EILEEN TOPLANSKY: OBAMA AND THE WICKED SON
http://www.familysecuritymatters.org/publications/detail/obama-and-the-wicked-son
During the holiday of Passover, Jews retell the story of the liberation of Hebrews from slavery in ancient Egypt. At the seder or special Passover meal, questions are welcomed as Jews worldwide remember Pharoah’s bondage. They pledge not to be enslaved again, nor to enslave another. In fact, the greatest loss would be to “forget where we came from” because then we would lose the message of freedom–an astounding declaration in light of the endemic slavery in the world today.
Pragmatically, Jews should never have survived the multitude of attacks and genocidal attempts on them. Yet, Mark Twain marveled that “The Egyptian, the Babylonian, and the Persian rose, filled the planet with sound and splendor, then . . . passed away. The Greek and the Roman followed. The Jew saw them all, beat them all, and is now what he always was, exhibiting no decadence, no infirmities of age, no weakening of his parts. … All things are mortal but the Jew; all other forces pass, but he remains. What is the secret of his immortality?”
Part of the answer rests with the idea of children as “builders” because they will be educated in the vision of freedom and pass this onto their children. And, in fact, children play a vital part in the seder meal. They begin to understand that out of the humble beginnings as a slave nation came the “extraordinarily humane” ordinances in the Bible that mandate that the orphan, the widow, and the hungry must be cared for so that “human dignity [is] available to all.”
And most amazingly as Rabbi Jonathan Sacks notes , . . .”ancient Israel was where the idea of freedom was born” and it was transferred to the ideals of the American republic.
One of the most fascinating discussions at a seder focuses on questions asked by four sons who represent different levels of comprehension. Two sons are of particular interest. There is the wise son who asks “What are these testimonies, statutes, and judgments which the Eternal, our God hath commanded you?” The in-depth detailed question by this son reflects not only wisdom but also a deep and abiding interest in the foundations of the law and customs. He is connected to the community as he learns about its foundations.
On the other hand, there is the wicked son, who defiantly asks “What mean you by this service?” It is the derisive way that he uses the word “you” that shows he has actually withdrawn himself from the community. His contempt indicates that he is not at all interested in celebrating the liberation from slavery and all that it entails.
Each year, the Passover story takes on new layers of meaning, but this year I was struck by yet another parallel to the motivational trajectory of the 44th President.
Unlike the wise son who is eager to learn the statutes and understand the nuances of the law, Obama is dismissive of the underpinnings of American idealism. For him, the Constitution is an impediment. He trivializes or simply ignores the law when it is convenient and/or demeans American patriots when they point out that what he is doing is trashing the very bedrock of American values.
Not only does he willingly sell his own birthright in order to impose a tyrannical order, he sells the birthrights of all Americans as their history becomes demeaned and distorted. In order to understand what it means to be American, one must be “steeped in history.” Yet for the past four decades, American history has not been objectively taught, nor is it celebrated. Instead, the left has seen fit to malign the achievements of America’s basic tenets and Obama is a true student of this leftist ideology.
To understand the greatness of America is not to exact a mere loyalty to a clan or a tribe. It is a commitment to the ideal of American exceptionalism. Yet in 2009 Obama made clear his view on this potent idea when he opined that he believed in “American exceptionalism, just as [he] suspects that the Brits believe in British exceptionalism and the Greeks believe in Greek exceptionalism.”
In American Exceptionalism: An Experiment in History, Charles Murray points out that American exceptionalism is “a concept that was shared by observers throughout the Western world; in fact, it was ‘foreigners who took the lead in describing the United States and Americans as being unlike all other countries and peoples'” and “refers to qualities that were first observed in the opening century of our history which can still apply today.”
Thus, Murray explains that the work ethic of the early founders that was based on their honesty, industriousness, religiosity, and morality helped to create a society that had no counterparts anywhere else. Yet, Obama and the left decry these very characteristics. Under Obama, welfare and disability claims have skyrocketed. Businesses that strive to succeed are continually punished with regulations that hamstring them. And even now, religion and morality are under constant assault by this administration, i.e., Little Sisters.
