Thanks, Obama!

Yesterday, I got another one of those emails explaining why President Obama has been the worst President in all of human history.

For people who have managed to retain a sense of humor during the seven-plus years of the Obama Administration, there has been plenty of similar material to keep them chuckling. (Now, granted, my own reaction to some of the crazy has been to beat my head against the nearest wall, but people more stable than I am just laugh a lot. And have fewer headaches….)

I do like the Facebook entries making fun of this tsunami of blame: “On this date in [whatever year], the Titanic sank [Or the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor. Or insert your preferred historical calamity here]. People died. Thanks, Obama.”

The Rightwing crazies have blamed everything from Kim Kardashian to El Nino on our first black President. ( I’m sure the fact that he is the first black President is entirely co-incidental. Also, if you are interested, I have some swampland in Florida for sale….)

At the bottom of all of the Obama blaming is an irony that has evidently escaped most of our President’s determined critics: on the one hand, we are constantly harangued from the Right with accusations about Obama’s deficiencies: what he doesn’t understand, hasn’t accomplished, doesn’t have sufficient experience to appreciate….in other words, we are constantly told how utterly feckless he is.

At the very same time, we are treated to constant admonitions about this President’s absolutely amazing prowess: he has singlehandedly lost wars, destroyed economies, created racial tensions in hitherto loving and peaceful neighborhoods, interfered with your gallstones….I mean, you name it, this dude’s super-powers are up to the task.

I thought about this disconnect (okay, haters gotta hate) when I read about an O’Reilly accusation over at Dispatches from the Culture Wars:

Did you know that it’s Obama’s fault that people use hard drugs? I didn’t either. And do you know why it’s his fault? Because he apparently knows what words mean.

Here’s the quote from O’Reilly in support of this….um ….interesting thesis..

President Obama’s leading the way on this, classifying drug dealing, hard drug dealing, as a, quote, “nonviolent crime.” That sends a signal to the country that, you know what, it may be illegal to sell drugs, but it’s not all that bad. And the left is generally supporting the madness.

As Ed Brayton notes, classifying a transaction as “non-violent” (assuming no violence occurred) is generally seen as–what’s that called?– using words to convey information.

 If I sell you a bag of dope and you pay for it and we both drive away without any physical confrontation, then that transaction was — by definition — non-violent. Still illegal. Still might be very bad for the person who takes the drugs, depending on the drug. But it isn’t violent. Thus ends our lesson in using a dictionary.

What Ed has obviously missed is the central lesson of the past seven years: everything bad is Obama’s fault.

Come to think of it, just where were the Obamas when Prince died…??

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