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Basking In The Obamaglow

This is probably just another stage of depression or mourning or whatever, but I was already feeling it yesterday when I encountered a friend of mine who voiced it. It felt really good. It was that President Obama feeling …

My buddy’s a Midwesterner, grew up doing many irresponsible things with guns, was a Marine, now lives in Boston, has supported Bush and mongered war lo these many years.

“I’m feeling great,” he said yesterday about living in Omerica. “It’s like a big weight lifted off my shoulders. Now I don’t have to listen to those people bitching anymore. Hey, you wanted it, you got it, it’s all yours.”

I had been thinking along the same lines. After a momentary funk on Tuesday night as the results became clear, I began to feel the weight lifting.

It is serious business. Defending war was never an easy position to take. It’s meant defending the spilling of blood, defending the maiming of young men and women, the losses families have suffered. If you know any of those people, you might have an idea of the depth of pain. My concern has been that their sacrifices, and our nation’s hard-fought gains, will be thrown away by people who think there is an easier way. But there is nothing I can do about that now. It’s theirs.

We get to sit back and watch the show. Gonna make the world a better place? Kumbayah, dude.

It’s not like they’re suddenly going to stop bashing Bush. Bush will be the excuse every time their guy stumbles. That’s OK, let them blame Bush. I’ve noticed they’ve already started looking for ways to avoid responsibility, dancing around the mandate issue. SF Chron: 

President-elect Barack Obama’s resounding election triumph was greeted Wednesday from nearly every quarter in Washington as a mandate for change. What was most striking after a resounding victory that also added at least five Democrats to the Senate and 23 to the House, was how gingerly Democratic leaders treated their new mandate.

It is “not a mandate for any political party or any ideology,” said Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., “but a mandate to get over those things that divide us and focus on getting things done.”

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-San Francisco, warned that Obama comes to office with “more expectations than any president I can ever remember in my lifetime,” and quickly sought to dampen them, citing the constraints of two wars and a sinking economy.

Even Democratic Party Chairman Howard Dean said, “I don’t think it’s a mandate for the New Deal. … I think it’s a mandate that the political class in this country has an obligation to young people in this country to stop fighting over stuff that might have been a big issue 25 years ago but it isn’t anymore.”

The White House and House and the Senate majorities aren’t enough … they don’t have the power to utterly squelch the opposition, and because life is hard, with two wars and a bad economy (insert Bush bash here), they can’t really be expected to accomplish anything. Reid, Pelosi and Dean, perhaps bitterly cognizant of their failures past, seem to be grasping at excuses for the failures to come: All you get, Obamanation, is that big, bright Obamaglow. Let’s not get crazy with the hope, actually expect change now.

Though as I look at what they aren’t actually voicing in this article, it seems to be a more pointed message. Obama’s election is not a mandate for them to actually do anything. It’s a mandate for Republicans to shut up. About abortion, gay rights, guns, affirmative action, killing jihadis, and whatever else Republicans have been squawking about. That’s an interesting kind of mandate. Mandate for an end to free speech?

It’s not just that it’s a relief, after eight years of relentless Bush-bash, not to have to be listening to ramped up McCain and Palin bashing, cries of racism, assorted vitriolic spew these last couple of days. It could be actually fun. 

The election of a Democratic Congress in 2006 turned out to be highly entertaining, as the much-heralded mandate to end the war devolved into non-binding resolutions and unsuccessful bids to support the troops by cutting their supply lines. The Party of Surrender eventually was forced to give up and admit defeat re the Iraq war.

I’m starting to enjoy this new Omerica more. Too bad, though, that the mandate for Republicans to shut up could be a mandate to throw away the sacrifices of the dead and wounded. Maybe the chronic Democratic inability to take definitive action means they will be unwilling to pull the plug on Iraq and Afghanistan. Maybe, as has been suggested, they may even figure out that Guantanamo is full of dangerous unlawful combatants they really don’t want to let out on the street. Maybe they will actually let the military fight the war. Could happen.

It’s nice to feel the weight lift, if only briefly. Somehow I don’t think this curious Obamaglow I’m basking in is going to last, though.

Some quick news, views:

The Hill: Dems lower expectations

Hold up, what’s this? NYT: Dems vow to pursue an aggressive agenda

Well, usually that means, “Advance to the rear!”

Hot Air on that mandate thing, as Novak gives the Dems an out.

Gateway with some big mandate fans: Iran, Cuba and Venezuela.

Reuters: Iraq to Obama: Not so fast!

Putin angles a return to Czarship

Fine Cabinetry … it’s Obamalot! Speaking of which, here’s some classic Surber channeling me and waxing lyrical on that.

The Obamist anti-gay agenda. SF Chron on how Obama voters killed gay marriage in California. Well, he is opposed to it, you know. At least he said he was.

