Chapter 4

Welcome To Jonestown

The Record Of President Obama

It is difficult to objectively speak about President Obama's record in large part because Obama and his inner circle have no capacity for objectivity. If every criticism, no matter how minor or how gentle or how legitimate is met with a counter charge of racism, civil discourse will not flourish.

Let's put the ACA, Dodd-Frank, the merits and demerits of deficits, Middle East Policy--all the left brain stuff—let's just put it aside for now. President Obama's most sensational achievement, for lack of a better term, is his elimination of civil discourse. We might take it a step further and say that Barack Obama destroyed civility.

Barack Obama is the most divisive figure in then history of America. It has nothing to do with race and everything to do with playing the race card, a personal attack on the accused.

How would you objectively assess Sarah Palin's record as governor of Alaska? It is a conversation we cannot and will not conduct. You see her as an object of hate and ridicule deserving of all vocal heretics. I see her as a victim of religious bigotry.

The ghost of Saul Alinsky hovers above us as a toxic cloud. The loyalists in the media have protected Obama to the degree that we don't know much about his philosophical influences except for Saul Alinsky and a mysterious man named Frank. Let's put Mr. Davis aside briefly and discuss Alinsky.

Saul Alinsky is one of those retched figures whose appeal will always mystify me. He advocated personal attacks over civil discourse as a means of influence. For whatever reason, Barack Obama took Saul Alinsky's methods to heart. For Barack Obama, it is all personal, all the time. There is no exchange of ideas.

What was the undefined change, Barack Obama promised America? It turned out to be unbridled hate, bigotry and intolerance for dissent. Change really has come to America. Change tens of millions of people can believe in.

Barack Obama worked hard to develop a cult of personality, a cult of worship. Part and parcel to his deification is the implicit—and at times explicit—notion that all who oppose Barack Obama are evil. Mysticism is unifying. Reason is divisive. There will be no exchange of ideas unless otherwise specified.

The Tea Party is an informal political movement that originally concerned itself with government overreach and fiscal responsibility. It sprang up after CNBC correspondent Rick Santelli launched into a spontaneous rant about his objection to bailing out reckless borrowers.

There was nothing anti-Obama in the origins of the Tea Party. Most of the early protestors probably expected a warm reception from the new administration. Wouldn't a community organizer be sympathetic to the plight of oppressed peasants? One would think.

The Tea Party would be met with surprising hostility. Obama's media thugs would do their darnedest to assassinate the character of the movement. There was the repeated insinuation of racism. A lot of, “not everyone in the Tea Party is racist but...” Ultimately the press would settle on “extremist” as the slur of choice.

What is key—and this goes to the heart of what has changed in America—is not the specific ideas the Tea Party advanced that threatened Barack Obama. Originally, there was a hodge podge of disparate resentment being expressed. It was the idea of the idea that threatened Obama. The concept of idea. The premise of idea. There would be no rational discourse. Change had come to America.

Contrast this reaction to Obama's embracing of the obviously AstroTurf Occupy Movement. YouTube offers hours and hours of woefully inarticulate interviews with Occupants who simply cannot express what they were protesting. It was a theater of fuzzy resentment performed by political puppets with trust funds. Intellectually, the movement never rose to the level of an idea. Reason is divisive. Barack Obama voiced his support for these protestors.

We would witness Barack Obama reject discourse whenever there were budget stalemates. Rather than jumping into the fray, the president would take his show on the road. He would conduct pep rallies where he would insult Congress and generally misstate Republican positions.

This was puzzling behavior to many of us. The captain of the ship abandoning the helm and screaming at the crew with a bullhorn from a lifeboat. Those of us who thought we had seen it all were deplorably amazed. This guy will do anything to avoid the exchange of ideas (and anything to bask in the adoration of a crowd.)

There has been a lot of speculation about the ideology of our international man of mystery. Frank Marshall Davis was a card carrying Communist and young Barry, as he called himself, spewed Marxism as a student at Occidental. He has been called a socialist but his indentation is more suggestive of fascism, which is to say, socialism with loopholes. But the ism that best defines Barack Obama is authoritarianism.

The authoritarian manner in which President Obama pushed his agenda will forever eclipse his legacy. Good or bad, the Obama agenda has never been a mandate from the voters. The administration preferred to use executive order or bureaucratic fiat or the courts to impose its will. Even when the Democrats controlled both Houses of Congress, they operated in secrecy. One of the most enduring quotes of the Obama era is Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi's instructions about the Affordable Care Act. “We have to pass the bill to find out what's in it.”

That is not how the system is supposed to work. Something I did not know until well into adulthood is that our Congressmen do not usually read the bills they pass. A 2,700 page bill that was voted on roughly two days after its final draft took shape was probably not read by a single legislator. It's not even certain who wrote the gargantuan document, although a few wonks have come out of the shadows to claim their input.

It is unlikely the president read this leviathan prior to signing it into law. To make matters more confusing, the bill was written with provisions to allow the Secretary of Health and Human Services to modify the law. The cherry on top was the president himself using unilateral power to delay implementation and to grant waivers as he saw fit. The ACA did not provide funds for one more doctor, nurse, hospital or medical school but it did call for additional IRS agents to collect all the new taxes and fees.

Every bit as Byzantine is the 3,000 page Dodd-Frank bill that was passed in the guise of financial reform. Its impact has yet to be fully felt. It may or may not improve our economy but it will certainly increase the power of political appointees.

The defining characteristic, the trademark of the Obama Administration is the near doubling of our national debt. I hold the strong conviction that debt does indeed matter. If it does not matter, why should anyone ever be required to pay a penny of taxation? We all know the answer to that question. Debt matters greatly!

I admit my bias as a fiscal conservative. Having stated that, I also hold the belief that “stimulus funds” are not all of the same merit. Some spending is simply more prudent than other spending.

The most depressing aspect of reckless spending is that we have nothing to show for it. At over $7 trillion, we could have repaired every bridge and roadway and everything else that was said to be crumbling when Bush was in office but is not often mentioned with Obama in office. We could have the world's best passenger rail system. We could have colonies on the Moon. At $200,000 per home (slightly higher than the median price) we could have built 35, 000,000 houses. Full employment, no more homeless shelters, no more homeless people, real estate surplus.

So what do we have to show for our $7 trillion debt (the actual expenditures exceeded $20 trillion)? Nothing. Nothing. Nothing.

The administration has probably raised tax rates beyond the optimum rate of return. Should we decrease corporate and individual tax rates, we would probably have more government revenue, not less. Nonetheless, the Obama Administration will never advocate for a decreased tax burden. They lust at every prospect to punish successful people.

The good news about the economy is that America is undergoing an energy renaissance. Hydraulic fracturing is producing an abundance, possibly even a surfeit, of oil and natural gas. The bad news is that the Obama Administration has been openly hostile to fossil fuel production. The degree of resistance with which the Obama Administration opposes oil, coal and natural gas will largely determine the prognosis for America's economic revival.

On foreign policy President Obama often appears dwarfed by circumstance. He reminds one of a college sophomore who returns for Thanksgiving to pronounce old friends, family and everyone in his hometown hopelessly unenlightened. Suddenly, the college sophomore is thrust upon the world stage, advising Israel on the location of their borders, drawing a red line in Syria, leading from behind in Libya, making tsk tsk sounds at the Kremlin, offering encouragement to the Muslim Brotherhood, writing off ISIS as a JV team, calling ISIS, “ISIL”, and upgrading them to varsity status, candidly admitting that we have no strategy for dealing with ISIS and ultimately...he looks like a college sophomore thrust upon the world stage.

We cannot summarize the Obama years without commenting on the Zeitgeist. Barack Obama is a cult leader. He asks and receives unending loyalty from his minions. The citizens of his country who are not blindly faithful are treated as infidels. They are treated with scorn and ridicule, hostility and intimidation. We have witnessed IRS intimidation, DOJ intimidation, fraudulent warrants used to silence reporters, and domestic spying on a scale Stasi could only dream of.

Barack Obama makes every political discussion personal. In so doing, he has spread rancor far and wide. He has split families and ruined friendships. Barack Obama has defiled the spirit of America. It could take a long time for that to be restored.

The Personality Of Barack Hussein Obama

Grandeur:

Barack Hussein Obama is an exotic personality. We tend to think of successful people as having large scale personalities and that is often the case. That is, they are much like us but their drives are stronger, their endurance greater, their will power unwavering. In the words of Scrooge McDuck, they think a little faster and jump a little quicker.

Barack Obama's personality is a radical departure from that template. If there is but one word to define our forty fourth president, that word would be grandiose. A man who cultivates his own deification is a dangerous man.

Let us just skip the self-comparisons to Mandela and Gandhi and self-rating his administration no worse than fourth ('with the possible exception of Lincoln, FDR, LBJ) on foreign policy and legislative achievements. And let us just ignore the underachieving lawyer who held the lofty position of community organizer writing an autobiography (the material discrepancies are addressed elsewhere) and let us forget that Candidate Obama readily played the role of the embodiment of “Hope” and adopted the word as an uncopyrighted logo.

John Kennedy and Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton all liked to be the center of attention. They loved the spotlight but at no time did they promote worship of themselves. No halos or fainting damsels for these men. Had their handlers tried to elevate to objects of worship, the aforementioned would have rejected it. Efforts to encourage religious devotion would probably embarrass them as it would most normal personalities, even personalities who seek attention.

The deliberate promotion of self-deification separates Barack Obama from every other puppet as well as most public figures. The president's personality is similar to that of a religious cult leader such as Jim Jones or David Koresh. If that assessment seems too harsh, ask yourself this: Dating back to the age of Constantine, what Western Civilization public figure would request that references to Christ be shrouded prior to his arrival? Can you name even one?

That is exactly what Barack Obama did in April 2009 at Georgetown University in Washington, DC. “IHS” the ancient symbol for Jesus was covered, prior to the new president's arrival. Sadly, the faux Catholics at Georgetown complied with the White House's request.

At the time many of us saw this as the president's first gaffe. In retrospect, the obliteration was no blunder, it was much more sinister than that. It was part of Barack Obama's ongoing effort to cultivate his worship. There was only room for one deity on stage and we know who that happened to be. His followers shall have no gods before him.

Incidentally, the news media only reported this story after it was volleyed around the blogosphere and radio host, Michael Savage reported on it. Reluctantly, a few members of the Fourth Estate stuck their toes in the water and offered some lame excuses for their preferred deity.

Barack Obama profoundly believes that his very essence is more significant than his actions. Sadly, he sold this belief to his followers. June 3, 2008 following an Obama victory in the Democratic primaries: “ this was the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and our planet began to heal.” Barack said it. They believe it. That settles it.

Barack Obama, as well as his followers, believes that his presence in the White House would somehow improve America's standing in the world. Obama believes he projects irresistible charm and of course the Arabs, the Russians, the Iranians and the Chinese would all revel in his unending brilliance.

Barack Obama believes that actions similar to those taken by his predecessor might yield vastly different results. George W. Bush spent money recklessly. (“Two wars on a credit card” repeated ad nauseum). Obama sincerely believes that he is metaphysically different from Bush and other mortals as well. Obama's profligacy would yield prosperity and balance budgets. Most of America bought this perspective as well.

Clinically speaking, I don't think this guy has all of his oars in the water.

Malignant Narcissism

Let me state that I am reluctant to pin clinical diagnoses on other people. Having worked in the mental health field, I can tell you that clinical diagnoses can be judgmental, imprecise and at times downright fictitious. I have seen psychiatric evaluations performed on the same patient by different evaluators in a short time frame yield vastly different conclusions. I have seen clinicians who fixate on a single diagnosis and assign that diagnosis to just about everyone they meet (This is especially true of clinicians who have undergone drug or alcohol treatment and thereafter see most of humanity as addicts and alcoholics in various states of denial). I have seen patients rubber-stamped with anxiety or depression to expedite the process and allow the writer to sooner punch the clock.

Clinical terms are often trendy. OCD, ADD, or bipolar disorder is featured in the news and the ailment de jour arrives in clusters. For better or worse, the hottest, trendiest diagnosis is narcissism. It was featured on “Dr. Phil” and “Coast to Coast” radio, a show that usually deals with UFO's and Sasquatch sightings. I personally know a clinician who pins the “N” word on every patient who is anti-social. It's the fashion, man. Get with it.

So I am hesitant to apply clinical terms to others and I am especially hesitant to label anyone a narcissist. With those disclaimers out of the way, let me state unequivocally that Barack Hussein Obama is a textbook narcissist. This is not my diagnosis. I am citing Samuel Vaknin on this matter. Vaknin is not a mental health professional but he is a self-professed narcissist. He is one of the most prolific writers on the subject and he was way ahead of the curve in identifying this disorder. As one who spends forty hours a week with mental health professionals, I trust Vaknin's analysis more than I respect the opinions of degreed people.

Vaknin identifies seven characteristics of narcissists that can be found in Barack Obama:

1. Magical thinking. We have already touched on this. Barack Obama seems to believe that his presence determines outcomes more than his actions. Unfortunately, this delusion is reinforced by his ardent followers.
2. Barack Obama's worldview is one of perceptions, not of substance. In his mind, the message is all. If the Affordable Care Act seems unworkable, get the right people—pop stars and athletes—to sell its merits. Bring a bunch of doctors to the Rose Garden and hand out lab coats. Problem solved.
3. Imperturbability. I part company with Vaknin on this one. Yes, the president is described as cool, aloof and detached but he is quick to show disgust. He might not pound the table but he did scratch his chin with his middle finger as Hillary Clinton talked. He quietly but visibly seethed when Paul Ryan challenged him on the premise of national health care and later when Benjamin Netanyahu told him that Israel had no intention of returning to their 1967 borders.
4. Pronoun density. According to Vaknin the average person uses I, me, myself 15-20% of the time. Barack Obama uses those pronouns 70% of the time. This might need some clarification but Vaknin is not alone in recognizing this habit. According to The National Journal December 22, 2012, “ President Barack Obama used the funeral for Hawaii senator Daniel Inouye to talk about himself. In the short 1,600 word speech, Obama used the word "my" 21 times, "me" 12 times, and "I" 30 times.”
5. Barack Obama sees people as unimportant props in his own movie. In Vaknin's words, the narcissist sees people as “cardboard cutouts” or “non-people.” Obama has no sense of empathy. This is ironic because when asked which politician cares more about people like them, would-be voters overwhelmingly chose Obama over his opponent.
6. Barack Obama displays a false modesty that masks haughtiness.
7. Barack Obama likes to play the eternal adolescent.

