|
|
|
Jewish World Review Aug 17, 2012 / 29 Menachem-Av, 5772 A storied presidency By Jonah Goldberg
http://www.JewishWorldReview.com |
In 1995, Nearly a decade later, Obama introduced himself to the country with a stirring speech at the 2004 Democratic convention in which he conceded, "I stand here knowing that my story is part of the larger American story ... and that in no other country on Earth is my story even possible." "Even as we speak," Obama declared as he strode the high road at takeoff velocity, "there are those who are preparing to divide us, the spin masters and negative ad peddlers who embrace the politics of anything goes." "Well, I say to them tonight, there's not a liberal America and a conservative America; there's "I've got news for them, too." Obama thundered. "We worship an awesome God in the blue states, and we don't like federal agents poking around our libraries in the red states." Obama's rhetoric soared high, despite the ballast of straw men clinging to his sentences like desperate souls clinging to the struts of an American helicopter leaving Four years later, Obama ran for president as a "change" candidate championing the transformative power of words. In the Democratic primary, he announced that his true opponent was "cynicism" itself. Apparently, to oppose Obama's candidacy for any reason was to give in to dark motivations. Later, he explained that Democratic voters who preferred Indeed, as Obama told No doubt he believed it, in And by Of course, Obama won. People liked his story. Some say President Obama has been a smashing success, achieving everything he promised to do. He himself told "60 Minutes" in December that his domestic and foreign-policy accomplishments exceeded those of any president "with the possible exceptions of Johnson, FDR and Lincoln." Others claim President Obama was stymied at every turn by an obstructionist But last month he added a new twist to his tale. He told What a curious thing to say, particularly for such a storyteller. It amounts to: "I did everything right, but the public can't see it without a story. By the way, if amassing And what was he focusing on? It's an uncontroversial observation inside the Beltway that Obama farmed out the stimulus and health care to congressional Democrats. What was he doing if not telling stories about green-energy magic and invisible recovery summers? Just in the last few weeks, the Obama campaign or its surrogates have accused (either directly or by insinuation) his opponent -- I mean But fear not. If you don't like those stories, the president has more. He's always got more stories. And he actually believes them, too.
© 2006 TMS |
Arnold Ahlert | |||||||||||||
