President Obama as a child with his father.
In the Wall Street Journal yesterday, Fouad Ajami published a devastating analysis of Obama’s foreign policy.
Ajami focuses on Obama’s reflexive radical leftist ideology that posits a phantom American colonialism and neo-colonialism as the original sins for which we must atone.
In his encounters with the foreign world, Mr. Obama gave voice to a steady and unsettling expression of penance. We had made our own poor bed in distant lands, Mr. Obama believed. We had been aggressive and imperial in the wars we waged, and in our steady insistence that our way held out the promise for other nations. In that narrative of American guilt, the Islamic world was of central importance. It was in that vast, tormented world that Mr. Obama sought to make his mark, it was there he believed we had been particularly egregious.
Read the entire article.
This is all well and true.
But my wife Karen, a Ph.D., psychologist with a finely tuned antenna for human behavior has, I believe, an equally trenchant critique of Obama’s political-psychological motivation.
Summarizing my conversation with Karen:
Barack Obama’s life has been dominated by his absent father. A man who, by every account, was a liar, a drunk, a serial adulterer, a man who married, sired children, and then abandoned wife and offspring. Obama Sr,. was also, not surprisingly, a Communist.
President Obama’s father was, in brief, a bad father.
The trajectory of Barack Obama’s personal and political life has been a sub-conscious attempt to please this bad father. It’s a common pathology. Women who are beaten by husbands and lovers endlessly try to appease and gain approval of their abusers.
Thus, Mr. Obama looks at the bad actors of the world, the hermit kingdom of North Korea, the Communist tyrants of Cuba and Venezuela, the mad Mullahs of Iran, the blood-thirsty Assads of Syria, the genocidal yearning Palestinians, etc., and his main impulse is to curry favor with these human beasts.
Obama still yearns for the approval of his bad father.
Against the theater of geo-politics Obama’s personal demons play out as appeasement wherein America’s enemies are rewarded and her allies are ignored or worse, denigrated.
Just a cursory glance at Obama’s biography supports Karen’s psychological profile: from his political birth in the living room of American terrorists Bill Ayers and Bernardine Dorn to a 20-year discipleship to the racist, Jew-hating Jeremiah Wright, Barack Obama has sought the mentorship of one bad father after another.
Most Americans look towards George Washington or Abraham Lincoln as father images we wish to emulate.
But America’s current President is in the grip of such psychological dysfunction that his self-worth—the personal as political—is defined through dreams of pleasing the one man in the world whose approval equals an embrace of nihilism.
Ariel Chaim Avrech, ZT'L, May His Righteous Memory be a Blessing.
18 Comments
Interesting post.
My father was very busy as a Mormon bishop when I was young, and in other religious callings when I was a teenager, and I sometimes resented that he was a bit inaccessible at times.
But there were some things that would get his attention. For example, when I won the regional science fair, he very nearly chuckled out loud, he was so pleased. He did chuckle out loud some time later when he told me that someone at work had asked him if he was my father. The reversal, father known by his son rather than son known by his father, amused him. I can imagine men who would feel a little displaced at that, but not him.
So maybe I didn’t always see him as much as I would have liked, but on the whole I was lucky.
Do I still have an unconscious drive to please my father? Probably. Doesn’t seem to have done me too much harm, though. I guess the point is that the problem is not that Obama is unconsciously driven to please his father; the problem is that that father was kind of a monster.
Forgive me if this is in poor taste, but one wonders what the history of the 20th Century would have been like if Alois Shicklgruber had been something better than a drunken, womanizing, abusive petty government official who had previously failed as a farmer.
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I don’t know about Barry and his father but – he did rather emphatically state his life’s philosophy in the beginning of Chapter 7 in “Dreams from My Father” when he said: “In 1983, I decided to become a community organizer.
There wasn’t much detail to the idea. I didn’t know anyone making a living that way…
…Instead, I’d pronounce the need for change. Change in the White House, where Reagan and his minions were carrying on their dirty deeds. Change in… Change in… Change… Change…
…That’s what I’ll do. I’ll organize black folks. At the grass roots. For change.”
Now, this may all be tied up with pleasing daddy; I don’t know.
But, I do know that Barack wants to feed the foodless; house the homeless; clothe the naked; empower those without power; and redistribute the wealth from those that Have to those that Have Not.
Which are all noble goals!
Unfortunately, President Obama has absolutely no ethical values regarding good and evil or right and wrong.
In his strange universe, Change is good. The poor; the needy; the homeless; those that Have Not, are Good.
And therefore – conserving the status quo is Bad. The rich; those with homes; those that Have – are Evil.
This is his universe.
He is thoroughly demented and dangerous individual.
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Dr. Carol,
Just FYI–historically, PhDs ARE the real doctors. The other ones (who, initially, weren’t even as educated as PhDs are) appropriated the title.
Quite historically correct.
‘Doctor’ is derived from the latin docere (to teach, instruct)
As many medieval physicians were also University Instructors of Medicine, they appropriated the title.
The original term has no connotation of ‘healing’.
(and till today, British Surgeons take the titile of ‘Mr.’)
That said, there is an interesting Talmudic quote:
Gadol miRabon Shimoh
(Greater than the highest of titles, is when one ‘s name alone is enough …)
i.e., It’s enough to say Shakespeare (or Seraphic Secret) without any preferatory titles
This has lead to some of the inverse academic snobbery where professors specifically forego their title, and prefer being addressed by name.
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Whew! Finally registered. Believe it or not, at least one person in the DC area isn’t viewing this site for nefarious purposes!
