Is Obama the AntiPresident?

[OCinBuffalo]

First, I mean AntiPresident in terms of antipope, not anti-Christ. Liberals: let's not focus on the silly, as this "piece" is ultimately about the political future of your philosophy(and others as well) and the very real danger it's in, I ASSURE you.

 

Antipope was a purely political creation. If you want history for why and how antipopes came to be, here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antipope Q: Why does antipope fit here? A: The irony of an antipope. The Pope, by definition, is inviolate. He is supposedly infallible as well. So, to have somebody, anybody, call the Pope illegitimate...is shocking, bizarre and offensive to those who respect the office of Pope.

 

President of the United States is similar, in terms of the office, of course, not the man. (The problem with the Pope is that distinction isn't made) What separates the great Presidents from everybody else? They come the closest to personifying the office.

 

Just like the Pope, the President is expected to lead "the flock" and execute in the office via generally accepted standards and precedents. To have a President who doesn't do these things, and therefore, delegitimizes himself...is shocking, bizarre, and offensive to those who respect the office.

 

President Obama isn't being the President, as we know it. The office we expected to be filled, by the person we elected, is vacant. Instead, I submit for your consideration, that Obama has created, and installed himself into the office of the AntiPresident. No different than was done in Avignon in the 1400s.

 

Although the method and mechanics are different, the motivation, pure politics, is the same. The office of the Presidency, as defined, does not suit Obama's needs, his stengths, or the political realities of the day. Yeah, part of those realities are the Republicans who are more afraid of their primaries than their general elections, with good reason. However that is not the only part, and it's not the biggest. Obama's approach to the job, and his American Idol, all sizzle, no steak, approach to getting elected, are problems #1 and 2. Thus, the office of AntiPresident fits perfectly.

 

My evidence? A memo from a respected Democratic strategist, that is a great piece of analysis, by any standard: http://www.politico.com/story/2013/05/dem-strategist-warns-party-in-decline-91172.html If you have the time, I highly suggest you read the memo: http://images.politico.com/global/2013/05/09/sosnik_memo_59_final.html as it is very useful.

 

Conclusion: Doing harm to the faith(or the party, in this case) in favor of preserving the man's claim to the office, is both how the antipopes of the 1400s came to be, and also how Protestants came to be. We could more accurately say that both "factions" are destroying their collective "faith", as the only 2 legit parties. We can also say, as the memo does, that Obama removed his own electoral mandate, because of how he won: not setting a policy agenda.

 

Is Obama the self created Avignon faction, and the Republicans the Rome faction, who are, as the memo says, both declining in influence at the same time, and therefore, clearing the way for a new "Protestant" Third Party?

 

When the history of this is written, will Obama be remembered as the AntiPresident who is chiefly responsible for "change"...but just not the kind of change he intended, or that any of his supporters signed up for?

 

I don't imagine many Democrats having the objectivity, especially being under attack, again, this week, to see this clearly now. Obama's decision to cannabalize the party's credibility and capital, in order to keep his office, and refusing to lead "the faith" or even acknowledge his duty to do so, is a problem correctly identified by a Democratic strategist, not me.

 

The massive losses in the states is also not something I made up. If Obama's actions on Benghazi, and sucking up all the oxygen leaving none for his party, ends up making it impossible for Hillary to run, never mind win, when there's really nobody else who can?

 

How can we not remember him as AntiPresident Obama I? Will anyone even remember the "The Tea party is tearing the Rs apart" meme, if time and reality proves that Obama did much worse damage to the Ds?

 

.............................

 

Aside: it's clear from the memo that the "demographics means D are inevitable winners going forward" is false. You aren't inevitable if you are losing support across the board in your coalition, and have 0 chance of repeating the black turnout. It doesn't mean that 242 electoral votes against from day one of the 2016 cycle is any easier for Republicans to deal with. However, it does mean that the 242 is anything but permanent, especially when one considers how much of the "grass roots" and political infrastructure the Ds have lost since 2010.

 

And, God forbid a political expert was talking about party self-ID...because it actually does matter. The next time you see a poll, remember that.

[B-Man]

 

Enter the non-President and his un-Administration

 

By: John Hayward

 

So… what, exactly, does Barack Obama “preside” over? He claims to have learned about the IRS scandal by watching the evening news last Friday. He’s got no idea what those crazy rogue operatives in the State Department and intelligence community were doing when the Benghazi consulate was attacked, or during the crucial news cycles that followed. He’s got nothing to do with the economy – he wishes for jobs with all his heart when his head hits the pillow each night, but they never come. The sequester he insisted on suddenly became a conspiracy to short-circuit his beloved super-government by trimming a few bucks off future spending increases. Why, Mr. Obama was even helpless to keep the White House open for tours!

