Something that I was raised with–by an uncle and a grandfather who both served in the military during times of war–is that The President is always the President. You don’t have to respect the man, but you must always respect the office and the choice that the American people made.
I did not vote for President Obama. I voted for his primary opponent, Senator McCain. And since taking office, the President has done some things I agree with, but also things I heartily disagree with.
But he is The President. Our duly-elected members of the Electoral College said so. He is my President, and, good or bad, I accept that whole heartedly.
Thus, while on occasion I may treat the current temporary occupant of that office with some disdain, I never fail to refer to him as The President. Or Mr. President. It just doesn’t matter how much I like him or dislike him. He is The President, and no matter how pissed off I might be with him at any given moment, I never forget that. The American people, in their wisdom (or foolishness) chose him, and I utterly abide by and respect that.
And yes, by the way, no matter how much it makes me look like a “liberal” pansy, I’m fracking elated that America chose a black person of questionable origin to be its leader. It isn’t freaking relevant if I voted for him or not: America chose the illegitimate son of a single mom of biracial origin to be its Commander In Chief. This says so many good things about America I can’t even begin to count them.
President Obama often annoys me, and he often disappoints me. So what? This is new so far as Presidents go?
Here on Dean’s World, I try my best to always refer to The President as The President. Or Mr. President. It doesn’t matter how pissed off I might be with him on any given day. We chose him (even if I wasn’t one of those who actually voted for him, I am still a part of “we”) and I trust that he’s going to do his best to honor the incredible responsibility he’s been given.
Hail to the Chief.
No, seriously. It isn’t about whether you like the guy or not. Hail to the Chief, and thank God every day if you can that you got to help decide on him. No matter what f***ups you think he may have committed, and no matter how much you think he has screwed up.
Hail to the Chief.
{ 23 comments }
Dean,
I edit your post because of the F-bomb you dropped.
Thanks for the reminder Dean, why didn’t you just link to the same sort of post you MUST have made when people were referring to GW Bush as “chimpy McHitler” and such.
FWIW, I have a certain amount of respect for the office of the President, and I was raised in a military family so you can guess how that went. But, with all due respect Dean, the whole point of our political system is that the President is just another citizen, that’s all.
I call him “President Obama” on occasion and I call him “Obama” on occasion, or even Barack if I’m in the mood. I did the same thing with Reagan, Clinton and Bush. In fact I mostly refer to GW Bush as “GW Bush.”
It is my firm principled belief that the President of the United States deserves NO MORE RESPECT than any decent, honorable person. Period. And even a President can LOSE that privilege if he behaves in ways to lose it. I lost an immeasurable amount of respect for Bill Clinton when I found out he was abusing the power of his office to boff star-struck interns in the Oval Office.
While I have no problem with people referring to the President by his given legal name, I do have a problem when people sneeringly use an obvious insulting “nickname” to attempt to diminish the man. I find “McBushitler” to be as offensive as “Barack Osama” and vice versa.
But if you expect me to afford Barack Obama more respect than he affords me, you’re wasting your time.
Yeah but please — no “my President.”
I prefer Hopey McChange. ;~)
Does anyone know where I can buy some Boy Scout beanies, you know,
the ones with the red,white and blue propellers that blow in
the wind no matter the direction that say Hail to the Chief across your forehead.
Boy Scouts informs did not and do not include beanies with propellers.
Thank you very much. (*SNARL!*)
(heh.)
Derek,
Sorry, I was being slightly facetious.
While our current President Obama is still looking (for common ground with pro-lifers and OJ is still looking for the real killers), BO has in fact issued during his first week in office, an executive order —–that requires your and my taxpayer money be paid for federally funded abortions, here and overseas.
And BO still supports live-birth abortion.
So it is unlikely that one needs at the moment to buy into the “Hail to the Chief” scenario currently on the agenda.
I best not say anything else as it could lead to claims of being unchristian.
Since I suspect that part of Dean’s motivation to post this is the disrespect I have been showing for Barack Obama due to his pervasive habit of misleading people by saying one thing and doing another, I’m going to address that too.
I call Obama a liar. I guess I can’t deny that is “disrespectful.” Unfortunately it is demonstrable. So now if I follow this “you must be respectful” mantra, then I can’t speak the truth. Well, I have lots of principles, and one of them is indeed to treat the President (and anyone else) with respect. But I have a higher principle which is to speak the truth.
The man lies. He lies for a purpose. George Orwell wrote about this kind of politician, he described him as one who deliberately misleads the listener by having different private definitions of what he is saying than the definitions he allows to be publicly assumed. I think that’s a pretty fair description of Obama and how he uses his speeches to lead people to believe one thing when he fully intends to do something completely different.
I have a word for that.
I call it lying.
