Welcome to Fantasy.
The awarding of the Nobel Peace Prize to Barack Obama is fantastic in the strictest sense of the word. Truly, when I saw the headline that he had won my initial conclusion was that I was reading parody, satire or spoof. Now I realize I was reading a frightening fantasy, for this fantasy is reality (and far too few people discern it as fantasy).
In the span of a few short minutes listening to talking heads on the radio this morning, I learned that Mr. Obama was awarded this prize a priori; the deadline for nominating him was a mere two weeks into his term, well before he had accomplished anything. And yet, fantastically, he is given this honor, in part, for his great work in fostering a diplomatic spirit throughout the nations. I also learned that Mr. Obama was chosen as the very epitome of peacefulness for his "aspirations and attitude" and for giving the world "hope."
In other words, this is a spiritual award, even a religious one: Barack Obama has baptized the planet with optimism. His term as American president is like a new pentecost: nations speak his name in many tongues that portend peace, unity, hope. This is not about ACHIEVEMENT, but mere sentiment, and the ephemera of personality and perception. It is about the subjective warmth of thought and emotion: Barack Obama has set, like a new Holy Spirit, a fire that burns hot in the breast of the yearning, expectant nations.
I heard someone from the Nobel committee earlier today talk about Mr. Obama's popularity in the world. She said that "his predecessor" was not popular among the nations; that Mr. Obama, in fact, had restored, not so much the popularity of the United States in the world's eyes, though he has helped, but the office of the presidency. But, she added, he has somehow raised his own popularity above the office; that he has elevated his own well-cut figure among the peoples far beyond the mystique of the Oval Office. He is a sign. A portent. He brings hope.
What the world fails to understand about the office of the United States presidency is that the office is not about personal excellence, achievement, or capacious ability. It is about successfully winning a national popularity contest, a national beauty pageant. Mr. Obama is hardly what one would describe as achieved. After all, what has he REALLY done? Granted, one could ask this about many a president; many have asked this of others who've been elected. But Mr. Obama REALLY has done little with his life other than win popularity contests. In fact, his presidency -- like all presidencies -- is not something earned but something conferred: Mr. Obama's success is really nothing more than what has been given him by others. Any president's success, as president, is the result of the will of the electorate. Mr. Obama is not special; he is where he is because millions of people put him there.
Hence, for the world to think that Mr. Obama DESERVES something like the Nobel Prize is patently absurd. It is fantastic, illusory, confounding in its weirdness. Yes, he can read a fine speech, and read it well. But he has not accomplished anything (at least on his own). "Mere words?" Yes, mere words are all he's given.
Of course, the Nobel committee has also stated that Mr. Obama is being honored for his work in calling for the reduction of nuclear arms throughout the world. As if anyone in the western world is calling for the proliferation of nuclear arms and Mr. Obama stands unique in his position; that Mr. Obama is honored for calling for what the nearest child would call for is ridiculous on its face. And when I heard two weeks ago that his great diplomatic achievement as the moderator of the UN Security Council -- the first American president to ever serve in that capacity -- was to pass a resolution calling for a world-wide reduction in nuclear weapons, I guffawed in disbelief. This is the best our president can do? Nothing more than what countless high school student councils have resolved to do for decades?
And that is what I actually think of Mr. Obama. To me, he is, at best, a high school student council chairman. I don't see the brilliance, the expansive intellect, the singular and unique vision, the mastery of language, the openness to new ideas. His whole presidency is rooted in old, stale, hackneyed ideas, the sort of ideas bandied about in AP high school social studies classes and those lecture halls in which matriculating American students gather for Political Science 101. Does anyone really think that universal health care is not the sort of thing that children propose in 8th-grade class assignments about "building utopia"? Does anyone think there is anything one whit adult and "new" and "progressive" about "international, multi-lateral diplomacy" or "reducing the nuclear arsenal"? Or am I the only one Barack Obama's age who recalls being weaned on this stuff from birth? Barack Obama's vision of the world, his views of science and consensus and health care and war and peace all amount to pablum.
Lastly, let us note one important thing. America was rejected (by many) during the Bush years because of its apparent arrogance, aggression; its uni-lateral bullying and its imperialistic "we are right and have the might" attitude. America was disdained in part because it perceived itself as so essential, so necessary; as the super-power par excellence. It pushed democracy on nations that did not want it within their own borders.
