There’s method to his madness
We’re embarrassed to admit that it took us a long time to figure out what Obama was doing when he spoke gibberish and nonsense in selling Obamacare (here and here, for example). His reasoning made no sense at all, and his numbers didn’t come close to adding up. Sigh. We were missing the point.
If you read Obama’s various texts on healthcare, the point isn’t numbers or logic or reasoning at all. Rather, Obama repeats phrases that are evidently poll-tested (“promotes choice,” “cuts waste,” “build on common ground,” etc.) whether or not the phrases have any relationship to the reality of the situation. There is no necessary or important relationship between rhetoric and truth when it comes to Obama achieving his policy objectives.
Apparently the idea is that the American people aren’t accountants, and maybe aren’t too bright. They can’t understand numbers, and they prefer high sentiments and unifying rhetoric to understanding the minutiae of a bill in Congress. What Obama may have forgotten is that, when it comes to paying their own bills — particularly in these difficult times — many Americans are closer to being accountants than poets. If the awful healthcare bill fails, that may well be the reason.
Are we wrong?
August 6th, 2009 at 10:10 pm
you are indeed wrong. The average person won’t do the math, they’ll just slobber up the propaganda like they did all through the election campaign circus.
And that extends to congress, which passes any Obamabill without even bothering to read it. They’re just rubberstamping whatever their Messiah dictates, have lost their real function as a controlling branch.
The average person is so stupid that they can’t understand (or can’t be bothered to understand) the implications of anything decided in Washington and now, with their Messiah and Prophet in power, they won’t see the need to protest either.
If (nay, when) things go wrong, they’ll just as rapidly accept the statements that blame the failure on the opposition of “rightwing extremists” and “Jewish saboteurs”, on the attempts by “Big Industry” and “capitalist pigs” to derail the march to progress.
It worked for 70 years in the USSR, works even today in Venezuela and Cuba, and is working in the US on an unprecedented scale.
August 7th, 2009 at 3:12 am
JT Wenting has it right insofar as his comment goes, but I would say the blame has to be shared equally between the Congress and the media. If newspapers, news magazines and the TV talking heads were doing due diligence, we would have avoided what we’re faced with now — even if the Congress were as compliant and complicit as it is right now. I believe (perhaps I should say “I hope”) someday journalism schools will teach this period of time as a case study in the press abdicating its responsibility. F
August 7th, 2009 at 4:06 am
I think you are spot on. People are starting to figure out that it’s not what he says, but what he does… His speeches are conspicuously absent of any hard facts. The fact is that he doesn’t have the facts to validate his ‘facts’. He is the embodiment of the fictional emperor without clothes, except he’s in on the scam.
I did the same thing with the Porkulus bill. I kept evaluating Congress and the White House’s decisions based on logic. It isn’t logical — unless you want to destroy the economy. The DNC’s agenda is power. Period. They’ll stop at nothing until they are in control of every aspect of our lives.
Man cannot be regenerated by the State. Salvation is by faith alone, in Christ Jesus alone.
August 7th, 2009 at 6:55 am
–”“I hope”) someday journalism schools will teach this period of time as a case study in the press abdicating its responsibility.”–
Not likely, considering who taught the current crop and who will still be brainwashing the next, but, I share your hope.
You are certainly right about who bares the blame, but it is our country and we deserve what we settle for. I’m encouraged by the current vocal dissent growing across the country. Especially, due to the spontaneous nature of it, which many in power simply can’t accept, at their peril. I see the possibility of it weakening if the economy improves, which it always does, no matter how wrong-headed the policy in Washington. Americans underestimate their own power and overstate that of the government in our complex economy.
I suspect the next election may demonstrate something very surprising: Americans can be fickle, but when their freedom is at stake they will demonstrate what makes them different from most other nations of people. This latest attempt at the inevitable failure that is socialism will die early and hard. That is my real hope.
August 7th, 2009 at 2:41 pm
http://pajamasmedia.com/blog/obama-impervious-to-empirical-evidence/