Fulton J. Sheen once said, "Pride is an admission of weakness; it secretly fears all competition and dreads all rivals."
I am no pinnacle of humility, and I've learned my fair share of hard lessons from the camps of conceit. But I'm not sure the former Chicago politician occupying the White House has ever been schooled with a primer on the perils of pride.
It's one thing (though still distasteful) to be boastful in a sports or fighting ring – it's quite another in the Oval Office. We were promised change, but it seems to me this White House's smug swagger and strut rivals the great taunts and bluster of Mohammed Ali in his heyday. In fact, if I were handing out awards, President Obama would win hands down the Oscar for overconfidence and arrogance.
Here are a few examples of his Oscar political performances:
Who can forget the State of the Union back in January, when the president utterly disregarded and disrespected our military commanders and the U.S. Supreme Court? President Obama rebutted the entire Supreme Court in its presence and before the whole nation, with a premeditated and prepared accusation that the justices "reversed a century of law that I believe will open the floodgates for special interests – including foreign corporations – to spend without limit in our elections." (We now know why U.S. Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito immediately shook his head in dismay and mouthed the words "not true," because there are at least three accounts in the 183-page ruling that forbid its application to foreign nationals, groups or corporations.)
I ask you, which is worse: South Carolina Rep. Joe Wilson's impromptu outburst "You lie" to President Obama during his September 2009 address to Congress or the president's premeditated public innuendo and lie during the State of the Union that the U.S. Supreme Court justices are not protecting American sovereignty but handing over political sway to international powers? And did anyone see the mainstream media afterward pressure the president to apologize the way Wilson had to?
And what about the faces on the military commanders during the State of the Union? Regardless of one's views on gays in the military, the president's smug demeanor in pushing the issue and our military's stoic response prompted me to ask, "Is the State of the Union really the place for a commander in chief to cast in-your-face politics before his leading military personnel, with all America watching?"
Consider even the recent so-called health-care summit. It might sound simple to some, but I believe it is symptomatic when, away from the teleprompters but still on C-Span, other members of Congress call the president "Mr. President," while he calls them only by their first name. For example, when Minority Leader Rep. John Boehner started his remarks, the president said, "John, go ahead." And Rep. Boehner replied, "Mr. President, I want to say thank you for having us here," to which Boehner added at least another five addresses to "Mr. President." At the end of his statement, President Obama again replied, "John, you know, the challenge I have here …"
The president went the entire six hours or so in this room full of Washington politicians and various notables addressing them by their first names, rather than the socially accepted and proper forms of address for senators and congressman that the rest of us use: "Paul … Jim … Charles … George … Eric … Louise … Tom … Jay … Marsha," etc. One may argue that these are examples of familiarity, but I believe they are of contempt.
In addition, to Sen. John McCain's, R-Ariz., genuine concern for ramming a pork-ridden health-care bill through Congress by politics as usual, president Obama replied, "We're not campaigning anymore. The election is over."
And after Rep. Eric Cantor, R-Va., politely opened his remarks by saying, "Mr. President, thank you again very much for having us and for staying with us for the six hours. I appreciate that," the president sarcastically commented about the high stack of pages in front of Rep. Cantor by saying: "Let me just guess – that's the 2,400-page health-care bill. Is that right?"
Is it just me, or does the president's lofty arrogance bother anyone else, too? Imagine how it would make headline news if anyone in that health-care summit addressed the president as simply: "Well, Barack, let me tell you my opinion …"
Down here, particularly in the South, we use sir, ma'am, Mr., and Mrs., your honor, etc., and every other fitting and proper title in addressing others. People call it Southern hospitality. Mom raised me on it in Wilson, Okla. As a result, I believe respect is deserved by all people – regardless of color or creed. Of course, in martial arts, restraint and respect are two of the most critical components. I might have played tough guys in movies and television, but in real life it's respect all the way. But I confess that those to whom I often find it most difficult to show respect are the kings of conceit – those who lord and laud themselves over others.
I mean, how much pride and arrogance does it take for a president to ramrod a national health-care bill through Congress and down the throats of all Americans, despite a majority of Americans have voiced opposition to it, every Republican in the House and Senate opposes it and Michigan Rep. Bart Stupak and 11 other Democratic lawmakers vow to kill it?
And to those average Americans and others who oppose Obama's far left agenda, rather than respecting their opinion or working with their differences, the president spoke about them before a live audience a few months back and condescendingly declared, "To those who are trying to stand in the way of [my] progress, let me tell you: I'm just getting started! I don't quit. I'm not tired. I'm just getting started! It's important for those folks to know: We're just going to keep on going."
And President Obama had the audacity before an audience in France in April 2009 to call America "arrogant"?
The president believes he is above any opposition, and even tried to demonize No. 1 Fox News as an illegitimate news organization because some commentators disagree with him. Pat Buchanan was right when he concluded that, "This White House has no humility."
Amazingly, and a shocking testimony to a society blindly drinking Washington's political Kool-Aid, most mainstream media still marvel over Obama's deification. Many are under some type of political hypnosis, like the editor of Newsweek who gloated last year on MSNBC's Chris Matthews' show, "I mean, in a way Obama's standing above the country, above the world. He's sort of God." No wonder one acrostic for E.G.O. is "edging God out."
The president doesn't just lord himself over broadcasts agencies, other politicians, his opponents and the American people, but over its most precious founding documents. As I noted in last week's column, I repeat here for emphasis: President Obama described the Constitution as "an imperfect document … a document that reflects some deep flaws … an enormous blind spot … and that the framers had that same blind spot." In so doing, the president places himself above the Constitution and those "blind framers" who just couldn't see the big picture as he does today. After all, he's the constitutional scholar and the framers were just, well, the creators of the document!
It might have worked for Al Capone, but the Chicago politics slogan is unbecoming for any occupant of the White House: "Hire your friends, and smash your enemies." Lou Pritchett, a former vice president of Procter & Gamble who worked for that company for 36 years until his retirement in 1989, hit the nail on the head when he wrote his now famous "open letter to President Obama": "You are the thirteenth president under whom I have lived and unlike any of the others, you truly scare me. … You scare me because you lack humility and 'class,' always blaming others."
Even stranger and possibly his gravest error, President Obama haughtily placed himself above the Judeo-Christian religion and scriptures, when speaking at a church in June of 2006 as a senator of Illinois. In that message, he denigrated biblical books like Leviticus and Deuteronomy, ridiculed the issue of inerrancy and the Bible, called the Sermon on the Mount a radically inapplicable passage of scripture, and declared that basing public policies upon the Bible "would be a dangerous thing." He arrogantly concluded that "folks haven't been reading their Bible," setting himself not only above most others' understanding of scripture but all of us who read it. In olden days, such sacred contempt would have been regarded as an abominable desecration – a man standing in the house of God claiming to be like a god, above others and even scripture itself.
President Obama, I don't know if you've spent a day in a Sunday-school class, so here's a verse that might help you. Proverbs 16:18: "Pride goes before destruction, a haughty spirit before a fall."
(For more on how to reawaken America to our founder's vision and plans for this country, which includes entire copies of the Constitution and Declaration of Independence, check out Chuck Norris' brand new – January 2010 – expanded paperback version of his New York Times best-seller, "Black Belt Patriotism.")