Barack Obama delivers a statement on the attacks in Paris from the press briefing room on Friday Nov. 13, 2015. (Photo: Pete Souza)
So many legacies; so many symbols. As President Obama enters his last months in the White House, and the question of his legacy swirls, several choices come to mind: There’s ObamaCare socialism.
There’s quantitative easing and the whole magic money thing. Speaking of, there’s the loss of America’s AAA credit rating.
There’s the showdowns with citizens about the border – and the showdown with cattle ranchers in Nevada. There’s the bus dumping of illegal minors at a community near you.
There’s the rise and spread of ISIS, the administration’s blind eye to the persecution of Christians – the administration’s blind eye to the IRS persecution of Republicans. And the administration’s blind eye to the criminals and potential terrorists skipping up from Mexico. There’s gun control and no border control, fights with Israel to win favor with Iran.
Somebody cue Billy Joel’s “We Didn’t Start the Fire” and bring in a good lyricist. The list goes on.
But the assortment of images that could be used to capture such legacies is equally long. How about putting the picture of a magician pulling a rabbit out of its hat on the dollar bill? The magician’s face could even be Obama’s – for added symbolism, that is. Or maybe we could simply fly white flags of surrender along the southern-most tips of southern states’ boundaries say, every 10 feet or so. Or brand a special pen and cell phone gift set to memorialize Obama’s famous-and-favorite mantra, “Who Needs Congress?”
A t-shirt of a random police department, with the words, “Whites Need Not Apply?”
A desktop paperweight forged from the melted steel of confiscated guns?
A world map that contains a Palestine but no Israel?
Just some thoughts.
But the symbol that sums up all Obama’s legacies – the one that really encompasses all the president’s passions, from killing the American economy through regulation to killing the American family through forced transgender and gay rights – is this: Bruce Jenner.
Or Caitlyn Jenner.
Whichever. Bruce Jenner in a dress – which is to say, Caitlyn Jenner.
Regardless, set the figure to a bobble head and that’s Obama’s legacy in a nutshell. Why?
Go back in time to 1976, the height of the Cold War and tense relations between the Soviet Union and America. It’s the Summer Olympics in Montreal and the Soviet’s Mykoloa Avilov is fiercely defending his 1972 gold win in the decathlon. Here comes Jenner – who wins it. And in so doing, he captures not only the hearts of adoring American fans, who dub him the “world’s greatest athlete,” but also secures his long-running iconic placement on boxes upon boxes of Wheaties breakfast cereal – all while shooting a not-so-subtle middle finger Russia’s way. In America’s centennial year, no less. Quite an accomplishment.
Now fast-forward to 2015 and Jenner’s abandonment of manhood – his girlification, so to speak.
Isn’t that how America’s morphed under Obama?
Our once unquestioned mightiness is in doubt; our once unparalleled status on the world stage as A-Number One uncertain. Our dollar is down. Our foreign policy, a shambles; our education system, subpar; our exceptionalism, mocked and degraded – and not just by our enemies. Obama himself regularly downplays America’s greatness.
America, the mighty Olympian, has fallen from grace. We’ve ceded the gold to another. We’ve gone girly, just like that other great American Olympian of yesteryear.
So this president’s legacy? Truly, nothing says Obama like a Jenner bobble head.
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