send in the clown(s)

Send in the clown(s)

Former President Barack Obama, who made waves with a speech in South Africa in which he turned the Nelson Mandela Annual Lecture into a thinly veiled rant against President Donald Trump, is making a(nother) comeback. Obama, who used the July speech to caution "strongman politics are ascending suddenly," and that "those in power seek to undermine every institution or norm that gives democracy meaning," is continuing his roadshow next week when he accepts the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign's Paul H. Douglas Award for Ethics in Government. In an event which will be closed to the general public, Obama is expected to "echo his call to reject the rising strain of authoritarian politics and policies..."

Pardon me while I pull the handbrake on the hypocrisy highway, but when did the University of Illinois turn into a Monty Python sketch? I get that President Pen'n'Phone is an Illinois homeboy, hailing from the "gun-free" paradise of Chicago and that putting a president's face on the flyer certainly helps draw the big-money donors. But giving the Douglas Award for Ethics in Government to a guy like Obama means the Douglas Award for Ethics in Government is really just a participation trophy. The plaque might as well read "To Barack Obama. At least you tried." When it comes to people who embody "ethics in government," Obama ranks right up there with Boss Tweed and Warren Harding.

It's almost worth asking the prize committee if they have the right Barack Obama. The same Barack Obama who:

• Turned the Internal Revenue Service into his own personal brute squad. Ethics Obama, aided by minions like Jon Koskinen and Lois Lerner, used what is arguably the most powerful agency in the federal government to systematically target and harass conservative-leaning groups. The settlement between 400 of them and the Feds was finally settled last year, in favor of the good guys. Obama's morally-upstanding objection to tyranny cost the U.S. taxpayers what has been described as a "substantial" amount of money.
• Turned the NSA into his personal dirt collection agency. During the Obama regime, the excesses of our digital spies got so out of hand, no one was safe from their prying; no matter how insignificant they might be. But nothing says "opposition to authoritarian government" like keeping tabs on what kind of ceramic cats your Gam-Gam buys from the Home Shopping Channel.
• Spied on — and even jailed — journalists. Wanna know how deep Obama's affinity for openness and transparency is? Ask James Risen and Dinesh D'Souza. Be forewarned, a copy of your message will likely be stored on a bathroom server somewhere.
• Left us to clean up the moldering corpse of Obamacare, a fraud-riddled and deliberately opaque bureaucratic power grab which threw the nation's health care system into chaos. The man selected by the Douglas Prize committee for his steadfast manning of the barricades against statism literally forced the entire country to buy what he commanded or face the full might of the aforementioned goons at the IRS.

This cat even went after Gibson Guitars over a minor-league violation involving imported wood that was so obviously a thank-you card to Big Labor, even Stalin would have admired the move. In what world, I ask you, does hating rock'n'roll earn you an award for being cool?

Personal Liberty^® doesn't have the bandwidth for me to list the arrogant hypocrisies which have come to define the Party of Jefferson (speaking of hypocrites — Ms. Hemmings says "hi," Mr. Jefferson). We could do this all day. They needed a lot more than a three-point turn to reverse course from Hillary Clinton's admonishment to accept the results of the election. The #MeToo movement counterpoints as well with the party's lengthy roster of powerful men who have to figure out that "no means no." For Pete's sake, the Clintons were back at Harvey Weinstein's Long Island Sound palace just two weeks ago as special guests at a party which included — if I'm lyin', I'm dyin' — circus performers and a big-top tent. Their chairhole, Tom Perez, says that "socialism is their future," and is proving it by backing bubble-headed Alexandria "Chiquita Khrushchev" Ocasio-Cortez and the policies that made Venezuela such a party. But dragging Obama out of retirement to throw them an electoral life preserver, especially considering the wreck he left of his party, is silly. To try and burnish his legacy as a champion of ethics is hilarious.

Obama is gonna be around a lot this fall. As the polling gap between the two parties has narrowed, the Democrats are waking up to the reality that "Trump sux!" isn't exactly a steamroller of a platform. The obvious ploy is to trot out the man in the great tan suit. It strikes me that counting on a 2012 all-pro to lead a 2018 party to the end zone suggests that "Trump Sux!" might be the better game plan. But it makes the opposition's job a little easier. Granted, the GOP will probably pay consultants millions to come up with "nuh-UH!," but that's not far from a winner. The Democrats are becoming a parody of themselves. Let them send in the clown(s).

— Ben Crystal

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