So Obama botched the whole toasting-the-queen thing in London this week. It’s not exactly breaking news, and it’s ultimately very unimportant to policy-making. But the reaction to his gaffe by liberals in the American media is more proof of their ongoing love-affair with our sitting president.
In case you haven’t heard, President Obama was in the middle of giving a toast to the queen when the Royal Band started playing “God Save the Queen.” He had asked everyone to rise (According to the “English rules”, that means it’s time for the national anthem.), and British Royal protocol says to wait until after the national anthem has finished playing before toasting. Despite the fact that the music had started playing, Obama continued with his prepared speech and then raised his glass to give a toast to the queen. Embarrassingly enough, however, he was the only one with his glass in the air. Everyone else, including the Queen who was sitting next to him, was still standing at attention for the National Anthem. When Obama realized his mistake, he set his glass down and awkwardly listened to the rest of the song. Finally, when the anthem was over, everyone raised their glasses in a toast to the Queen.
It’s been interesting to watch how everyone in the media decided to cover this. They’re saying the band misinterpreted the cue from President Obama. They’re suggesting the band should have waited till after Obama was finished speaking before they played the national anthem. Many of them criticized the queen for not helping Obama out, for not lifting her glass so he didn’t look stupid for being the only one in the room with his glass in the air.
Let me make this clear. I am criticizing the media here, not Obama. In all reality, could this have happened to anyone? Sure. Is a gaffe like this important to national or international relations? Probably not. Do I hope my fellow conservatives don’t take advantage of this opportunity to make a mockery of our president by lowering themselves to the level of the liberal media every time something like this ever came close to happening to Bush? Absolutely.
It’s the media that doesn’t make sense here. If Obama really is the amazing president they believe him to be, why should they have to make excuses for him? Shouldn’t he be able to dust himself off on his own every time something like this happens? If he’s so amazing, shouldn’t he be able to whip out a good joke and laugh at himself like Reagan would have done? According to their own larger-than-life view of him, he should be able to handle it. He’s a big boy. He can take care of himself. He’s more than a big boy. He’s the president of the free world, the president who has the power to usher in hope and change. Why should the queen or the people of England (who were simply following custom and tradition) have to help him out?
You’d think, right? The problem is that Katie Couric, Matt Lauer, Peter Jennings, Tom Brokaw, Chris Matthews, etc. all invested everything into Barrack Obama. They raised him up and supported him and helped him get elected by not only voting for him but by ignoring any and all stories that suggested he was anything less than the greatest president this country would ever see.
The liberal media’s relationship to Barrack Obama reminds me of parents who refuse to believe there is anything wrong with their kid. Whether it’s poor grades, disruptive behavior, bullying, etc., some parents get defensive when a teacher, coach, church leader, or someone else tells them their kid has problems that need to be addressed. The parents don’t want to believe the truth, because it hurts. They’d rather have the short-term satisfaction of ignoring a problem than enjoy the long-term fruits of being humble enough to listen to constructive criticism that others lend them.
There’s nothing inherently bad about a kid acting up in class at school, just as there’s nothing inherently bad about Obama toasting the queen too early. Mistakes are part of life. But if you ignore your own or those of someone you love, you’re not doing anyone a favor. If the media really had Obama’s long-term interest as a president in mind, they would report the objective truth about these gaffes he seems to find himself in. Their “mother hen” status is really starting to show through. It’s showing through them, and it’s showing through Obama’s followers, from academia to Hollywood. They’re all beginning to realize (as they look at the economy, the war on terror, immigration, his handling of natural disasters, etc.) that he’s not the superhero they thought he would be. And they’re scared of what it means for them and their careers.
Friday, May 27, 2011
Friday, May 20, 2011
Obama’s Birth Certificate: Old News, Timeless Lesson
Tonight, I want to address the controversy and conspiracy theories surrounding Barrack Obama’s birth certificate. I realize this may be old hat for many people. Once again, I am writing about an issue long after it may have already died (or at least after it has been buried temporarily). Seriously, though, I think we conservatives can take a few lessons from this issue.
First of all, one of the biggest problems with modern-day politics in general is that people of all viewpoints accept the logical fallacy that they need to believe every bad rumor or theory about a politician with whom they disagree on policy. They think anything less than doing so equals disloyalty to their respective movement or party. However, to a certain extent, believing that represents a degree of disloyalty to such a party or movement. Let me explain:
Several weeks ago, a woman called Rush Limbaugh’s show to chide him for not putting more pressure on Obama and left-leaning media to release his birth certificate. This was right around the time that more people, led by Donald Trump, were pressuring Obama to release his birth certificate. And, as we all know, the Whitehouse did release a more detailed version of Obama’s birth certificate than the one the Obama than they had before.
Anyway, this woman was irate with Limbaugh (given his influence on the media and national politics) for not demanding that Obama release his birth certificate. Mr. Limbaugh then did this woman a huge favor in how he defended himself. He told her that she was living in a fantasy world to think that simply removing a bad president from office was going to solve the country’s problems.