Additionally, narcissists believe they are omniscient and infallible. You are either one hundred per cent with them or you are against them. The slightest disagreement will result in conflict. Perhaps most importantly, when they go down, they take everyone with them.

Chronic Dishonesty.

Barack Hussein Obama is a tightly-woven gestalt. It is hard to say where one facet ends and another begins. He is a chronically dishonest human being. With that said, if one lies boldly and frequently, knowing that he will probably be called on it later, one has to wonder if that person can distinguish fact from fantasy.

When a political figure who seeks the White House writes an autobiography with at least thirty-seven “material discrepancies”, he has to expect to get caught. Nope. But getting caught never even slowed down Barack Obama. No embarrassment. No shame. Move on. Re message.

Barack Obama lied repeatedly that people could keep their preferred doctor under the Affordable Care Act. How many times did he repeat this falsehood? That question was posed at various message boards including “Yahoo Answers.” There is no consensus but someone said “about twenty.” A YouTube montage has the president saying this seventeen times. He also made false claims that ACA would result in lower premiums and lower overall costs.

It would be no exaggeration to say that it would take hundreds, if not thousands, of pages to chronicle Barack Obama's falsehoods. Factor in broken campaign promises or the sliding scale of honesty we allow politicians (“The failed policies of George Bush” Specifically which policies?) the misquoting or misstating of his rivals' positions, pulling numbers out of thin air and the accumulation of falsehood is overwhelming. With an obsequious press unwilling to call their beloved leader on his chronic deception, we have become a Land of Babble. Nothing is believable and everything is believable. It's all the same.

A few quick highlights of Obama's ongoing efforts to deceive.

1. Operation Fast and Furious. Complementing the president's positive falsehoods are his administrations efforts to obstruct, distract and impede. The Obama Department of Justice successfully stonewalled a Congressional investigation. Give an assist to the president for extending Executive Privilege to his Attorney General for matters that clearly did not involve Executive Privilege.
2. Benghazi. Falling back on the repeated success of a deliberate, outlandish lie, the entire administration advanced the idea that the attack on the Benghazi, Libya consulate on September 11, 2012 was the result of a protest against a not much viewed YouTube video that insulted Islam. A spontaneous protest that that got out of hand is more politically palatable than an Al Qaeda terrorist attack.

3. The IRS Scandals. Lost and broken hard drives, private emails, foggy memories, the Fifth Amendment, a promised FBI investigation that never got off the ground and a president who goes on television to announce “there is not a smidgen of corruption” at the IRS as his Justice Department conducts a non-investigation.

4. Voter ID. The Obama Administration fought states' effort to require a photo ID prior to voting. Every position is arguable except perhaps this one. There is but one reason to fight the integrity of the electoral system and that is to allow and institutionalize widespread cheating.

Yes, politicians and fishermen are notorious for their outrageous claims. Is Barack Obama less honest than other politicians? Yes, absolutely. What is different about Barack Obama is that the fawning press has downplayed, excused, covered and even facilitated their cult leader's falsehoods. It is all about the worship.

I could pile on but you get the point. A web search of “Obama's top lies” will get you hundreds of sites. No, they do not all repeat themselves. Obamalies.net provides a greatest hits, of sorts.

Three personal favorites. One, Obama stating that the new administration had no idea how bad the country's financial situation was until they took office. This was a falsehood to appeal to idiots who believe that George Bush kept a set of secret books under his bed and a key to a giant vault. The country's finances are a matter of public record and a sitting Senator can get just about any financial information he wants with a wave of his hand.

Two, the false biography. I never put a lot of stock in that Kenya birth certificate thing (but the administration and the loyalists in the press actually kept the subject alive.) When a middle-aged man takes a much younger wife, he usually does not bring her home to meet his original family. Even it such practices were common, I doubt if most late stage pregnant women would want to fly to Kenya during the 1960's. I believe Barack Obama was born in Hawaii.

It would later be revealed that a young Barack Obama would solicit the services of the literary agency, Acton & Dystel in 1991. The agency would circulate brief biographies of their clientele, usually about four sentences long. “Barack Obama, the first African-American President of Harvard Law Review, was born in Kenya and raised in Indonesia and Hawaii...” Oops

Jay Acton and Jayne Dystel have refused to answer questions about Barack Obama, as has former staff biography editor, Miriam Goderich. Of course, the Cult of Obama members employed in the Fourth Estate did not try all that hard to unravel this mystery. Could it have been a simple miscommunication?

The United Kingdom's “Daily Mail” reports that Acton and Dystell maintained the “born in Kenya” assertion about the junior Senator from Illinois on their website as recently as 2007. If there was an original miscommunication, it would probably have been corrected over sixteen years of updates. As with the “material discrepancies” in “Dreams From My Father,” the Barack Obama persona was subject to revision to better suit audience preference.

The loyalists screamed “Foul!” at the slanderous Birthers. Obama loyalist David Gregory ambushed both Michele Bachmann and John Boehner with Birther questions, even though neither of them had ever broached the subject. Of course there would be allegations of racism leveled against anyone who questioned the official version of the nativity.

Yes, the born in Kenya rumor was one big lie. Ironically or not, the lie seems to have originated from the lips of Barack Obama. Barack Obama is the real father of the Birther Movement.

Perhaps there are more sensational lies but one oft-repeated Obama lie carries the day for its pure unadulterated sleaze. Drum roll, please. The number one lie spread by Barack Obama is the oft-repeated fable that his mother died at the hands of greedy insurance barons.

Barack Obama used that much-repeated falsehood to sell his Affordable Care Act. That mendacious testimony dragged all of us into the sewer. Stanley Dunham's life and death would be just one more occasion for political theater. Call me old fashioned but in my day a man did not pimp his mother's memory to promote his own career.

Constant Adulation.

This aspect might seem benign but it could also reveal something disturbing. Barack Obama has never performed the duties of a president as they were normally performed. He skips meetings and security briefings. He does not regularly meet with his Cabinet and he hates to meet with Congress for any reason. Such things involve confrontation, disagreement and work. Barack Obama hates all of those things.

Barack Obama loves to speak to adoring fans. He loves fundraisers and teleprompter speeches and the love of an adoring crowd. It seemed odd to may observers that he kept on campaigning after getting re-elected in 2012. With each budget subsequent budget fight, Barack Obama left Washington to take his message to the faithful. There he would vilify the Republicans and generally misstate their objectives. The loyal press cheered him on with each prompt of the tele.

There is speculation that Barack Obama will not leave office in 2017 as he is required to do. Some people think he will create an emergency, perhaps a war or even a civil war to extend his term. That used to seem farfetched. Now, it is plausible. I am not sure he can give up his addiction to praise and celebration.

Petulance

We have already discussed abuses of power and we had to shorten the list for brevity's sake. There is a lot of suspicious activity that is just par for the course with these people.

Were Republicans targeted in Chrysler and General Motors dealership closures? Were non-union employees also targeted? Did FEMA deny disaster-area status to a wildfire-scorched Texas because they were under Republican leadership? Did the Obama Administration target Standard and Poor's for downgrading the US government's credit rating? Was Trump University targeted by a Democratic state government because of repeated criticisms of the White House leveled by Donald Trump?Was the government's response to Hurricane Sandy slower in Staten Island due to their citizenry having the audacity to elect a Republican to serve in Congress?

Dozens such questions have gone unanswered. What is certain is that the Obama Administration has done its utmost to intimidate all but staunch loyalists. We also know from the president's ongoing budget battles that he has no qualms about using innocent people as political pawns.

The spending conflicts of 2013 were ugly events with even uglier results. Obama would win the war decisively. He bypassed Congress altogether and took his message directly to his hand-licking media.

The puppies would deliver the day for their master. This would be no budget crisis or impasse or stalemate involving two sides who could not reach an agreement. Oh no. This would be presented as an irrational act by the anti-government bomb throwers and extremists in the Republican Party. Once more, the press coverage could not be more lopsided.

There was just one little obstacle. The sequester just was not painful. It involved but a drop in a trough of red ink. No one seemed to notice. But the cult leader was not to be defied. Compromise was for mortals.

To win the challenge to his supremacy, Barack Obama deliberately inflicted hardship on innocent people. An embarrassing email to a low level USDA employee named Charles Brown advised Mr. Brown that he should, “make sure you are not contradicting what we said the impact would be.” In other words, if we say it's an earthquake, tremble till you drop.

Brown would not be the only government employee to receive such a directive. The administration warned of “maximum pain” and other departments fell into line. Florida congressman John Mica accused the administration of orchestrating airport delays across the entire country. More than 2,000 illegal immigrants, many with criminal records were released to the street due to phony budget shortfalls. The administration even used kids with cancer as political pawns. When it was revealed that an NIH-funded program was being discontinued due to the sequester, the GOP offered to fund the experimental program. Obama promised to veto any such measure. Let them eat chemo.

The Obamacist media remained faithful to their leader and he pushed onward. When it seemed there was not enough pain, President Obama called pressed our park rangers into service. The National Park Service barricaded places that needed no service or immediate government funding to stay afloat. War memorials were barricaded. The privately-funded World War II Memorial was blocked off and when veterans, some in wheelchairs, invaded the memorial, the president responded by placing armed guards around the perimeter. That's right, additional spending to make phantom spending cuts seem painful. The National Mall in Washington, DC would be shut down but briefly re-opened to host an immigration rally.

The National Park Service tried to prevent tourists from viewing Mount Rushmore from an access road. They used their muscle to close roughly one hundred privately-managed parks at a financial setback to their non-government employees, as well as depriving the federal government of revenue. American Forces Network suspended broadcasting, army chaplains were furloughed and warned not to perform services gratis and the USDA website went black.

To recap, the Diva-in-Chief won the day and our titanic National Debt grew even larger. Humanity has witnessed worse atrocities than sequester bullying but has humanity ever witnessed petty vindictiveness played out on such a broad stage? Not that I can think of.

Control

Politics is largely about control but it is also about humility. The Obama Administration has never met an industry they did not want to dominate. Health care, health insurance, auto manufacturing, student loans, education, personal finance, banking, energy...you name it, they want to grab it, twist it and shape it to their liking.

The impulse to control is rooted in conceit. Anything you can do, I can do better. I am simply wiser than you in all respects, therefore I should be the captain of the ship. Every ship.

Managerially speaking, Barack Obama is a hands off micro-manager. He wants absolute power but he does not want to be bothered by details. Micro-managers are not optimum performers but they have strengths. They are hands on, detail oriented control freaks. They can be difficult to work for and work with but they are familiar with the minutia of their domain.

The hands off micro-manager craves power but he does not like minutia. His finger is never on the patient's pulse, he does not care to see the patient but he insists on supervising his treatment anyway. Outside the world of kings and clergy, the hands off micro-manager is a rare bird. Their obvious flaws are recognized early on and their talents are diverted to a non-managerial track.

It is not coincidence that Barack Obama never had an executive position prior to his inauguration. He is ill-suited for leadership but he is blind to his deficiencies. So to, are his followers.

Greed

People who rail against greed are invariably greedy. Barack Obama is no exception. His late Aunt Zeituni Onyango lived in South Boston, Massachusetts despite being denied political asylum based on ethnic violence in her native Kenya. Barack Obama likes to brag about his wealth and his commercial success as a writer. There is no evidence that he helped his destitute aunt but the US taxpayer picked up the slack. Aunt Zeituni was placed in public housing where she would live out her years free from the burdens of employment.

Regardless of who picked up the tab, someone helped Zeituni Onyango. The same could not always be said about the president's half brother, George. George Obama lived in a hut in Kenya. By almost any definition he was poor. A hundred dollars a month would have gone a long way in Kenya and would have significantly elevated his living conditions. For whatever reason, Barack Obama refused to help out his less fortunate brother.

When George Obama's son needed medical attention he called filmmaker Dinesh D'Souza in New York to help him out. Barack Obama could not be bothered. Yes, the president is greedy but that is not his worst attribute. His is not a lust for wealth, it is the pursuit of superior wealth. He wants to rub his good extravagance in the face of the less fortunate.

Lavish vacations. Two-jet vacations. The family dog airlifted on Marine One. Hobnobbing with the beautiful people in mansions. Two hundred rounds of golf on exclusive courses. Living the good life for all to see and envy.

Despite his excessive “fair share” verbiage, Barack Obama took elaborate measures to assure that he only pays about a twenty per cent rate on his income taxes. Yes, the president's secretary pays taxes at a higher rate than the chief executive. Barack Hussein Obama is among other things, a miser.

Summary

Anyone who takes an unbiased gaze at our forty fourth president will view an unflattering portrait. Without nitpicking, without holding him to a ridiculous standard of perfection, without fabrication or even exaggeration, an unusually flawed character is revealed. Deification did not occur because Barack Obama is so gosh darn awesome that his charisma was plainly self-evident. Oh no, Barack Obama has proffered and promoted and advanced his own worship. He is as megalomaniacal as every other dictator, as self-important as every other cult leader.

