Obama’s Annus Horribilis.
- “Obama proved himself to be an arbitrary person who happened to lead the United States.”
- “Obama, like a bad tenant, is trying to ruin everything in the apartment he no longer rents.”
- “Obama’s goal was simply to create new problems for President-elect Donald Trump —more obstacles in building better relations with Russia.”
- “The whole world, from stalls to the gallery, had been watching the crashing blow to the prestige of America and to its leadership, caused by Barak Obama and his illiterate foreign policy team that opened to the world her biggest secret — exclusiveness was a mask for helplessness. And no enemy of the United States could have done worse damage.”
- You are only allowed to read this out loud if you do it in a good Liam Neeson voice. For those of you from Florida, this is a Ballymena accent.
- David Brooks, the PBS/NYT house conservative, accused Trump today of consorting with foreign governments against a sitting president. Does he really want people looking at Obama’s relationship with Valerie Jarrett (Iranophile) and Huma’s background with the Muslim Brotherhood to be scrutinized? I guess he doesn’t have much to work with so this is the best he can do.
- The unaccountable, metastasizing federal bureaucracy.
- The nerve of the man! Zumwalt suggests we think logically about Obama allegedly allowing the Russians to hack the DNC on his watch.
- He makes exiting first family Clintons look classy. All the Bush’s had to do was replace the furniture and silverware.
The Gift of 2016
The ghosts of Hearst and Pulitzer must be banging their heads against the spectral bars of their infernal cages at the terminal stupidity of their modern counterparts. Assuming they get 24/7 CNN in hell. Which is a fair assumption, since no greater torture could be imagined. Anyone delayed in Atlanta Airport can attest to this.
Why did they do it, these modern geniuses of mass media? What depths of despair brought about this mistake, this irreversible move into checkmate, this fatal kick of an own goal, this “Wrong Way Corrigan”? Can so many people be so foolish all at the same time? Or, at the first leap of a demonized Gadarene sow over the cliff could they see no other destiny but to follow to their demise?
2016 has brought the world many marvelous gifts, from the delation and hoped for banishment of the Clinton Cartel, to the exposure of Obama as a puppet, to the rise of Trump (whatever is in that mysterious gift), to the hopeful signs for the benighted people of Syria. It has truly been an annus mirabilis, for many, but certainly not for all. Fortune passes everywhere.
But perhaps the greatest gift was this: fake news. Not the news itself, but the concept. Of course, cranky old buggers throughout all history have regarded “news” with a jaundiced eye. Most religions are a species of the conspiracy theory. For religion, there is what is going on in the world, illusion and falsehood, and what goes on in their version of heaven, reality and truth. That the king tells lies is an idea as old as history itself. That history is written by the victors is no surprise to anyone who has thought about it for a moment.
They, the media, were not content to let it be, however. Here was their unforced error. By uttering the term, “fake news” the mass media in the western world and the governments that run them brought down the temple on themselves. It was horrible to see. Even that old cynic, Pontius Pilate, declined to make a statement, but merely asked the provocative question, “what is truth”? The modern media, on the other hand, in their fanaticism and subsequent lack of moderation, dared to look directly at the camera. And wink. The spell was broken. Suspension of disbelief dissipated. If some news is fake news how will we tell what is true news? Who has it? Do they protest too much? Even the crooked polls cannot mask the destruction of credibility that has occurred. Even the most purblind consumer of infotainment is now on sullen guard against being hoodwinked. False certainty is forever lost. Fact checking, like fortune, passes everywhere. The world has changed. We are now forced to “pay attention to the man behind the curtain,” whether we like it or not. [Anonymous]