Suckered by Obama

20 March 2009

–by Mike Murray

To those center-right columnists (David Brooks, Kathleen Parker, David Frum, Christopher Buckley, Peggy Noonan, et al.) who – directly or indirectly – endorsed Barack Obama’s candidacy, I ask this: What the [heck] were you thinking? Exactly what was it, in Obama’s past, that convinced you that he is politically moderate? That he is genuinely “post-partisan?” That he is “transformative?” That he is trustworthy?

Each of you has been around the block a few times; each of you is plenty old enough to know better than to take campaign rhetoric at face value (no matter how soaring, it is often little more than blarney). Actions, not words, reveal intent. Leopards do not change their spots; neither do dyed-in-the-wool ideologues.

So what gives? Did you just want to join the “in” crowd? Salve the pain of your angst-filled high-school days? Be one of the Cool Kids – at long last?

It didn’t take a genius to figure Obama out. He is a proponent of big government. Always has been. Probably always will be. As president, he’s spending big. Very soon, he’ll be taxing big. He thinks government should be the solution to every problem, and so should be granted permission to invade every nook and cranny of our lives.

Rather than providing equal opportunities, Obama believes it reasonable that America engineer equal outcomes – which is why he considers it the government’s prerogative to do more than spend funds, frugally, in order to assist the needy. Instead, he thinks the feds should tax and redistribute income on a much grander scale. Socialist (but don’t call him that) Obama believes we should “spread the wealth around.” He announced as much, before the election. Were you not listening?

Obama is also very much into accumulating power. For himself, and for his party. How could you (presumably) clever, (supposedly) conservative pundits have missed that fact? How could you have allowed yourselves to be played for suckers? To be turned into pawns?

It does no good now to claim that, gee, “He’s not the guy we thought he was. Our bad.” Yeah, your bad – and the country’s nightmare. It’s much too late to be reaching for that barn door. The horse is long gone. So is your credibility.

Berea Pundit