As the grim legacy of the Obama Administration starts to take form a few public figures have rationalized their support by saying that Barack Obama had offered us hope. So too did Charles Ponzi and Glenn Turner and figures much more nefarious. Every con artist offers hope. It's what they do. Delivering on their promises is not something they do quite as well.

Perhaps the most disturbing aspect of Barack Obama's personality is his lack of empathy. The man may or may not have sympathy for political pawns, but he has zero compassion for any and all who do not bow down before him. Lacking the capacity for empathy, he cannot put himself in another person's shoes.

“If a son shall ask bread of any of you that is a father, will he give him a stone? or if he ask a fish, will he for a fish give him a serpent?” You might ask for another ten years of viability but President Obama prefers you receive palliative care. You might ask to just be left alone, or at least have your insurance plan left alone. You will be handed a serpent. Your preferences are moot. In Barack Obama's eyes, people are stupid and therefore deserve to be treated like livestock. Call it arrogance or vanity or conceit. It is the most dangerous facet of Barack Obama's personality and we are all affected by it.

The Future Of Jonestown

I don't like politics but I have become obsessed with the subject. Growing up, politics was discussed at the dinner table and it was something I could have done without. It was not intrinsically interesting to me. Politicians seemed like timid people who tip-toed through life, avoiding people and places that might someday be viewed as a political liability.

I made a point to mingle with political liabilities and I have never regretted that decision. I was wary of what politics might do to one's personality. This suspicion would be confirmed when Rush Limbaugh became a sports analyst. Hours into the job, Limbaugh injected politics into a discussion about football. I had seen something like this happen on smaller stages. I had witnessed politics consuming people. Now I saw it consume Rush Limbaugh. Limbaugh saw everything through a political lens, even something as deliberately escapist as professional football.

A learned lesson was reinforced. Rush Limbaugh seemed like a decent guy who was so obsessed with politics that he could never turn it off. He was not unlike the sidewalk preacher pedestrians crossed the street to avoid. I did not want to be like the sidewalk preacher or the guy in the office who turns every conversation into political discourse. Not me.

That is not to say that I was without core values or opinions. I was born a freedom-loving, anti-authoritarian guy who was suspicious of bureaucracy and even more suspicious of propaganda and mind control. Generally, you would not know my political beliefs unless you asked. I was more likely to express an opinion about a movie or a basketball coach. Political discussion was something I usually avoided.

Years went by. We would witness a major terrorist attack, a bloated and often destructive bureaucracy, an ever-expanding police and surveillance state and a national debt that threatened our social and physical well being. Into this mix came Barack Obama.

I was suspicious of Obama from the onset. Who was this guy? It is a question we still ask daily. We thought the news media would eventually provide factual information about this mysterious character. We did not think our our relatives, even the stupid ones, would blindly pledge their allegiance to a man they did not know or care to know. We did not expect our lifelong friends to put on their blinders and guzzle the Kool-Aid. But it happened. America had become Jonestown.

Over the next six years I grew obsessed with finding out who Barack Obama really is. As to the reflexive charge of “You just don't like him,” in all of its implied racism, that was not the case at all. I judge a man on his actions and “like” and “dislike” do not mean much to me. Things like “respect” and “believe” are much higher on my scale than a Facebook judgment.

I gave up or greatly reduced the following activities:

Spectator sports. I used to love watching sports on TV so much that I would have to take measures to limit my viewing time. After Obama came to power I would click on the dial during a commercial break, go to a news channel and forget all about the game. I don't even read the sports page anymore.

Music: Completely replaced by talk radio.

Fiction: I used to read a lot of fun books. Now I read books like “Culture of Corruption,” “The Amateur,” and “The Great Destroyer.”

Movies: Hollywood and I were already drifting apart. The remake did a number on me. Why should I pay to see “The Longest Yard” when I can see a better version at home for free? In Jonestown, movies no longer delivered the two hour escape. Gone. All gone.

Socialization: I have always been an introvert and something of a loner. Those qualities have grown more pronounced in Jonestown. I submit that my isolation is largely self-imposed. Reading and writing and blogging are solitary pursuits. I do not dislike Obamacists but I do have a hard time respecting anyone who pledges allegiance to a cult leader they do not know and do not care to know. Solitude serves me well.

I did not plan on becoming politically obsessed. Then again, I did not plan on living in Jonestown.

American became Jonestown but can Jonestown become America? The press will never vet Barack Hussein Obama. They will tell us how brilliant and how concerned and how sophisticated and how praiseworthy he shall ever be. They will tell us he is principled but they will never elaborate on the principles he embraces. They will tell us he is misunderstood but they will not help us understand his occluded personality. Mostly, they will turn the criticism on the critics. We never supported him. We never gave him a chance. Implied racism. More implied racism. Insinuations of racism. More insinuations of racism.

We know Barack Obama has friends in high places who can make things like passport records disappear. A benefactor probably funded his education. Despite what Michelle Obama might have said about student loans, no such debt was ever mentioned in any of his election filings. Will we ever learn of the identity of this mysterious sugar daddy?

Here and there talk radio would host a caller who would tell the listeners that Barack Obama will not leave the White House after two terms. The comments section that follow YouTube videos sometimes have statements to that effect. Those comments used to seem silly to me. They no longer do.

2012 reminded us that Barack Obama's record was not on the ballot. However, Barack Obama's divine essence was on the ballot and it carried the day. He was not just a bad president he was duplicitous, tyrannical and corrupt. All irrelevant. Unconditional love.

Then a series of scandals surfaced in 2013 such as the IRS targeting political dissidents and the NSA spying on average Americans. These and other abuses of power were circulated around the Internet but kept out of the mainstream media until after the 2012 elections. Now that they came to light maybe the Obamacists would see what kind of bully and cheater and....Nope! Unconditional love. Unending worship.

Then there was the budget wars where Obama used dying children and hobbled veterans as props in his one man play. For what purpose did the president resort to such Machiavellian tactics? To inflate our national debt. To assert his supremacy over mortals. To punish those who dared to mock him. Maybe now the spell would be broken. Nope! Barack Obama is still a god to tens of millions of Americans, perhaps hundreds of millions of people worldwide.

As previously mentioned I started the blog, Post Obotomy Syndrome, shortly after the 2008 elections. It was not intended to be one more Us vs. Them hot spots. It was an effort to spread more light than heat. This site would primarily focus on the unacknowledged religiosity of the overnight cult of personality. Yes, I thought if I could reveal the magician's secrets, I could effectively deprogram the masses. I greatly underestimated the length and the strength of the cult's tentacles.

What distinguishes Obamacism from every other religion is that this is the first and only media-created religion. As concern our forty fourth president, the Fourth Estate can be divided into two categories: the Obamacist Cheerleaders and the Silent Majority.

Obamacism is for now an unacknowledged religion. Practitioners might identify as Catholic or Jewish but their loyalty and their worship is extended to their cult leader. Here and there the cheerleaders will trip themselves up and tell us that Obama, “is kind of like God,” but they don't feel it's safe to place both feet out of the closet just yet.

The Silent Majority has pledged omerta for their leader. Maybe they don't have secret handshakes and maybe they don't don robes and burn incense but if you want to continue to report on barking dogs in Dacron, Ohio, you had better keep mum about your social superiors. Thou shalt not connect the dots.

The Lame Scorpion President

The Silent Majority might not care to discuss their leader's core values but a picture is coming into focus. First, if Barack Obama's core values were popular with the American people, he would advertise them. His secrecy on these matters speaks loudly.

Barack Obama might not be anti-American but he certainly is not pro-American. Barack Obama might not be anti-Israel but he is certainly not pro-Israel. Barack Obama is opposed to the premise of free enterprise. He likes rich people who give him money and he resents rich people who do not give him money.

Barack Obama is not enthusiastic about protecting religious freedom, at least not for Christians. He goes out of his way to see that Islam is never offended. He might be less of an Islamic sympathizer and more of an OPEC sympathizer. The Oil Producing Exporting Countries have helped promote the global warming/climate change/climate disruption hoax, possibly to impede American energy independence.

Who purchased Al Gore's Current TV? Qatar-based Al-Jazeera. Who financed Matt Damon's anti-fracking movie, “Promised Land”? Image Nation Abu Dhabi, a subsidiary of Abu Dhabi Media, based in United Arab Emirate. Who quietly purchases stock in western news companies? Mideast oil interests who have a vested interest in keeping energy prices high and preventing a worldwide energy glut.

The Lame Scorpion President might use all of the resources at his disposal—the Environmental Protection Agency, the Department of Energy, The Department of Justice, the IRS, Federal courts—to hobble domestic energy production. In some circles there is the belief that an American renaissance, fueled by energy independence, is inevitable. That might not be case if OPEC has its way.

An OPEC shill might not be the worst case scenario. We need to re-examine John Drew's insights into the mind of a young Barack Obama. It should concern one and all that the future president was a fervent Marxist-Leninist. It might concern us even more that the Occidental student was enthusiastic about the inevitability of a worldwide revolution. Our grandiose president might take extreme measures to ensure that he is not omitted from the history books.

Perhaps the most successful anti-achievement of the Obamacist Media is the removal of budgetary issues from the news cycle. We stopped talking about our colossal debt that spelled Armageddon throughout the Bush administration when it was one third to one half of what it is now. America cannot pay off $18trillion in debt as well as tens of trillions more in unfunded liabilities.

Both political parties have contributed to the fiscal crisis but the Republicans could make the case that theirs was the slower road to ruin. They have become the party of lesser evil, silver medalists in the destruction competition. Siss boom bah.

I reiterate: We are told that deficits do not matter as we are also told that we must raise taxes. We are being conned.

Taxes are not always generated to pay for deficits. Deficits are sometimes created to raise taxes. I know of no country the Marxists/Leninists/Maoists/Communists or even the Socialists or Progressives have made rich, but they have made billions of people poor. Leftists might not be able to deliver Heaven on Earth, but they can give all of us a taste of Hell.

Leftists perversely view destruction as a virtue. Not what Schumpeter called creative destruction where the word processor destroys the typewriter and an MP3 player destroys the compact disc. No, the leftist takes pride in destruction minus the creativity.

I am afraid that Barack Obama shares the leftist view of destruction as virtue. He has upgraded the status of the apparatchik class and a few Wall Street/K Street insiders to the exclusion of just about everyone else. Barack Obama is driven by something. What exactly? It might be his desire to dismantle (or as he says “fundamentally transform”) America.

Some people have suggested that the president will start a war or allow a terrorist attack prior to the 2016 elections. Others have gone so far as to state that he wants to start a civil war. Those sorts of extreme measures might not be necessary. The crushing debt coupled with an economy deliberately crippled by Washington might provide sufficient social unrest to extend Barack Obama's second term.

Maybe Barack Obama is deliberately spending us into oblivion. It looks like the Federal Reserve did what it could to numb the pain in the short term, delaying the day of reckoning until after the 2014 midterms. They can't keep the plates in the air forever. Bernanke and Yellen have had more success at elevating stock prices than elevating stock earnings. At an average P:E ratio that exceeds 15, Wall Street is on shaky ground.

Do not lose sight of Barack Obama's heightened sense of grandeur. He would love to preside over a nation in turmoil. He likes chaos. He would love to dispense food here and withhold water there. The petulant child would love to reward loyalists and punish infidels.

Remember too, this man's addiction to adulation. If there is any way to keep the crowds cheering, our diva will find it. If there is a large scale cyber attack or the crippling of our nation's electric grid, the crowds will just have to chant “Yes we can” by candlelight.

A major crisis, orchestrated or spontaneous, would serve Barack Obama's personality but something more pragmatic might make the dominoes fall. His administration is rife with crime. The Obama DOJ can only obstruct justice as long as they are the Obama DOJ. A Republican DOJ might not be as willing to overlook abuses of power, graft, perjury and other forms of corruption. It is doubtful that a Hillary DOJ would be any more merciful. The Clintons despise all things Obama.

So yes, it is conceivable that a crisis might be generated by senior Obama Administration officials who fear indictment. Which is to say there is a long, long, long list of people who want to lower the curtain—at least until the statues of limitations expire.

In fiction we sometimes say things we can't otherwise say. This is especially true of movies and television where executives do not want to offend large segments of the viewing audience. In, “The Twilight Zone,” Rod Serling tells parables about racism using aliens as characters. No need alienating the Deep South.

In this century there are seemingly fewer restrictions to viewer content. Profanity rules the day. So too, do references to bodily functions and more bodily functions and bodily functions we don't all share, thank goodness. And we can discuss sodomy and man to man love and blaspheme, GD, OMG...what if anything cannot be said on television?

We cannot make fun of Barack Obama or his mindless worshipers. Remember the Missouri rodeo clown? Do you think perhaps, the rise of Zombie shows that came to life during the Obama Administration, might reflect society's fears about brain dead Obamacists? Obama would not be a daunting figure without the massive hordes of walking dead who support him. Many of us fear God but not as much as we fear his followers. The same can be said for Obama and his zombies.

We have to come to grips with what stares us in the face. Jim Jones never had more than a few thousand followers in Guyana and California and he managed to get 923 people killed. David Koresh, with a following of a few hundred, was responsible for 85 deaths, not counting his own.

The Obamacists are not as tightly controlled as other cult members, not yet anyway. Are they as fanatical as other cultists? On average, no. But there are tens of millions of them in the US and many more of them spread throughout the world. Not all of them are as stupid or as pliable as the Occupy Wall Street marionettes but they are just as loyal. Some of them have the technical skill and the position to wreak cyber havoc. If they see their deity facing eviction, they might spring into action.

