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Barack O-boredom
Rich Lowry, National ReviewThere's nothing wrong with a boring politician. But Obama isn't becoming boring in a stolid, dependable Angela Merkel kind of way. He's not boring like a mannerly George H. W. Bush or a thoughtful Bill Bradley. He's boring like yesterday's celebrity. He's the teen heartthrob who's grown a little too old. He's the star from The Real World Denver -- three years ago. The cruel vicissitudes of the celebrity culture apply to everyone. If Paris Hilton can be overtaken by the even-more-pointlessly famous Kim Kardashian, no one is safe. Much of what was new and different about Obama didn't survive its first contact with reality. An American president is almost by definition overexposed. But Obama has jammed a full term's worth of exposure into a mere eleven months. Michelle Obama notoriously said during the campaign, "Barack will never allow you to go back to your lives as usual, uninvolved, uninformed." What she really meant, apparently, was that Barack would never again allow us to turn on the TV without seeing or hearing Barack. The historic, high-stakes Obama speech is practically a fortnightly experience. Given the frequency, they can't all be interesting. But in their tendency toward the crashingly banal, they all run together into the same mind-numbing oration. He often speaks in a professorial manner that treats his listeners as if they are all eager to be lectured in Obama 101, managing to sound thoughtful without any true depth or wisdom. Abraham Lincoln once said, "It is very common in this country to find great facility of expression and less common to find great lucidity of thought." Obama confirms the insight. He can't help studding his speech with self-references, as if he were still fascinating and new. Obama is not nearly as dull as, say, Herman Van Rompuy, the European Union's new president. But he is inflicted on us much more routinely and with much greater intensity. On net, that might make Barack Obama one of the most boring people in the world. Posted by: Mike 2009-12-11 |
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