I will be honest here. I can relate to this woman’s frustration. During the 90’s, when we conservatives mistakenly thought we’d seen the worst U.S. president ever (in the form of William Jefferson Clinton), I remember thinking how convenient it would be if he just magically disappeared. But now that I’ve stepped back and looked at everything, I realize that such a wish is just that: a wish. It’s not reality.
The sitting president of the United States may have a lot of power but at the end of the day, his election simply reflects the sentiment of the country at the time he was elected. And the sentiment of the country is formed by the thoughts, emotions, and the logical and sometimes not so logical conclusions of its people. The president is just one person. And when it comes to American politics, somebody always steps up to the plate to take advantage of the sentiment of the country. At the end of 2008, America was disillusioned by the War in Iraq, worried about the economy, and the liberal media had convinced them that they needed a president from the opposite party. The mood of the country was such that if Obama had not become president, Hillary Clinton would have. If not her, someone else. If not that someone else, then another someone else, and so on and so forth.
The birthers, to put it bluntly, need to wake up and start talking about the actual issues if they want to save this country from its Constitutional demise. Don’t get me wrong. I would not be the least bit surprised, given the way the liberal media covered Barrack Obama’s campaign in 2008 and the way they’ve tried to protect him and his bad policies since then, if there are a lot of skeletons in Obama’s closet that simply sound like conspiracy theories right now.
However, if these birthers really want to change the long-term future of the country, if they want conservatism to win, they will stop putting all their energy into finding short-term solutions, if you can even call them that. They will stop putting all their eggs into one basket. They will stop banking all their energy and hope on what is simply, excuse the pun, a “Trump” card for saving America.
If the birthers want long-term conservative victory in this country, they need to join ranks with fellow conservatives by arguing about the merits of their policy-oriented ideas. They need to engage in a war of ideas and principles, rather than wasting much needed energy on political strategies that may or may not work and will do little, if not nothing, to help solve this country’s problems.
First of all, one of the biggest problems with modern-day politics in general is that people of all viewpoints accept the logical fallacy that they need to believe every bad rumor or theory about a politician with whom they disagree on policy. They think anything less than doing so equals disloyalty to their respective movement or party. However, to a certain extent, believing that represents a degree of disloyalty to such a party or movement. Let me explain:
Several weeks ago, a woman called Rush Limbaugh’s show to chide him for not putting more pressure on Obama and left-leaning media to release his birth certificate. This was right around the time that more people, led by Donald Trump, were pressuring Obama to release his birth certificate. And, as we all know, the Whitehouse did release a more detailed version of Obama’s birth certificate than the one the Obama than they had before.
Anyway, this woman was irate with Limbaugh (given his influence on the media and national politics) for not demanding that Obama release his birth certificate. Mr. Limbaugh then did this woman a huge favor in how he defended himself. He told her that she was living in a fantasy world to think that simply removing a bad president from office was going to solve the country’s problems.
I will be honest here. I can relate to this woman’s frustration. During the 90’s, when we conservatives mistakenly thought we’d seen the worst U.S. president ever (in the form of William Jefferson Clinton), I remember thinking how convenient it would be if he just magically disappeared. But now that I’ve stepped back and looked at everything, I realize that such a wish is just that: a wish. It’s not reality.
The sitting president of the United States may have a lot of power but at the end of the day, his election simply reflects the sentiment of the country at the time he was elected. And the sentiment of the country is formed by the thoughts, emotions, and the logical and sometimes not so logical conclusions of its people. The president is just one person. And when it comes to American politics, somebody always steps up to the plate to take advantage of the sentiment of the country. At the end of 2008, America was disillusioned by the War in Iraq, worried about the economy, and the liberal media had convinced them that they needed a president from the opposite party. The mood of the country was such that if Obama had not become president, Hillary Clinton would have. If not her, someone else. If not that someone else, then another someone else, and so on and so forth.
The birthers, to put it bluntly, need to wake up and start talking about the actual issues if they want to save this country from its Constitutional demise. Don’t get me wrong. I would not be the least bit surprised, given the way the liberal media covered Barrack Obama’s campaign in 2008 and the way they’ve tried to protect him and his bad policies since then, if there are a lot of skeletons in Obama’s closet that simply sound like conspiracy theories right now.
However, if these birthers really want to change the long-term future of the country, if they want conservatism to win, they will stop putting all their energy into finding short-term solutions, if you can even call them that. They will stop putting all their eggs into one basket. They will stop banking all their energy and hope on what is simply, excuse the pun, a “Trump” card for saving America.
If the birthers want long-term conservative victory in this country, they need to join ranks with fellow conservatives by arguing about the merits of their policy-oriented ideas. They need to engage in a war of ideas and principles, rather than wasting much needed energy on political strategies that may or may not work and will do little, if not nothing, to help solve this country’s problems.
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