Fouad Ajami has an op-ed piece in the Wall Street Journal today, pointing out the emptiness inherent in the election of the current occupant of the Oval Office and suggesting that Americans who value substance over style are now coming to understand the enormity of what they have done. I only hope that there are more of us who understand and prefer substance than those who would rather think they can get a free ride off the successful part of the.
Click the link above and read the article; here are the last two paragraphs:
American democracy has never been democracy by plebiscite, a process by which a leader is anointed, then the populace steps out of the way, and the anointed one puts his political program in place. In the American tradition, the "mandate of heaven" is gained and lost every day and people talk back to their leaders. They are not held in thrall by them. The leaders are not infallible or a breed apart. That way is the Third World way, the way it plays out in Arab and Latin American politics.Those protesters in those town-hall meetings have served notice that Mr. Obama's charismatic moment has passed. Once again, the belief in that American exception that set this nation apart from other lands is re-emerging. Health care is the tip of the iceberg. Beneath it is an unease with the way the verdict of the 2008 election was read by those who prevailed. It shall be seen whether the man swept into office in the moment of national panic will adjust to the nation's recovery of its self-confidence.
