Authored by J. Doolin
November 2016
While the media, mainstream and other(s), contemplate, pontificate or ruminate over Trump’s victory lets hear from an older “deplorable”, one who considered voting for Barrack Hussein Obama in 2008. Lets examine our sitting President’s “record” as reflected in a select group of comments and pronouncements regarding specific issues over the past 8 years. Such a probative query may illuminate the otherwise unfathomable origins of Trump’s recent victory. It is the premise of this effort that Obama’s comments reflect his mindset, but also reveal the how and why he directly contributed to Trump’s victory.
In all elections, similar to selecting an ideal purchase, voters like consumers pick their candidate based on a myriad of elements. But some fundamentals will emerge as more important than others for a particular purchase and similarly for why Obama’s comments were crucial in reflecting this President’s desensitized disconnect with Americans. Examining not only what Obama said, the contents of his comments, but also their context may further an appreciation of why Trump has succeeded so remarkably.
Statement #1
“…elections have consequences,” and, in case there was any doubt, “I won.”
The context was shortly after his 2009 inauguration when meeting with congressional Republicans about his economic proposals and it provided seasoned leaders in Washington from both parties a glimpse into this young President’s future leadership style.
The statement was a literal rebuke to the losers, “you lost, deal with it and fall in line”. Those in attendance were astonished at the arrogance and the hubris of this statement, not to mention how it was used as a literal “slap in the face” to anyone in opposition to his personal “manifest destiny”. This was the first inkling of Obama’s perspective on his position and his view of those in disagreement with him. As such there is both the statement and the contextual trappings of the newly elected “man of color” in effect telling his elders to “understand his significance.”
Several in attendance commented that his admonishment was coupled to a near cynical joy in his African heritage’s uniqueness. They were aghast in this near cruel disdain, almost pleasure in the flummoxed discomfort of the old order; it seemed to brighten the sparkle in his eyes. He was smiling and it was not a kind gesture; it was more than a dismissive smirk-it bordered on the pitiless. Arguably, these were perceptions of those in attendance, the conventional Washington politicians with views perhaps warped or clouded in the passage of time. Alternatively it is precisely this contextual clarity that provided the underpinnings of exposure of such actions by Obama about Obama. This was the beginning perhaps of his slow but steady decline. The beginning of a disconnect from an agent of “hope and change” to one of uncoupled autocratic divisiveness and political hyper-polarization.
Here was a community organizer from Chicago, someone who had training or at least experience in building up a socially broken environment to attempt to enhance the lives of people in this microcosm of a much larger city. Typically, community organizers are responsible for constructing a “group of people or institutions to work towards a common goal through collective action.” In order to work towards this objective, community organizers must be trained to really listen to people when they articulate their concerns and voice their fears. (1)
The first concern must be that if this was Obama’s attempt at exchanging views with individuals with different perspectives, Republicans in discussion with his economic proposals, what lessons did he actually master in Chicago? How do you go about “really listening” to people when they articulate their concerns or fears when all you want to do is remind them of their “proper place” and demand that they almost “bow” to the “inevitable” as self-described in the results of an election.
Likely many of the people in attendance did not understand or in fact have a clue as to their “proper place” as seen by Obama, himself so full of himself and his historic victory. For many of us watching from the peanut gallery, the citizenry of the United States, we actually did bow our collective heads, but it was in our recognition that this young man was not yet wise to the use of power. For many in attendance, scared by war and service to our Nation, their timeless universal realization was and continues to be that true power, in its most poignant and forceful application, is seldom magnanimous or beautiful. It is however, never far from humility.
It is in this understanding of power and the appreciation of its inherent potentially terrible inertia that great leaders have harvested its ultimate meaning and outcomes in its use. Only humility has allowed them to go before God in search of acceptance even forgiveness for the outcomes of their chosen paths. Lincoln, Roosevelt and Eisenhower were bathed in the blood of their fellow citizens. Each coming to their individual realization of the price that is extracted for the task required and that personal spiritual humility is offered in return. What constructive dialogue Obama could have sewn in exchanging views appropriately with the people who came to question his proposed legislation. His was to ask with the humility of the victor, for the input of the “vanquished”; simple and effective with dividends for the future. He did not and the water began to color, it began to darken.
Obama’s rather characteristic disdain for the opinions, perceptions or beliefs of those differing from his own has propagated so efficiently that it has now come home to roost. This is a telling commentary. A man, who started his Administration possessing a moral clarity somewhat unique among recent Presidents, has ended it very differently. He was after all a “man of color” rising to the pinnacle of political power in a nation that once enslaved those sharing a portion of his genetic origins. But it has ended with him being almost emblematic of one who is disturbingly detached from events, unable to convince any but his most loyal disciples as to the veracity of his vision.