Unconditional love and undying loyalty are the hallmarks of Obamacists. With a little prodding, from their deity or the people around him, bedlam could be released. Let us be prepared.

How To Deal With An Obama Worshiper

Treat an Obama worshiper like a crackhead. Tell them you love them and care about them but until they can curb their idolatry and the willful self-delusion that accompanies cultism, you cannot associate with them. Holidays will be less stressful without the blanket charges of racism leveled against infidels.

If they can put down the Kool-Aid, welcome them back with open arms. You might introduce them to Judeo-Christian principles even if you are not particularly religious. Theological beliefs inoculate a person against manipulative leaders and The First Commandment serves as mosquito repellant to protect even the most succulent cult bait.

But what if I have Obamacists in my family? Get a new family. It will be worth the effort. Would you allow a practicing heroin addict in your home, even if he was once a loving brother?

A heroin addict will empty your bank book and max out your credit cards but they are not as spiritually draining as Obamacists. There is a refreshing honesty present in all junkies. They want to get high and they will do whatever it takes to get there. There is no pretense of enlightenment or better taste or superior judgment. Whatever else might be said about Opioid-Americans, they will not pass legislation in secret that raises your insurance premiums and restricts your choices in health care and forces you to pay for things you find immoral, repulsive and inhumane. Their evil has limits.

There is a part of the cultist's psyche that says, “Wait a second. Hold on a minute. Don't go to Jonestown.” The cultist must train himself to silence that voice. Theirs is a path of deliberate self-delusion. It is self-delusion as a chosen lifestyle. It is maintaining this constant self-delusion that allows for religious bliss, a bliss he has never known. The delusion that the community organizer is a god incarnate must be constantly reinforced. Doubt must be silenced.

From Sarah Palin to Larry Sinclair, from Dr. Ben Carson to Wayne Alan Root, from James Rosen to Sharyl Attkisson, we witness bad things happen to those who mock the cult leader. Bad actions for a good cause is a credo that is embraced from top to bottom in Jonestown. Does that evil lurk in the hearts of every Obama worshiper? Maybe not. But why take chances?

If you shun a practicing Obamacist, do tell them you like them, even though you are cutting them out of your life. They live in a world where like and dislike are paramount. It is safe to say that social approval means more to them than it does to you.

I used to dismiss outright the conspiracy sub-theories that stated that Barack Obama would not leave office after his second term as president. He would inflict some sort of emergency, some sort of pandemonium, that would allow him to temporarily suspend the electoral process. I no longer dismiss those ideas.

Barack Obama is addicted to adulation and luxury (Dick Morris circa 2008 stated that the perks of the presidency are worth about $50 million/year. Barack Obama likes to live large and his extravagant lifestyle has certainly exceeded Morris's estimate). He also loves chaos. That cannot be underestimated.

Please remember too, that President Obama's stranglehold on the Department of Justice has successfully impeded criminal investigations that might implicate high level officials. Chief amongst these is the widespread, ongoing abuses of the Internal Revenue Service. Faulty hard drives and foggy memories will not stop a determined attorney general who believes in the rule of law and the premise of justice. Our president's third term might extend until such time that the statutes of limitation prevail.

If asked to do so, Obama's followers would drink cyanide for him. They poured out in 2012 to re-elect one of the worst incumbents in American History, a man they love deeply and know superficially. They gave their time and money and votes to their deity and they will support him again and again and again. We are in Jonestown now.

Deprogramming is coercive and we cannot deprogram tens of millions of people. We must treat Barack Obama with kindness and respect but we must humanize him. If we could politely lead him to the deck of the Battleship Missouri and humbly request that he renounce his divinity to his countrymen....it ain't gonna happen!

Therefore, we must take it upon ourselves to humanize Barack Obama. Treat him with respect and kindness but finally, finally, finally let us discover who this man really is. Does he really have the highest IQ of any president? Then what is his IQ? What classes did he take as an undergraduate? Who were his professors? Did he write any papers? Why was he invisible at Columbia? Who financed his education? Why in the world would his family introduce a formidable teenager to Frank Marshall Davis? There are about a million loose ends here.

We are not in Kansas, we are in Jonestown. Reciting, “There is no place like home,” is not going to get us anywhere. The cult leader must be humanized once and for all. The wizard is not the man and the man is not the wizard. We must expose the abracadabra. Some will loyally divert their eyes but we must stand resolute. Only when the wizard is humanized will our country heal.

We must ask the question: Who is Barack Obama?

Chapter 2

Chapter 2

The Landscape: The Perfect Time And Place To Sprout A New Religious Cult

The Decline In Traditional Religion

Homo sapiens is a religious species and for decades, formal religious affiliation declined in America. A void was there to be filled and The Cult of Obama became an overnight religious awakening.

Obamacism could not have thrived in an era dominated by traditional religion. Idolatry would not have taken root and the act of deliberately cultivating worship would have been met with harsh disapproval. The Obama Halo would have been recognized as blasphemous. The White House's demand that Jesus's name be covered when the president spoke at Georgetown--a demand the craven wafers granted without a fuss--would have sunk every other politician's career. In another era, celebrities would not refer to the president as lord and savior and had there been a YouTube it would not feature videos of people praying to a politician.

Why religion? It could be that we are genetically programmed to believe in celestial affairs. As such, do we favor religions that promote our survival and well being and shun those that do not. Then again, maybe sociobiology doe not explain everything.

Maybe a spiritual realm does indeed exist and religion is our way of speculating on its nature while also safely harnessing our spiritual exploration. Some, like the late Robert Anton Wilson, are fortunate enough to “see God out of the corner of my eye.” Some of us will experience a freakish moment where we blurt out the lines of a TV show right before the character speaks his part. Most of us witness just enough telepathy, clairvoyance and premonition to make us say, “There is something more than the material realm.”

Why the decline in traditional formal religious worship? When eggheads compile their list of most influential books or most important books, they never include Raymond Moody's “Life After Life.” Published in 1975, this book concerns case studies of what would later be called near death experiences or NDE's. Never mind how many copies were sold. This book opened the floodgates. Soon, so it seemed, everyone's Aunt Zelda had seen the light.

It should be noted that NDE's became more common with the advance of medical technology that allowed patients to come back from a state of near death and tell all about their experiences. We tend to think of technology as an opponent of spirituality but defibrillators changed the ontological perspective of many a person.

Regardless of one's opinion of NDE's, they have shaped popular belief and popular culture. No more physically rising from the grave on Judgment Day. No more souls frozen in dormancy until Kingdom Come. “Grandma saw the light right away. She reviewed her whole life and it was a pleasant experience. She didn't want to come back.”

A few people have undergone hellish NDE's, but most comeback kids experience something unspeakably wonderful. It's not just Lutherans or Protestants or Christians who experience the conversations with deceased relatives, the journey through the tunnel, the warm, comforting light and so on. Experiences did not seem to vary between baptized and non-baptized, believer and infidel.

Why worship at The One True Faith if we all end up in front of the light? Might as well sleep in on Sundays. There are many roads to salvation. In the wake of the NDE phenomenon idiosyncratic religions flourished. Traditional religions have not fared so well.

It is not just NDE's that have emptied the pews. Many of us are critical of traditional religion for its focus on sexuality to the exclusion of just about everything else. I would like to see religions address public vs. private morality, property rights, volition, voluntarism, temperance of plunder, cruelty for cruelty sake and a boatload of other topics concerning the moral issues we discuss on a daily basis. Religious leaders need not draw the same conclusions I draw but they should at least mention the subjects.

More idealistic souls would like to see religious leaders condemn war or at least submit guidelines as to when war is moral and just. Other people would like to see environmental issues addressed from the pulpit. Still others would like to see the clergy at least examine issues of animal welfare. Unfortunately, the ethos of the day is never on the menu.

I take evolutionary theory, or sociobiology as it was originally called, with a grain of salt. It does not sufficiently explain adoption of children genetically dissimilar to the parents. It does not explain voluntary celibacy, voluntary sterilization, homosexuality and other non-reproductive sexual practices. What sociobiology does explain is how religions became obsessed with matters below the waist.

In an era when venereal disease was rampant and there were no cures and no means of prevention, sexual restraint was the pinnacle of virtue. In an age when children of two parents were unlikely to see adulthood and the fate of illegitimate children was even worse, sexual mores defined the person. When larger battalions were needed, sexual practices that did not produce future soldiers were condemned.

Once more, technology challenges our morality. Condoms and antibiotics make sexually transmitted diseases significantly less threatening. Birth control options influence people's attitude towards marriage. Universal access to indoor plumbing changes....it changes a lot of things. One can shout “moral relativism” but isn't moral relativism what the clergy endorse when they ignore the previously mentioned hot button topics?

When a sect emphasizes sexual behavior as the gold standard of morality, they will fill their pews with the timid more than the virtuous. So too, the old, the feeble, the lonely, the unwanted. They will reap a harvest of impoverished men and dowdy women. Mostly, people who live a moral lifestyle by default.

Institutional religion has not weathered eclecticism very well. In places like the rural South, rural Utah, the Middle East and and Northern Africa, formal religion reigns supreme because just about everyone is of the same faith. So too, traditional religion does well in urban neighborhoods with tight ethnic identities. This is especially true when those ethnic groups feel a rivalry with people of a different faith. The Catholics of Belfast unify around their perceived persecution by the British. The Protestants of Belfast unify around their perceived persecution by the Catholics of Belfast. Neither group seems influenced by eclecticism.

Technology has not been kind to traditional religion. Yes, we have televangelists and websites devoted to devotion but all in all technology has been disruptive to worship as it was once defined. The automobile might have given to the rise of the megachurch but before doing so it gave rise to suburbs.

The deck got shuffled in the suburbs. When a kid grows up in an Italian American Catholic neighborhood, he will probably remain Catholic for the rest of his life. When an Italian American grows up on a suburban street where the next door neighbor is Mormon and his next door neighbor is Nada and his nest door neighbor is kind of New Age and his next door neighbor grew up Catholic but then married a Baptist but then married a Buddhist and then married someone who is “deeply spiritual but not religious,” his religious destiny is not so readily determined.

Spiritual values transcend time and place and circumstance. How religions adapt to technology, mobility and eclecticism remains to be seen. So far, religious leaders have not figured it out. Religious trends are a fascinating subject but for now, they are beyond the scope of our attention. Let us focus on the decline of traditional religion and the spiritual void that is left in its wake. For some people that spiritual void was filled by Barack Obama.

American religions have slowly lost members, influence and clout over the course of several decades. In 1948, Gallup reported <via Yahoo. Linda D. Ross.> only 2% of the population considered themselves unaffiliated with any religion. In 2008, that number rose to 12%. This number taken by itself might not be so alarming but the degree of involvement has decreased among the “affiliated.”

Protestant and Roman Catholics have been hit hard. Whereas the Mainstream Protestants have lost more members, the Catholic Church has suffered sharper decreases in attendance and participation. From Kenneth Jones' “Index of Leading Catholic Indicators” :

Priests: From 27,000 in 1930 to 58,000 in 1965... 45,000 in 2002.

Ordinations: 1,575 in 1965...450 in 2002.

Priestless Parishes: 1% in 1965...15% in 2002.

Seminarians: 49,000 in 1965...4,700 in 2002.

Sisters: 180,000 in 1965...75,000 in 2002.

Parochial Grade School Students: 4.5 million in 1965...1.9 million in 2002.

The Sacraments: 45 million Catholic Americans and 1.3 million infant baptisms in 1965.

65 million Catholic Americans and 1 million infant baptisms in 2002.

126,000 converts in 1965...80,000 in 2002.

352 Catholic marriages in 1965...256,000 in 2002.

Sunday Mass Attendance: 74% in 1958 (Gallup.) 26.6% in 1994 (University of Notre Dame.)

Meanwhile the Protestants lost almost 5 million members from 1990 to 2000.

This same period saw an almost 20% decline in all church attendance.

In 2010, Southern Baptists reported four straight years of declining membership. They also reported a 4.98% decline in baptisms from 2009 <lifeway.com>

Every year more than 4000 churches close their doors compared to just over 1000 new church starts.

<churchleadership.org>

We have focused only on Christians but Jews have also grown more secularized. Estimates of non-practicing Jews range from 60 to 75%.

Near death phenomena, psychedelic drugs and pop culture have spurred interest in the paranormal but the “other world” is impossible to harness. One can do many things with paranormal activity except institutionalize it. Spiritualist churches are something like Lincoln's Ax, changing both congregation and meeting place with such frequency as to question the institution's very existence. Spiritualist churches do not have lifelong multigenerational families. They usually rent space from function halls to perform their rituals.

Americans had become Spiritualists in the sense that they entertained fleeting, ephemeral interests in celestial matters alongside their congregation of dilettantes. It was a perfect storm of sorts. A religious species in a traditionally religious land, spiritually stimulated but spiritually unanchored. Tinder awaiting a spark. And out of the screen would pop this dashing figure who would ask us only to “Believe.”

There is a free-floating assertion that the non-religious are more rational, less easily duped, than the religious. Unfortunately, not every atheist is Bertrand Russell, The “Whatever” school prevails. Jesus is boring and God is like, old. But Barack Obama is “The One.”

Religion can be a bit like eroticism. People return to both activities because they enjoy them. In both pursuits, the object of fascination is not always so easy to find. Barack Obama is to religion what the Playboy centerfold is to eroticism. Finally, the fickle are pleased.

America has always been a hotbed for religious cults. Nascent religions were usually subjected to a period of scrutiny that could last decades. The establishment was traditionally skeptical of charismatic cult leaders who lined feathered their own nest at the expense of the gullible. The faithful were usually unfriendly to cult leaders who sought worship for themselves.

