But His Lectures Were Great . . .

In this morning’s NYT analysis of Sen. Obama’s twelve year tenure of con law at the University of Chicago Law School, several things stand out.  First, this sentence in the first paragraph is interesting, but not surprising: “While most colleagues published by the pound, he never completed a single work of legal scholarship.” It seems Barry was as prolific a professor as he was a law review editor and is a United States senator.  Secondly, Obama commented in 1996 on President Clinton’s bipartisan overtures this way: “On the national level, bipartisanship usually means Democrats ignore the needs of the poor and abandon the idea that government can play a role in issues of poverty, race discrimination, sex discrimination or environmental protection.”  This sounds like Sens. Boxer or Kennedy, not the Great Bridge Builder, not the Uniter, not the inspiration behind the “Obamacans,” not the One who will heal our divisions.  Will a reporter perhaps ask Him about this?  Finally, the theory that Sen. Obama’s Ego developed as a result of the adulation after his speech at the Democrat convention is clearly mistaken.  The article tells of his popularity among (liberal) students, but his behavior was off-putting to even them.    “In what even some fans saw as self-absorption, Mr. Obama’s hypothetical cases occasionally featured himself. “Take Barack Obama, there’s a good-looking guy,” he would introduce a twisty legal case.”  But the real audacity is not of hope, but of narcissism:

Douglas Baird, another colleague, remembers once asking Mr. Obama to assess potential candidates for governor.

“First of all, I’m not running for governor, “ Mr. Obama told him. “But if I did, I would expect you to support me.”

He was a third-year state senator at the time.

Confidence is a positive attribute.  This is frightening.

Red, White, Blue, and Black

Those of you who follow absurd racial grievances and the liberal white people who bow before them will recall all the attention given to efforts in Portland by something known as the “Office of Neighborhood Involvement” to foster greater understanding of “gentrification.”  The Oregonian hyperventilates here, and the NYT catches up a month later here.  Gentrification is the latest academic buzzword to describe when white people move to what has been historically black neighborhoods.  Longtime black residents are understandably upset when local businesses are replaced with pretentious java shops, organic grocery stores, and outdoor apparel stores, in order to serve the growing community of over-educated, condescending, vegan, emo members of the “creative class,” i.e. unemployed coffee house musicians with a trust fund.  But, hey, it’s a free country, and I imagine if blacks started to move into white neighborhoods no one is going to justify whites’ discomfort, let alone use a government office for white people to explain their uncomfortableness with this new diversity.  The reason for this post is an article in the July 29, 2009, edition of the WSJ.  Reporter Douglas Belkin tells the story of Montana, where 200,000 newcomers “are reshaping the way this state looks, acts–and votes.  Along the way, these new Montanans have sparked a testy culture clash and, for the first time in a generation, opened the door for a Democrat presidential nominee to win the state in November.”  A long-time resident complained that the newbies, overwhelmingly Democrat-leaning, well-educated, and not familiar with the culture of the state, are turning Bozeman into “another Aspen.”  This has altered the makeup of the state so much that the state where George Bush won by 20 points in 2004 now has Sen. Obama up 5 points.  Of course, there is no hand-wringing about a loss of culture and tradition.  Instead, we have a celebration of the possible loss of another red state and their backward ways.  As a liberty lover, private property is private property.  But it struck me that the real cultural imperialists are well-educated, upper middle class Obama voters.  They are invading minority and rural areas, replacing their tradition and culture with organic arugula and bike paths.  Diversity and tolerance, to a leftist, only work if you agree and live like them.