Posted by
Dennis Pemberton on Thursday, February 05, 2009 1:43:47 PM
In the corrosive effect on the public morals, President Obama may well surpass Bill Clinton. While Clinton eroded our concept of what is sexually moral (or even, what is sex), I don't think he had the far more dangerous effect of increasing public cynicism about the Government. When they elected Bill Clinton, people knew what they were getting- a bright, ambitious, man who was also an incredible lecher. While the Bimbo eruptions hobbled his Presidency, I don't think anybody expected any more of him, and even when he lied to our faces, that was expected, and even justifiable. I mean, who admits to affairs, especially when married to the First Lamp Thrower?
But Obama is worse because his idiotic "change/hope/hope/change" mantra was deliberately vague, allowing people to convince themselves that he was different, a new day dawning, representing not so much revolution, but evolution of the political animal into some New Man. Incorporating all our best characteristics, disdaining our worst, and above it all, aloof and "cool," the Ubermensch Obama promised to be our secular messiah. And when the rubber met the road, and he insisted that his Administration would be the antithesis of the crooks of the last, his shadowy image clarified into the Lawgiver. He signed Executive Orders as easily as he made campaign promises, as if ethics could be created by fiat. He yammered about the emergency, and how we all had to work together to forestall disaster. He told DC residents they needed to "toughen up" in the intense cold.
And now in just a couple of weeks, he is showing himself to be just another pol, probably a below average pol at that. He has nominated tax cheats, lobbyists, and flat-out liars to key positions. Instead of actually working on a stimulus bill, he stood aside and let Nancy Pelosi write it, as if he were still just a presidential candidate instead of The President, anxious to keep his fingerprints off possible failure. Like some Global Warming Marie Antoinette, he heated his office to tropical levels, while telling us to freeze.
That's the kind of thing that really destroys the moral fabric of a country. Not when the President lies about sex. But when the President lies about himself, who he is, and what he means. Cynicism isn't created by a liar telling lies. It's created when a man who says he's better than you demonstrates he is less than you.