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And when it all comes down to it, we're all just baskets of dreams... - Barack Obama is a genius. [entries|archive|friends|userinfo]
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Barack Obama is a genius. [Jan. 12th, 2009|02:23 pm]
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[mood |bouncybouncy]

In an attempt to learn (in a much more sophisticated manner) what I should have learned in high school (I slept through everything), I'm reading David Herbert Donald's deservedly popular biography "Lincoln." I'm about 300 pages into it right now and it's riveting. I'm at the point where he was recently been elected to office and he is the President-elect an it is hilarious. I am now convinced that Barack Obama has engaged in the second most impressive social engineering project ever embarked upon in the "modern" world.*

(NOTE: Links do not actually have to be read)

He has made no secret of his admiration of Lincoln. See: http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1077287,00.html

Also, muuuuuch ink has been spilled about the parallels between the two. Examples:

http://www.nybooks.com/articles/21290

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/manisha-sinha/is-obama-lincoln-to-hilla_b_98955.html

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/the-trail/2007/12/18/ken_burns_compares_obama_to_li.html

And muuuuuuch more. Now Obama is playing into the game by being sworn into office with Lincoln's Bible and riding a train to mimic Abe's own inauguration.

I won't add much more to all these words but I am highly amused. The South was highly disturbed by the election of a Republican president before he even got into office. While I doubt a physical war will break out, many contemporary Southerners are disturbed and creeped out as fuck. It is a grim day for the culture wars! Mary Lincoln is described as being an insufferable, overemotional bitch in much the same way Miss Angry-Black-Woman is expected to grace the White House. I swear Obama only wrote an emotional farewell letter to Chicago since Lincoln did the same for Springfield.  Hahahaha this is all too great.

Though, it's a sombre day when the best person the "modern" world has to offer aspires to be merely derivative of a former "great man" instead of new, creative, paradigmatic in his own right but perhaps I shouldn't get into that one. I'm having too much fun! XD


*Hitler was the most successful, obviously
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Comments:
[User Picture]From: [info]batmiles
2009-01-12 08:13 pm (UTC)

(Link)

Re: that last, non-footnote section: there's a time-honored tradition of pretending to be the new version of whoever the last awesome dude was. It makes the fuddy-duddies and stick-in-the-muds feel less threatened. Popes, kings, generals, emperors, favored sons--the list of people with Roman numerals after their names in an attempt to either aspire to or elicit former greatness just goes on and on.
[User Picture]From: [info]verbsonice
2009-01-12 09:25 pm (UTC)

(Link)

OMG dude, you're right. Sorry about that! Good looking out!

I guess it just drove me insane hearing him referred to as Abe, JFK-MLK hybrid, Superman, Jesus, Osama Bin Laden, Jimmy Carter.....it's so epic.