I think we need to cut Senator Obama some slack.
After all, for the past seven years our nation has been led by a gifted, silver-tongued orator of unparalleled abilities. President Bush has combined a gift for eloquent rhetoric capable of soaring high above pedantic realities with a folksy, approachable, down-to-earth charm. I mean, even after all this time, whenever I hear the man speak I think, "Gosh, I'd like to have a beer with him."
The voters have gotten spoiled. We've just grown unrealistically accustomed to a chief executive able to grapple with immensely complicated subjects and deftly deflate them to sound-bite length talking points. We've been so blessed to have a President who can just dispense with the kind of confusing, obfuscative nuance that makes it hard to know when we're being pandered to or demonized for political gain. He reassures us that he's sustained by his faith, without boring us with details about just what it is he believes. He never has to defend his pastor, because he doesn't go to church. He doesn't get bogged down in wonky grammar, wasting energy making sure of his verb agreement; no, that kind of intellectual elitism sends the wrong message and emboldens the terrorists. Bush knows that his job is to tell us whom to fear today.
And so Americans, naturally, are a bit bewildered by the spectacle of a politician offering up single sentences containing as many as 73 words. (Yes, I counted.) What to make of a presidential candidate who gives a lengthy address on divisive issues during which he never once utters either the word "Republican" or "Democrat"? I mean, how are we even supposed to know where this man stands?
Yes, we've been lucky to have George W. Bush as our president. Who knows how the primaries and the general election will turn out? We may just have to resign ourselves to the prospect of being led by a circumspect, diplomatic legal scholar, one who doesn't even own a ranch.
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7 comments:
Are you sitting down, Andy? Good. Now, hold onto your chair. Having read some of his pastor's remarks, I'm starting to like Obama. (Admittedly, I like his pastor more; he, at least, has the guts to say what he believes without covering his ass in namby-pamby double-talk.)
Actually, no, I'm lying in bed with my laptop looking at websites I probably shouldn't.
What disappoints me about Mr. Obama is that while he finds the concept of separate but equal repugnant when it comes to education, but he thinks that is the right answer when it comes to gay marriage. I guess the back of the bus is good enough for homos like me.
Excellent. I have linked this on my blog. Won't you be so happy when we never again have to listen to the voice of GW Bush and instead get to listen to this? Ah, sweet.
Thanks, anonymous. You've just opened up the secret chamber of my mind wherein lies the reason for my hatred of every last one of the presidential candidates: They're not REALLY proponents of equality; regardless of the fact that I have no desire to get married to another man, they would prevent me from doing so, thereby treating me as a second-class citizen. They are traitors all, and they should die!
I sense some sarcasm in this post.
Wait, Obama doesn't own a ranch? Does that mean he doesn't clear brush? I better take the sign out of my yard.
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