Mr. Obama recently said that no world order can succeed when one nation or people dominates, or sees itself as supreme, or the best, or more equal than others. Of course, what this means is that Mr. Obama wants to impose democracy on the world in a different way than his predecessor Bush: he wants to show that the United States, no longer caring that democracies thrive within the borders of its many neighbors, is ready to let all nations democratically give voice not only to the direction of the new world order but also the United States itself. He is a consensus builder, announcing in his many apologies that the United States is now ready to see itself as equal to every other country; it is no longer the best, it will not impose itself on the world without the world's approval. It will lead, yes, but only by following.
What is so insidious, so deeply pernicious, is that Mr. Obama -- merely the winner of a nation's popularity contest -- has presented to the world that while the United States is not absolutely right or absolutely honorable or absolutely necessary or absolutely indispensable, he is indispensable and necessary and honorable and right; that while the United States can't do all the "heavy lifting" and that it ought not to, he himself is necessary to bring the world together, that he is the heavy who lifts the world from divisiveness and strife and hopelessness. He is needed. He is wanted. All nations are to be colonies of his magnanimous vision, his glorious unifying voice.
The world does not need America like it once did, or believed it did. America is not the model or force of empire. But the world sure needs America's Barack Obama, because he is hope.
___________________
Last year about this time, as the election drew near, I told family and friends that I thought Mr. Obama would lose the election in the United States and that charges of racism would course through the country and the world: that it would be perceived that Mr. Obama had been rejected by America because America is a vicious, backward, racist place. I also told family and friends that I thought his defeat would engender world sympathy and that the world would work to place him atop the United Nations. I was wrong. What seems more likely is that Mr. Obama will pass through the Oval Office so he can eventually assume the throne in New York City. Perhaps in 2016, when Michelle Obama runs for the White House and loses, her loss, interpreted as rejection rooted in sexism and racism, will secure Mr. Obama's position as President of the United States of the World.
Lest we forget: Dissent is not unpatriotic. Dissent we do.
©Contratimes/2009. All rights reserved.
The awarding of the Nobel Peace Prize to Barack Obama is fantastic in the strictest sense of the word. Truly, when I saw the headline that he had won my initial conclusion was that I was reading parody, satire or spoof. Now I realize I was reading a frightening fantasy, for this fantasy is reality (and far too few people discern it as fantasy).
In the span of a few short minutes listening to talking heads on the radio this morning, I learned that Mr. Obama was awarded this prize a priori; the deadline for nominating him was a mere two weeks into his term, well before he had accomplished anything. And yet, fantastically, he is given this honor, in part, for his great work in fostering a diplomatic spirit throughout the nations. I also learned that Mr. Obama was chosen as the very epitome of peacefulness for his "aspirations and attitude" and for giving the world "hope."
In other words, this is a spiritual award, even a religious one: Barack Obama has baptized the planet with optimism. His term as American president is like a new pentecost: nations speak his name in many tongues that portend peace, unity, hope. This is not about ACHIEVEMENT, but mere sentiment, and the ephemera of personality and perception. It is about the subjective warmth of thought and emotion: Barack Obama has set, like a new Holy Spirit, a fire that burns hot in the breast of the yearning, expectant nations.
I heard someone from the Nobel committee earlier today talk about Mr. Obama's popularity in the world. She said that "his predecessor" was not popular among the nations; that Mr. Obama, in fact, had restored, not so much the popularity of the United States in the world's eyes, though he has helped, but the office of the presidency. But, she added, he has somehow raised his own popularity above the office; that he has elevated his own well-cut figure among the peoples far beyond the mystique of the Oval Office. He is a sign. A portent. He brings hope.
What the world fails to understand about the office of the United States presidency is that the office is not about personal excellence, achievement, or capacious ability. It is about successfully winning a national popularity contest, a national beauty pageant. Mr. Obama is hardly what one would describe as achieved. After all, what has he REALLY done? Granted, one could ask this about many a president; many have asked this of others who've been elected. But Mr. Obama REALLY has done little with his life other than win popularity contests. In fact, his presidency -- like all presidencies -- is not something earned but something conferred: Mr. Obama's success is really nothing more than what has been given him by others. Any president's success, as president, is the result of the will of the electorate. Mr. Obama is not special; he is where he is because millions of people put him there.
