No to be outdone...

...President Obama's Blackberry claims to know the intimate thoughts of "the one".  Check out Obama's blackberry blog.  Not as sophisticated as Obama's Teleprompter blog, but even so it is still a clever idea.  We'll see if it gets added to the "Peruse for Dicta" blogroll (depends entirely on how creative the commentary is).

However, "the one" got me thinking about something I failed to publish around the time of inauguration.  I saw this t-shirt for sale - pictured at left - and was utterly shocked about the theological overtones involved.  As the t-shirts were disappearing before my eyes, I wondered if people truly believed that Barack Obama was a messianic figure; one who could do no wrong.

At the time, I chalked it up to a fervor for "change" and assumed that it was simply the rhetoric of hope gone too far. However, now I am starting to doubt that assumption.  The other day, a fellow law student posted the following status on Facebook:

"(Said Law Student) is getting really tired of people hating on Obama. He, for real, has been in office for about 5 minutes, people, damn!"

My first inclination was to simply ignore the comment, but then I recalled the "messiah complex" and thought I should test what was really being said. So I wrote:

"With all due respect (Law Student), it's not how long your in Office that matters, it's what you do during that time that matters. The five minutes is irrelevant to the decisions made and, politically speaking, there have been some extremely poor decisions thus far."

Others commented, and then the original author responded with this (I've edited some obscenities):

I feel where your coming from, a lot can happen in uhhh a little less than three months- fine. But don't blame Barack for the ****** up **** AIG tried to do- furthermore, do you sincerely believe john mccain's old *** would be doing THAT much better? This whole Republican obsession with this "I told you so" **** needs to go out the window, when 9/11 happened, Democrat's supported Bush's stupid ***- but now when people's pockets get involved all y'all wanna blast Obama for **** that for real isn't all the way his fault. The time for change has come my dude we can't **** with them old *** politicians no more, man!

The difficulty with a Messiah being in office is that a Messiah can do no wrong, cannot make a mistake. I am not saying all, or even a majority, of President Obama's supporters hold this view point. I am saying that there are some who believe the current President is above reproach because of who he is.  I think the response by the author of the Facebook post demonstrates the point well. It's quite clear that President Obama has made some mistakes along the way. Whether or not I blame President Obama for the mistakes with AIG, it is clear that he nominated lobbyists when he said he wouldn't, he signed two spending bills with numerous earmarks (failing to note who the earmarks were for) and has now proposed a budget that will create a 10 trillion dollar deficit over the next 10 years. (On top of the roughly 11 trillion dollar deficit we already have).  Put plainly, President Obama's proposed spending will double the Federal deficit over the next decade.  

As a citizen, I should be able to critique that without reproach.  I shouldn't be constrained to supporting silly ideas and broken promises just because they happen during the initial stages of a term.

One might say, "I'm not constraining your ability to critique, I'm simply saying that these actions are necessary, worthwhile, etc. and therefore above critique."  To this, I would suggest that you look to the words and promises of President Obama:

"... lobbyists won't find a job in my White House."

"Shine Light on Earmarks and Pork Barrel Spending: Obama's Transparency and Integrity in Earmarks Act will shed light on all earmarks by disclosing the name of the legislator who asked for each earmark, along with a written justification, 72 hours before they can be approved by the full Senate."

"Obama and Biden believe that a critical step in restoring fiscal discipline is enforcing pay-as-you-go (PAYGO) budgeting rules which require new spending commitments or tax changes to be paid for by cuts to other programs or new revenue."

Perhaps if a Messiah admonishes his future actions, it suggests he's no longer the Messiah? 

As I stated during the campaign: "the higher the standard President Obama creates for himself, the farther he will fall when he cannot meet it."  President Obama has failed by measure of his own words. To all those who bought the t-shirt, I am sincerely sorry that you bought into a lie. I am sincerely sorry that you bought into the rhetoric and political pandering of "hope" and "change". Now is not the time to say that I and others cannot call him out on it.  Rather, now is the time to demand accountability from our President and recognize that he is a politician, not a Messiah.  Let's require that our President live up to his commitments rather than make excuses for him.