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This stuff is getting truly scary:

http://bighollywood.breitbart.com/jjmnolte/2009/11/04/elementary-epidemic-11-uncovered-videos-show-school-children-performing-praises-to-obama/

http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D9BKU4HG0&show_article=1

I was writing a post that says about the same thing this editorial from the Washington Times says.  But why should you be be subjected to my poor prose when the editor emeritus of the Times, Wesley Prudens, says it so much better.   Enjoy.

http://washingtontimes.com/news/2009/oct/23/obamas-third-world-get-the-press-rant/?feat=home_headlines

In his response the announcement that he had be named the winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, our President said, ”To be honest, I do not feel that I deserve to be in the company of so many transformative figures who have been honored by this prize, men and women who’ve inspired me and inspired the entire world through their courageous pursuit of peace.” 

I agree, he certainly does not deserve to be in the company of the likes of Gandhi, Martin Luther King Jr. or Mother Theresa.   However, I did notice that he said he does not feel he deserves to be in the company of so many of the recipients of the Nobel Prize.  Clearly, he does feel comfortable in the company of some of the winners.  I agree.  He is certainly as deserving as Jimmy Carter, Al Gore and Yasser Arafat.

“So soon? Too early. He has no contribution so far,” former Polish President Lech Walesa, 1983 Nobel Peace Prize Winner 

The pattern of honoring this man before he actually accomplishes anything continues. 

I am reminded of something I read recently about how America has created a generation of narcissists.  The author of this article theorized that we did this when got into the business of seeing to it that our children had positive self images regardless of actual accomplishment.  Basically, we began praising our children just for existing.  The author theorized that this has resulted is a generation which has an overly inflated opinion of its own worth and a sense of entitlement previously unknown in American history: “I am praised, therefore I exist”. 

One of the first appearances of this new narcissism occurred several years ago when some of our top math students competed with students from around the world in an international competition.  Before the text the students were poled on how well they thought they would do.  The students from other nations — who actually scored well on the test — were the most worried they would do poorly.  In contrast, the Americans were the most confident, but they did the worst on the actual examination.   This led to the quip that the Americans felt good about themselves for no apparent reason.

The narcissism of the emerging generation is actually prompting seminars for employers on how do deal with worthless employees  who feel entitled to high pay, promotions, time off, etc., even though they are unwilling to work and have actually accomplished nothing.  Normally an employer would just fire them.  Unfortunately, the job pool is filled with more just like them.  This creating a real problem.  Mommy and Daddy told them the were wonderful, even when they weren’t, so now they think they are entitled to the rewards heretofore reserved for actual achievement. 

Now, it seems, we have a narcissist in chief with the same problem.  In a recent weekend news blitz, the President appeared on almost all of the Sunday morning talk shows.  An audit of the content of these programs revealed the astounding statistic that he talked about himself every 13 seconds.   The same audit revealed that he talked about himself 1,198 times in his first 41 speeches (This broke down to 1,121 “I”s and 77 “me”s).   

Clearly, our President likes to talk about himself.   His Nobel prize should give him many more opportunities to do so.  Saddly, this man has many enablers.  Even more incredible, and for no apparent reason, the world seems to be prepared to worship him.  This is scary stuff.  We live in perilous times.

IN A RELATED RANT: http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=112318

In an earlier post I stated that our President had met with General McChrystal for 20 minutes after his failed effort to bring the Olympics to Chicago.  I misspoke, so in fairness to the President I want to publish a correction.  His conversation with McChrystal actually lasted 25 minutes.

The Jerusalem Post has recently repeated a report that first appeared in Cairo’s Al Ahram newspaper, that “Archeologists have discovered ancient Egyptian coins bearing the name and image of the biblical Joseph”.  The importance of this find for — if substantiated – for those who believe that the accuracy of the Bible is obvious.  But for historians this find would have another important corollary, it would show that coins were being minted in Egypt, and used as a medium of exchange, far earlier than previously thought.  For my purpose in this series of posts it would also be a reminder that there are few institutions more ancient than the market place.

When God created a nation of His own during the Bronze Age, He planted His kingdom in the midst of a world which the market place, and the rules that governed it, were already quite ancient…and so also were the attempts of human government to control it.  For example, the surviving text of The Laws of Eshnunna (About 2000 BC) begins with an ancient attempt to regulate prices and wages.  It is fair to say, then, that the tension between the market place and government has probably existed for as long as these institutions have existed. 

Simply stated, the tension between these two ancient institutions can be distilled down to the market’s insatiable desire for freedom and government’s insatiable desire for control. I saw an example of this during my first trip to India in 1998. 

Our host decided to take us shopping on a national holiday, Republic Day.  Republic day is the day when India celebrates the adoption of its constitution.  By law, all businesses are closed.  So, one may wonder, how can you go shopping on Republic Day?  We wondered about this ourselves.  But we learned that it was really not difficult, because the stores were not really closed.  

The large, metal, garage style doors were closed.  But it was not difficult to gain admission, and once inside the shopping was great.  You see, there were men and boys loitering around the entryways of certain stores.  These loiterers were really lookouts and plain-clothed doormen.  All our host had to do was let them know we wanted to shop in a particular store and within a few minutes we were in. 

This is how it worked: the loiterers would make sure the police were not around, then they would knock on the door of the store in which we wanted to shop, then the door would quickly be drawn up so that that we could enter the store, and just as quickly, shut behind us.  Once inside, business preceded as usual. So much for governmental control of commerce in the city of Vijayawada. 

