Posted on 12/26/2008 10:25:16 AM PST by Tom the Redhunter
Yesterday I spent a wonderful Christmas Day with family. Then, sometime after opening gifts my brother showed me this story in the Washington Post:
As Duties Weigh Obama Down, His Faith in Fitness Only IncreasesBy Eli Saslow Washington Post Staff Writer Thursday, December 25, 2008; Page A01
Being elected president forces a man to take inventory of his life, so Barack Obama has trimmed his schedule to the bare essentials. He's not in the White House yet, but gone are the hours he once spent reading novels, watching television and obsessing over the daily transactions of Chicago's sports teams. He eats out only once every few weeks. He visits friends rarely, if at all.
But one habit endures: Obama has gone to the gym, for about 90 minutes a day, for at least 48 days in a row. He always has treated exercise less as recreation than requirement, but his devotion has intensified during the past few months. Between workouts during his Hawaii vacation this week, he was photographed looking like the paradigm of a new kind of presidential fitness, one geared less toward preventing heart attacks than winning swimsuit competitions. The sun glinted off chiseled pectorals sculpted during four weightlifting sessions each week, and a body toned by regular treadmill runs and basketball games.
There is a term for this, and it's "soft porn."
Note that this was a page 1 story, with the section quoted on the front page. Below the fold, but page 1.
It is good that we have a president who keeps himself in shape. It lessens the chance that he will die or become disabled in office. It's also a positive example for the rest of us. Further, I go to the gym three days a week when I can (although I've hurt my knee so am staying away for a few weeks).
Bu this "sun glinted off chiseled pectorals" business is messiah cult-of-personality worship. One doesn't comment this way on someone's body, at least not publically, and certainly not in a news story. It is weird and it is creepy.
Democrats cannot at once complain that the right is not respectful of our new president (ok, president-elect) and turn their heads at this type of story. Conservatives can often go too far with the Reagan this, Reagan that, and "what would Reagan do," . We've also seen it with John F Kennedy. But in the end there is just no comparison to what we're seeing today with Obama.
The rest of the story isn't any better. A few more excerpts:
"He does it every day like clockwork," said Marty Nesbitt, one of Obama's closest friends from Chicago. "He doesn't think of it as something he has to do -- it's his time for himself, a chance for him to reflect. It's his break. He feels better and more revved up after he gets in his workout." ...
Ubermenschen Obama!
"That's one of the first things you learn working for him: You better make sure he gets his workout," said Jim Cauley, who managed Obama's 2004 U.S. Senate campaign. "If there isn't any time, he's not going to feel his best that day. If he only gets 30 or 40 minutes, he's still not really happy.
His physical prowess exceeds that of the average human!
"It's something he takes seriously, and that's why he's in great shape," said Alexi Giannoulias, a friend of Obama's and a former professional basketball player. "When people picture him running or whatever, they might think he's just going through the motions. But he goes hard. He's fit. He could convince you he's half his age."
Age does not affect him as it does others!
Even Obama's closest friends said they marvel at how he has maintained his commitment.
He even amazes his friends, who no doubt are used to being amazed!
For the small group of reporters tasked with following Obama's every move, his fitness has become a running joke repeated in the stories they file. They sit at McDonald's while he exercises in Hawaii. They eat calorie-rich scones while he sweats at Regents Park. One reporter for the Christian Science Monitor, filing his report about one of the president-elect's gym trips last month, noted: "While Mr. Obama worked at maintaining his lithe look, your pear-shaped pooler spent quality time at a local coffee shop."
The reporters are amazed!
Obama still suffers from one vice -- smoking -- although he has worked hard to quit since he started the presidential campaign. He's down from three or four cigarettes each day to what he terms the occasional "slip."
He is working to eliminate his one small vice with a will of steel!
Oh my heavens. I thought I'd seen a lot but this story just about takes the cake. This Eli Saslow has a man-crush on Obama that is embarrassing.
One can say none of this is Obama's fault, as he neither wrote the story nor has issued any press releases about "chiseled pectorals." But neither has he dissuaded anyone from writing this type of story. Indeed, as Mark Levin pointed out a few months ago, it's just this cult worship that "his campaign has carefully and successfully fabricated."
