President of the Greater America UN Census Area

Just recently some in the mass media have stumbled upon the accusation that there may be an oft overlooked difference between Barack and John. Could it be that all positions and counterpositions, new vs. old, liberal vs. conservative, differences aside, one of the two (McCain) is simply more American than the other? Don’t laugh. Or choke. This has been a question gravely and seriously put by conservative, that’s conservative, columnists. Which of course presents the obvious question in response: Are you retarded? Meaning that in the most literal sense; Slow, behind, underdeveloped. Incapable of recognizing what is obvious to those up to a common bar?

Of course I was on to this long ago, when Senor Ricardoson, (D-Ciudad de México) was still at the hustings, as the English and early Americans (hint hint) would say. .

But since it apparently needs to be said that the sky is normally blue and that water is wet, I will specify Yes, John McCain is more American than Barack Obama is. Much more. It is, in fact if not in fashion, entirely appropriate and necessary to question whether BO is really American at all in the normally understood sense. His father was a Kenyan—not an African-American—he grew up (sic) in part in Indonesia (that’s in Asia. A lot of people who will vote for him have never even heard of it and would look for it on a Howard Johnson’s childrens’ placemat map till they found Indianapolis. Who reads past the first three of four letters of such a big word anyhow?). But that’s already old news to those who should be too smart to ask the original question. The painful-to-watch fact is that BO has only a passing, exchange-student’s acquaintance with the US and US culture. Not Black culture, or Ivy League culture or political culture…ANY American culture. He is a welcome guest everywhere to the liberal chatteratti, but at home nowhere. The type of cosmopolitan who fits into Manhattan just as well as London, Paris, Rio, Nairobi, or any Embassy Row. A great UN ambassador for somewhere, if those two adjectives could ever make sense in union.

Being an American means two different things. One, the legalistic definition and the one preferred no doubt by the the Cosmobamatistas , just means you are a US citizen. You can’t be deported and you are entitled to a US passport if you meet the qualifications for leaving the country voluntarily. That is all. Through that macroscopic lense being an American is a mere accident and nothing special. Yes, Obama is one. So are Robert Hanssen, Jose Padilla, Louis Farrahkan, George Soros, Rosie O’Donnell and “Taliban Johnny” Lindh. Not to say BO is a spy or a traitor or worse, just to illustrate the point that this definition of Americanity means less than nothing, really.

Being an American in the meaningful sense requires that you identify culturally with American and its values and that you are loyal to its interests above all else. That means more than any other country and above all other things like “global unity”, environmentalism, Scientology, the Vatican, the UN, the Industrial Workers of the World, or Oprah.Winfrey. A good, in-the-field shibboleth would be the question: If the US is in a war, who do you hope wins? If the response is anything like, “Who is the war with?” or “What is the war about?” it is safe to convene the firing squad and sort out the ramifications of your action in memoirs thirty years later.

Relevant Americanism comes from a core identification. Naturalized citizens can have it; native born ones don’t necessarily have it. BO does not have it. His forced, and very recent, proclamations of patriotism are evidence of this in themselves. When was the last time a presidential candidate, even a Democratic one, had to establish his nationality for the electorate? And he fails. It’s not that he didn’t wear a flag pin, it’s that he didn’t understand why that was important. It’s not that he tried to hide Jeremiah Wright. It is that he didn’t get what the big deal about him was. It’s not that he opposed the war in Iraq. It’s that he doesn’t care if we lose it. It is not that he wore African tribal clothes on some foreign visit. It’s that he supposedly grew up in the Midwest but he has never, ever gone bowling. Or even knew what it was if the tape can be believed. He’s supposedly a 46 year-old American; can he name the Brady kids? Sing the theme song to the Flintstones and Gilligan’s Island? How old was he when he learned the words to the Pledge of Allegiance (assuming that he knows them now; and I am not joking). Has he always known that the game with the black and white ball is called soccer, not football, EVER? Maybe, above all, an American, especially one running for president, would never, ever say this:

“We can’t drive our SUV’s and eat as much as we want and keep our homes at 72 degrees at all times…and then just expect that other countries are going to say OK. That’s not leadership. That’s not gong to happen.”

It’s not going to happen if we have BO in the WH instead of a president, that’s for sure. Leadership is most certainly what those things require. Other countries should be deciding how much we eat? How comfortable our houses are? Basically, we should cede our leadership to the sensibilities of other countries? If that is not an un-American sentiment, I don’t know what would be. That isn’t even to say, “I hope we lose the war”. It is saying, “Let’s skip the war and get right to the surrender”. America is no better than anywhere else, after all. We don’t need to be triumphant, we need to be fair. That’s UN talk, not USA talk, and anyone who grew up in America would know at the very least not to say something like that, even if their soul was burnt enough to think it.

Here’s a good summing up for history buffs: Alexander Hamilton was barred from the presidency, but Barack Hussein Obama qualifies? This is frighteningly odd.