I think Karen is spot on in her analysis– I’d also like to add that not only does he have father-issues, he has deep *abandonment* issues related to both his parents. Combined with his narissic tendencies, this is a HUGE red flag. I tried to get people to pay attention to the Rev. Wright angle, but to NO avail. Whether through guilt or just wanting to believe the pretty picture painted by the MSM, there were (and, sigh, still are) people who WANT to have a political figure that does it all– assuage guilt, “unite” people, bring “peace” to the world, etc.
I wish there was a way to get people to open their eyes more, but human nature being what it is…
Inflation and lack of jobs may get more people awake and questioning. Americans in general don’t like depending on gov’t for anything.
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During the 2008 campaign Obama was never scrutinized or subject to a background check appropriate for a president. He was a HLS grad and Chicago school lecturer, a best selling author and a product of a broken home overcoming great social obstacles. The Sidney Poitier of politics. Nothing to look at there – lets go find out if Sarah Palin has any more pregnant daughters.
The media is not about to admit they made a mistake in 2008 so they will ignore this story even if his dad rises from the grave and moves into the White House. It would just be used as an example of the greatness of Marxism and expect Obama to turn the economy over to the Wobblies. Karen may have a Ph.D. but she’s a conservative so her intelligence is automatically discounted (I had a neighbor with a Ph.D. that wanted people to always call him doctor while the real doctors from my wife’s hospital always wanted to be called by their first names in social settings).
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Just FYI–historically, PhDs ARE the real doctors. The other ones (who, initially, weren’t even as educated as PhDs are) appropriated the title.
Have to stick up for my phellow PhDs! But I don’t use the Dr. socially–I do insist on it in class, so that I don’t get called Mrs Carol while my male colleagues get called Dr. LastName.
I think Karen is on to something here. The whole hysterical and histrionic reaction of the left to this debt debacle has been interesting to see. Obama is so transparently out of his depth that I think they are panicking. I just hope he doesn’t get re-elected; I don’t think the world can survive that.
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Dr Carol:
Some parts of the world – and leaders – are hoping fopr his re-election
As a psychological study I suppose he is interesting – what kind of personality is driven to believe he is “The One” when it is patently obvious that he is out of his element?
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Obviously Phds are doctors but my neighbor was a manager overseeing a staff of engineers. When he asks to be addressed as doctor at backyard gatherings I think the title has gone to his head.
Physicians have big egos from my experience but none has ever asked to be called doctor when I’ve met them at parties or baseball games. I’m sure my neighbor worked hard to get the title but his ego really got the better of him.
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It is an intriguing and thought-provoking post. How else can one explain Obama’s inclinations? But then why does he condemn Libya yet coddle Assad?
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As I look at the picture, I can’t help feeling sad. Obama Jr. is beaming as he grasps his father, finally holding this elusive man, stealing him away from his political campaigns. Yet, the father’s interest seems to be off camera. He is not returning his son’s enthusiasm; he is not in the “moment.” His departure, and the son’s disappointment, is obviously imminent.
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Barry…I think it is completely appropriate to analyze and discuss a politician’s character as well as his views on specific issues. If I’m hiring someone for even a first-level management position, I want to know how he reacts emotionally when the chips are down, how he treats other people, whether he is a problem-solver or a blamer, etc….these things are as important, or more so, than his views on particular business issues. And the president is, when all is said and done, our employee.
An executive of my acquaintance was fond of the saying “fix problems, not blame.” Obama’s approach to life is precisely the opposite. His style is positively toxic, and any organization that he ran–a store, a factory, a warship, a Little League baseball team–would soon become a nightmare of conflict and recrimination.
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Robert–I am completely on side with you and your stance on Israel, the threats to that nation as well as our own. But this thing you’ve just published on The President is at the talk radio level. It, in its way, is as inappropriate as some of the things written and said about George W. Both men deserve better. I wish you would stick to specific issues rather than whatever it is you have just put out there.
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Barry… as in Barack Hussein Obama? Is that you Mr. President? Are you reading Seraphic Secret again?
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Prophet Joe:
I get quite a few hits from D.C. I assume that Barry & Co. keep tabs on Seraphic Secret in order to monitor the International Zionist Conspiracy.
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All the DNC needs to do is to look at the Tea Party/Conservative-types in Congress to see what’s happening on the Zionist front.
After all, we all know they get their marching orders from Bibi and the Knesset. I know because I read the Huffington Post and the Daily Kos!
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Barry:
Psychological profiling is an important tool in understanding politicians and , er, criminals. It’s all well and good to emphasize policies, but to me, a screenwriter, a dramatist, the motivations behind the policies is of immense interest. We are all complex products of influences ranging from DNA to environment. Obama’s penchant for cozying up to vile actors is a life-long pattern that deserves attention.
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I agree with Robert. I find it interesting to hear Karen’s views on the subject as she is the only licensed psychologist I know. Besides, it’s sparks my curiosity and made me read a little more about Obama Sr. — womanizer, drunk, socialist/marxist, Catholic-turned-Muslim-turned-Atheist… great role model.
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Well, my therapist (who was raised in Venezuela) has said “Hugo Chavez is a wacko, and that’s my professional opinion”—I imagine that’s sorta the psychology profession’s official joke, they say it whenever they can.
If Obama had any sense at all, it’d be his father he resents—if he had a brain we’d all be commenting on his simplistic hostility to Islam and Marxist anti-colonialism. But no, “smartest president ever” has to try and carry on the halfwitted ideals of Obama Sr., never mind that A) America’s only colonialism has been in Puerto Rico, the Philippines, Liberia, and Cuba—good or bad, we’ve barely done any of it; and B) ignoring the fact America’s barely had any colonies, decolonization, with the partial exception of India and Lebanon, has been an unmitigated disaster throughout the world…usually in direct proportion as it’s empowered Muslims and Marxists (all the problems in Lebanon, and most in India, anybody?).
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