While Obama claims Hawaiian birth, it is abundantly clear that his ideological heart is elsewhere. He sent a terrifying message the first time that he bowed to the Saudi King for he indicated that now free men would bow down to the cruel despots of the world.
Obama will not entertain the exceptional notion that “. . . human beings acting in their private capacity tend to be resourceful and benign [while] human beings acting in the political realm tend to be resourceful and dangerous.” Which is why the system of checks and balances and the Bill of Rights are so paramount in keeping the republic whole. Which is why Obama flaunts, flouts and thwarts these constraints on the government. Which is why he retorts that he has a “pen and phone” and will use these as he sees fit.
He flagrantly dismisses the American ideology that is exceptional because it does not fit into his world view. He will not acknowledge that “one of the key tenets of the American ideology [is] that human beings acting in their own best interest will also serve the public good–that’s why freedom works in practice.” Instead Barack Hussein Obama sees only the underbelly of capitalism and deprecates the wealthy in his ongoing class warfare.
American exceptionalism is when “authority is [properly] distrusted and held in constant scrutiny . . . where the status of men flowed from their achievements and from their personal qualities, not from distinctions ascribed to them at birth.” But by his actions, Obama crushes American aspirations.
Under Obama, submission rules the day. It is why this modern day wicked son sheds crocodile tears as Christians, Jews, Buddhists, and Moslems are murdered. For Obama it was just a bunch of folks who were slaughtered in the kosher delicatessen in Paris. One need only contrast Obama’s smile at Beau Bergdahl’s father’s recitation of Arabic with his studied indifference as he looks on when Prime Minister Netanyahu speaks.
Obama sees America as a place plagued with rank jingoism. He denigrates Americans by claiming that “they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren’t like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations.” He conveniently forgets that the egalitarianism of America “. . . was the absence of the paraphernalia of class.” Yet, Obama is all about class and race baiting. And there has never been any ambivalence or conflict about his views on this.
Nor is there a genuine interest in aiding the next generation which he has saddled with mounting debt and false promises of a free college education. With Obama it is all hype and stagnation now that hope and change have all but evaporated.
As the latest embodiment of the wicked son, Obama does not care to understand the basis of American history and exceptionalism. He does not discern that “given the importance the Founders placed on religion, few of them were traditionally devout.” But what made America unique was its “unqualified breadth of its religious freedom . . . in the absence of any state assistance for a preferred faith.” And that absence of government support for American religiosity has . . . been its salvation,” a salvation that Obama mocks as Americans’ personal consciences come under ongoing government scrutiny and control via intimidation and fear be it through the IRS or Obamacare.
Obama is merely the latest in a 50-year destructive tsunami of the civic culture that Americans once used to embrace. And to that end, the “distinctions between America’s and Europe’s politics have blurred.”
But Americans do have a core set of values that distinguish us from any other nation. Sadly we have allowed collective historical amnesia to seep into our society. It does not, however, have to remain like this.
Dr. Erica Brown has written that “[q]uestions within a framework of conversation demonstrate interest and engagement. Certain questions can transform the course of a life.” Thus, one must ask whether we wish to be like the wise son and ask and learn about those aspects of American exceptionalism that made us unique in the world or do we wish to follow the wicked son’s sardonic cynicism and cavalier manner that scoff at the bedrock of our system?
Have we come to the point where Americans no longer care for the sacrifices and responsibilities inherent in being free? Will Americans see liberty as a burden and choose more government control or will they understand that freedom is not free but must be fought for every day because without this God-given right, evil expands and the wicked son prevails.
Eileen has been a medical librarian, an Emergency Medical Technician and a Hebrew School teacher. She is currently an adjunct college instructor of English composition and literature. Active in the 1970’s Soviet Jewry Refusenik movement, she continues to speak out against tyranny. Eileen is also a regular contributor to American Thinker. She can be reached at middlemarch18@gmail.com
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