The critics fell silent for Barack Obama. Truth is, a lot of ministers, such as the previously mentioned Andrew Greeley, were mesmerized by Barack Obama. If they did not buy into his divinity, they did not challenge it either. Sure, he cultivated his own adoration but who are we to judge? Wasn't Christianity just a dress rehearsal for Obamacism?

There is a new savior in town.

Taste Equals Opinion, Opinion Equals Fact

We live in an age of babble. We recognize words but they are so frequently used in a manner inconsistent with their meaning, that we might as well be speaking different languages. The word “opinion” is used often but it is rarely used to convey the meaning it had a few decades ago.

Frequently, a presentation of facts is dismissed as opinion. “That's just your opinion.” Not always. Some statements transcend opinion. Lassie is a dog. Not an opinion. Lassie is a good or noble or smart or loving dog. Opinions.

Some people are unable to make the distinction between fact and opinion. Theirs is a world of like and dislike, of agree and disagree. Like if you agree.

Theirs is largely a subjective world. Yes, they know if they jump off a tall building, they will die. They know that if they drive too fast at certain places at certain times, they will be caught. However, the bulk of their mental processes is the selection of aesthetic preferences. Ginger or Mary Ann? Betty or Wilma? It is all a matter of taste.

Facts and opinion are equated but so too, are taste and opinion. There is the saying, “Opinions are like assholes, everyone has one.” Not necessarily true. Everyone has a perspective. Everyone has a viewpoint. Everyone has a preference. But opinion?

Opinion involves at least a cursory examination of facts and at least a minimum of mental toil. Reflex, impulse and preference do not necessarily rise to a level of opinion. Opinion is not just choice, it is conscious choice. If the option is Coke or Pepsi, taste is all that matters. Ideally, opinion is paramount in the selection of political and religious leaders. But back at Jonestown...

Taste = Opinion

Opinion = Fact

Ergo, Taste = Fact

America has selected a religious leader in much the same way an infant selects an object to put in his mouth. That shiny quarter was just so pretty.

We sometimes hear the term “informed opinion.” That might not be a flagrant redundancy but truth is, opinion requires information. Without information, we have only our taste to guide us. Without, information, we have Barack Obama. Without information, we have Jonestown.

The Impact of Social Media

Some of us underestimated the power of social media, especially Facebook. Some of us thought that there was nothing revolutionary about Facebook. We were of the belief that the Internet was the Internet and there was nothing to be said about Facebook that could not be said about the Internet. Yes but...

Facebook accelerated the spread of simplism. That was not always the case with the Internet. Because of boundless storage space, should we decide to do so, we could peruse the source notes of a given book. A big fat non-fiction book might contain dozens of pages of footnotes. Reading the source notes would require hoofing it to a high quality university and a lot of legwork thereafter. Post-Internet sources derived from say, a medical journal, could probably be read in one's living room. That was the Information Superhighway.

Facebook might be The Misinformation Superhighway. The selected audience called followers or friends generally does not contest the veracity of anything. Whereas we were dealing with information overload, social media especially Facebook, solves the problem. Facebook is a goldmine of slogans, cliches, half-truths, selective truth, quotes out of context and outright silliness.

A quick illustration of how misinformation is spread via Facebook. Robert Reich, in conjunction with Movement produced “The Truth About The Economy.” The video lasts two minutes and thirst seven seconds and at this writing it has 1, 652, 790 views.

It is considered impolite to call a public figure a “liar.” I get annoyed at the Occupy Amazon/Occupy YouTube crowd who reflexively call their rivals “liars” because they are either too lazy or too stupid to refute anything. That is the Alinsky influence and if you don't believe Saul Alinsky has damaged our country, think again. We should respect other people's views. They might be reading from a different cannon. They might be misinformed.

Having said that, Robert Reich has once more crossed a line. For some wacky reason we hold public figures to a lower standard of honesty. In a less than perfect world, we would expect truth from a Secretary of Labor or a college professor. Truth.

Robert Reich is at the very least, guilty of intellectual dishonesty. Of course he is also caught promoting “material discrepancies.” Falsehood seems to inflict those who believe strongest in their moral superiority.

The Reich video for all its flaws teaches priceless lessons: Sadly, it takes more verbiage, more time and more energy to refute a falsehood than to promote a falsehood. At Post Obotomy Syndrome I posted two videos that dismantle the Reich video. One is Robert Murphy's which does a masterful job of not just refuting Reich but also exposing his falsity. It took Murphy ten minutes and two seconds to present his case. As of this writing this video has 72,097 views, less than 4% of Reich's audience.

Lee Doren also does an admirable job of crushing Reich's fairy tales. It took him five minutes and to date his video has been viewed by 60,320 people.

The Reich video was made popular by Facebook users. Two minutes. Just two minutes. Who cares about all that truthy stuff? Just two minutes. Mark Twain said “A lie can travel halfway around the world while truth is putting its shoes on.” Twain was correct but in the Facebook era the lie can fly around the world two thousand times while truth is lacing them up.

Another perspective on Facebook. To this day I do not understand Facebook's appeal. A former co-worker insisted I get on Facebook. I did. It was fun for a while. Kind of like everyone now has a blog. Got it. Of course, not everyone has much to say and the minutia of their daily lives soon grew tiring.

After the 2012 election I jumped ship. Most of my FB friends guzzled the Obama Kool-Aid. They did not care that we were a bankrupt nation. The presidency was just one more season of “American Idol” and they like Barack. Bye bye zombies.

Then a relative developed a serious illness and decided to post status updates on FB. I reactivated my status and I was back in the pool in all of its myriad contents. Despite constantly reminding myself to keep a low profile, I would ultimately get baited by a ridiculous comment.

“I think a man with a helmet defending his country should make more money than a man with a helmet defending a football.”

That is a pointless and inane statement but it attracted “Likes” and several supportive comments. “Don't flame. Don't flame. Don't flame,” the voice within roared. I posted a polite comment stating the obvious. We can pay football players $2 million/year because there are only about two thousand players in the NFL. If we paid all 1.3 million members of the Armed Forces in a likewise manner, it would cost us approximately $2.5 trillion, roughly our entire government revenue. That figure does not include reserve forces or the National Guard.

It was a left-brained, dispassionate comment. I did take a gentle jab at the poster, K, a good guy who is not stupid but who is prone to saying stupid things. I called the comment politically correct (which it is) because K does not fancy himself even a little bit PC. I kicketh the hornet's nest.

Heartless. Tom Brady gets free medical care, our vets get zero. What does a football player contribute to society? Valid points one and all but let's get back to the numbers. More disapproval including a guy who pasted an oversized thumb pointing downward in reference to my commentary.

A microcosm emerged and I was reminded of why one of the worst presidents in US History was re-elected. The social medium is the social message and Facebook's message is rampant stupidity. Facebook was loaded with bumper sticker wisdom of the income as a function of respective helmets variety. There was paraise for Obama and even more scorn—and falsehood and smears and character assassination—for all who challenged him. David Axelrod Alinsky would have mounted a determined effort to spread lies about Mitt Romney's taxes, his felonious white collar crime, his misogyny, his murdering of an innocent woman using conventional methods. Facebook simply made his job easier.

You have to wonder if Jim Jones regrets that fatal glass of Kool-Aid. He was born in 1931 so he would been seventy seven when America officially became Jonestown. He would watch from the sidelines but I suspect he would watch with an approving eye. The man who wrote the book an the care and feeding of zombie followers would see his playbook put into action on a scale once thought impossible. If Jim Jones had Facebook, he might have been Barack Obama.

Sentiment Versus Reason

Since the dawn of man, the head and heart have been at war. The no-rules, feel good, go with the flow Eve persuaded Adam to perform the ultimate irrational action, to displease their Creator. Then again, one could say it was the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge—reason itself—that got the first couple in trouble. Had they contented themselves to live as their fellow animals forsaking knowledge itself, had sentiment defeated reason, we would all be living in The Garden of Eden.

Oy vey. A narrative so simple and yet, so complex. It beautifully illustrates the ongoing struggle between the yang of reason and the yin of sentiment. Pathos vs. logos. Aphrodite vs. Apollo. The poet vs. the engineer. Ultimately, sentiment points her warm, fluffy finger at reason who in turn points his cold, steely digit at his bubbly bride.

Sentiment usually gets the best of reason. Reason requires effort. It can be time consuming. Sentiment just seems to have a stronger grip on the rope most of the time.

In 1774, Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe published “The Sorrows of Young Werther,” a novel about a broken-hearted young man who ultimately terminates his life with a pistol. Vital statistics were not what they are today but it is widely believed that “Werther” set off a string of copycat suicides throughout Europe and the novel was banned in several countries.

Some scholars believe “Werther” laid the foundation for the later Romantic literary movement, a reaction to the strictures imposed by the Enlightenment. Just as Thinking comes out of the shadows, Feeling boots him squarely in his over-sized head.

There was an industrial revolution, scientific and technological advances, the institution of capitalism, representative democracy, cures for diseases. Reason was doing OK until someone invented a moving picture camera. Edison's toy could have been used to deliver academic lectures to Peoria. Of course, Peoria would rather watch Vivien Leigh get all fluttery over Clark Gable and get even fluttier over that Ashley dude. Sentiment was back in business!

Then came radio and the flowering of Madison Avenue. By the time television arrived on the scene, the ad men were quick to apply their skills to the tube. Fifty years later, they would play our hearts like Fischer played kingside pawns.

A quick note on bias, partisanship, unavoidable bias and universal bias. Journalists, like people, bring a set of biases to their work. Some biases are overt, others are cryptic, some others are sneaky and some are almost impossible to avoid. The most influential ism of our era might be simplism. Simplism does not simply mean simple, it means overly simple. Simple bordering on the ridiculous.

Newspapers, the forefathers of American journalism were always, to one degree or another, plagued by the burdens of simplism. Material costs limited space and forced editors to embrace the doctrine of simplism, either consciously or otherwise. Survival required short, snappy articles. Hence, newspapers kowtowed to sentiment at the expense of reason.

Editors often endorsed the prohibition of anything and everything because “No” could be expressed in fewer sentences than an exploration of unintended consequences, unintended costs, counterproductivity as well as the problems arising from the emergence of an imperial bureaucracy.

Newspapers reflexively advocated that governments should “Do something about______” because “Help” could be expressed in fewer sentences than an exploration of unintended consequences, unintended costs, counterproductivity as well as the problems arising from the emergence of an imperial bureaucracy.

Broadsides reflexively advocated for bureaucracy for bureaucracy sake because “Regulate” could be expressed in fewer sentences than an exploration of unintended consequences, unintended costs, counterproductivity as well as the problems arising from the emergence of an imperial bureaucracy.

Newspapers usually favored positions to which opposition required excessive verbiage. Simplism carries the day for sentiment. Radio and television took the doctrine of simplism to a higher level. The constraints of time are less yielding than the constraints of space. Often simplistic became always simplistic.

Reason was banned from broadcast studios. Through the lens of simplism it is easier to view the hardship of the spending cut than the hardship caused by the spending. Reason does not sit on the panels that discuss debts and deficits, the solvency of public pensions, the solvency of entitlements, or the value of our currency. We don't need no stinkin facts.

To the extent that reason is allowed the occasional chirp, simplism quickly drowns him out. Thus:

We hear more about “settled science” than we hear about objective analysis of climate data.

Millions of children grow up without fathers because of pathos-laden bromides advocating the financial support of single mothers.

Tens of millions of Americans face a lifetime of unemployment because the peddlers of conspicuous compassion jack the minimum wage thereby making it extremely difficult for unskilled people to find entry level jobs.

We have elevated tax rates far beyond the optimum rate of revenue enhancement because higher rates satisfy a childish fixation with “fairness.”

We endure mindless prattle about the evil one per cent by people who are in the 99^th percentile of income on a global basis.

We endure endless chatter about the one per cent of top earners from passionate fools who fail to mention that composition of the economic strata are constantly changing (except for those families who are locked into the culture of dependency for generation after generation.)

We continue to increase funding to public schools that fail to teach literacy, numeric competency, World History, American History, civics, scientific reasoning, rudimentary economics or anything else that might promote civilization but that do promote self esteem, self delusion, an appreciation for “social justice” and the celebration of all things politically correct. A generation emerges with hypertrophied hearts and contempt for truth.

This is an inexhaustible subject. Show me any topic and I will show you an argument being fought and won with slogan, sound bite and poster child. Reason be damned.

The triumphant sentiment rains her spoils on all of us. Self esteem has become the gold standard of pedagogy. Kids who can't add two numbers without a calculator are confident of their mathematical proficiency.

Handicapped kids are mainstreamed to make all of us feel good about inclusion as we neglect their special needs. We forbid dodgeball and ruin the joy of competition by pretending that no on keeps score. We have multiple valedictorians and we have zero valedictorians. We have trophies and awards for everyone including children who do not want and do not strive for trophies and awards. Everyone is a champion for fifteen minutes.

Unbridled sentiment does not always bring smiles. We have witnessed the rise of “offense culture.” Sports mascots offend the vocal and the verbose. So too, do Nativity scenes. And crosses. And portraying certain ethnic groups as criminals. And displaying beautiful women in any context is “objectification.” And describing dark-skinned residents of Caribbean Islands as “black” when they should be described as “African-American,” even though they are neither African nor American is now deemed as offensive. If you are not profoundly offended by something, you simply are not making the effort.

Jay Leno's “Jay Walking” wherein the talk show host takes to the street to ask common people questions like “Who fought World War II?” So rich is the field of ignorance that Jay Walking has inspired several imitators. Jesse Waters and Mark Dice will ask people why we celebrate the 4^th of July or what year the Declaration of Independence was signed. They sometimes go to pricey colleges to ask their questions. What is doubly discouraging is not just the usual wrong answer to simple question but also the pride so many of the queried display. They are content with their mental vapidity, smugly celebrating their post-fact existence as they cruise through life with uncluttered minds.

