[img]1|left|||no_popup[/img]Standing in a tub of scalding water over his grandiloquent Guantanamo gaffe, Barack Obama rushed through his Supreme Court nomination of Sonia Sotomayor this week to deflect attention away from his narcissistic self for the first time since his inauguration, or maybe since his Muslim version of bar mitzvah.
One of the numerous — and very unattractive — storylines of President Obama’s media-shielded administration that has been studiously ignored is his extreme loathing for details.
He specializes in sweeping views, spectacular strokes. Behind him, the head-down peons are charged with devising and executing the serious thinking.
Here is how it works:
He thinks up a swashbuckling idea. He takes enough deep bows to give himself the bends, then quickly leaves the White House’s gold lame stage.
Thereafter, it is up to his drop-dead court jesters to figure out how to pull off the strategem.
If you just rely on the daily newspaper that is tossed onto your porch, you would have believed that this month alone, the President is leading God by at least 100 to 10 in thinking up original and nifty ideas.
The truth lies elsewhere.
Stop Counting. It Is Not Fair.
Until he was convinced to accelerate his selection for the Supreme Court by naming a cinch left-wing media sensation, Mr. Obama’s gargantuan Gitmo gaffe was headed for the nuclear waste pile, threatening his jealously guarded popularity.
He commits numerous rudimentary errors. This was one of his earliest and worst.
Although he has busted more lavish campaign promises than he has kept — scorekeeping suddenly seems to have been outlawed — Mr. Obama announced with swirl and dash on Jan. 21, his first full day, that he would close down the Cuban island prison.
After that, nothing happened. He was onto his next hot-button scheme.
Potential disaster lurked, though.
A week ago, Mr. Obama and his presumed Democratic allies were headed for a nasty confrontation over disposition of Gitmo’s 240 terrorists after the supposedly bold Dear Leader locked the gates.
Thinking Is for Other People
With obviously scant aforethought, the President, adopting the pose of a man dealing cards, thought he would quietly redistribute the 240 Muslim mugs around the country— just as he hopes to do with your accumulated wealth.
If the media would treat such a move with mundanity, perhaps no one would notice, he logically reasoned. Surely the cheering from his bold shutdown proclamation would drown out objections to the dispersal of the terrorists.
But except for certain 900-pound gorillas, not much can be slipped past the alert eyes of the boys and girls in Congress.
Led by Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV), Democrats vowed that not one terrorist would ever be locked up on American soil, which simultaneously shocked and worried the President back to eyes-rubbing reality.
How unseemly to duel, in public, with your friends, imperiling his prized popularity.
Brilliant tactician that he is, Mr. Obama proved that even he can be caught with his trousers at half-mast. Not for long, but long enough to make him break into his first sweat.
Slick tactician that he is, though, Mr. Obama brilliantly rebounded.
He dipped into his wall-tall bag of devious tricks and pulled out the name of Sonia Sotomayor a few weeks after his aides jad started softening up the country in preparation for her selection.
“Playing President” sounds like a grown-up board game that could become a smash as long as Mr. Obama keeps tripping.
