For those that don't have James Taranto in their facebook or email subscriptions, you should... he comes up with some outstanding phrases.

Best of the Web Today: Obama vs. the World - WSJ.com

http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10...reno64-wsj Wrote:David Remnick, editor of The New Yorker, has a message for the world, noted by Daniel Halper of The Weekly Standard:

Quote:"The profile [of President Obama] that I published in the New Yorker was somebody that eerily, eerily seemed to be claiming himself--it was a sense of not giving up, but of deep frustration--that was the profile that I published in the New Yorker. Somebody frustrated and disappointed," said Remnick, who has proven to be deeply sympathetic to this president.

"And that's what's frustrating to me sometimes about Obama is that the world seems to disappoint him," he continued to laughter from others on the [MSNBC] set. "Republicans disappoint him, Bashar al-Assad disappoints him, Putin as well. And the fighting spirit sometimes is lacking in the performative aspects of the presidency."

Remnick asked: "Do I think that at the end of eight years this will go down as a terrible presidency?" He answered: "I don't. I think an enormous amount has been achieved." That's not surprising: Reviewer John MacArthur described Remnick's 2010 book, "The Bridge: The Life and Rise of Barack Obama" as portraying "the First Black President's ascension to the White House as nothing less than a glorious saga." So Remnick has a professional interest as well as an ideological one in a successful presidency.

But as for Obama's disappointment with the world, we'd like to make a case that it is well-founded. "The world" has let the president down.

The specific examples Remnick cited--Republicans, Putin and Assad--are somewhat beside the point. All are of course inhabitants of the world, but they are not representative of what those who supported Barack Obama's candidacy had in mind when they spoke of "the world." Rather, they meant "the world" of Western elites, including but decidedly not limited to American liberal elites. If "the world" has a representative body, it is the Norwegian Nobel Committee, which annually awards the Peace Prize.

Beginning in 2002 with the political dispute over the Iraq war, "the world" maintained a hostile relationship with George W. Bush. The 2002 Nobel Peace Prize went to Jimmy Carter, a harsh Bush critic, in what was widely seen as a rebuke to the then-U.S. president. Two more Bush-era Peace Prizes went to Bush antagonists: Mohamed ElBaradei, director of the International Atomic Energy Agency, in 2005, and Al Gore in 2007.

In 2009, of course, Obama received the Nobel Peace Prize "for his extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples." Those efforts consisted of . . . well, nothing really. After all, he'd been in office less than a year. As we wrote at the time, "this staggeringly premature honor" was "the equivalent of a lifetime-achievement Oscar for a child star."

The Nobel press release pretty much acknowledged that Obama's accomplishments were notional: "Only very rarely has a person to the same extent as Obama captured the world's attention and given its people hope for a better future." The Norwegians awarded Obama "the world's" highest honor simply for being who he was--or what they imagined him to be.

That sums up the story of Obama's early relationship with "the world." He was showered with adulation just for being himself. But somewhere along the way "the world" changed its expectations. Now he's being judged for what he's done, or hasn't done. Why shouldn't he feel let down? He thought they loved him for him.

"The world," of course is disappointed with Obama too. It gave him all that attention, invested in him all that hope. "His diplomacy is founded in the concept that those who are to lead the world must do so on the basis of values and attitudes that are shared by the majority of the world's population," said the Nobel press release. Such a vaporous sentiment was never going to have any real power in the hard world of diplomacy.

Obama's relationship with "the world" was based on reciprocal self-deception. It was bound to end eventually in mutual disappointment.

My interpretration of the President was correct from Day One. And I'd bet a million dollars that my interpretation of his post Presidency will be correct: that he will insulate himself within the global liberal cocoon, jetting from conference to speaking engagement to fundraiser, nary a concern except to furl his brow at the lack of a "Qu'ils mangent de la brioche" world King along the lines of Di Xin, the infamous Chinese Emperor who in his later years was given over to drinking, women, sex and a lack of morals, preferring these to the proper governance of the country, and ignored almost all affairs of state.

To be clear, I do not think Obama is a hard drinking womanizer with a lack of morals. Though I do believe, strongly believe, that Obama much prefers the future pomp and circumstance of the highly regarded academic / commenter / global ambassador as opposed to the true affairs of state.

You are almost certainly correct. He will insulate himself within the liberal cocoon where he is not challenged to accomplish anything on his own, because that is how he has spent his entire life, propped up without having to accomplish much of anything.

He has accomplished more for the liberal cause and in conjunction America than you give him credit for but you could very well make the argument that he was just in the right place at the right time. GWB's administration did the heavy lifting.

The ACA is here and it may be reformed but the main elements of it will be around for our lifetimes. I could see able bodied men over 18 being booted off but other than that, It's here to stay and for that Obama will be be considered a liberal champion.

He will be the FDR of our generation.

Everybody hates the ACA.

(05-08-2014 12:40 PM)Machiavelli Wrote:  He has accomplished more for the liberal cause and in conjunction America than you give him credit for but you could very well make the argument that he was just in the right place at the right time. GWB's administration did the heavy lifting.

I can't deny that he has accomplished a lot for the liberal cause. I'd have a bit of a debate if that was good for America.

(05-08-2014 12:50 PM)Lord Stanley Wrote:  

(05-08-2014 12:40 PM)Machiavelli Wrote:  He has accomplished more for the liberal cause and in conjunction America than you give him credit for but you could very well make the argument that he was just in the right place at the right time. GWB's administration did the heavy lifting.

I can't deny that he has accomplished a lot for the liberal cause. I'd have a bit of a debate if that was good for America.

I would say GWB accomplished more for the liberal cause, unwittingly, than Obama did. And none of it was good for America.

(05-08-2014 12:57 PM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  

(05-08-2014 12:50 PM)Lord Stanley Wrote:  

(05-08-2014 12:40 PM)Machiavelli Wrote:  He has accomplished more for the liberal cause and in conjunction America than you give him credit for but you could very well make the argument that he was just in the right place at the right time. GWB's administration did the heavy lifting.

I can't deny that he has accomplished a lot for the liberal cause. I'd have a bit of a debate if that was good for America.

I would say GWB accomplished more for the liberal cause, unwittingly, than Obama did. And none of it was good for America.

Yea I don't think it's overstating it to say that GWB got Obama elected. But McCain didn't help matters any in that regard.

(05-08-2014 12:57 PM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  I would say GWB accomplished more for the liberal cause, unwittingly, than Obama did. And none of it was good for America.

I see what you are getting at, but under this current administration we've seen more of the liberal social justice / check your privileged / micro aggressions / political correctness that has realigned American culture in a long term negative way. Our country gains nothing, and loses everything, when for instance Secretary Rice withdraws from giving a commencement speech based on the whargarbling of sensitive snowflakes. It's all designed to do nothing but cut off debate.

So while we can always work to pay down a physical debt, it’s the Left that’s championing waging a war against the intellectual traditions that made the West a great, and – by world historical standards – free, prosperous and enlightened place.

The country was going downhill well before 2008.

(05-08-2014 01:45 PM)NIU007 Wrote:  The country was going downhill well before 2008.

This country has been going downhill for the most part since the 1960s.