On the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator just under 60% of people surveyed are Feelers and the other 40% are Thinkers. Pop culture caters to majority tastes. In the realm of what has been labeled entertainment, sentiment does not just trounce reason, she spikes the ball in his end zone. Smart people are portrayed as socially awkward, morally challenged and always missing out on the folk wisdom that enriches the lives of simpletons.

“Hazel” taught us that maids know more about human nature than lawyers. “Columbo” taught us that smart people are evil. “Law and Order” continues the tradition of evil smart people but it also expands the scope of evil to include all rich white folk.

In movies and television children are wiser than adults. Woody and Carla are privy to a certain sagacity that escapes Lilith and Frasier. And let us never forget movements like Farm Aid where Sentiment rubs salt into Reason's wounds. Willie Nelson and John Mellencamp tug at our heartstrings to lobby for the expansion of corporate welfare and the further enrichment of our landed gentry. In your logical face!

Barack Obama makes voters feel even better about themselves. In their non-thinking, high-feeling cores, people formulated the belief that voting for “The One” would confirm the elector as an open-minded, caring and concerned individual and the country would be better for it. Did they have any concerns about Barack Obama's character, his mysterious past, his limited political experience, his limited work experience and his absence of any—as in zero. As in not even a paper route or a shift manager at McDonald's—executive experience?

No. Facts suck. Facts involve thinking and...what was that again? Just feel it, man. Just feel it. Just feel it.

Superficiality Over Substance

Usually one refers to style over substance but superficiality includes all things style related and it also includes those matters that are not of human invention. If one wishes to assign preferential treatment to physical characteristics, one is rewarding superficiality, not style.

We also note that some of what is being said here overlaps with Sentiment vs. Reason. The two struggles are neither synonymous nor mutually exclusive. Sentiment favors superficiality and reason favors substance—physical evidence, factual knowledge, rational discourse, and logic.

I was a small child, not sure what age, when I questioned the merits of celebrity endorsements. Sure, it made some sense that baseball players would endorse bats or gloves and Ted Williams, the consummate angler, would also promote fishing rods. But even then I was not willing to dismiss Zebco or Shakespeare or some off-brand lacking a high-priced shill. Way back when, I preferred left brained methods of persuasion.

Whereas I advocate for substance in matters of import, I am not so style deaf as to miss the advantages of securing the right product spokesman. Jon Hamm is the perfect Mercedes-Benz voice-over. After all, Jon Hamm IS Don Draper, television's version of Jay Gatsby in all of his mysterious elegance. Would the Mercedes stockholders be better served by a McCain supporter—Wilfred Brimley or Pat Boone or Chuck Norris? I think not. Jon Hamm is the perfect pitchman and if I were Don Draper I would probably support Barack Obama if only to keep up appearances.

It makes sense that Kim Kardashian is on a package of cosmetic items because she knows a thing or two about looking good. It makes sense that Jay-Z might endorse a telephone because he probably places a premium on audio resolution and technical reliability. And Adam Levine suffered and prevailed over the heartache of acne, so of course his imprimatur is well worth considering. But when hordes of celebrities endorse a political candidate based on the belief that he is metaphysically different from the rest of humanity and roughly one out of six adults are illiterate, we are on the fast track to Jonestown.

Many of us subscribe to a conspiracy of ignorance but we point our fingers at different culprits. George Carlin famously blamed capitalists who in his view had a vested interest in cultivating a stupid consumer base. I disagree.

American industry would love to have a strong native talent pool. Unfortunately, WalMart does not run our public schools. We know who runs the show and who has the vested interest in actively promoting ignorance. They reaped the benefits in 2008 and again in 2012.

Let me refer you to Wikipedia's Copyright Policy. Per their instructions I am providing the pertinent URLs. At any rate, I should be covered by fair use privilege as one cannot adequately discuss a snapshot without displaying the snapshot in question.

The usual caveats. Wikipedia is about ninety per cent accurate but we are not performing brain surgery. In this case it's a hurricane and I will leave it to the experts to name and categorize the storm. We don't require a meteorologist to recognize the direction of the turbulence. From Wikipedia's list of 2008 and 2012 Obama supporters, one glaring inclusion is Bob Dylan, whom we will discuss shortly. For our purposes the scale and scope of the discussion is served by Wikipedia with whatever details they might have flubbed.

Before we pass judgment on the Jonestown cheerleaders let us acknowledge that some Obama supporters might be acting in their own rational self interest. It might seem foolish (and reckless and counter to the very best of American principles) to attend a $35,000/head Obama fundraiser. To those who aspire to be one of the Beautiful People in all of that group's perks and benefits, to have one's name swirled in the crème de la crème of the overclass, it is a small price to pay.

Do remember that Barack Obama is an enduring fashion accessory. In a subculture that values pricey status symbols, there is no faster route up the social staircase than an endorsement of “The One.”

Some of the listed actors might have supported Barack Obama just to preserve their livelihood. This was crucial for NBC employees. General Electric, NBC's former parent company, had a long list for Santa Claus. They wanted to continue their lucrative defense contracts. They wanted to expand their wind turbine operations. They didn't want to pay no stinkin taxes and they wanted the Department of Justice to approve their sale of NBC Universal to Comcast.

That last favor was the big ticket item. Comcast would ultimately shell out in excess of $30 billion for NBC Universal. To curry favor with the Obama Administration, NBC blended politics into the entertainment mix. They committed all NBC news outlets to promoting a pro-Obama agenda. In so doing, they ramped up the partisanship at MSNBC to Pravda levels playing fast and loose with basic facts. For twenty four hours a day MSNBC would relentlessly attack Obama's enemies, his rivals, his critics and anyone who might slightly disagree with him. In the Obama era I can only remember one NBC journalist—Rick Santelli at CNBC—who broke ranks and he quickly toned it down.

$30 billion is a lot of clams and it was worth it to GE to promote a poorly-rated cable channel that would please the administration. You can bet NBC Entertainment got the memo. So let us not be too harsh on Lorne Michaels or Jimmy Fallon or Tina Fey for their subservience. Pimp Daddy Jeffrey Immelt ran a tight ship.

Wikipedia lists 54 entertainers—actors, actresses, musicians, screenwriters and directors—who endorsed John McCain in 2008. The same source lists 195 actors and actresses alone who endorsed Barack Obama. But what McCain lacked in quantity, he made up for with...no he didn't!

Let us examine the busload of McCain supporters.

wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_John_McCain_presidential_campaign_endorsements,_2008&gt;

Entertainers[edit]

María Conchita Alonso, actress[111]

Stephen Baldwin, actor[112]

Pat Boone, singer[113]

Powers Boothe, actor[114]

Wilford Brimley, actor[115]

Jerry Bruckheimer, producer[113]

James Caan, actor[113]

Dean Cain, actor[113]

Adam Carolla, comedian, television and radio host[116]

Lacey Chabert, actress[116]

Jon Cryer, actor[113]

Daddy Yankee (Ramon Ayala), musician[117][118]

Charlie Daniels, musician[119]

Robert Davi, actor[120]

Robert Duvall, actor[113]

Clint Eastwood, actor and director[121]

Erik Estrada, actor[122]

Joe Eszterhas, screenwriter[123]

Lou Ferrigno, actor and bodybuilder[124]

Kelsey Grammer, actor[125]

Lee Greenwood, musician, often performed "God Bless the USA" at McCain/Palin rallies[126]

Angie Harmon, actress[127]

Elisabeth Hasselbeck, co-host of The View[128]

Patricia Heaton, actress[113]

Victoria Jackson, comedian[129]

Lorenzo Lamas, actor[113]

Blackie Lawless, musician[130]

Gerald McRaney, actor[113]

Dennis Miller, comedian[131]

Heidi Montag, Hollywood figure[132]

Craig T. Nelson, actor[113]

George Newbern, actor[113]

Chuck Norris, actor[133]

Ted Nugent, hard rock guitarist[134]

Gail O'Grady, actress[113]

John Ondrasik, singer[135]

Joe Perry, guitarist for Aerosmith[136]

John Ratzenberger, actor[137]

John Rich, musician[138]

Shauna Sand, actress[139]

Tom Selleck, actor[140]

Gary Sinise, actor[113]

Kevin Sorbo, actor[113]

Sylvester Stallone, actor[141]

Connie Stevens, actress[142]

Rip Torn, actor[140]

Cowboy Troy, musician[143]

Janine Turner, actress and author[144]

Dick Van Patten, actor[145]

Jon Voight, actor[146]

Hank Williams, Jr. musician, often performed at McCain/Palin rallies[147]

Gretchen Wilson, musician, often performed at McCain/Palin rallies[126]

James Woods, actor[148]

David Zucker, director[116]

There is something to be said for getting Methuselah on one's side but when you outlive your audience, it might limit your political clout. Wilford Brimley played a geezer in the 1980's and there was a time when he could have mustered the Depends crowd. So too, there was a time when he could have parlayed his status as pitchman for Liberty Medical to deliver the brittle diabetic vote but that was eons ago and I am afraid the sun might have set on Wilford's power base.

Of course, McCain got Pat Boone's endorsement. That's got to be five or six votes right there. And Rip Torn, probably twice that number. Dick Van Patten? Eight is close enough. And of course Chuck Norris fought gallantly to capture the dimwit bloc, but Obama's stranglehold was much too strong.

Now let us turn our attention to the throngs of celebrity who endorsed Barack Obama in 2008. The 195 actors and actresses, the 20 comedians, the 24 directors, the 142 bands and recording artists as well as TV and radio figures, ladies and gentlemen your 2008 Obama Celebrities!!!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Barack_Obama_presidential_campaign_endorsements,_2008&gt;

Entertainers and Artists[edit]

Actors and actresses[edit]

Ben Affleck

Shohreh Aghdashloo[536]

Jessica Alba[537]

Jennifer Aniston[538]

David Arquette[539]

Penn Badgley[540]

Alec Baldwin[541]

Eric Balfour[542]

Antonio Banderas[543]

Elizabeth Banks[544]

Drew Barrymore[545]

Jason Bateman

Jennifer Beals[546]

Noah Bean[547]

Kristen Bell[548]

Maria Bello[493]

Annette Bening[549]

Halle Berry[550][551]

Jessica Biel[552]

Jack Black[553]

Matthew Broderick[554]

Adam Brody[555]

Josh Brolin[544][556]

Pierce Brosnan[404]

Ellen Burstyn[366]

Sophia Bush[557]

Nick Cannon[558]

Justin Chambers[559]

Don Cheadle[560]

Kristin Chenoweth[561]

John Cleese[562]

George Clooney[563]

James Corden[564]

Bill Cosby[565]

Kevin Costner[566]

Courteney Cox-Arquette[539]

Daniel Craig[567]

Cindy Crawford[568]

Chris Crocker[569]

James Cromwell[570]

Alan Cumming[571]

Jamie Lee Curtis[404]

Tim Daly[572]

Matt Damon[573][574]

Ted Danson[575]

Larry David[576]

Rosario Dawson[577]

Laura Dern[578]

Robert De Niro[579]

Zooey Deschanel[580]

Danny DeVito[581]

Cameron Diaz[539]

Leonardo DiCaprio

Taye Diggs[552]

Fran Drescher[582]

Kirsten Dunst[583][584]

Megalyn Echikunwoke[585]

Aaron Eckhart[539]

Idris Elba[586]

Tracee Ellis Ross[587]

Isla Fisher[588]

Kate Flannery[589]

Jodie Foster[404]

Jamie Foxx[590]

Brendan Fraser[591]

Morgan Freeman[592]

Anna Friel[560]

Jennifer Garner[593]

Danny Glover[594]

Joseph Gordon-Levitt[595]

Topher Grace[549]

Bryan Greenberg[592]

Andre Gregory[366]

Adrian Grenier[596]

Andy Griffith[597]

Melanie Griffith[598]

Jasmine Guy[587]

Luis Guzmán[599]

Maggie Gyllenhaal

Mark Hamill[600]

Josh Hamilton[601]

Tom Hanks[602]

Hill Harper[603]

Valerie Harper[604]

Ed Harris

Anne Hathaway[577]

Dennis Haysbert[536]

Dulé Hill[605]

Gary Holt [606][unreliable source?]

