The Age of Incompetence Chapter XXVII

Obama: the brains of a professor and the courage of a mouse

December 27, 2009

PLZEN It's the end of a dreary, ugly year, a year that began with hope. A few days ago on BBC radio I head the following, "Now the health care bill the U.S. Senate passed will have to go to the U.S. House of Representatives for reconciliation with the more radical version of the health bill."

Those few words sum up perfectly where we are in the world in the waning hours of 2009: a bill that saves lives and brings about a measure of social justice to millions of people is considered, by the British no less, as radical while a bill cobbled together by a bunch of senators who lobby to protect the insurance companies are considered normal.

Several weeks ago I wrote about how despite all the electronic wonders we live with today we are still surrounded by evidence of living in a medieval age. Medieval life was dominated by power from above by the few, such as by the church and by kings. The rule of law that we think democracy is built around was something still utopian by the masses. Survival was the main concern of the masses.

Today we see the survival mentality creeping back, especially in America and the idea of justice, law, and democracy ever shrinking. Democracy under George W. Bush and the rule of law took a near fatal blow to the groin. And some say it's not clear yet it didn't take a fatal blow. Barrack Obama was supposed to have changed all that.

To me there is but one story in 2009: the unbelievable flop and disappointment of Barrack Obama. I have read countless explanations for it on the internet and a few in the mainstream press - the mainstream press hasn't come to grips with it yet because like every other critical event that effects ordinary Americans, the mainstream pretends it doesn't exist until it can no longer pretend.

I confess I have no explanation for it yet. I have only a theory. And my theory is that the

President Obama
man simply hasn't any courage. He has the intellect of a professor and the courage of a mouse.

I still troll the internet to see if I can find out what ordinary American are thinking. Here are a couple I found about the Obama collapse. "I'm beginning to wonder if the problem is someone has scandalous information about Obama. He makes no sense." - Unknown blogger to HuffingtonPost.

"Unfortunately, as some wrote before, I feel the same way when Obama appears on TV... I change channels... I cannot stand to hear or see him. I feel he has failed the people's trust, but very specially, his wishy washy position on health care I find the most offensive." - Unknown blogger to Huffington Post.

These two comments from Americans are clues about what the American public is feeling about Obama.

I think the most telling and dangerous comment of the above is the last comment about the American who is simply tuning Obama out, much as millions of Americans simply tuned George W. Bush out.

The health care bill quite simply is a fraud. All the things it was supposed to do, it doesn't do. It doesn't bring health care to all Americans, there will still be from 15 to 20 million Americans without health care, and it does not restrain the cost of health care. It is a thinly disguised bill to enrich the insurance companies. It is as grotesque as the bail out of the corrupt banking system. And no amount of lies or propaganda can change that reality.

What would we think today if President Lincoln in announcing the Emancipation Proclamation has said this abolishes slavery but only in the state of North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, and Florida. The rest can wait. It would seem so absurd as to be unthinkable.

Yet some people find it perfectly normal today that we are going to tell from 15 to 20 million American, you can wait. We're leaving you behind. And if some of you die, we're sorry about it, but the status quo must be preserved. It is considered readical when we say no American will be left behind.

None of that seems to phase Obama. He can stand up and with a straight face, just as he did after the gigantic failure on the environment in Copenhagen, say black is white and white is black. After the Senate passed a health bill Obama called it the most significant bill to pass since the depression.

What an absurdity. But that is where America is today: it has become an absurdity. It has become so toxic that it is grotesque. It reminds me of some Greek history that I read long ago in Edith Hamilton's brilliant book, The Greek Way. It was about the war between Athens and Sparta, known as the Peloponnesian War. (I know before I write this that for the average reader something which happened in history over 2,500 years ago induces boredom and yawning.)

Mighty Athens was the king of the seas and Sparta had the world's best army. Athenians were lovers of art and democracy and Sparta was steeled to be men of the sword and bow. Toward the end of the war Athens sent out her fleet to a small island of no import, Melos, but by then the Athenians had lost sight of either honor or justice. The fact the Melinians wished to be neutral was an affront.

In her brilliant style Hamilton wrote: The Melinians were impractical and they fought. They were conquered with little trouble to Athens. She put the men to death and made slaves of the women and children. She had reached a point where she did not care to use fine words about ugly facts, and the

reason was that they had ceased to look ugly to her. Vices by then, Thucydides says, were esteemed as virtues. The very meaning of words changed: deceit was praised as shrewdness, recklessness held to be courage, loyalty, moderation, generosity, scorned as proofs of weakness....Athens was conquered in 404 by Sparta.

That is where America is today: The very meaning of words has changed: deceit is praised as shrewdness, recklessness held to be courage, loyalty, moderation, generosity, scorned as proofs of weakness..."

We are quite willing to consign 15 or 20 million Americans to the sword and call it something else. Ugly facts have ceased to be ugly. And the nation's chief speech maker can stand before us and tell us that the senate health bill is the most important bill since 1930!

Hamilton concluded about Athens, "Athenian art and thought survived the test of time. Athenian democracy became imperial and failed. So it is with America. We have become imperial. We invade small countries based upon lies, just as Athens invaded Melos, and deceit is praised as shrewdness.

The U.S. Senate is a perfect example, it is filled with what Hunter Thompson once called "men with the minds of king rats and souls of dung beetles." They scurry about and do the bidding of their paymasters, the oligarchs who run the insurance companies and banks. Yet it was these very creatures that Obama turned the fate of millions of Americans over to. This was beyond the grotesque; when a man goes public in showing his lack of courage and decency one feels a sense of shame beyond words. But Obama feels no shame. He too takes his marching orders from the paymasters at banks and insurance companies.

Thus as we sail into the new year there is a sense of dread.