The Divider-in Chief: Why Barack Obama’s Partisan Presidency Must Go

The president acts not only like he doesn’t like his job very much, but he doesn’t like this country very much. At least, that is the takeaway of someone who has watched his criticism of the country while he has traveled abroad, his bowing to fellow foreign heads of state, his unwillingness to embrace American exceptionalism, and his recourse and appeal to foreign authorities like NATO and the UN, rather than his acknowledgment of the proper jurisdiction of Congress and the Supreme Court.

Maybe voters can accommodate Mr. Obama this November and free him up to do something more suited to his miraculous talent for soaring, un-American rhetoric. Like community organizing, for example.

It’s not where he’s from, but where he stands that makes Barack Obama such a strange presence in the White House. The president acts as if he is a member of royalty holding an office below his station as a favor to us trifling and meddlesome Americans. Electing such a man as our nation’s leader is an unusual and dangerous turn of events in our history. It perhaps says more about our gullible electorate than about Obama himself, but that’s another story.

There are certain memorable images that reinforce the perception that Mr. Obama is less than enthused about leading this country, such as his failure to salute the flag while on the campaign trail in Iowa. A truly patriotic American would not forget such a courtesy, especially acting as a politician thrust upon a public stage. You don’t just forget such basics of national decorum.

Such warning signs that Barack Obama was a different kind of political actor went unheeded by the public. It is as if the Aztec natives had their Sun God, and could not see that they were following a mere man. Our duly elected head of state now acts as if he is unbound by our country’s laws and not even compelled to act in its best interest — such as his offering of missile defense access with the Russians and by funding the Muslim Brotherhood. Citizens don’t generally demand “flexibility” of their president on such issues as national security, although there may be a need for compromises that benefit our country. But there are numerous occasions when the Mr. Obama has “compromised” with our adversaries and enemies with no discernible short-term or long-term benefit accrued. The lack of reciprocity proceeding from the Russian “reset” is one of the most blatant.

Barack Obama also seems ill-suited for the office of the presidency by his demeanor and temperament. His projected image of aloofness and political transcendence noticeable during his first campaign and Honeymoon period has been tarnished in his fourth, and hopefully, last year of his presidency.  The emperor not only has no clothes, but no makeup, either. As his approval ratings have dwindled, and even some in his unquestioning base have bridled at his warmongering ways, Obama has had to contrive deflection issues and even partially engage in some ugly politicking.

The Sandra Fluck condom-baiting and Trayvon Martin case are prime examples of media fixations meant to distract us from the president’s economic ineptitude and foreign policy bungling. Obama has played into this misdirection by phone-calling the Democrat activist Sandra Fluke to console her for being called an undesirable name by an ideological adversary, and by personally interjecting race into the Trayvon Martin furor by stating, “If I had a son, he’d look like Trayvon.” While Mr. Obama once appeared to be above the office of the presidency, he now appears below it.

The president had his opportunity to unite the American people, and he has failed. Some of this would require stifling one’s ego and making concessions to those one disagrees with. Let the left say what they will about our previous president, but he at least was conciliatory — even to a fault. And while the left continues to rail against conservatives with the “Bush did it!” rejoinder, we are not only unhappy with some of Bush’s policies (such as Medicare Part D, at the very least), but we are not fawning cult-worshipers who will blindly follow a leader regardless of what he does. Our current president not only followed suit on nearly every one of the Bush policies the left claimed to despise during the former president’s term, but Obama has doubled down on them. It is intellectually dishonest to rebut conservative complaints of President Obama by pointing to similar complaints that have been made of his predecessor, and disregards any sense of proportionality. We continue to move towards economic catastrophe without abatement, and the Democrat Party that Obama heads seems completely oblivious. This throws into question whether or not the party has the nation’s best interest at heart, or more to the point, whether they care about their own petty political fortunes more than the nation as a whole.

What has been missing during the entire course of Barack Obama’s presidency are steady and sure signs that he truly reveres this country as it was founded. There may be the cynical insertion of well-worn political slogans in certain speeches, but there is no grand narrative of Obama’s vision for America consistent with anything most citizens are familiar with. The concept of the “post-racial” presidency was a nice fantasy, but it has proven to be that — just a fantasy.  Other than healing the racial divide, the president appears to have had no other mandate. He certainly didn’t have any bankable fiscal experience or governance skills. What he had, as was all-too-conveniently glossed over by the activist media, was a radical frame of mind and a fancy for demagoguing. Although his predilection for indefinite government expansion and remedial redistribution may play well within the cloistered left-wing talking shops of our universities and non-profit agencies, it is certainly foreign for a president to openly and brazenly tout them, as he did in his Osawatamie speech.

The problem with the leftist media and their pet politicians is that they continue to try to mainstream their ideas in a myriad of ways.  Yet leftwing ideas are at their core foreign not only to this country, but to human nature. That is why they don’t work, and I dare any left-wing advocate to prove otherwise. Many Americans know this, because we know what works. Disagree with capitalism on ethical grounds, but don’t argue that it doesn’t produce a relatively high degree of wealth for most. Acting as if it is an evil, unjust system is just asinine; and false promises of a utopia where we are all equally as well off, albeit with dominant state planners just doesn’t fly here, because we know this is wrong by reason and experience. Americans are a pre-eminently commonsensical people, if you strip away the veneer of stupidity projected by the media, and though we are slow to move, there eventually comes a point where the inertia of public sentiment overcomes even the most sophisticated of political deceptions.

President Obama serenaded us with healing, inspiring words during his candidacy and delivered belligerent class warfare rhetoric and unending criticism once elected. But it is even worse than a matter of tone. The disparity between economic reality and appearance can only be kept up for so long. While, to quote Milton, “the mind is its own place, and in itself can make a heaven of hell, a hell of heaven,” that only holds true for those who rule a kingdom. And we are not all disciples of the Lucifer-adoring Alinsky, like our president has been shown himself to be.

People don’t set out to “fundamentally transform” nations they hold dear. This radical goal would entail altering the essence of our Constitution and not reforming the government, as even conservatives desire. What makes us conservatives is we desire to conserve the core essence of limited government, individual rights, and economic freedom, which we do not simply hold out for our own benefit, but even of those whom we disagree with. It appears the president does not share these basic tenets, and instead rules as a partisan on behalf of his own preferred interests at the expense of others.

Our nation can tolerate divided government, but not a government that divides the people. As the divider-in-chief, this president is a disaster.