This is cult-of-personality stuff. It's the type of thing we used to see about the great dictators of the 20th century; not only did they espouse great ideas and were great leaders, their personal qualities exceeded those of their subjects. Any faults are minimized and they are working successfully to overcome them.
I am not saying that Obama is or wants to be a dictator. But it's getting hard to deny that the cult of personality that is building up around him does bear similarities to what we saw during the last century.
The symbols created of him are cultish: the Obama "O" sign, the special Obama flag and presidential seal, the weird picture that I've seen in all sizes, one at least 8 feet tall:
There are all of the songs sung to Obama, some by children, some by adults, one by kids in camouflage marching military style.
All of this has got to stop.
One more thing. If his duties are weighing him down, how it it that he's on vacation and going to the gym 90 minutes a day? Didn't George Bush get in trouble when he went or stayed on vacation during a time of national emergency? I thought we had a financial crisis going on. Oh that's right, he is Ubermenschen, who will unite and save us all. He can do all this and more while on vacation and going to the gym regularly. And don't you dare say otherwise.
Tom the Redhunter blogs at The Redhunter
DC Chapter Ping
Excellent commentary, Tom. Thank you for the post.
Isn’t it mind boggling. I am falling off my chair laughing at the stupidity of it all.
eew
Oh Lord. Is this what we've got to look forward to for the next 4 years?
What else are they going to write about?
His stellar accomplishments?
His voting record? His decisive stands on any number of issues he took, frequently contradicting himself over and over?
His new administration and the changes we will see in personnel that will “stun” everyone?
The fact that he’s screwed his lefty base nine ways to Sunday by bringing Hillary’s Shadow Government to DC so She will actually be defacto President?
Naw. Let’s just print a photo of Mr. Chicken-chest and flog the celebutard news much like The Star.
What next WAPO? Batboy and Michelle hookup?
This IS creepy stuff - I don’t want to see or hear anything about the pecs on the POTUS (and certainly not about the mere President-elect), thank you, Mediascum.
The Obamessiah cult is in full bloom......
Maybe one line about the fact that a President exercises vigorously (or not) is plenty, thank you. The hard-body worship is just ridiculous — celebrity culture has completely infected the “news” media beyond all shame.
It’s clear even from a distance that those aren’t ‘pectorals’-it’s a condition called HTC induced gynocomastea (manboobs).
“There is a term for this, and it’s “soft porn.””
There’s another term: Emetic
Oh Lord. Is this what we've got to look forward to for the next 4 years?"
As for myself, I'm praying for more cloudy days.
Is WaCompost issuing special kneepads with the OWhammy insignia on them to its reporters to cover OBamBam?
Or do they each cheerfully provide their own?
The sun glinted off chiseled pectorals sculpted during four weightlifting sessions each week, and a body toned by regular treadmill runs and basketball games.
There is a term for this, and it’s “soft porn.”
////////
For the love of God. Are we now reducing ourselves to a Neo-Victorian priggishess?
If that is “soft porn” then let’s light the fires and start burning the books beginning with:
Anaïs Nin — Delta of Venus
D. H. Lawrence — Lady Chatterley’s Lover
Henry Miller — Tropic of Cancer
Mark Twain — 1601
Pauline Réage — Story of O
Vladimir Nabokov — Lolita
and the ever favorite book of eroticism
Solomon—Song of Songs.
I am trying to laugh but more and more I feel like puking!
Methinks you entirely missed the point.
I understand, but I am still laughing
Chiseled pecs...like Michael Vick?
Anyone who cannot distinguish between the sensuality of the Song of Songs and the explicit, egregious commodification of human sexuality of Nin and Miller is unfit to make any moral or aesthetic judgments.
If this be neo-Victorianism, make the most of it.
No. I get it. But to equate “messiah cult-of-personality worship” with “soft-porn” is specious at best and mendacious at worst.
Sad that you immediately go for the “priggish” charge. And accuse me of being a “book burner.” I had rather expected better.
I have read Song of Songs thank you. It’s a love story all within marriage, as it should be. Not quite the same as the man-crush cult worship of Obama.
I just don’t see this as an appropriate way for a major newspaper to describe the president elect. It’s weird and cultish.
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