Many just don’t agree with his viewpoint, almost as many don’t trust his vision to accurately reflect “facts on the ground” or his rendering of current real time circumstances. For these people, everything has become politicized, tainted by an ever-present slime or film of near “Tammany Hall” crudeness. Institutions that were supposed to be simply American institutions owned by the people were suborned into an ugly fetid partisanship. The IRS, FBI and Justice Department became institutions seething with Democrat versus Republican, Progressive versus Conservative. Inevitably these institutions were damaged and their credibility diminished; but Obama didn’t and perhaps still does not understand that such actions hurt him even more. Any history will likely reveal an even harsher commentary on his organizational abuses.
Statement #2
On September 11, 2012, the U.S. diplomatic mission in Benghazi, Libya was attacked resulting in the deaths of the US Ambassador to Libya Chris Stevens U.S. Foreign Service Information Management Officer Sean Smith, and two former Navy SEALS, Glen Doherty and Tyrone S Woods. On September 16, Susan Rice appeared on CBS’s political TV show Face the Nation and ABC’s This Week to state that the attack was a direct result of a “heinous and offensive video”, and was spontaneous, not preplanned.
This was a LIE and now we ALL know it. But here is the interesting thing. Omitting the loss of life for the victims, and the devastating impact on the families and loved ones of these heroic dead Americans; Hillary Clinton has arguably paid the highest political price for this deception. It became part of a larger narrative concerning her that eventually solidified into a public description of her character; a tendency to obfuscate if not outright lie. It is a well-deserved narrative that contributed mightily to her loss in November of 2016. But none of this, the false stories of a “heinous and offensive video”, that the attack was spontaneous and not preplanned, none of it could have been foisted on the American people without Obama consciously, maliciously and intentionally orchestrating the ruse. Obama, not Hillary Clinton, orchestrated the fictional response regarding Benghazi. This is a FACT and here is why.
The “Obama response” was predicated by Obama. He gave it immediately after examining the facts on the ground. There were 4 dead Americans and he, his surrogates, his administration, and the entire American military with a global interventional reach had done nothing. His response was to understand the devastating enormity of his omissions, his total lack of action that led to the death of our people, just eight weeks before his re-election day of reckoning; and then LIE. For many in Washington but also throughout the country, there was an immediate visceral recall of that “Clintonian” moment; one of similar reflexive nausea and realization. The “I never had sexual relations with that woman…” was an immediate admission as to this very fact. And thus an important minority knew immediately Obama’s narrative could not be accurate regarding the events that led to the death of these four brave Americans. And for this same minority, they knew why.
Coordinated oppositional efforts were required to plan and then breach our embassy’s security. Such a requisite of premeditation is not usual and not foreseeable in the psychology or actions of an enraged mob’s reaction to a video. Such coordinated action makes the assertion of spontaneous mob action an almost farcical suggestion, as one has to suspend common sense about how riots progress. Mob action like water runs down hill breaching only the weakest impediment before they move on to claim the next lowest “hanging fruit”. Riots operate on ease, speed and success of destruction. People in a mob do not form synchronized coordinated attacks against walled-in trained security personnel. Everyone in Washington with any experience in security, defense or protective systems knew immediately that Obama’s people were distorting the truth if not outright lying.
Numerous professional questions were immediately bubbling to the surface from this weakly contrived alternative narrative propagated by Clinton and Susan Rice on the Sunday morning talk shows. But at its necrotic center was the hidden origin of pathology from the only person who could approve of such a despicable soiling of the truth; Barrack Hussein Obama. In future years, the truth of the events surrounding the tragedy of Benghazi will inevitably come to the surface. Like flotsam fighting to the surface from a lost vessel, the refuse from this debacle will eventually come into view. And Obama will be identified as the only individual capable, willing and with the requisite authority to propagate this false narrative to the American people.
It can be reasonably argued that historically Presidents have committed greater crimes with more innocent lives lost than what was involved here. After all Obama did not kill these people. No but he didn’t rescue them when the record shows he could have done just that. Further, the false narrative surfacing form this horror is as self-serving for him as any for any past President in our nation’s history. Four Americans were murdered while their government could have saved them but did NOTHING. And then the government perpetrated a lie as to why it happened to deflect any responsibility for its tragic outcome.
