Reverend Obama, redux

You need additional evidence of BO's PC-conservativism? Barack praised Reagan while in the sticks Reno a few days ago, while again dissing the Clinton administration: "I think Ronald Reagan changed the trajectory of America in a way that Richard Nixon did not and in a way that Bill Clinton did not. He put us on a fundamentally different path because the country was ready for it. They felt like with all the excesses of the 60s and the 70s and government had grown and grown but there wasn't much sense of accountability in terms of how it was operating. I think he tapped into what people were already feeling. Which is we want clarity, we want optimism, we want a return to that sense of dynamism and entrepreneurship that had been missing."


Yes, Rev. Obama, he put us on a fundamentally different path: a fundamentalist path, a path which we still stumble upon. Rather improper comments, and the criticism from Edwards and Clinton seems quite appropriate, even if one does not agree to the Edwards' agenda in full. Reaganomics was not exactly a concept to be admired either--even from a moderate perspective. Who can forget corporate welfare, the S & L crisis, the bloated deficit, boomtowns for the wealthy and powerful, environmental disasters, and the rise of a theocratic "moral majority." The "sense of dynamism and entrepreneurship" doesn't quite do Reaganomics justice.

Reagan was arguably even less capable a politician and person than was Nixon (Christopher Hitchens, having met RR, called him a "senile lizard" or something). Anyone recall James Watt or Edwin Meese? After getting his mandate from the American zombies people, Reagan (or perhaps Reagan's bosses) awarded administrative jobs to various mafiosi and shady financiers, the effects of which are still to be felt (check the reports of Dan Moldea for Reagan's hidden connection to the NFL and professional gambling). As Dylan once said, "it doesn't take a weathervane to tell which way the wind blows": Reagan's celebration of Sinatra and Co. indicated fairly clearly the relationship between American politics, celebrity power, and organized crime, for lack of a better word. Obama taps into that power.

Obama's praise for Reagan should be counted as a rather significant faux-pas, but the spineless cretins who now make up the DNCocrats will probably let it slide. Obama's political strategy indeed bears a certain resemblance to Reagan's, even in terms of the "insider-ness"; as with most of the good ol' boys in the GOP, Obama too covets the position of American Mob Boss. The Obama posse might consider spinning Sinatra, say, doing "Chi-caw-go, my kind of town," at the DemCon in honor of the Reagan-Sinatra heritage.