; but they are likewise taught, if they are well taught, to give the loosest possible rein to their resentment and indignation, whenever their parents, their friends, their country, or their brethren of the common family of mankind are injured. Those who have not such feelings, under such circumstances, are base and degenerate.

Lord Bacon has very well said, that "revenge is a kind of wild justice." It is so, and without this wild austere stock there would be no justice in the world. But when, by the skilful hand of morality and wise jurisprudence, a foreign scion, but of the very same species, is grafted upon it, its harsh quality becomes changed, it submits to culture, and, laying aside its savage nature, it bears fruits and flowers, sweet to the world, and not ungrateful even to heaven itself, to which it elevates its exalted head. The fruit of this wild stock is revenge regulated, but not extinguished, -- revenge transferred from the suffering party to the communion and sympathy of mankind. This is the revenge by which we are actuated, and which we should be sorry, if the false, idle, girlish, novel-like morality of the world should extinguish in the breast of us who have a great public duty to perform.

This sympathetic revenge, which is condemned by clamorous imbecility, is so far from being a vice, that it is the greatest of all possible virtues, -- a virtue which the uncorrupted judgement of mankind has in all ages exalted to the rank of heroism. To give up all the repose and pleasures of life, to pass sleepless nights and laborious days, and, what is ten times more irksome to an ingenuous mind, to offer oneself to calumny and all its herd of hissing tongues and poison fangs, in order to free the world from fraudulent prevaricators, from cruel oppressors, from robbers and tyrants, has, I say, the test of heroic virtue, and well deserves such a distinction.

Could they have done this, if they had not been actuated by some strong, some vehement, some perennial passion, which, burning like the Vestal fire chaste and eternal, never suffers generous sympathy to grow cold in maintaining the rights of the injured or in denouncing the crimes of the oppressor?

Burke is making this speech as his "Speech in Reply, First Day" at the impeachment trial of Warren Hastings for his vast crimes in India in Burke's capacity as leader of the Commons chosen to present the case for conviction on Impeachment.

I quoted it in the Clinton era, it is proper here as well.

[neverdem]

America's Ruling Class -- And the Perils of Revolution Long, but a MUST READ, Rush lauded it today.

Obama's next act

Should Black Folks Give the Tea Party a Second Look?

Coyotes in the State of Nature

Some noteworthy articles about politics, foreign or military affairs, IMHO, FReepmail me if you want on or off my list.

[Jeff Head]

Obama is a marxist ideologue. His fundamental change is to change America into a marxist people's bannan republic and destroy our Constitutional Republic.

He must be neutered in 2010 and sent packing in 2012.

OBAMA IS A MARXIST IDEOLOGUE

[Ultra Sonic 007]

Ping of interest.

[GOPJ]

America's Ruling Class -- And the Perils of Revolution Long, but a MUST READ, Rush lauded it today.

WOW - thanks for the ping.

[Billthedrill]

Hmm...having seen the inaugural celebration I can sort of see where Burroughs got the purple toga and the pack of killer baboons story...

[FreedomPoster]

>>Hell, he makes Jimmy Carter look good — and I didn’t think anyone could ever accomplish that.

My sig for a big chunk of 2008 was “Obama: Carter’s only chance to avoid going down in history as the worst U.S. president ever.”

I think I nailed it. I’m not at all happy to have been so correct, mind you.

[Ronin]

Shortly after he was elected, I predicted that within the space of two years, Obama would be the most hated man in America.

I also predicted (although I was not alone in this) that he would look for ways to mobilize fanatics in his political base into para-military goon squads that would intimidate and coerce average Americans in much the same way that has proven effective by fascists, Nazis, Communists and now Islamics. That will be the “Civilian National Defense Force” he was talking about.

Huge numbers of people have expressed puzzlement at Obama’s policies and actions since elected, but they all appear logical to me — if viewed from from the standpoint of increasing federal control over every aspect of American life and his control over that same government.

His unswerving goal is to rule. He does not and has never intended to relinquish power voluntarily. He is working to transform America into a one-party state with himself as the lifelong leader.

I think Obama knows he only has one chance at this. Hell, one of the reasons I think he takes so many vacations and plays so much golf may be that he doesn’t really expect to pull it off, so he is determined to enjoy the power and perks of the Presidency for as much time as he has. However, make no mistake about this, it fits right in with Emmanuel’s policy of “never letting a crisis go to waste”.

[Cicero]

Brilliant. Brilliant. Brilliant.

I’m sending it out to my list, whether they like it or not.

[Cicero]

ping

[JDoutrider]

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