Byron's Blog

Anonymous says it's the height of lunacy to give any consideration to who actress and professional gab artist Oprah Winfrey wants for President.

Stay Home Oprah

by Anonymous

Wow, what a scene -- throngs of screaming, adoring, dizzy fans gathered together to hear the ramblings of a woman who chats ad nauseam about fashion and pole dancing. This time Oprah was there not to tell them what book to read or film to watch. She was giving them guidance about who should run the most powerful nation on the planet. Analyze the event through the prism of time and it becomes especially easy to see the stunt for what it was -- meaningless.

Barack Obama is simply not qualified to be President. He lacks the experience, perspective, judgment that the job requires. Oprah Winfrey wants to deflect attention from that reality, but her gushing and fawning about him not work. She mouthed what Mr. and Mrs. Obama are trying to foist on the American public and that is that the nation needs a leader who can restore hope and belief to the populous. It makes for a mediocre news story but not much else.

Hope and belief do not solve problems. They do not negotiate arms agreements, they do not end war, they do not capture terrorists or spur economic growth and development, yet they are central to the Obama campaign and Oprah's around to merely augment that message. It's all so very silly. Think about it. Say you're considering a economic, or military advisor who comes a meeting on strategy and offers you hope. Perhaps you'd have the discipline to hide your astonishment, tell the individual, thanks for the time, never contact that person again, then proceed to find someone with experience. There's that word again, the one that scares Barack Obama and his pals who're doing everything they can to divert your attention away from it.

They've read the polls that say when voters are looking for a candidate based on experience they choose Sen. Clinton, but they find Barack likable. It's sheer insanity to think that the Democrats are going to select the person to run an international superpower because he's friendly and smiles real big. None of that matters. The worst thing that can happen for the Obama folks is that voters actually take a look at the world and decide based on what they see.

Scan the globe. American troops are involved in two wars, the value of the dollar is plunging, inflation is looming, the balance of trade deficit is hopelessly out of whack, foreign central banks practically own the domestic economy, U.S. stature is fading and rogue nations have no intention of giving up their designs on more weapons and power. Many parts of the African Continent are in chaos, the Middle East is fractured and Democrats are about to count on hope to pull it all together? Please.

There are some elements that may mitigate the misguided Barack-is-our-guy attitude among the unfocused public. One is that Americans are smart enough to vote for who they want and not who celebrities say they should elect. One big reason why the Oprah-for-Barack campaign will probably have zero impact on the who lands the job of Chief Executive.

Another aspect -- her association with him might actually damage his credibility. The polls also show that Americans already think of him as a 'celebrity candidate.' That feeds into the notion that he's qualified to deliver slick speeches that promise the stars and moon, but not equipped to do much else. Sure, they're marginally entertaining to watch, but they don't mean anything and are loaded with assurances that he could never fulfill, even if he spent all the bullion at Fort Knox.

Yes, it sounds noble to want to build schools all around the world, pay the tuition of everyone who wants to go to college and provide the insanely high level of health care that Congress members assured for themselves, but that's not going to happen, even in the extremely unlikely event that he wins the race.

Those problems deserve attention and are worth tackling, but it's going to take more than speeches to get it done, some of which he delivers with a phony southern accent to certain crowds below the Mason-Dixon line. Talk is cheap, whether it comes from him or his buddy Oprah, who cannot resist the urge to chime in on everything from her new diet to her new attitude. Chat all you want, Oprah but save it for your fluffy show and leave Presidential politics to the pros.