Dennis Hopper[607]

Kelly Hu[608]

Jennifer Hudson[609]

Kate Hudson[610]

Josh Hutcherson[611]

Samuel L. Jackson[542][612]

Scarlett Johansson[613]

Angelina Jolie[614]

Rashida Jones[549]

Ashley Judd[615][616]

Brendan Kay[536]

Daniel Dae Kim[187]

Regina King[617]

Christopher Knight[618]

Michael Kostroff[619]

Ashton Kutcher[620]

Ken Leung[621]

Lucy Liu[536]

Blake Lively[540]

Lindsay Lohan[622]

Nia Long[623]

Eva Longoria[624][625]

George Lopez[626]

Julia Louis-Dreyfus[627]

Josh Lucas[549]

Tobey Maguire[578]

James Marsters[628]

Rue McClanahan[629]

Anne Meara[581]

Alyssa Milano[630]

Demi Moore[631]

Julianne Moore[632]

Benjamin McKenzie[626]

Enrique Murciano[542]

Eddie Murphy[633]

Mike Ness[634]

Thandie Newton[544]

Cynthia Nixon[635]

Amaury Nolasco[636]

Edward Norton[573]

Ed O'Neill[637]

Al Pacino

Gwyneth Paltrow[638]

Hayden Panettiere[639][640]

Sarah Jessica Parker[641]

Bill Paxton[642]

Mario Van Peebles[582]

Amanda Peet[643]

Kal Penn[585][644]

Sean Penn[645]

Harold Perrineau, Jr.[542]

Ryan Phillippe[646]

Chris Pine[647]

Jada Pinkett Smith[648]

Brad Pitt[649]

Jeremy Piven[650]

Sidney Poitier[651]

Ellen Pompeo[652][653]

Natalie Portman[654]

Jaime Pressly[539]

Dennis Quaid[568]

Queen Latifah[655]

Zachary Quinto[605]

Carl Reiner[604]

Ryan Reynolds[552]

Nicole Richie[656]

Chris Rock[657]

Adam Rodriguez[658]

Brandon Routh[659]

Paul Rudd[660]

Susan Sarandon[375]

Richard Schiff[661]

Johnathon Schaech[542]

Martin Sheen[662]

Alicia Silverstone[663]

Will Smith[648][664]

Phil Spector[665]

Lexington Steele[666]

Mary Steenburgen[667]

Ben Stiller[538]

Jerry Stiller[604]

Meryl Streep[668]

Rider Strong[669]

Donald Sutherland[670]

Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa[187]

Charlize Theron[671]

Marisa Tomei[539]

Chris Tucker[672]

Kathleen Turner[673]

Wilmer Valderrama[577]

Amber Valletta[658]

Kate Walsh[674]

Denzel Washington[675]

Isaiah Washington[582]

Kerry Washington[672]

Wil Wheaton[676]

Bradley Whitford[677]

James Whitmore[644]

Forest Whitaker[678][679]

Olivia Wilde[585][680]

Gene Wilder

Debra Winger

Henry Winkler[681]

Alfre Woodard[587]

Daniel Wu[682]

Renée Zellweger[683]

Comedians[edit]

Aziz Ansari[684]

Russell Brand[685]

Margaret Cho[686]

Will Ferrell[404]

Larry Gelbart[581]

Kathy Griffin[536]

Chelsea Handler[687]

Steve Harvey

John Leguizamo[626]

Richard Lewis[688]

Bill Maher[689]

Tracy Morgan[690]

Lorne Michaels[691]

Eugene Mirman[684]

Sarah Silverman[404]

Hal Sparks[692]

Stella (Michael Ian Black, Michael Showalter, David Wain)[660]

Wanda Sykes[693]

Lizz Winstead, co-creator of The Daily Show[601]

Jon Stewart, host of The Daily Show[601]

Directors[edit]

J. J. Abrams[694]

Lexi Alexander[695]

Woody Allen[543]

David Benioff[643]

Ken Burns[696][697]

Eric Byler[698]

Jesse Dylan[699]

William Friedkin[366]

Todd Haynes[366]

Ron Howard[404]

Callie Khouri[700]

Spike Lee[701]

George Lucas[577][702]

David Lynch[703]

James Mangold[366]

Garry Marshall[604]

Michael Moore[704][705]

Rob Reiner[568]

John Sayles[366]

M. Night Shyamalan[706]

Steven Spielberg[404]

Oliver Stone[544]

Quentin Tarantino[549]

Boaz Yakin[581]

Models[edit]

Christie Brinkley[707]

Adrianne Curry[618]

Heidi Klum[708]

Musicians[edit]

50 Cent[709]

Arcade Fire[710]

Burt Bacharach[711]

Beastie Boys[712]

Billie Joe Armstrong[713]

Big Kenny[714]

Andrew Bird[715]

Biz Markie[536]

The Black Keys[712]

Black Thought of The Roots[716]

The Breeders[712]

Carrie Brownstein, guitarist for Sleater-Kinney[717]

Melanie Brown[536]

Jackson Browne

Jimmy Buffett[718]

Win Butler[719]

Nick Cannon[658]

Mariah Carey[720]

Chris Carrabba[721]

Clap Your Hands Say Yeah[580]

Kelly Clarkson[722]

Cold War Kids[580]

Natalie Cole[723]

Common[724]

Sean Combs[725]

Harry Connick, Jr.[568]

David Crosby[713]

Sheryl Crow[726][727]

The Decemberists[728]

Tom DeLonge[729]

Devo[712]

Dianogah[715]

Celine Dion[730]

DJ Z-Trip[731]

Bob Dylan[732]

Eminem[733]

Melissa Etheridge[734]

Donald Fagen (Steely Dan)

Fergie[577]

The Fiery Furnaces[601]

Flea of the Red Hot Chili Peppers[735]

John Flansburgh of They Might Be Giants[736]

David Foster[568]

Jay Jay French, guitarist for Twisted Sister[737]

Ben Harper[578]

Ben Gibbard of Death Cab for Cutie[738]

Goo Goo Dolls[644]

Kim Gordon[739]

Macy Gray[740]

Merle Haggard[741]

Mickey Hart, Phil Lesh and Bob Weir of the Grateful Dead (Deadheads for Obama)[742]

Herbie Hancock[658]

Faith Hill[743]

Jennifer Hudson[609]

Jim James of My Morning Jacket[744]

Jay Red Eagle[745]

Jay-Z[701]

Young Jeezy

Stephan Jenkins[746]

Jin[747]

Billy Joel[748]

Alicia Keys[725]

Carole King[749]

Beyoncé Knowles[701]

Glenn Kotche of Wilco[750]

Ed Kowalczyk[658]

Leo Kremer[746]

Kris Kristofferson[751]

Amel Larrieux[752]

Cyndi Lauper[753]

Annie Lennox[754]

Les Savy Fav[601]

Jenny Lewis[580]

John Legend[755]

Adam Levine of Maroon 5[756]

Ludacris[757]

Joel Madden of Good Charlotte[656]

Chris Martin of Coldplay[758]

Dave Matthews[746]

Master P[747]

Michael McDonald[577]

Tim McGraw[759]

Katharine McPhee

John Mellencamp[713]

Mos Def[760]

Nada Surf[580]

Nas[761]

Graham Nash[712]

Immortal Technique

The National[712]

Willie Nelson

Joanna Newsom[366]

Ne-Yo[644]

No Age[762]

OK Go[763]

Conor Oberst[764]

Don Omar[765]

Pearl Jam[766]

Peter, Paul, and Mary

Q-Tip[767]

Questlove of The Roots[716]

R.E.M.[768]

Bonnie Raitt

Johnathan Rice[580]

Rise Against

Samantha Ronson[622]

Rhymefest[769]

Nile Rodgers[366]

Pat Sansone of Wilco[750]

Tom Scholz, guitarist of Boston[770]

Patti Scialfa[771]

Seal[568]

Shakira[772]

Shudder to Think[763]

Silversun Pickups[580]

Russell Simmons[773]

Ashlee Simpson[539]

Patti Smith[774]

Jill Sobule[746]

Regina Spektor[775]

Bruce Springsteen[776][777]

Mavis Staples[778]

Michael Stipe[779]

Barbra Streisand[404][780]

Taboo[626]

James Taylor[781]

Tenacious D (Jack Black and Kyle Gass)[553]

Justin Timberlake[782][783]

TV on the Radio[784]

Jeff Tweedy of Wilco[764]

Andres Useche[785]

Usher[786]

Vampire Weekend[712]

Chris Walla of Death Cab for Cutie[713]

Tegan and Sara[787]

Joan Wasser[763]

Rufus Wainwright[549]

Roger Waters[788]

Pete Wentz[789][790]

will.i.am[658]

Pharell Williams[426]

Stevie Wonder[791]

Television & radio personalities[edit]

Perez Hilton[792]

Star Jones[577]

Kim Kardashian[793]

Yul Kwon[794]

Lisa Ling[795]

Judith Sheindlin[796]

Michael Smerconish[797]

Howard Stern[798]

Emme Tomingbang[187]

Oprah Winfrey[799]

Hold the applause for a second. Wiki lists Bob Dylan as an Obama supporter in 2008 and again in 2012.! Wrong! Besmirch someone else's artistic integrity, if you must. Bob's idiot son, Jesse, endorsed Obama but Bob is apolitical on principle. The last protest he attended was when Martin Luther King delivered his infamous "I Have A Dream " speech in 1963. Bob sat out all of the Vietnam protests and all the orther civil rights marches ("Equality, I spoke their word as if a wedding vowwowwow") and he even sat out the no-nukes fad.

Jimmy Carter called Bob Dylan his friend but he never gort his endorsement. In an interview that went absolutely weird, a "Rolling Stone" hack badgered and harrassed the songwriter in an effort to muscle an endorsement for Barack Hussein Obama. Bob refused.

The interrogator pressed onward. He called Obama's opponents racist—that is why they don't like Obama—and all but demanded Bob's sanction. Bob Dylan, an artist of supreme integrity, refused.

I can still listen to Bob, especially "Blonde on Blonde" and "Blood on The Tracks." (If you are into Dark Side of The Rainbow, synchronicity, try syncing up "Idiot Wind" to the muted videos of "We Are The Ones" and "I Pledge Allegiance To Obama" played back to back.) Bruce Springsteen is another matter.

Bruce, you don't owe me a thing. Nill. Nada. Zero. Zilch. But Barry Soetoro?

One soft infested summer

Me and Barry became friends

Trying in vain to breathe

The fire we born in

But don't you have some obligation to me, to...to...to maintain some standards? Some standards, Bruce?

Laying here in the dark

You're like an angel on my chest

Just another tramp of hearts

Crying tears of faithlessness

OK, rub salt in my wounds. But we had memories, Bruce. Memories that no one could spoil. No one. No one but you.

Hiding on the backstreets

Hiding on the backstreets...

Backstreets my ass! You were jetting around Air Force 1 with your phony ass charlatan. Rub it in my face! You don't see any irony that the guy who gave us “Blinded By The Light,” a masterpiece that perfectly encapsulated the religious cult phenomenon, would fall for the sleaziest, cheesiest cult leader in the history of Planet Earth?

Barry let me in, I wanna be your friend

I want to guard your dreams and visions

I forgave you for everything you did since “Nebraska.” Everything! You could have left me with the memories. Just “Kitty's Back” and “Spirits In The Night.” You had to ruin them too?

One soft infested summer

Me and Barry became friends...

SHUT UP!!!

Oh look! Wilco is here! Real artists with real integrity whoring out to the biggest corporate whore America has ever produced.

Goldman Sachs (donated $1,013,091)

JP Morgan Chase ($847,895)

Google Inc. ($814,540)

Microsoft Corporation ($852,164)

General Electric ($529,855)

Wilco did fundraisers for Obama. Why not cut just rattle the cup for Goldman Sachs? It's all going to the same place anyway.

<JP Morgan is cited at opensecrets.org. Others are also listed at thenewamerican.com>

Not that I have anything against corporate whores or corporations or “corporatism, “ but now that we are here in the land of the corporate bashers I would like to point out that when you hire the services of Lefty Celebrity, you usually hire the services of the corporation that is Lefty Celebrity. Just a little side bar. Let's get back to the Beautiful People who brought us to Jonestown.

Looking back on my life, I came to realize that both the friends I chose and the public figures I admired had one thing in common: They all had active bullshit detectors. My friends did not grow up to become Hare Krishnas or Moonies or LaRouchians. My friends have usually been the antithesis of the Obama worshipper.

I learned to read by reading “Mad” and that exercise nurtured a certain skeptisicm. I would later expand my cultural horizons to include “National Lampoon” and P. J. O'Rourke remains a hero. He always seems to recharge his BS detector.

Howard Stern led a vigilante movement against all things phony. You were my hero, Howard. You ran away from the genius label but that term fit you perfectly. Geniuses are not necessarily clever, they are honest. You slammed every show biz convention. If the publicist told you, “Don't ask them if they're gay,” you started the interview with, “So are you guys gay, or what?'

You Howard, exposed the humorlessness of humorous people. Remember Chevy Chase's ongoing bout with PMS? Remember the time his wife got on the phone and Chevy screamed for her to hang up but she kept on talking? Didn't MTV ban you for life? Remember when you took over “The Tonight Show” and NBC refused to air the segment?

Remember Stuttering John interviewing Walter Cronkite and remember when he got tossed out of The Ebony Awards at the request of David Bowie and when he got punched by Sharon Stone's bodyguard? Remember when Captain Janks pledged a half million dollars to the CP Telethon in Kathy Lee Gifford's name? He didn't even sound like a woman and they swallowed the bait!

It was you against the world with tiny people like me cheering you on. But when the biggest bullshit artist in history arrived on the scene, you drank the Kool-Aid. Et tu, Howard?

When the chips were down, you sold out. You are just one more Jay Conan Imus. I will not follow you to satellite. Fortunately, your greatest hits are still on YouTube.

And you, Dave. Wiki did not list you as an Obamacist but you were in the tank for him all the way. Giant sigh. Conan and Kimmel and Fallon will never know what it was like to be David Letterman in the 80's. For that matter, Jay Leno with all of his fabulous ratings will never have the rabid following you had back then.

I know of someone who landed a job because he was a Letterman fan. You were a conversation starter. “Did you see Stupid Pet Tricks where that dog...” “Did you see Stupid Human Tricks where that guy...” ”Did you see fish cleaning night?” Yours was the only cult I ever joined.

You were fearless. Remember when you disrupted Jane Pauley's interview with a bullhorn? Remember when you pointed your cameras on the NBC studio while the anchorman read the news? Remember your feud with Bryant Gumbel?

Your bullshit detector was spot on. If a guest sucked, you let them know it. If they were plugging a silly movie or TV show, you let them know how you felt about it, even when the show aired on NBC. No bullshit got past Dave.

In 2008, the biggest con artist in history arrived on the scene and David Letterman counted his money. You would be in good company. There would be no levity in Jonestown.

The one person who actually called Barack Hussein Obama on his bullshit was Sarah Palin. Sarah Palin vintage 2008 was the closest thing alive to Letterman vintage 1985. And of course, you loyally trashed Palin and her family. It's sad when a comedian loses his courage. Welcome to Jonestown, Dave.