Mc Kiernan, I knew you were being facetious. I’m just giving you a hard time because Boys Scouts have been an easy target for “antiquated traditional values” disparagement, and it irks me.
But please note the humor parenthetically included in my comment. Well, it was intended to be humor. Context sometimes gets lost on the Internet.
Cosmic, if you think the President is a liar, say, “The President is a liar.” See how easy that is?
You can even say “The President is a smarmy, two-faced, unprincipled, arrogant, dishonest and despicable liar.”
Gets the message across just as well, while acknowledging that the smarmy, two-faced, unprincipled, arrogant, dishonest and despicable liar is, in fact, the President.
Dean, don’t you realize how objectifying that is? Referring to people solely and exclusively by their job title denies their individuality — it’s dehumanizing!
Ok, yes, I said it with tongue in cheek — but in fact, that actually is my real-life policy.
Oh, if you watched any of the Sonia Sotamayor confirmation hearings, you probably noticed a very familiar pattern of behavior. When confronted with words she wrote and repeated a dozen times in the past? “I chose bad words.” Yeah how many times? When asked why her old boss would describe her pro-abortion stance as “absolutely”? “I have no idea why he would say that.” etc. etc….
You know what they say about how the boss sets the tone….
Yes, context sometimes gets lost on the Internet.
Soldier becomes a conscientious objectorbecause he claims Obama is not eligible to be president
Ag, what is interesting about that story is that the Major’s orders were revoked after the lawsuit was filed. If you were trying to make that lawsuit go away, that would be a good way to do that. One wonders where those orders originated.
Also, there are rumors (and I have not checked them out) that his civilian employers have been pressured to fire him.
Over at Mudville Gazette, they note the following.
1. The major was reserve who requested deployment.
2. Such a request generates “orders” since nothing happens in the Army without papers.
3. Reserves who make such a request have up until the day of their departure to request a revocation of the orders – orders they themselves generated by requesting active duty.
The officer who would have been Major Cook’s CO has, apparently, also “determined that he does not want the services of Maj. Cook.” And the Army determined, based on Maj. Cook’s actions that he did not want to go, and thus revoked his orders as a matter of policy.
And, finally, the case has been dismissed.
One thing that separates America from failed/false democracies and banana republics is the faith we have in our election process. The majority of the people are willing to accept the results of a fair and free election, and our leadership regularly changes without the use of military coups, fighting in the streets, threats of civil war, partisan violence or lawsuits. Once the election is over and the votes are counted, all Americans are willing to acknowledge that the president is ‘their’ president.
Oh, wait, I should have written the entire paragraph above in the past tense.
By “past tense,” Mary, you mean “pre-2000,” right? ;)
I hadn’t thought about it until your comment. But now that I have, I wonder of the relationship between those who declared that George W. Bush was “not my President” and those who declare that Barack Obama is “not the President.”
It reminds me that “political view” is not a straight-line continuum but a horse shoe, with both extremes being closer to each other than to the folks “in the middle.”
Chances are good that even if Obama was born in Kenya and is not technically a “natural born citizen” the SCOTUS would rule that he was somehow still eligible just to avoid a constitutional crisis, so I think this sort of thing is mostly wasted time and counterproductive.
But it is interesting on occasion. Had McCain been elected the same thing would be happening due to his Panama Canal Zone birth.
Dean
I think you are being too formal. Referring to the president as Obama isn’t an insult. People regularly refer to their presidents by their last names. Common usage trumps formality IMHO.
Here here! I’ve been calling people in positions of power over me Douche Nozzle McGillicutty for years. Look at where I am now!
America chose the illegitimate son of a single mom of biracial origin to be its Commander In Chief. This says so many good things about America I can’t even begin to count them.
I’d agree if the characteristics you mention were incidental to his being elected — that is, if he would have been considered the best person for the job independent of those things. I don’t believe he would have, and if I’m right, his election also says some bad things about America.
I don’t know what:
America chose the illegitimate son of a single mom of biracial origin to be its Commander In Chief. This says so many good things about America I can’t even begin to count them.
means. We should elect people because they are illegitimate? We should elect people because they are from single mom families? We should elect people because they are biracial? That’s good? Or we should “overlook” those characterstics? Why do these things keep coming up? (IMHO, he was elected because he is black, and that’s not so good; it shouldn’t even have been a consideration one way or the other).
And BTW, I’m one of those who firmly believes the man in the office deserves respect, although not a press (excuse me, I meant pass). I am apalled at the way people in Congress have made claims wihtout regard for the office, truth, and just plain good manners without consequence. However, it has worked for a couple of decades for the Democratic party, and I have a hard time criticising the rather tame level of rhetoric from the Republican party in context.
Comments on this entry are closed.