One must be specific if one wants to list the worst things that occurred during Barack Obama's first term, as including the term itself as an item would be appropriate and yet too vague. Try to summon the energy to be specific even during this listless era. Enough voters summoned the energy to vote so they could loaf through another term.
You have likely endured another four-year loss of power unless you're a de facto Soviet strongman, fading solar power panel manufacturer, or Mexican gangster. Just as how giggling over how foolish each fancifully daft plan sounded even before its enactment is the only way to endure the ensuing collision with reality's steel, shaking one's head through coping laughter is how we'll remember the worst moments of a rotten term during an even more putrid second:
1. Obamacare- If you're going to surrender autonomy, you may as well have to wait in comically long lines to be cured. Maintaining that the government will lower costs and provide better service is the truest sign of faith in Obama, as there is zero evidence that the exchanges will offer a good rate on your well-being.
Don't make people do things. That standard is too high for those who maintain abortion is a choice but having mandatory crappy insurance isn't. The administration will make up for it by forcing everyone to pay for killing inconvenient babies so we're all culpable. Not having to experience guilt alone is what compassionate health care is all about, right? Let's not pay those doctors well for saving our lives, either, and we can use the savings that are totally coming to buy those plug-in cars that are going to save our economy. And you doubted it was all part of the plan.
2. The stimulus- What a tease. The administration that treated trillions like change cast a spell that resulted in the remarkable dark magick of spending a fortune to put more people out of work. The one-time joyless splurging embodies the mentality of pitifully trying to repair an economy using someone else's cash for the benefit of others. In the end, nobody was helped, but at least we're all poor.
More spending will fix everything; just don't ask about the cost. The attitude that it's the government's money all along permeated the entire broke and broken term. But at least he demonstrated the value of keeping one's damn hands to oneself. Obama's crew will never be honest enough about the world to admit their policies function as the equivalent of trying to calm hyperactive children with Slurpees. They remain convinced we must merely add more corn syrup.
3. Libya- The only thing that could make the astounding nonchalance behind watching flames and homicide overcome Benghazi worse is knowing that it resulted from having to preserve the flaccid policy that caused it. The White House couldn't be bothered to fight against the coldest-blooded American-killers, as admitting that our people needed reinforcements would be the same as conceding that terrorists still dislike us.
Our ambassador and three people trying to defend him were collateral damage in the campaign to pretend we're safe. Impeachment won't protect us, but it would confirm that Obama's favorite form of dereliction is nonchalance. Staying awake wouldn't have brought Chris Stevens back to life, so why would Obama have bothered being cranky the next day?
4. Fast and Furious- The cunning plan to ensure nearby drug gangsters were able to set a baseline for human monstrosity was only the Obama administration's first Watergate with a body count. Giving guns to some of Earth's most dangerous monsters turned out to have negative consequences for whatever reason.
Perhaps spilling gallons of innocent blood didn't justify the most disgustingly cynical attempt to push an agenda. Opponents of gun control are also typically not in favor of arming Mexican cartels with no plan for capturing the murderous peddlers. Historians may already conclude that, under Obama, the Department of Justice's primary goal was to make its name ironic.
5. The damn attitude- Well, aren't you awesome. You don't even need to achieve anything to prove it. The most historical aspect about the Obama presidency is how much smugness they achieved compared to the utter dearth of success.
People who display such a superiority complex usually have accomplished something. Except for all the things, the White House has done much good. As for tangible results, they united everyone who thinks the government's job is to do everything but provide consulate security. Obama's refusal to acknowledge the bloodbath reflects his coldness as a president and human, but it beats having to admit that trying to hug our enemies just made it easier for them to stab us in the front.
Now, there's a truly miserable era to which future political junkies may use as a reference point. By contrast, the Obama team tends to accuse their opponents of wanting to return to eras like the '80s and '50s, namely decades of unmitigated prosperity and growth accompanied by meaningful civil rights legislation, respectively. And the evil prosperity of the '20s led to the Depression in the same way that unfettered capitalism caused our present downturn, namely not at all. Subprime mortgages are our era's Smoot-Hawley tariffs.
Meanwhile, the stubborn diehards still bewilderingly granted White House access use economic and international ideas discredited early in the 20th century. To be fair, free condoms and intramural marriage are new concepts, so the neo-pinkos were on the vanguard of the free goodie and dictionary tearing frontiers.
On a broader scale than the specific instances of horrendously counterproductive executive decisions, Obama's America is now hated internationally along with being disrespected. Soon, we'll also be ignored thanks to self-imposing a salary cap that keeps us from accumulating championships. Global parity is decidedly not good for the game.
Obama's failures are only overshadowed by the embarrassments, which are in turn only dwarfed by the scandals. Peddling the contended nature of misery as a welcome alternative to pursuing riches is only outweighed by the countless other instances of bowing to foreign overlords or surrendering to eight percent unemployment. The only thing more limitless than the incidents of depressing mayhem brought by people whose incompetence is only surpassed by pernicious ideology is the debt.
Anthony Bialy is a writer and “Red Eye” conservative in New York City. He tweets at http://twitter.com/AnthonyBialy.
