As he puts together his administration in the days following the election, President-Elect Barack Obama’s political opponents have commented on his choices, which is normal and expected. Perhaps the commentary is harsher and more finely focused than many think it ought to be, and if that is so, perhaps it is because Mr. Obama’s flamboyant style and enormous ego have made him a vastly more tempting target than usual.
That Barack Obama has a high opinion of himself is neither a secret nor particularly unusual; politicians are most often ego-maniacs to some degree. But Sen. Obama takes the cake; he has taken the art of ego to an entirely new level.
A list of evidentiary items supports this position, among which are:
**He called his campaign plane “O Force One”
**He created a faux Great Seal with his name on it
**He took a “world tour” normally reserved for sitting presidents, and before he had actually accomplished anything other than declaring his candidacy
**Though he hasn’t been sworn in, or even officially elected yet, he has already created a more government—the Office of the President-Elect
All of the foregoing belies that Mr. Obama was so cock-sure of his eventual election to the highest office in the land—or was it that he was entitled to it?—that he took on the trappings of the office even before he won his party’s nomination.
His “soaring rhetoric” during the campaign suggested that merely being elected would represent a moment of the grandest, most transformative kind. When he actually accomplished something, winning the Democrat nomination, Sen. Ego spent a small fortune to recreate the Acropolis at Mile High Stadium, because accepting the Democrat Party nomination in the modest confines of the Pepsi Center, as the mere mortals who preceded him, was not nearly grand enough.
And then he declared it a great turning point in history: “Generations from now we will be able to look back and tell our children that this was the moment.” “We are the ones we’ve been waiting for,” he bragged (the use of the royal “we” did not go unnoticed).
In his mind he has already achieved success as president by merely running for office, by winning the nomination, and winning the election. Don’t trouble The One with unimportant details such as what he will do in his four or eight years to benefit America.
What Barack Obama does not seem to understand is that giving a speech before the Brandenburg Gate is something you earn not just by being a black man running for president, but by being a president with who has accomplished something more than being elected.
During the campaign objective observers found themselves wondering just who is Barack Obama? But that question has been replaced with a more important one: Who does Barack Obama think he is?
Clearly, he is possessed by an ego-centrism that is as transcendent as Mr. Obama thinks he is, and that should truly be of concern.
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