 

Reporting on the Benghazi and IRS scandals, NBC News correspondent Peter Alexander wailed, “Some observers are already asking if Mr. Obama is falling victim to the second-term curse.” Falling victim to a curse? Leaving aside for a moment the inconvenient detail that Benghazi happened at the end of Obama’s first term, the idea that he’s some hapless doomed victim of malicious second-term evil spirits is pathetic. He’s a bystander to his own presidency now. It’s a crappy reality show he watches on TV.

 

Obama is keen to expand government, but he wants nothing do with administering it. Which is too bad, because he’s part of a lavishly funded operation called “The Obama Administration.” But he’s not even keen on discussing what the Obama Administration does. After he allegedly discovered the IRS scandal by watching TV on Friday night, he said nothing until the sole question permitted during his joint press conference with British Prime Minister David Cameron broached the subject. Only then did Obama weigh in on a massive, rapidly developing scandal that threatens the very foundations of American government. He doesn’t even preside over his own mouth.

 

The spectacle of a non-President loosely associating himself with an un-Administration that doesn’t take responsibility for anything is particularly troubling in combination with Obama’s vision of the all-powerful super-State. Watch the Administration blather about “low level employees in Cincinnati” somehow unleashing a wave of politicized tax audits, then ask yourself how carefully the ObamaCare complaint box is likely to be monitored. The same people who targeted Obama’s political opponents for audits will be the enforcement arm of a health-care plan that’s already coming apart at the seams… a plan that grants insane levels of “discretion” to the iron-fisted bureaucracy that will be enforcing scores of mandates against millions of individuals and business entities.

 

{snip}

 

Isn’t it funny how “progressives” are always taking steps toward bigger government, which they insist can never be retraced… while simultaneously assuring voters they can be held accountable at the ballot box? How do you hold someone “accountable” for a disaster that can never be cleaned up?

 

Why does anyone fall for that?

 

We find ourselves with an Administration that can no longer earn the minimal level of trust that would be required for a trim libertarian government, let alone reach the highly improbable level of transparency and accountability that would make Obama-sized government seem vaguely reasonable. Scandal after scandal rocks this Administration, but none of its power players are ever held to account. No one admits wrongdoing; nobody gets fired. Bloody disasters from Benghazi to Boston are portrayed as stunning surprises nobody could have anticipated, but then we learn of countless red flags that were ignored… by the same government that devotes very special levels of scrutiny to law-abiding domestic political opponents. We are told to accept the authority of those who recognize no authority. We can be punished for failing to comply with their agenda, even when obedience violates our conscience, but no dereliction of duty on their part is unacceptable.

 

 

But notice that they love using the word “unacceptable.” It’s the frowny-face emoticon of political irresponsibility, a meaningless verbal gesture from people who very much expect us to accept their failures and lies.

 

http://www.redstate.com/2013/05/13/enter-the-non-president-and-his-un-administration/

[ajzepp]

 

The Pope, by definition, is inviolate. He is supposedly infallible as well.

 

That's actually a common misconception. Catholics don't consider the Pope infallible. He's a sinner just like the rest of us. The only time infallibility comes into play is the very rare event where he provides an official declaration/teaching/clarification in the area of faith and morality. The infallibility refers to the teaching, not the pope himself.

[OCinBuffalo]

http://www.redstate....administration/

What is that, like the 4th time in 2 weeks?

 

I am rapidly tiring of these right wing websites stealing my ideas, changing them just enough to slide by, and posting them 2 days later. But by all means, keep posting them, right after mine, so that I know who's doing this.

That's actually a common misconception. Catholics don't consider the Pope infallible. He's a sinner just like the rest of us. The only time infallibility comes into play is the very rare event where he provides an official declaration/teaching/clarification in the area of faith and morality. The infallibility refers to the teaching, not the pope himself.

I only threw that in there because while I was writing it, I remembered CatholicMatch.com(per my mother, don't ask) asks you questions for your profile, and one of them is: Do you believe in papal infallibility?.

 

Yes, utter silliness on my part, but that's why I said, "supposedly".

[ajzepp]

What is that, like the 4th time in 2 weeks?

