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(First published in July 2008)Obama: Citizen of the World!
A Commentary by J.D. Longstreet
A Commentary by J.D. Longstreet
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I have a lot of difficulty relating to anyone who claims citizenship in the world. Frankly, that person is frightening. Saying one is a citizen of the world negates one’s actual citizenship as… well, a native of the country within which he/she was born and, to which, he/she owes allegiance. Saying you are a citizen of the world is too…well… vague. But then… that is exactly what Mr. Barack H. Obama is… vague.
I’m one of those old geezers, still alive today, who actually heard some of President Franklin Roosevelt’s speeches. While listening to Obama in Berlin, my mind began shifting gears, feeling its way around his words and phrases, because I was sure I had heard them before. It continued to nag at me until a picture of FDR solidified in my mind’s eye. It was then that I realized this was the effect his speech was supposed to have on me! It was beautifully delivered. It was oratorical music. It was a symphony of simplistic sermonizing declaring… not much, really. As an American of part German ancestry, I understand the magnetism of compelling oratory. It stirs my soul. And for a brief moment, or two, I WAS stirred.
But, that’s about as far as it went. Once I focused on his words, I was dismayed to hear his proud profession of faith in, (gasp!) Globalism!
Look, I am unashamedly a nationalist. I am an American, first, last, and always. I am proud of my country and have been all my life. Some of my country’s leaders have certainly not lived up to the greatness America offered them, and THEY have shamed me, but, never my country.
It is apparent that Mr. Obama IS a globalist. One who believes in liberating the globe of national borders and having one single worldwide government…a one-world government.
Globalism is another of those ethereal dreams our liberal brethren have latched onto. It dates back to, at least, the Hippies. You know: tie-dyes, long hair, sandals, free love, free dope, etc, etc. Oh, I had a momentary lapse of memory! Many of our Congressional delegates ARE old hippies! How, could I forget that, even for a moment? Not Obama, of course. From my perspective, he’s just a “wannabe hippie”.
There was something very unsettling about hearing a terrific orator drawing throngs of cheering Germans into a public square in Berlin. I had flashbacks of another great orator doing the same thing back in the 1930’s and early 1940’s. We still bear the scars from the fall-out of the explosion HE caused. Listening to Obama play the crowd, as a master violinist would play the violin, was unnerving.
I have mentioned before how watching the faces in the crowds at Obama events remind me so much of the faces in the crowds at Hitler’s speeches. As could Hitler, Obama can lift a crowd’s emotions to a near orgasmic response. An emotion charged crowd is only a click or two away from transformation into a mob.
To say Obama’s event in Berlin was troubling to me would be an understatement. One, blessed with both charisma and special oratorical skills, has a responsibility, it seems to me, to never allow his words to stoke a crowd’s emotional furnace too much. It is entirely possible to strike the trip wires that loose the hearer’s motivation to take action based on faulty judgment made at the height of passion. That has happened before, and in Berlin.
OK, so I am an old fogy, long past my prime, and prone to judge current events by events I have witnessed in the past. That used to be looked upon as a sort of “wisdom of the aged”. I realize that is not so in this modern era. But, I must tell you, I feel a certain responsibility to hold up the “caution signs” when I see things, hear things, and experience things that indicate to me there could be trouble ahead.
Historians tell us that as the great Roman generals would ride in their chariots in the triumphal parades through the flower strewn streets of Rome, soaking up the cheers and accolades of the crowds of admiring fellow Romans along the way, there was a fellow Roman, sometimes even a slave, whose job it was to stand in the chariot with the hero, slightly behind him, and whisper, continuously, in his ear: ”Remember, thou art but a man… thou art but a man.” Seems to me, Obama needs someone to whisper those words in his ear, and often.
I have a lot of difficulty relating to anyone who claims citizenship in the world. Frankly, that person is frightening. Saying one is a citizen of the world negates one’s actual citizenship as… well, a native of the country within which he/she was born and, to which, he/she owes allegiance. Saying you are a citizen of the world is too…well… vague. But then… that is exactly what Mr. Barack H. Obama is… vague.
I’m one of those old geezers, still alive today, who actually heard some of President Franklin Roosevelt’s speeches. While listening to Obama in Berlin, my mind began shifting gears, feeling its way around his words and phrases, because I was sure I had heard them before. It continued to nag at me until a picture of FDR solidified in my mind’s eye. It was then that I realized this was the effect his speech was supposed to have on me! It was beautifully delivered. It was oratorical music. It was a symphony of simplistic sermonizing declaring… not much, really. As an American of part German ancestry, I understand the magnetism of compelling oratory. It stirs my soul. And for a brief moment, or two, I WAS stirred.
But, that’s about as far as it went. Once I focused on his words, I was dismayed to hear his proud profession of faith in, (gasp!) Globalism!
Look, I am unashamedly a nationalist. I am an American, first, last, and always. I am proud of my country and have been all my life. Some of my country’s leaders have certainly not lived up to the greatness America offered them, and THEY have shamed me, but, never my country.
It is apparent that Mr. Obama IS a globalist. One who believes in liberating the globe of national borders and having one single worldwide government…a one-world government.
Globalism is another of those ethereal dreams our liberal brethren have latched onto. It dates back to, at least, the Hippies. You know: tie-dyes, long hair, sandals, free love, free dope, etc, etc. Oh, I had a momentary lapse of memory! Many of our Congressional delegates ARE old hippies! How, could I forget that, even for a moment? Not Obama, of course. From my perspective, he’s just a “wannabe hippie”.
There was something very unsettling about hearing a terrific orator drawing throngs of cheering Germans into a public square in Berlin. I had flashbacks of another great orator doing the same thing back in the 1930’s and early 1940’s. We still bear the scars from the fall-out of the explosion HE caused. Listening to Obama play the crowd, as a master violinist would play the violin, was unnerving.
I have mentioned before how watching the faces in the crowds at Obama events remind me so much of the faces in the crowds at Hitler’s speeches. As could Hitler, Obama can lift a crowd’s emotions to a near orgasmic response. An emotion charged crowd is only a click or two away from transformation into a mob.
To say Obama’s event in Berlin was troubling to me would be an understatement. One, blessed with both charisma and special oratorical skills, has a responsibility, it seems to me, to never allow his words to stoke a crowd’s emotional furnace too much. It is entirely possible to strike the trip wires that loose the hearer’s motivation to take action based on faulty judgment made at the height of passion. That has happened before, and in Berlin.
OK, so I am an old fogy, long past my prime, and prone to judge current events by events I have witnessed in the past. That used to be looked upon as a sort of “wisdom of the aged”. I realize that is not so in this modern era. But, I must tell you, I feel a certain responsibility to hold up the “caution signs” when I see things, hear things, and experience things that indicate to me there could be trouble ahead.
Historians tell us that as the great Roman generals would ride in their chariots in the triumphal parades through the flower strewn streets of Rome, soaking up the cheers and accolades of the crowds of admiring fellow Romans along the way, there was a fellow Roman, sometimes even a slave, whose job it was to stand in the chariot with the hero, slightly behind him, and whisper, continuously, in his ear: ”Remember, thou art but a man… thou art but a man.” Seems to me, Obama needs someone to whisper those words in his ear, and often.
J. D. Longstreet
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