Abraham came from Ur. Commerce there would have been very similar to that which existed in the kingdom of Eshnunna.  He traveled to where the market was much freer, but where the city states and loose alliances of the land of Cana made life far more dangerous than the land he had known.  That is always the trade off.   Government offers the market safety of its walls, gates and protection of its soldiers, but always at a price; taxes and some measure of control. 

Often governmental control is aimed at protecting the unwitting “consumer” from dishonest merchants, or sure that the “working man” receive fair compensation.  These motives can be seen in the Laws of Eshnunna. But government, like the camel that gets its nose in the tent, can always be depended upon to exercise as much control as it can.  You see government and the market place have one thing in common, greed.  The market is driven by its greed for profit.  Government is driven by its greed for power. 

It is ironic that the same Joseph whose inscription may have been found on a number of ancient Egyptian coins, was one of the first to push the power of government to its ultimate limit, and like a modern day follower of Saul Alinsky, he used a crisis to do it.

The civilization of Egypt was different in many ways from the culture Abraham had known in Mesopotamia.  But in Abraham’s time it did have these things in common with the world the great patriarch had known: 1. there was still private ownership of the means of production, which in the ancient world was land; 2. the market was still a place where the producer traded his produce for a profit.   Joseph changed that.

You may recall that when the full effects of the seven year drought were felt in Egypt, and the hungry people began to turn to Pharaoh for food (which Joseph had diligently stockpiled during the seven years of plenty), the desperate people were willing to give all of their money to the government, then their livestock, and finally their land and their bodies.  The scriptures describe what happened: “Joseph bought all the land of Egypt for Pharaoh, for every Egyptian sold his field, because the famine was severe upon them.  Thus the land became Pharaoh’s.  Thus, all Egypt became slaves to Pharaoh.

Total government control was not such a bad thing when Joseph was in charge.  Unfortunately for Joseph’s people, “A new king arose over Egypt, who did not know Joseph” (Exodus 1:8), and the Israelites discovered, as people always do, that statism[i] is not all that its cracked-up to be.       

Fortunately for Israel, God led his enslaved people out of Egypt, instructed them never to forget the awfulness of being slaves in Egypt, and established a very different kind of kingdom in the Promised Land.         

One of our readers has requested that I re-post a couple video I had posted briefly but removed.  I removed them because I thought my intent might be misconstrued.  I was afraid that readers might think I was drawing a direct comparison between Adolf Hitler and Barrack Obama.  This was not my intent.   What is disturbing to me is the fact that there are apparently large portions of our country which are prepared to worship a man, just as Germany was willing to worship Hitler. 

I am also disturbed that rather than rebuking the cult of personality that is developing around the president, Obama and his handlers have purposely encouraged and cultivated it from the beginning.   In this I will draw one similarity between Hitler and Obama’s rise to power.  Objectively speaking, based on resume alone, no rational person would conclude that either man was qualified for the office he sought.  The only ability either man exhibited at the outset of their careers was the ability to give speeches that spoke powerfully to the collective unconsciousness of their people. (This observation is not unique to me.  Obama’s main rival during the campaign, Hillary Clinton, even referred to the fact that the only thing he had accomplished in his career was the giving of a very effective speech at the previous Democratic convention).  So, how did such unqualified men become the leaders of their respective nations?  The presented themselves as Messianic figures who embodied their countries hopes for change, and they allowed and encouraged the development of a cult of personality.  

I think it is a sad and frightening moment in any nation’s life when it reaches such a point and it does not bode well for the future.   Leaders that allow and encourage such things concern me too.  I am reminded of the title of the first volume of Ian Kershaw’s biography of Hitler, Hubris. My reading of history leads me to conclude that such hubris does not sit well with God. 

Hmmm.  This seems familiar.  Where have I seen this sort of thing before?  O, I remember:

As a bonus: thislittle ditty produced during the campaign.  It was posted briefly on Obama’s own website.   I will say this about it, Musically, it is far superior to the first number.  So if we have to hear our children sing the praises of a mere mortal I guess I would prefer that it be easy on the ears, and I have to admit that the soloist has a very nice, sweet little voice.  Also, the director is interesting.  I think she looks like she would pretty much ready to bow down and worship if Obama were to step into the room. 

While President Obama, his wife, and his prophetess, Oprah, were planning their trip to Copenhagen in an effort to win the all important 2016 Olympic games for Chicago, the city where the dead still vote, there was another planning meeting going on in Afghanistan.  The latter meeting resulted in what the Times On Line referred to as “a devastating, well-planned attack”.

Unfortunately the  second meeting, by the Taliban, and the plan that came out of it, was far more sucessful than our Commander in Chief’s efforts to land the Olymics for his wife’s home town.  While Obama dreamed of Olymic glory, our enemies in Afganistan were thinking of something far more gory.  The result was our worst loss in a year; ten American soldiers died.  But in our President’s defense he did manage to squeeze in a 20 minute meetng with his hand-picked commander, General McChrystal. 

General McCrystal requested more troops several months ago, warning that without them we were fighting a losing battle in a war our leaders said we must win.   Responding to this urgent request the President was able to carve out enough time from his busy schedule to talk with this commanding general one time before his most recent 20 minute conversation.  He is trying to figure out what he is going to do.

Meanwhile the families of ten American servicemen mourn, and the families of others worry that their sons or daughters  may be the next casulaties.  The kindest thing I can think of to say about our President’s performance as Commander in Chief is that he is guilty of dereliction of duty.  If my son or daughter were among the recent casualties I do not know if I could contain my rage.

In an unrelated story, we are all glad that the President was able to break away from the hard word of evaluating our strategy in Afganistand to celebebrate his 17th wedding anniversary with a night on the town.