The Manchurian Candidate

Is Barack Obama the Manchurian Candidate?  As per the 1962 movie, is he an assassin specifically groomed by the communists to undermine American interests?  The evidence suggests that he might be.

If the Russians, Chinese, and Iranians got together to select the perfect person to promote their agendas, they could scarcely have chosen a better nominee.  After all, in area after area, he has done what they would have had a stooge do.

Consider our enemies’ wish list:

·      Damage the American economy.  See to it that it fails to recover from the last recession.

·      Abandon Israel.  Make it more vulnerable to its foes.

·      Do not impede Russian aggression.  Allow it free reign in the Ukraine and Syria.

·      Do nothing to obstruct Chinese ambitions.  Allow them to spy on American companies and to build airstrips in international waters.

·      Permit the North Koreans and Iranians to become nuclear powers.  Fund Iranian political expansion as well.

·      Hollow out the American military so that it is no longer respected.  Make sure our allies understand that we will not protect them.

·      Set Americans against each other.  Stir the pot so that blacks and whites, men and women, rich and poor are distrustful of one another.

·      Ignore the constitution.  Destabilize American political institutions to make them weaker.

·      Drive the nation broke.  And, by the way, wreck its medical system into the bargain.

Check, check, check, check, check, check, check, and check!

The Bible says: You will know them by their fruits.  If we apply this bit of wisdom to Barack Obama, there can be little doubt that he abhors our country and has done his best to harm it.  Although he frequently tells us how much he loves us, his actions speak louder than his words.

The most charitable explanation of our president’s failures is that he is incompetent.  He did not, for instance, see Putin’s Syrian gambit coming because he is politically naïve.

The problem with this defense is that Obama is not stupid.  There can be no question that he foresaw what lesser intellects clearly perceived.  Besides, he was repeatedly warned of these impending moves by his intelligence services.  No.  He simply did not care.

How then can so many Americans believe their chief executive?  Anyone with half a brain knows he lied about the IRS, Benghazi, the VA, Obamacare, and most recently the Iranian deal and gun control.

His partisans, of course, have their blinders on.  Their need to believe is so great that Barack could shoot someone on the front lawn of the White House and they would devise a plausible excuse.  Witness the many liberal Jews who refuse to acknowledge that Obama has betrayed Israel.

Three more factors have provided this, perhaps, unwitting accomplish of our enemies with camouflage.  The first is that he is extremely glib.  When he flashes that winning smile and unleashes a torrent of honeyed words, people get lost in what seems to be compassion.  They are seduced into trusting that he cares about them.

Second, Obama has been lucky.  Hence just before the last election hurricane Sandy distracted the electorate.  Mitt Romney could not be heard through the media blitz.   More recently, the Oregon shooting tragedy diverted attention from the Middle Eastern fiasco.

Next comes our president’s race.  Despite lingering racism—or maybe because of it—there has been a tendency to accord Barack the benefit of the doubt.  Most Americans want to overcome our bigoted past.  For this reason alone it is impossible to impeach him for transgressions that would have brought another president to the dock.

All in all, we Americans will have endured eight years of poverty, weakness, and polarization before this long national nightmare ends.  Sadly, by then, the damage will be greater.  To repeat: our president does not care!  He does not love us!

Let us therefore hope we love ourselves enough not to duplicate this tragedy the next time we go to the polls.

Melvyn L. Fein, Ph.D.

Professor of Sociology

Kennesaw State University