A few months ago I finished reading Miguel De Cervantes' amazing work, Don Quixote. The novel is 940 pages long, and it introduces to the reader 669 characters. It took me about four weeks to read it.I did not read Cervantes' masterwork, arguably the first of all novels, because I had to. I did not read it because failure to do so would result in disaster. I did not read it because it claimed to contain all manner of remedy and solution. I did not read it because it promised to stave off some inevitable slide into depression, sorrow, or destitution. I read it simply because of desire: I had read a condensed version in college with the expressed aim of reading it in its entirety at some later date. That date has now come and gone.
Barack Obama is about to sign into law an emergency bill full of all kinds of promises; the bill is over a thousand pages long and promises to help in this time of economic recession. At the very least, or so it goes, if the bill does not turn the American economy around, it promises to ease all Americans' pain. It may not stop the recession -- the mother of all recessions, allegedly -- but it will ensure that the recession will be "less bad," less deep, less painful.
Mr. Obama has told everyone in America that unless the bill is passed, all hell MAY break loose, a hell so vile, so vulgar, we may never escape from it. This, in a real sense, is allegedly the Al Qaida of all recessions: We must act boldly and swiftly, without wavering, to preempt a disaster that may -- or may not -- come! Mr. Obama stands upon the trash heap of the American economy, shouting to the world through a megaphone.
The solution to our great worries is a "vital" bill over 1,000 pages long. This bill is so DESPERATELY needed for our DESPERATE times, that every person who voted in favor of it, and the person who will sign it into law, has not bothered to read it. In fact, there are no reports coming from the White House that Mr. Obama is holed up in his study poring over his first legislative masterpiece. No one has even announced that Mr. Obama -- or anyone else! -- has simpy read this massive, cumbersome and unwieldly tome. No one has even hinted that tomorrow, or Tuesday, Mr. Obama will probably come out with a revised and edited bill, one that conforms not only to his image of excellence in literature, but also one that has been analyzed to see if the work meets its objectives. And Mr. Obama's preface to his novel bill -- there really has never anything like it before -- has been at times petulantly and amateurishly presented; yet he boasts without knowing the contents of his own work that something -- apparently anything -- is better than nothing.
Welcome to the new politics, far more vapid than the old. Nihilism seems more attractively informing and engaging than this cynical approach to stimulate economic recovery.
And cynical is the apt word for what is going on. Mr. Obama is just cynical enough to have his minions denounce critics with the apparently incisive retort that "no one ever reads appropriations bills." He is just cynical enough to publicly and unabashedly proclaim that doing anything is better than doing nothing. He is just cynical enough to confidently swagger toward the podium and suggest that Americans don't mind enslaving themselves to his massive debt for generations -- in the land of the free. He is just cynical enough to tell Americans -- except for his own cabinet appointees -- that we all must show our patriotism by "giving back," by sacrificing through hard work and persistence the monies earned fairly and honestly. He is just cynical enough to earmark billions of dollars to many of his campaign's largest donors. He is just cynical enough to believe you don't really care.
Indeed, it may be true that no one reads appropriations bills, which is a shame. But this is no ordinary appropriations bill: this is nearly a trillion dollars in EMERGENCY outlays. This is SUPPOSED to work. But who believes Barack Obama when his own party has not read its own answer to his warnings? Attentive Americans respect in an instant those who voted against the bill BECAUSE they have not read it; Republicans who stonewalled did so largely because the NEW and IMPROVED president and his minions did not provide enough copies of the bill or even enough time to read it before putting it to a vote. (Apparently, it is historically [in a recent sense] the case that bills of this magnitude are presented in digital format so analysts can search for key words to expedite the analytical and editing process. Not with this bill, which came over the transom in print form. Moreover, the Obama administration promised all bills would be posted for five days on the White House website so the public could comment. But not this bill. Such actions and inactions prove how cynical and grotesque this new government actually is.)
The reality is that you've been deceived. Barack Obama is both a liar and a mere Yes Man. He has not read his own work; he has no idea what he is actually signing. Yet he tells us we live in desperate times and thus must act responsibly. His very actions speak against his own alarmism and moral convictions. And since he has not read his bill but will sign it anyway, we know he does not care that he puts his name to the work of ghostwriters. He is merely saying Yes to those who are REALLY leading him. He's not in charge. He's merely the front man. How else to explain his shameless signature on a bill he has not read -- or drafted -- that claims will heal all woes? This is supposed to be HIS bill, his legislative success. How can that be when he can't take the time† to read a manuscript presented in his name?
It is hard to believe that this man won an election. Any election.
Peace through dissent.
©2009/Bill Gnade. All Rights Reserved.
†Even if Mr. Obama reads the entire bill, his signature explicitly endorses the entirety of the bill. Can you imagine that this alleged master politician and this alleged master of language would read this bill and not hold it for further editing, emending and review? Yes, it is easy to imagine because this is not about his actual leadership. Clearly, he is not his own. Welcome to the "new."
