THE MYTHOLOGY OF HOPE AND CHANGE

With another year rapidly coming to a close, thoughts naturally turn to a review of developments of the past year having the potential to affect our Republic in significant ways.

Of all the occurrences of 2013, none was so sudden and with such immediate repercussions as President Barack Hussein Obama's rapid fall from public approval.

 It seems such a long time ago, but it was just early 2009, when a dynamic young president took office and enjoyed widespread support. Americans wished the new president well and hoped that he would be able to unite a country, which overwhelmingly favored racial solidarity and harmony.  Fast-forwarding to 2013, we find that such hope has been dashed, while change has gone in a direction inimical to the expectations of most Americans.

Those who now prevail in the Obama administration are an odd mix of leftists and individuals whose experience has tended to be in the realm of the theoretical rather than the practical.  The Obamaites excel  at communicating via drawing boards and ephemeral schemes, but few, if any, have ever had to meet hard and fast deadlines in the private sector. The consequence of this deficiency is the crowning failure of the Affordable Care Act which, if not repealed or significantly revised, will have negative results for years to come.

Those presidents who have succeeded admirably in the role of chief executive have been individuals noted for their ability to persuade. The presidency is not a royal institution from which one merely throws out commands in expectation that things will be accomplished and projects will be implemented.  Instead, the presidency demands hard bargaining skills, an ability to compromise and a strong aptitude for swaying diverse elements. None of this would appear to be in the skills-set brought to the office of the presidency by President Obama. And this should not be terribly surprising.  Such facility would not come naturally for one whose experience was limited to a few years as a community organizer and a short stint as a legislator.  The pitfall of such inexperience is a naive belief that the office is such that unlimited power awaits the one who occupies the oval office.

Seemingly, an awakening to the reality of the presidency has occurred for the president, but rather than own up to failure and engage in good faith efforts to remedy shortcomings, we are overwhelmed by excuses and rationalizations and are subject to diversions that invariably touch on race and equality.  To outrageously throw out such drivel to the media says more about the bigotry of sham presidential rhetoric than about the prejudices of a society.

For those who know something of the world, it is a sine qua non to affirm that the U.S. is the most equitable and least racist nation on earth.  Could it be imagined that the United Kingdom would ever be led by a Prime Minister of African origins with the most un-British surname name of Obama?  Could there ever be a French president whose parentage was in Algeria and was known as Ben-Bella?   With a large minority of Turks, could there ever be an Erdogan serving as a German chancellor?    A great big "NO" will suffice to answer these questions.  And with the answer being so evidently obvious, the lie is exposed of the bogus efforts to reform a supposedly racist and inegalitarian  America.  Sadly, many of us have been duped by a presidency that prefers the counterfeit to the genuine.

Lately, a "respected journalist"  of some 60 years of experience has admitted to expecting President Obama to be a "messiah."  Talk about astounding, that someone who has covered the ends and outs of Washington for 6 decades was expecting to turn up a messiah in a gaggle of politicians simply boggles the mind! Even individuals of limited intelligence know full well not expect to find a messiah in the District of Columbia, much less in the morass of Chicago politics.  But there you are, and here we are with a decided lack of political sophistication in 21st century America.

Trust is a commodity in short supply these days.  It is ordinarily assumed that trust is a condition that allows certain individuals to express the general will by acting in such a way as to benefit others.  It is something that we in America have expect of our presidents.  But, after 5 years in office, President Obama has forfeited the assumption of trust from his countrymen.  On multiple fronts, trust has been broken.  Besides Obamacare, a catalog of presidential trust-busters and prevarications must include Benghazi, the IRS, Fast and Furious and a disastrous Middle Eastern policy.  All in all, the legacy of this president is scandalous.

President Bill Clinton was certainly known for breaching trust through his scandalous sexual behavior.  However, that was a type of personal scandal, somewhat different from the Obama scandals which have directly and negatively affected Americans.  While Americans were able to forgive Clinton his many and varied personal scandals, it is likely that the Obama scandals will work against trust ever again being restored between Americans and the 44th president.  And this, rightly so, should be President Obama's legacy.

And, finally, back to hope and change.  To be sure, there has been much change, but negative change in terms of traditional American freedoms and liberties.  As for hope, hope may be seen in the strong possibility that now exists that Americans will, through their ballots in 2014, turn back the tide of left-wing failure and deceit.  If the House is purged of more Democrats and if the Senate is returned to sane leadership, those of us who believe that America is an exceptional nation that must be nurtured and preserved will be vindicated. It is time that we should begin resolving to accomplish this all-important task in the New Year.

Deo Vindice!

God bless Texas and may the Lone Star State remain forever red!