I go way back with you, Bill Maher. I can remember when you were funny. I remember when “Politically Incorrect” was just that. You would confront any and all purveyors of bullshit, be it a sloganeering conservative or an angry feminist. Your humor was premised on brutal honesty.

Somewhere along the line, “Politically Incorrect” became the most politically correct show on television. And you sang from the Hollywood hymnal. You grew wealthy and angry and you spent all of your time telling Americans just how stupid they all happened to be.

Then Barack Hussein Obama arrived on the scene and you described him as a really, really, really really (was it 3 reallys or 4 reallys?) smart guy. Based on what, we will never find out. But your loyalty would never waver and you tirelessly berated his critics. You even pledged one million dollars to Obama's 2012 campaign.

It's your money and your Kool-Aid and you have secured a comfortable place in Jonestown, Bill. Bill Maher, the social critic too intellectual for religion jumps head first into the world's hottest religious cult. I wish the funny man would return.

Artists are supposed to have superior insight into the human condition. But if an artist falls for cheap propaganda, if he blindly follows someone he knows nothing about, if he believes a politician is divine because he has a halo photoshopped around his head, does he really possess insight? Is he really an artist?

I will always love “Pulp Fiction” and “Kill Bill” and “Reservoir Dogs” were enjoyable but I doubt if I will ever see any Tarantino movies after 2008. If he was duped by Mr. Hope and Change, the bloom is off the rose. There will be films in Jonestown but I won't be in the cinema. My love for movies fades to black. To quote another Obamacist, Jackson Browne:

When you see through love's illusions there lies the danger

When your perfect lover just looks like a perfect fool

Hollywood was my perfect lover but the popcorn will never taste the same. Oh well. “Star Wars VII” will do fine without me.

There is a corollary of Thorstein Veblen's conspicuous consumption streaming through Jonestown. We can call it conspicuous immunity. That is, one can advertise their success by showing indifference to trivialities like the costs of housing or education or health care. You got a house and you don't need no stinking degrees and you will always have access to the best doctors no matter what plan might be inflicted on the little people.

Conspicuous immunity can be expressed by indifference to fuel costs. We don't need a stinkin pipeline. We don't need no drilling. “My other car is a Prius.” Let them fly coach.

You need not concern yourself with how deficits endanger the stability of public pensions, You are in a bulletproof industry so who needs a vibrant economy? You have a few dollars in the bank. Why show concern for prosperity? So declasse.

You need not worry about the value of the dollar if you have diversified overseas. Who cares about rising food prices? Let them eat tofu. You can afford to support a politician who shares your indifference.

Among these highly successful artists are many who concern themselves more with relatitve wealth than absolute wealth. It is not enough that they win, others must lose. Why aspire to a lifestyle of the rich and famous if the middle class can match their opulence? The Uglies have to be put in their place.

There is a rivalry between the prosperous and those who yearn to prosper. Hollywood honors the Warren Buffett Doctrine that those who have ascended the ladder should saw off the rungs beneath them. Hollywood loves Barack Obama. Nothing says “I got mine but I will share my middle finger with you,” like a public allegiance to Barack Obama.

Not all Obama supporters are posers but all posers are Obama supporters. What a lovely assortment of dedicated Obamacists, the compulsively stylish, the socially mobile, the seekers of status. There are a few surprises listed above.

Devo? Did “Freedom of Choice” mean nothing?

Eminem? You mean Marshall acknowledged the existence of another human being who was not all mean to him? That might be Barack Obama's most amazing achievement.

Looks like Cindy Crawford is the only celebrity who was pro-Obama in 2008 and pro-Romney in 2012. Cindy has a brain and a conscience to go along with her other attributes.

Kelly Clarkson? Oh why single her out for her lack of depth? Shallow and superficial describes every Obama supporter. At least you are not shallow by choice, Kelly.

Justin Timberlake? Shedding that boy band image. JT, down for the struggle.

Adam Levine? The vapid salutes the vacuous.

Ben Affleck? Hate to break it to you, dude, but you'll never be half as smug as Matt Damon. But keep doing those Obama fundraisers and you will successfully cultivate a sense of superiority. You just have to believe in yourself and your own native arrogance.

Larry David? Did you know he owns a Prius? Hope your worship of Obama goes better than your allegiance to Al Gore. Did you know Larry owns a Prius?

Leonardo DiCaprio? Someday the Beautiful People will let you in their clubhouse, man. Keep jetting around the world screaming about carbon outputs and they will come to love you. You just have to be a little bit superficial, man.

Robert Deniro? We got it, man. You are better than us. Don't hit us with your wallet, Bobby!

Jamie Foxx? A sincere Obamacist. “...our lord and savior, Barack Obama.”

Jimmie Fallon? Really? You work for NBC and you support Obama? You sure hid that one!

Kevin Bacon? Oh man! We thought you were one of the people. Hope the caviar tastes good.

Jeff Bridges? Oh man! You seem so genuine. I guess you really are a great actor.

Brian Cranston? Oh man! You don't come across as a poser and you seem too smart to fall for the corny stagecraft. You too are a great actor.

Matt Damon? This should surprise no one. You are Good Will Hunting and Good Will Hunting is Hollywood. Matt Will Hollywood is not just smarter than everyone else, he is infinitely smarter than everyone else. And he is smarter in all areas and all categories. He not only solves the insolvable math problem, he crushes the pesky grad student in a barroom debate and tells the NSA to stick it (so unlike your deity, Barack Obama, who used the NSA to spy on all of us) because he is too shrewd to be fooled by their trickery.

With smarts, comes anger. Seething, frothing rage at the frustrations of being so damn clever in a stupid world. Who can get past your hostility? Not a minister or a scholar or a professor. Matt Will Hollywood is too brilliant for them. A therapist, someone who wants to talk about Matt and nothing but Matt, pierces his armor.

“Good Will Hunting” was a portent of the rise of Barack Obama with Bill Ayers subbing for Robin Williams in real life. Some of us will think of “Team America: World Police” when your name is brought up but the Beautiful People will always love Matt Will Hollywood. I could see where you, and Hollywood as well, could see a lot of yourself in Barack Obama.

Obama added even more star power in 2012 as Mitt Romney picked up the Osmonds and Kid Rock and Vanilla Ice as well as the surviving Republicans who supported McCain in 2008. Superficiality would carry the day once more in 2012. America in the Obama Era is England in the 60's 70's and 80's. Greatness had been fleeing Great Britain and she would eventually lose out on shipbuilding, aircraft, automobiles and other manufacturing. But through the fog, England had become Style Central and the world could not get enough.

Yes, there was a surplus of supreme musical talent that still boggles the mind. The Beatles are still the only band I know of whose every member could sing lead, play instruments and write songs. A producer could toss out Lennon and McCartney, add a decent bass player and come up with a group as good and as commercial as say, the Hollies.

And there would be Clapton and Townsend and Page and Waters taking an American art form and making it distinctly British. For all of those heavyweights there was also a steady stream of Dave Clarks and Vicious Sids and Boys George. The world's thirst was unquenchable.

Beatle cuts and mod clothing and punk style and new wave fashion spread globally. Ostentatiously British novels like R. F. Delderfield's “God Is An Englishman,” The “Flashman” series, works by Dick Francis and Barbara Cartland sold well wherever the Queen's language was spoken. British cigarettes and knick knacks sold well, especially in the former colonies. If you needed a logo, the Union Jack worked just about everywhere it was used. British television series were a major export and the success of the over the top Britisher-than-thou, “Chariots of Fire” left a lot of marketing people scratching their heads.

Fast forward to the Obama Era and America is the trendsetting hot bed. Yes, the Brits still have Adelle and Harry Potter and Cute Royals and they can always find one more Susan Boyle but America is the epicenter of style. Hip hop rules. No Led Zep or Stones have emerged to reshape it in a distinctly Anglo style. Gangster, yoyo, rap and hip pop have all spawned imitation from Korea to Brazil but the field is still largely an American phenomenon.

For a multitude of reasons, America has lost industry and commerce to the BRIC nations (Brazil, Russia, India, China.) Technological innovation is slipping away. The Internet is being hijacked in broad daylight. But we still have movies and television and pop music. America has style.

We have gotten good at style because we work really hard at it. A more superficial culture has never existed. American public schools might be deficient in things like literacy, numerical proficiency, geography, the life sciences, chemistry, physics, economics, history, philosophy, etc., but they are mini-Spartas of style. From American public schools will spring the next Tommy Hilfiger, the next Gwen Stefani, the next Eminem and the next Dr. Dre. American hard science and engineering and math programs will be dominated by foreign students at the graduate level but those students will look to the mavens of superficiality for guidance.

American youth culture is no longer marked by the gulf between the cool and the uncool. Now we have the stylish and the hyper-stylish and the hyper-hyper-styilsh. From the christening with an aerosol first name to their very first tattoo, every Troy and Madison will run a gauntlet of trends. Feelings will get hurt but style will be better for the pain.

I used to wonder why people of means, people who could afford to provide a quality education for their children, chose to send their children to an American public school. What I learned is that Americans send their children to public schools in the same spirit that past generations sent their kids to military academies or competitive prep schools. Yes, they will be challenged constantly and the going might get tough but they will graduate with a sophisticated sense of style. Little Harper will not be outtrended by anyone, nosiree.

It is not just style of dress or demeanor that is acquired. Sure, the graduate should appreciate tasteful hip hop and resplendent tattoos but they should also be provided with style of thought, whatever that might happen to be. If social justice, economic justice, climate disruption, advanced sensitivity and creative grievance are the flavors of the day, little Justin's loving parents will make sure their gifted son keeps pace with the other students.

One might think that any number of books or government studies or newspaper articles or TV news reports might do for American education what “The Jungle” did for sausage. Nope. Journalists from Walter Cronkite to John Stossel serve up documentaries that remind us just how absurdly deficient our schools have become. Their cultural impact is negligible at best.

There is much to say about the decline of American education but people are largely indifferent. If you can read just one book on the subject I recommend Martin L. Gross's “The Conspiracy of Ignorance” I hereby nominate Gross as the inaugural recipient of the Upton Sinclair Award.

Gross explains how education went off the tracks and what we can do about it. I will skip most of that. Let's get right to the carnage.

Gross recounts a math contest where American students finished last among seven countries but first in self esteem and math confidence.

In 1998 American 12^th graders finished 19 out 21 countries in math proficiency.

David Kearns, former CEO of XEROX, estimated that shortcomings of American education cost US industry $50 billion/year.

Back in the nineties, two of three American seventeen year olds, did not know the meaning of The Emancipation Proclamation. About half recognized Patrick Henry's “Give me liberty or give me death.” The same students were unfamiliar with things like The War of 1812, the Marshall Plan or the Great Society. Only 1 in 8 were judged 'adequate” in Analytical Writing and most could not identify Southeast Asia on a map.

Gross piles on. Throughout the 90's Americans scored poorly on standardized tests against foreign students. About half of American 17 year olds tested at junior high levels on math skills. 78 per cent of colleges offer remedial reading and about 29 per cent of college freshmen take a remedial class in college.

Historical knowledge is abysmal. Factual knowledge is itself often dismissed as rote learning.

40 Million Americans are illiterate. 1 in 7 college graduates is illiterate.

We are more concerned with the whats than the hows but it should be noted that things have probably gotten worse since the book was written in 1998. Educational achievement is inversely correlated with educational spending and spending continues to rise. Unbridled flattery is alive and well in the form of “gifted” programs, advanced placement programs, grade inflation and self esteem exercises. An overwhelming number of students perform “above average” even though that is mathematically impossible.

We mentioned Mark Dice and Jesse Watters and Jay Walking. That's the tip of the iceberg. A British TV show asks Americans to name a country that begins with “U.” Bzzz. They ask Americans how many sides a traingle has. Bzzz. Where was the Berlin Wall? Bzzz.

What starts as a bounty of chuckles soon grows depressing. The aforementioned Howard Stern sent out correspondents to interview Obama supporters prior to the 2012 election, repeating a theater of the absurd standby from 2008. Two years after Bin Laden was killed very few, if any, of the Obama supporters were aware that Bin Laden was dead. “Do you think Obama will eventually find and kill Bin Laden?” “Yes” was close to unanimous.

“Do you dislike Romney because he is pro-choice? Because he's a Moslem? Because he's black?”

“Do you think Obama made a good choice selecting Paul Ryan as his running mate? Do you think he picked Ryan because he is African-American or because he is qualified.?” Even the ever-irreverent guy who laughs at Captain Janks pranking newspeople in the aftermath of a plane crash stopped laughing and in a rare moment of exasperation he stated. “This is crazy.”

In 2008 John Ziegler asked Obama supporters a series of questions about Obama, Biden, McCain and Palin. Their ignorance was predictable, especially on questions related to Obama. To show that he had not cherry picked his subjects, Ziegler hired Democratic pollster, Zogby International to conduct a poll of Obama supporters. To say they were ignorant is an understatement.

Ziegler tried to get Zogby to conduct a comparable poll of McCain supporters but John Zogby refused. He had experienced serious blowback from the first poll on leftist blogs and was apparently concerned that he might lose the patronage of key Democrats. Had McCain supporters been queried I don't think the results would have surprised anyone nor do I think they would have influenced future elections. Substance no longer affects presidential elections.

One point bears reiteration. In all the YouTube parade of idiots there is rarely, if ever, any shame displayed by the ignorant. This is especially true of Obamacists. They live in a post-factual world. Their choices are based on superficialities and superficialities alone. The only truth in Jonestown is what their leader declares truthful. That is the fundamental change to America Barack Obama promised.