by Dr. Miklos K. Radvanyi
Like the supernatural firebird of ancient civilizations, Barack Hussein Obama, an obscure state senator from Illinois, burst into the troubled firmament of American politics in 2004 with the message of national rebirth and renewal. In practice, however, having been elected in the same year a United States Senator, he distinguished himself as a lazy and intellectually nondescript legislator.
Meanwhile, the long-running two wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, the looming decline in the United States’ fiscal and economic situation and the perceived passivity of the Bush administration in 2007 and 2008, galvanized the opposition against the alleged mismanagement of the nation’s domestic and international affairs by the Republican Party. The majority of Americans wanted change. The echoing of these sentiments, coupled with the promise of an easy redemption for the entire nation from a deepening crisis, unexpectedly propelled then Senator Obama to the presidency in November 2008.
At the beginning of his presidency Obama enjoyed huge amounts of domestic and international goodwill. His rhetorical sound bites about unity at home and global consensus abroad appeared to turn wishful thinking into achievable realities. Yet, the boundless enthusiasm of the past was quickly replaced by the many disappointments over the idiotic imitations of ill-conceived political myths of European and African socialism. Thus – revolutionary transformation, dislike of the free market, absolute faith in the government as a guarantor of social justice, disdain for the United States’ status as the strongest power, and a passion bordering on hatred toward the rule of law – led to extreme contradictions between his promulgated ideas and his convoluted beliefs. Indeed, Obama’s first term is already ended in terrific disillusionment for his erstwhile supporters and in monumental failure for the resurrected policies of the 19th and 20th centuries.
Today, just weeks before the elections, Obama, his campaign staff and a disgracefully supportive media are back in full force and reenacting their 2008 strategy. They all scream in unison that if they were given four more years they would perform miracles. In reality, Obama’s much touted sympathy for the poor and the middle-class, and his class-based view of the United States and the world have nothing to do with social justice. His argument that wealth is immoral and, therefore, needs to be taken away from those who accumulated it, is directed against individual liberty and institutional democracy. For this reason, Obama’s policies designed to empower the have-nots and the middle class have resulted in bloated government, stifling bureaucracy, subservient judiciary, shameless political patronage and corrupt economy.
Moreover, the political concept of wealth redistribution has created a caudillo-like chief executive. Now, Obama demands what he already requested in 2008 from the sovereign people, namely, absolute powers in lieu of preventing total national disaster. Again, the so-called cultural war between those who would like to put the sovereign people in chains and their opponents, who defend democracy, is paralyzing American society. The profound dissatisfaction with the current state of affairs in the United States will only change when Obama’s hypocrisy is unmasked as a dangerous fairly tale absolutely devoid of reality.
The fundamental tenet of Obama’s political philosophy is a comprehensive challenge to common sense: reality has no real existence. Consequently, the political principles of the constitution, the fundamentals of the economy, the moral imperatives of human existence are all relative and ephemeral. Ideas, such as intellectual liberty, economic freedom, individual responsibility, are illusions promoted by the powerful and the rich to prevent the vast majority of the people from reaching a state of perfect happiness. Poverty, crime, societal discontent, wars are all born of those illusions. Indeed, the existing laws of societies and nations are based on unreality. Therefore, the rules of the present are not the rules of the future. For this reason, they must be changed. According to Obama, there is only one solution to end the misery of this unreal democracy, this false narrative of freedom: to replace the reality of human existence with the utopia of universal peace, all-encompassing brotherhood and perfect economic equality.
The reality is that Obama is playing with fire in order to accomplish his unworkable goals, without realizing that in this process he is destroying himself, his party, the country and the world. His fairy tale world is nothing but a gigantic hoax. In it, he plays the omnipotent hero, who is sure of himself, when he appears and pontificates in a controlled environment. In this fairy tale, he is supported by the clear-sighted segment of the intelligentsia, the forward-looking part of the media and a fictional majority of the people. Opposite to Obama, there are the dark forces of reaction, full of malice and hatred toward the champion of universal perfection. Naturally, this group includes everybody who refuses the march in lockstep with the hero and his sycophantic followers. This minuscule minority is impure and must be excised from the political body of the nation, lest they contaminate the morally superior majority. Those who are stuck in the no-man’s land of political or emotional indecision, can redeem themselves and gain full absolution by repudiating the sinful elite, also referred to as the one percent, and join the mythical ninety nine percent, so designated by the unerring judgment of the hero himself.
Since it is impossible for anyone except the hero to chance whether his vision is superior to the existing order, politics must be reduced to a simple act of faith, and thus transformed into a religion. Hence, the hero is a semi-god. He is without blemish, sin and weaknesses. He is a genius, infallible and labors ceaselessly to improve the life of the people. Salus populi suprema lex. For him, the salvation of the people is the supreme law. He is a proud populist.
But more importantly, he is an insufficiently educated storyteller who is dangerous for two reasons. First, by not fully comprehending the consequences of his antediluvian vision, he distorts the history of European and African socialism, which is an unmitigated catastrophe. Second, the more insurmountable the difficulties that might prevent the realization of his pristine ideas get, the more extreme his aggression against his perceived detractors becomes. America beware! The reelection of Barack Hussein Obama will surely lead to the inexorable weakening of the domestic as well as the international positions of the United States. The same is true of the future of the world. With him at the helm of the leading power in the world for four more years, peace and stability may perish like the phoenix of bygone civilizations.