We can only fantasize how it might have been for Obama to own this debacle. For him to accept responsibility, to ask the American people for understanding and perhaps even forgiveness would have cemented a narrative of a competent leader dealing with complexities on the ground and being unable to win each challenge. This is harder to do initially, but remarkably constructive for the future. The country would likely have been tolerant if not outright supportive of such candor from our Commander in Chief in a difficult and dangerous world. But there had to be a reason other than Obama’s ineptitude for this mess and thus his cover-up. It can be called nothing else and it hardened the discourse on both his abilities and honesty-indeed his honor. And the dialogue is likely to darken for him in the future.
Nixon’s Watergate was equally self-serving, but I don’t recall people dying as a result of his self-indulgent need for re-election certainty. Obama had learned the lessons of Chicago-style politics well. When confronted by problems; lie, and lie often so that people are so inundated with lies that the truth is buried by the falsehoods. Chicago politics, Havana or Moscow-Obama understood the rules. But such behavior comes at the cost of credibility and trust; a fact that history will take into account; a fact that may very well cost him whatever remains of his legacy.
Statement #3
“The analogy we use around here sometimes, and I think is accurate, is if a jayvee team puts on Lakers uniforms that doesn’t make them Kobe Bryant.” The New Yorker, Jan. 27: In the 2012 campaign.
Obama’s comments as to the threat of ISIL (ISIS) arguably can be understood within the context of very “poor timing”. This statement also likely is reflective of deficits in US intelligence leaving the President vulnerable to underestimating the threat of this group of religious zealots. Unfortunately for Obama his comments came near that almost palpable tipping point wherein these renegade religious fanatics began to conquer large swaths of territory formerly held by the Iraqi army and then proudly showcase their celebratory rituals in mass beheadings and enslavement. Such staged atrocities became familiar to all via the web and their highly theatrical killings of innocents became almost commonplace. The result; Obama’s words slowly crystallized into a narrative of an “out of touch” leader or worse, one wherein domestic and international events were beyond his operational and intellectual grasp.
For many Americans this was the actual end of support, “the last straw”. It symbolized a man who had become distant from their concerns, fears and anxieties. He was no longer connecting with the average US citizen regarding their family’s safety. For this brilliant politician able to provide emotionally moving oratory, his apparent detachment, no matter how unfair the perception, had ultimately taken on a shard of objective truth. He did little to help himself later with his focused “service recovery” comments to the nation. These were almost “tone deaf” dismissive of the nation’s concerns. His statements were those of a lawyer defending a murderous client offered to a jury aware of overwhelming evidence of guilt. The tone was one of lecturing the nation as to the minimal odds of being harmed by this type of terrorism. The intellectual President did not connect with the emotions of a frightened, fatigued and exhausted public.
A Tincture of Time
Broadly, two types of historical commentaries become narratives for future generations to grade the actions of leaders of any movement or nation. First is the assessment of events viewed from a distant temporal vantage. Original actions may thus be immersed and judged in the often-violent cauldron of history with time itself providing a crucial informative context. Time serves as a “scrubber” or cleanser of actions taken, dispensing with the trivial while reinforcing the critical as carbon alloy hardens steel. We cannot objectively comment upon many of Obama’s statements using this form of narrative, as they are still too fresh.
But the other form of historical review is the more immediate appraisal dropped rapidly into the churning waves of real-time political struggle and discourse. These three statements by Obama have thus been placed within this latter perspective and merit careful analysis. With time, their value or lack of such will find balance in the first type of historical narrative. But even now each of these three is emblematic of a leader convinced of his prescient understanding of events often only to have reality severely constrain and challenge his conceptual viewpoints.
In the first instance, his hubris signified a basic distain for those in disagreement with his views ultimately self-legitimizing decisions to later politicize and thus weaken institutions (IRS, FBI, Justice Department) and the very foundations of our Republic in order to assist his allies and hinder his opponents.
The second was a demonstration of his premeditated willingness to deceive those that he represented; foisting a false narrative as to the reasons four brave Americans were murdered; sacrificed to the “greater good” of his re-election. And finally Obama’s failure to grasp the threat that ISIL represented his unwillingness to recognize, identify and deal with an existential threat to those he had sworn to protect.
It is no wonder why then, in addition to Hillary’s lackluster campaign, and the numerous other elements that Democrats believe harmed their candidate, that Donald J Trump is now standing on the threshold of the Oval Office. It is no wonder why then, that such a flawed candidate as Trump, succeeded when all who viewed him thought such victory was impossible. It is a remarkable statement as to the American electorate’s ultimate distain for the policies and perhaps the actual mindset of one Barack Hussein Obama.
Sententia Procul 