The Middle is Always Evil

I was doing a bit of intellectual slumming earlier tonight, watching Countdown with Keith Olbermann; Rachel Maddow was guest hosting. Initially, I was just going to shut the garbage off, but she previewed a segment on Jerome Corsi’s new book The Obama Nation that would appear later in the program, and since I am currently reading it, I decided to stick around for a bit.

I should have left the room.

I sat uncomfortably through the bizarre first half of the program, which, amid numerous calls for a united Democratic Party, mostly consisted of impugning John McCain for his wealth—very strange.

Finally, the segment I had been waiting for started, featuring Eric Burns, who was presented as a non-partisan “media critic.” I was skeptical. The segment started with Maddow saying flatly the book is full of lies that have all been debunked. “OK,” I said to myself, “if that’s true, Burns should have some solid information for me, and I can throw my copy in the trash.”

What did Burns actually have to say to discredit the book? Here he is:

“Let me… You didn’t ask me this, but I just have to mention this to you… You know, one of the other things that gives a book cachè—a non fiction book—is foot notes; you look at the back of the book and you see all these footnotes, dozens of pages of them, and you say, ‘this guy did a lot of research.’ Well, before the show tonight, and I didn’t have time to do more… but, of the first eleven footnotes in the book, nine of them, in nine of them, Corsi quotes Corsi—in other words, he quotes previous writings of his own. It’s a dubious practice to say the least.”

Wow, I thought. If that’s true, Corsi really must be a truly dishonest journalist. I happened to have the book right beside me at the moment, so I checked out what Burns had said. It was true! Of the first eleven footnotes, nine of them are of Corsi’s own writings. Shocked, I checked the actual text to see what they referred to.

Lo and behold, the citations referred to the preface of the book, which is entitled Who I Am and Why I Wrote This Book. The very first clause of the preface is footnoted, and it is one of the footnotes in question. It reads as follows:

“In 2004, I coauthored Unfit for Command: Swift Boat Veterans Speak Out Against John Kerry.”

The corresponding footnote reads:

John E. O’Neill and Jerome r. Corsi, Unfit for Command: Swift Boat Veterans Speak Out Against John Kerry (Washington, D.C.: Regnery, 2004).

A dubious practice indeed. Burns made it seem as though Corsi was being dishonest in citing himself, when he clearly was just being thorough.

Eric Burns is a renowned “media critic” with considerable experience. If Corsi’s book is so full of lies, why does a professional such as he have to distort the facts about the book itself in order to prove his case?

Barack Obama supporters are starting to creep me out in a serious way. You know the ones; chanting his name, crying during his speeches, fainting during his speeches, screaming “I love you!” as he passes.

Jesse Jackson, Jr. had this to say about Obama’s Nomination clinch:

“I cried all night. I’m going to be crying for the next four years,” he said. “What Barack Obama has accomplished is the single most extraordinary event that has occurred in the 232 years of the nation’s political history. … The event itself is so extraordinary that another chapter could be added to the Bible to chronicle its significance.” (italics mine)

Michael Morse, a teen columnist for TeenLink, a newspaper aimed at young people in South Florida, went to an Obama rally and shared his experience:

The crowd immediately ceased the roar when Obama approached the mic, eager to hear whatever the man has to say… I can’t believe the man whose speeches I watch on YouTube everyday is so close to me. His speeches give an aura of immortality that belies the fact that he’s a living breathing human.

Its very upsetting to hear this kind of thing from someone my age; it bears a frightening similarity to Hitler’s level of popularity in Nazi Germany, where he was elevated to a sort of demi-god status. This is especially concerning, considering Obama’s support for compulsory national service for American high-school, middle-school and college-age students, which is (if you accept my earlier analogy) more than a little similar the imfamous Hitler Youth, Hitler’s version of compulsory national service.

Obama’s supporters seem to have forgotten that Barack Obama is just a man– and less than a man, hes just a politician. Worse still, he isn’t even a good politician. Its been said over and over again, but Obama is all fluff and no substance. One struggles to find anything material on his webpage, aside from one, large PDF ominously titled, “THE BLUEPRINT FOR CHANGE” (caps his, not mine).

Time columnist Joe Klein knows what I’m talking about:

Rather than focusing on any specific issue or cause — other than an amorphous desire for change — the message is becoming dangerously self-referential. The Obama campaign all too often is about how wonderful the Obama campaign is.

Have you seen Obama’s website? Its creepy! On the main part of the site there’s a Kids for Obama page, where kids are given 10 ways in which they can get involved, encouraging children to host Obama-themed sleepovers and parties, to get a pen pal to talk to about Obama, among other things. If you sign up, you can set up your own little facebook right there on his homepage, give all your information, and join other Obamunists to celebrate his birthday, hold Obama-themed spa parties, book clubs, and any other kind of get-together you could think of– all in Obama’s holy name.

Worst of all, though, is Camp Obama, a four day training camp paid for by the Obama campaign, which teaches Obama supporters to learn more about how Barack Obama is a great and wise leader.

Hitler and Barack Obama have too much in common for me to not feel uneasy going into election season. Gun control, socialized healthcare, compulsory national service, an anti-market economic position, all on top of a creepy, cult-like leader worship by supporters. Thats five too many similarities.