 

I am rapidly tiring of these right wing websites stealing my ideas, changing them just enough to slide by, and posting them 2 days later. But by all means, keep posting them, right after mine, so that I know who's doing this.

 

I only threw that in there because while I was writing it, I remembered CatholicMatch.com(per my mother, don't ask) asks you questions for your profile, and one of them is: Do you believe in papal infallibility?.

 

Yes, utter silliness on my part, but that's why I said, "supposedly".

 

I debated whether to even mention it, cause I know it's not really pertinent to the points you were making, it's just something I often hear so thought I'd clarify. How did CatholicMatch work out for your mom? lol

[OCinBuffalo]

I debated whether to even mention it, cause I know it's not really pertinent to the points you were making, it's just something I often hear so thought I'd clarify. How did CatholicMatch work out for your mom? lol

 

Nice one.

[GG]

I am rapidly tiring of these right wing websites stealing my ideas, changing them just enough to slide by, and posting them 2 days later. But by all means, keep posting them, right after mine, so that I know who's doing this.

 

Sorry buddy. There's no copyright on thoughts.

[3rdnlng]

I debated whether to even mention it, cause I know it's not really pertinent to the points you were making, it's just something I often hear so thought I'd clarify. How did CatholicMatch work out for your mom? lol

 

See what it spawned?

[B-Man]

From Politico:

 

 

Obama's dangerous new narrative

 

No contemporary American politician has benefited more from the power of good storytelling than Barack Obama. He vaulted from obscurity to the presidency on the power of narrative — invoking his biography and personal values to make a larger point about how he would lead the nation.

 

So presumably no one understands more vividly than Obama and his close aides just how toxic and potentially paralyzing his situation has become this spring, as four distinct ethical and policy controversies have simultaneously converged.

 

Obama’s critics now have a narrative — a way of connecting four discrete episodes to a larger point about this president’s leadership style and values. In other words, they didn’t merely happen on his watch but were in important ways caused by his watch.

 

And for the first time, this anti-Obama storyline is being presented in a way that might seem reasonable to people who are not already rabid anti-Obama partisans.

 

The narrative is ideological. For five years, this president has been making the case that a growing and activist government has good intentions and can carry these intentions out with competence. Conservatives have warned that government is dangerous, and even good intentions get bungled in the execution. In different ways, the IRS uproar, the Justice Department leak investigations, the Benghazi tragedy and the misleading attempts to explain it, and the growing problems with implementation of health care reform all bolster the conservative worldview.

 

 

In Obama’s case, the narrative emerging from this tumultuous week goes something like this: None of these messes would have happened under a president less obsessed with politics, less insulated within his own White House and less trusting of government as an institution.

 

There is little doubt that Obama and Democrats would be making precisely this argument if the same set of controversies had descended on a Republican president. And the hope and expectation on the right is that the barrage of alarming headlines out of Washington will prompt Americans to make a top-to-bottom reassessment of what they thought they knew about their president.

 

 

Read more: http://www.politico....l#ixzz2TNOhYYAE

[Ralonzo]

How about just "Hidden Imam"?

[truth on hold]

He's the anti-president in the sense a lot of his support comes from people that are not a fan of him in isolation, but are horrified at the candidates the republicans have offered up lately and view him as a hedge against them. Even in office, theres been very few major Obama initiatives, his value again is seen as a buffer against radical right wing agendas.

Edited May 16, 2013 by Joe_the_6_pack

[3rdnlng]

Sure, Romney had a radical right wing agenda says the faux libertarian.

[B-Man]

_{Obama is the Ultimate Ad Hominem President}

 

 

_{Peter Wehner}

 

_{At a fundraising event earlier this week in New York City, President Obama said this:}

 

_{"What’s blocking us right now is a sort of hyper-partisanship in Washington that I was, frankly, hoping to overcome in 2008. My thinking was when we beat them in 2012 that might break the fever, and it’s not quite broken yet. But I am persistent. And I am staying at it. And I genuinely believe there are Republicans out there who would like to work with us but they’re fearful of their base and they’re concerned about what Rush Limbaugh might say about them…}

_{As a consequence we get the kind of gridlock that makes people cynical about government. My intentions over the next 3 ½ years are to govern. … If there are folks who are more interested in winning elections than they are thinking about the next generation then I want to make sure there are consequences to that."}

 

_{Mr. Obama’s statement, a variation of what he’s said countless times in the past, is worth examining for what it reveals about him.}

 

_{1. President Obama is once again engaging in what psychiatrists refer to as projection, in which people lay their worst attributes on others.}