Memo to Obama, with an assist from Gateway: This is what immigration looks like. It is a process that involves paperwork, and in the case of these new citizens in Iraq, can be expedited by military service. Gateway also has Palin offering to help the media with that bias thing. 

Malkin’s all over the anti-Palin recriminations and reprisals. NLex sneers at the circular firing squad. Last war. Time to move on, as the lefties say. Though as Redstate notes, never forget. I’d add to that list all the newly minted Obamacons.

Topics: Bush, Obama, pols

  Posted by Jules Crittenden at 9:53 am on Thursday, November 6, 2008

10 Responses to “Basking In The Obamaglow”

1. Fatty Bolger Says:
   November 6th, 2008 at 11:00 am

   Yeah, I feel the same way. It’s nice to have the target on somebody else’s back for once. The Dems weaseled their way out of any responsibility after the 2006 elections, but there’s no place to hide now.

   Now for something else to brighten up your day. Check out this article:

   Obama campaign workers angry over unpaid wages
   http://www.wthr.com/global/story.asp?s=9299280

   Money quote:
   “I want my money today! It’s my money. I want it right now!” yelled one former campaign worker.

   Oh, that’s just classic.

2. Bush, Obama, & Ghosts of Hate - UPDATED | The Anchoress Says:
   November 6th, 2008 at 3:34 pm

   [...] Jules Crittenden is beginning to enjoy Omerica, Quin Hillyer is saying America is over, kaput, finished, Evan Thomas suddenly finds Obama slightly [...]

3. RebeccaH Says:
   November 6th, 2008 at 6:26 pm

   I shared in your funk on Tuesday, Jules. But you make some very good points. Although we RWDBs (Right Wing Death Beasts, for those who aren’t part of the Vast Right Wing Conspiracy [VRWC]) will never be as vitriolic or unhinged as the KosLeft has been, we will enjoy being the “loyal opposition” and criticising our best criticises [sic] over every misstep of the Demoleft. Of which I am confident there will be many.

4. Baby M Says:
   November 7th, 2008 at 8:05 am

   What??? You mean he won’t stop the rise of the oceans and heal the planet after all?

5. Jim Treacher Says:
   November 7th, 2008 at 11:37 am

   I guess sometimes you just have to let the children break their toys. It’s the only way they’ll learn.

6. Bush, Obama, & Ghosts of Hate « The Sassy Tn’T PoLITicallY InCorrect Says:
   November 8th, 2008 at 1:51 am

   [...] Jules Crittenden is beginning to enjoy Omerica, Quin Hillyer is saying America is over, kaput, finished, Evan Thomas suddenly finds Obama [...]

7. pst314 Says:
   November 10th, 2008 at 12:51 pm

   “an obligation to young people in this country to stop fighting over stuff that might have been a big issue 25 years ago but it isn’t anymore.”

   I wonder what Dean really meant by that: Was he really saying that Dems should drop some of their issues (unlikely, knowing Dean) or did he mean that those who disagree with Dems are supposed to shut up and get with the program? The left has a long history of defining “non-partisan” as “do what we say”.

8. davidstill Says:
   November 10th, 2008 at 7:44 pm

   so many sour grapes! Obama won. The nation wanted a change. The young, the old, women, men, lots of wealthy and lots of poor. Blacks, Hispanics, Jews, Christians, orientals—they all voted and voted for Obama.
   Now you can sit about and make light, be snide, cute or whatever.

   cut the guy some slack and, once he is in office, then badmouth policies he favors rather than two months before he takes office make silly remarks that does you little good, the nation no good, and has you chomping on your liver.

   Obama won because 8 years of failure called for a change. And we got it.
   Now smile and hope the best for your nation.

9. Casey Says:
   November 11th, 2008 at 1:33 am

   I would suggest to all that you watch, and listen carefully the next few months. Not just up to the inauguration, but at least until summer.

   For all the fussing and moaning, Barry’s folks have already started to walk things back a bit.

   “Required” social service? Ok, not required, but expected, and maybe credits for the college kids.

   Close GITMO and start the civil trials? ….Not yet. That stuff looks pretty complicated, and we don’t want to let terrorists loose.

   I believe that the incoming administration is just now beginning to grasp the possibility that, just maybe, things aren’t as simple as they appeared earlier. It’s the difference between running, and governing.

   BTW, davidstill? Barry didn’t win because “8 years of failure called for a change.” He won because too many DC Republicans acted like a bunch of drunken sailors, didn’t take their opposition seriously, and let Bush get tagged with the recent economic meltdown. Ask Barney Frank about that last bit.

10. Mandate to the Left of me, Divison to the Right, here I am stuck in a nightmare with “O” « Sharp Right Turn Says:
    November 11th, 2008 at 11:39 pm

    [...] Jules Crittenden: It’s not like they’re suddenly going to stop bashing Bush. Bush will be the excuse every time [...]

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