Hence, for the world to think that Mr. Obama DESERVES something like the Nobel Prize is patently absurd. It is fantastic, illusory, confounding in its weirdness. Yes, he can read a fine speech, and read it well. But he has not accomplished anything (at least on his own). "Mere words?" Yes, mere words are all he's given.
Of course, the Nobel committee has also stated that Mr. Obama is being honored for his work in calling for the reduction of nuclear arms throughout the world. As if anyone in the western world is calling for the proliferation of nuclear arms and Mr. Obama stands unique in his position; that Mr. Obama is honored for calling for what the nearest child would call for is ridiculous on its face. And when I heard two weeks ago that his great diplomatic achievement as the moderator of the UN Security Council -- the first American president to ever serve in that capacity -- was to pass a resolution calling for a world-wide reduction in nuclear weapons, I guffawed in disbelief. This is the best our president can do? Nothing more than what countless high school student councils have resolved to do for decades?
And that is what I actually think of Mr. Obama. To me, he is, at best, a high school student council chairman. I don't see the brilliance, the expansive intellect, the singular and unique vision, the mastery of language, the openness to new ideas. His whole presidency is rooted in old, stale, hackneyed ideas, the sort of ideas bandied about in AP high school social studies classes and those lecture halls in which matriculating American students gather for Political Science 101. Does anyone really think that universal health care is not the sort of thing that children propose in 8th-grade class assignments about "building utopia"? Does anyone think there is anything one whit adult and "new" and "progressive" about "international, multi-lateral diplomacy" or "reducing the nuclear arsenal"? Or am I the only one Barack Obama's age who recalls being weaned on this stuff from birth? Barack Obama's vision of the world, his views of science and consensus and health care and war and peace all amount to pablum.
Lastly, let us note one important thing. America was rejected (by many) during the Bush years because of its apparent arrogance, aggression; its uni-lateral bullying and its imperialistic "we are right and have the might" attitude. America was disdained in part because it perceived itself as so essential, so necessary; as the super-power par excellence. It pushed democracy on nations that did not want it within their own borders.
Mr. Obama recently said that no world order can succeed when one nation or people dominates, or sees itself as supreme, or the best, or more equal than others. Of course, what this means is that Mr. Obama wants to impose democracy on the world in a different way than his predecessor Bush: he wants to show that the United States, no longer caring that democracies thrive within the borders of its many neighbors, is ready to let all nations democratically give voice not only to the direction of the new world order but also the United States itself. He is a consensus builder, announcing in his many apologies that the United States is now ready to see itself as equal to every other country; it is no longer the best, it will not impose itself on the world without the world's approval. It will lead, yes, but only by following.
What is so insidious, so deeply pernicious, is that Mr. Obama -- merely the winner of a nation's popularity contest -- has presented to the world that while the United States is not absolutely right or absolutely honorable or absolutely necessary or absolutely indispensable, he is indispensable and necessary and honorable and right; that while the United States can't do all the "heavy lifting" and that it ought not to, he himself is necessary to bring the world together, that he is the heavy who lifts the world from divisiveness and strife and hopelessness. He is needed. He is wanted. All nations are to be colonies of his magnanimous vision, his glorious unifying voice.
The world does not need America like it once did, or believed it did. America is not the model or force of empire. But the world sure needs America's Barack Obama, because he is hope.
___________________
Last year about this time, as the election drew near, I told family and friends that I thought Mr. Obama would lose the election in the United States and that charges of racism would course through the country and the world: that it would be perceived that Mr. Obama had been rejected by America because America is a vicious, backward, racist place. I also told family and friends that I thought his defeat would engender world sympathy and that the world would work to place him atop the United Nations. I was wrong. What seems more likely is that Mr. Obama will pass through the Oval Office so he can eventually assume the throne in New York City. Perhaps in 2016, when Michelle Obama runs for the White House and loses, her loss, interpreted as rejection rooted in sexism and racism, will secure Mr. Obama's position as President of the United States of the World.
Lest we forget: Dissent is not unpatriotic. Dissent we do.
©Contratimes/2009. All rights reserved.
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