_{In this instance, the most hyper-partisan president in modern times is ascribing that trait to Congressional Republicans. What we’ve learned about Mr. Obama over the years is that he that while he is unusually inept at governing, he’s quite good at campaigning. He certainly enjoys it, having taken the concept of the Permanent Campaign beyond anything we’ve ever seen. It turns out it’s the only thing he does well—no human being in history has raised campaign cash quite like he has—and it’s all he seems interested in doing.}

 

_{On some deep, subconscious level, though, Mr. Obama seems ashamed of the path he’s chosen. And so the president projects those traits he loathes in himself on to others. To give you a sense of how deep the malady runs, the president does more than merely project; he actually preaches against the very character flaws he himself cannot overcome.}

 

_{2. The president can hardly go a day without impugning the motivations of his opponents. They never have honest differences with the president. Instead they are suffering from an illness (“fever”), cowardice (afraid of what Rush Limbaugh might say about them), and lack of patriotism (caring about elections rather than future generations). Mr. Obama is the ultimate ad hominem president.}

 

_{3. The president spoke about cynicism toward government. But if the president is really concerned about this phenomenon, he might look at his own administration, which is dealing with multiplying scandals. I would submit that misleading the country in the aftermath of the deadly siege on the diplomatic outpost in Benghazi, the IRS’s targeting of political opponents, and seizing the phone records of journalists might well deepen the public’s cynicism toward government. And for the record, trust in the federal government has reached new lows during the Obama years. Might he have some responsibility for that?}

 

_{4. Mr. Obama professes deep concern “about the next generation.” Those words would be a bit more believable if he were not handing off to the next generation a crushing debt burden that will take generations to undo, if it is ever undone. No president holds a candle to Mr. Obama when it comes to engaging in generational theft.}

 

_{5. As for gridlock: This is actually inherent in our system of government. It’s called “checks and balances” and “separation of powers.” The president might want to consult this document for more.}

 

_{I understand Mr. Obama has complained many times that there are checks on his power, but I prefer the wisdom of James Madison to the ambitions of Barack Obama.}

 

 

.

Edited May 16, 2013 by B-Man

[OCinBuffalo]

Sure, Romney had a radical right wing agenda says the faux libertarian.

Hehe...I made a bet with myself what the o/u was going to be on that. Specifically, how many hours will go by before somebody says "you can't be a libertarian, and call the libertarian mindset, not agenda, radical, at the same time, moron."

 

The libertarians have no agenda, because, they are not out to get anyone. The people who are out to get people are easy to identify: who keeps insisting that we treat one group of Americans differently from another?

 

It's the exact opposite, really. Libertarians are out to protect, shockingly, liberty. The word is in the name, so it should be easy enough to understand. It's defense, not offense. Thus, there is no such thing as a/the libertarian agenda.

 

Rather, there is the libertarian response, to wingnut, obvious, idiot-spawned ideas like Obamacare, Gun Control, and the "Drug War is Working". All three of the things reflect an absence of reason, that stems from a refusal to see the world as it is, or a factual understanding of how the real world operates. All three of these things seek to destroy liberty, and have not, and will not, EVER produce the results that their proponents say they will. Thus all 3 of these things are not worth the time, $, or unintended consequences they create, in return for the liberty we must give up to have them.

 

Therefore, the libertarian seeks to free us from all 3. That is not an "agenda" that is defending liberty from stupidity.

 

Therefore, in response to unmitigated morons spouting stupidity and wishful thinking based emoting, the libertarians asks "is this worth our liberty". If the answer is no, then the libertarian fights the wingnut.

Edited May 16, 2013 by OCinBuffalo

[DC Tom]

And I genuinely believe there are Republicans out there who would like to work with us but they’re fearful of their base and they’re concerned about what Rush Limbaugh might say about them…

 

Why don't you look in the back seat, Mr. President?

 

!@#$ing moron.

[B-Man]

Raindrops wash away reeling O’s fake veneer

 

Watching President Obama trying to dodge raindrops and responsibility yesterday reminded me of the moment when Dorothy pulls back the curtain and discovers that the Wizard of Oz is “just a man.” Stripped of his spell of mystery and power, the wizard is worse than mortal. He’s a fake.

 

So it was with Obama in the Rose Garden. His performance was tired and trite, ordinary to the point of dull. His veneer of passion was so transparent that you could see him trying to summon his old-time magic by pushing the buttons and pulling the levers that got him out of tight spots before. “Folks” and “I” and “me” and “my” — stop!

