Really? |
I thought it was a joke. Honestly, I couldn’t believe it was
real. I assumed it was one of those fake commercials, like the ones they show
on Saturday Night Live. But at the end of the 30-second spot, try as I might to
deny it, the gruesome reality set in:
President Barack Obama, immortalized in red clay and green
hair as a Chia Pet. The perfect Christmas gift for kids of all ages.
That’s right: Move over, Shrek. Make way, Spongebob. No more
tasty snacks for you, Scooby-Doo. You’ve been upstaged by the leader of the
free world, as he joins you in that sacred pantheon of American culture: good old traditional crass
commercialism.
Good grief, Charlie Brown. What has become of our society,
that it’s now acceptable to trivialize the office of the American presidency?
Could it be that our national executive is now no better than a Veg-O-Matic, or
a Lava Lamp?
As I look back to my childhood, I remember that many of my friends
and neighbors wore t-shirts to honor their favorite celebrities: Jimi, Elvis,
Marilyn. Then sometime in the 1990s, Christian bookstores added an apparel
section that featured shirts bearing images of Jesus. And somehow both of those
uses seem perfectly fitting because all of these personalities, in one way or
another, have always been objects of worship in our society.
And then came the election of 2008: Legions of admirers, all
over the country and the world, began to sport Obama-wear. Then it was coffee
mugs, neckties, and action-figure dolls that were taller and beefier than G.I.
Joe. Not far from my home, at a local swap-meet, I found an Andy Warhol-esque
framed portrait, between similar images of Jim Morrison and Michael Jordan.
Interesting. I was born during the administration of President
John F. Kennedy, and from him to Johnson to Nixon to Ford to Carter to Reagan
to Bush, Sr. to Clinton to Bush, Jr., I can’t recall that any of their
supporters ever “honored” them with a silk-screened image on an article of
clothing. (Okay, so my local Party City store continues to sell Richard Nixon
masks for Halloween. Perhaps he, individually, had it coming.)
The older I get, the more opinionated I seem to become. So
please don’t point it out to me, I already know. And the more I watch the
evening news, the more I thank God that I’m privileged to live in a free and
prosperous country that works so hard to bring peace and stability to the
world. At times like these, like never before, we must strive to defend the
authority and dignity of the office of the Presidency.
Toward the beginning of the second Gulf War, I marveled at newspaper
images of Iraqi citizens – aided by American soldiers – tearing down dozens of
monuments to their despised ruler Saddam Hussein. Statues, paintings, a highway
sign pointing the way to Saddam International Airport. We all knew that it was
improper that a sovereign should be honored, almost deified, in this way. Good
riddance. Let’s move on to build a new civilization, governed by mere mortals.
And now this. We're supposed to be the enlightened folk who know better. We're the ones who vote principles instead of personalities, the good guys who show 'em how it's done.
I remember it like it was yesterday: Election night, 2008.
On every network and cable news channel, as always, they interviewed voters
emerging from the polls: Who did you vote
for? As expected, many affirmed their support for Obama. Then came the
second question: Why did you vote for
him? By my estimation, about three
out of four couldn’t say, apart from some slippery clichĂ© like “hope and
change.” Which, I suppose, can mean whatever you want it to mean.
They didn’t vote for a political ideology, or some important moral tenet, or a doctrine defined in a stump speech. When pressed they didn’t know their candidate’s stance on defense spending or foreign policy or tort reform. They didn’t vote for a forceful, authoritative Commander-in-Chief to keep them safe from terrorists; they pulled that lever for a handsome, affable Captain America to make them feel good.
Let’s restore a measure of dignity to the White House. Monuments
and t-shirt images belong to gods and rock stars. Not presidents.
I'm going to have to give the Obama Chia Pet a big raspberry.
ReplyDeletehm.
ReplyDeleteSo, do you yell at the TV also? Wish I had a dollar for every time I did.
HA! Veg-o-matic! Good thoughts, Steve.
ReplyDelete