Wednesday, December 8, 2010

Barack Obama & Rodney Dangerfield

Rodney passed away some years ago but we can still see him yanking on his tie or suit Jacket saying, "I don't get no respect!". He was a funny man who brought great laughter from night clubs, to TV, to movies. Who can not smile when one thinks of "Easy Money" and Caddy Shack and the whole host of Dangerfield's productions. Outlandish, hard to believe but very, very, funny. He came to us too late in life and left too soon at least in the category of performing. I don't think he ever got a star on The Walk of Fame in Hollywood. He was recognized mostly as a genius by his peers, fellow comedians who were as zany as he was. But in life and death he rarely got any respect from those who control the industry. Too bad. Yet at what he did he was great and left a lot of us happier he was with us. He accomplished his purpose, he made us laugh.

Barack Obama I fear is our political Rodney Dangerfield. President Obama is really a genius who is accomplishing much as he tries to get all his promises in place despite opposition from all sides. Obama has unintentionally given us lots of laughs, while he has gotten us through a financial crisis that perhaps could have equaled The Great Depression. He has managed to get a comprehensive health care program covering most Americans. Like Rodney not all of his moves were great success' but he tried. AND like Rodney he gets little respect. Let's look at the present brouhaha. He got a compromise which for the most part benefits the unemployed, the middle class worker among other things. He had to give the upper class what the Republicans wanted in order to get this. Today  we find his own party bashing him. He just don't get no RESPECT. This was pretty funny for Rodney but I don't think it is for Barack. I have a theory about this.
He doesn't get respect because no one is afraid of him. The Republicans, his own party, the Progressive Independents, they all feel the guy in the most powerful office in the world can't hurt them so they bully him. The longer he goes without hurting them the less respect he gets and the less respect he gets the more the country will laugh at him until like Rodney he will be gone, coming to us rather early in the life of a politician and leaving even earlier. He once said in an interview, I am paraphrasing, that he'd rather be a one term President that did good things than a two term President that compromised his beliefs in order to stay in office. If he keeps up his present modis operandi he will accomplish his prophesy.

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