 

 

The magic is gone, his act thin enough to say, as he recently did about Benghazi, that “there’s no there there.”

 

Standing under an umbrella held by a Marine, Obama looked simultaneously imperious and small, no match for the rising tide of scandals swamping his presidency. At a moment that demanded genuine resolve, his answers were evasive, especially about whether he knew the IRS was politically profiling conservative groups. His response, that “I can assure you that I certainly did not know anything about the [inspector general] report,” wasn’t even an artful dodge.

 

Serious trouble could be ahead if the president can’t give a straight answer to “What did you know and when did you know it?”

 

Similarly, his attempt to duck the Benghazi fallout by suggesting that Congress didn’t commit enough money for security, was, like his earlier bids to escape responsibility for the attack, preposterous and misleading.

 

He doesn’t seem to understand it yet, but Fear & Smear has run its course. The one-trick pony needs a second act to go with his second term.

 

That’s no small order. And it’s not because the Benghazi terror attack, the IRS targeting and the Justice Department snooping on The Associated Press all happened on his watch.

 

If it were a matter of bad luck, he would be a hapless but sympathetic president. The problem is that all three scandals reflect his views, policies and personnel. He wanted a big, activist government to transform the nation. He got it, and now his chickens are coming home to roost.

 

You would never know that from his reaction to the national uproar. His instinct is to see everything through a political prism, and the scandal trifecta is no exception. To him, politics explains the sun rise.

 

“My thinking was when we beat them in 2012, that might break the fever, and it’s not quite broken yet,” Obama told a group of celebrity donors in New York Monday night. “I genuinely believe there are Republicans out there who would like to work with us, but they’re fearful of their base, and they’re concerned about what Rush Limbaugh might say about them. And as a consequence, we get the kind of gridlock that makes people cynical about government.”

 

There you have his worldview in a nutshell. His presidency is at a crossroads, and he thinks it’s Rush Limbaugh’s fault and the other side has a “fever.” If only he had more power, people wouldn’t be cynical about government. Talk about scary visions.

 

Not incidentally, the IRS agents putting the screws on conservative groups shared his disdain for them.

[B-Man]

LOL............funny because of the truth therein,

 

 

Obama Denies Role in Government

 

Posted by Andy Borowitz

 

 

WASHINGTON (The Borowitz Report)—President Obama used his weekly radio address on Saturday to reassure the American people that he has “played no role whatsoever” in the U.S. government over the past four years.

 

“Right now, many of you are angry at the government, and no one is angrier than I am,” he said. “Quite frankly, I am glad that I have had no involvement in such an organization.”

 

 

The President’s outrage only increased, he said, when he “recently became aware of a part of that government called the Department of Justice.”

 

“The more I learn about the activities of these individuals, the more certain I am that I would not want to be associated with them,” he said. “They sound like bad news.”

 

Mr. Obama closed his address by indicating that beginning next week he would enforce what he called a “zero tolerance policy on governing.”

 

“If I find that any members of my Administration have had any intimate knowledge of, or involvement in, the workings of the United States government, they will be dealt with accordingly,” he said.

 

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/borowitzreport/2013/05/obama-denies-role-in-government.html?mbid=social_retweet

[ExiledInIllinois]

I guess if he is the non-President and has an un-administration... That must be "different" and is "change." Now the Wing Nuts are complaining he isn't the same. What/who was the baseline established? The last 33 years? Be different but, be the same like the others. Reminds me of the Steven Wright joke where he says he names his new dog: Stay. "Come here, Stay! Come here, Stay!"

 

Obama must be OC's East German Shepard:

 

"I bought a dog the other day. I named him Stay. It's fun to call him. "Come here, Stay! Come here, Stay!" He went insane. Now he just ignores me and keeps typing. He's an East German Shepherd."

 

 

 

[B-Man]

I guess if he is the non-President and has an un-administration... That must be "different" and is "change."

 

Now the Wing Nuts are complaining he isn't the same.

 

What/who was the baseline established? The last 33 years? Be different but, be the same like the others.

 

 

No one is saying that.

 

 

.

[ExiledInIllinois]

 

 

 

No one is saying that.

 

 

.

 

 

 

OC in Nutsville, USA is. Obama is unlike any previous POTUS. What does that make him? Different. Now they want him the same... Or @ least their way. What gives Stay? Hey, when the strawman fits... Wear it.

 

:-P