The more I ponder Eli’s analysis, the more it seems to me dead-on. I wonder what he and other readers would think of the following hypothesis:

In spite of his high intelligence and remarkable achievements, Obama is at core an empty, secretly depressed man. During the 2008 campaign, he was excited and exciting because he had a goal… or at least he thought he did.

Like so many people who crave power, wealth or fame, he subconsciously believed that winning the presidency would magically fill his inner void and make him finally able to love himself. But barely a few months after he was triumphantly elected and got his “fix”, he realized with horror that winning the presidency had changed nothing and that it would never fill his void nor cure his deep-seated depression.

Quite early on, he began to despise himself for manipulating the American people and also for fooling himself in the bargain. He began to loathe his job and probably himself for hankering so badly after something that ended up making him even more unhappy. In fact, he reportedly confided to a friend in late 2009: “Who would be stupid enough to want this job for two terms?”

He realized that he had run on a BIG LIE, that he had sold to the electorate a PERSONA, a false, idealized image of himself, someone who was a complete fabrication and had never existed. Many of us do this subconsciously during the first months or years of a love relationship and in a sense, “Obamamania” was a form of love relationship or hero worship that is leaving many Americans very disillusioned.

I have tremendous admiration for Canadian politician Frank McKenna who openly confessed on TV that he was “addicted to power” and had quit politics after ten years for that very reason. (He later became Ambassador to the U.S. and generated controversy in 2005 when he most undiplomatically blasted the U.S. government for being “in large measure dysfunctional”…). I think the healing of Barack Obama will begin when he gathers up the strength to tell the truth about himself and his ambitions with comparable honesty and candor. One day we may get to meet the real Barack and realize that he was not a bad man, simply a confused and wounded soul desperately seeking for a modicum of self-admiration.

I had been an ardent supporter of Barack Obama since his July 2004 speech. Painful as it is for me, I now realize he is an opportunist and a phony. He gave a brilliant impersonation of Martin Luther King. A master manipulator craftily exploiting the color of his skin, the myth of the “First Black President” and the power of certain emotionally charged words such as “hope”, “change”, “faith”, etc., this man campaigned as a second Martin Luther King but is governing like a third George Bush! No wonder millions of his most ardent supporters feel so deeply wounded and betrayed that they did not even bother going out to vote in 2010. Obama may have singlehandedly made a whole generation of Americans utterly cynical about politics.

To counteract this despair, it is crucially important to see how we were taken in by this man and the carefully orchestrated “Obamamania” of 2008. We must have the guts to cry out that this Emperor has neither clothes nor integrity, and the courage to teach ourselves the “TRUE audacity of TRUE hope”. This is the end of an illusion, but it need not be the end of the world. The land of the free can still triumph over the hordes of the phonies. As the brave people of Wisconsin are so convincingly demonstrating, YES, WE CAN think and walk like Egyptians – YES, WE THE PEOPLE CAN.

Escalation of Afghan War (Check)
Continuation of Iraq War (Check)
Continuing Rendition (Check)
Secret Prisons (Check)
Protecting Bush Torturers (Check)
Bailouts for Insolvent Companies (Check)
Bailouts for Wall Street (Check)
Lies about Transparency (Check)
Lies about Jobs created by the Stimulus Package (Check)

Are there any questions?

Your observations are rock solid. However, the corrupt system doesn’t absolve Obama of his policies. Many of which are having a negative impact on the people.

Good, we agree that the policies of Bush and Obama are the same.

“SURELY, he is not George Bush, or that administration, in the harm that has already been dealt to our country”

You just admitted that Obama’s policies are the same as Bush’s, so it is irrational to try to defense Obama by saying that he hasn’t done the same amount of damage. If his policies are the same, then the consequences must be the same. Therefore, Obama is continuing the damage.

“Not time to ‘throw in the towel’ yet!!”
When should we face the music? When the country is falling apart?

While I do not agree with a great deal of what you said in your article, I’m very impressed with the thought that you put into it. Tikkun Daily is a most wonderful “marketplace of ideas” indicating we continue to have “thinking” people in our midst and that alone gives hope for the future. Thanks for sharing your “food for thought.”

It strikes me as odd that, although the part about “all Men…are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness” is not a fully realized state by ALL Americans 233 years later, you feel that President Obama (co-administrator of this nation with 535 other people all with their own agenda) should have accomplished everything you want 233 days later.

So many of these comments come across as the typical American desire for “instant gratification” but this is not a TV show.