Something happened recently that really helps to highlight why I didn’t jump on the “hope” bandwagon before November’s election, and it comes courtesy of one of Barack Obama’s biggest supporters – figuratively and literally.
Oprah Winfrey, talk show giant and Obama uber-groupie, has been duped again, along with a book publisher and agent.
First Oprah was had by James Frey, who wrote a “nonfiction” book called “A Million Little Pieces.” The book supposedly documented Frey’s years as an alcoholic, drug-addicted criminal. I spotted the deception right away, because having all three of these qualities and not being in politics just didn’t seem believable to me. As it turns out, it wasn’t believable because it wasn’t true.
Still, this was no big deal to me for two reasons. The first was because I don’t watch Oprah’s show (but my wife does, so I feel like I have a spy in the enemy’s camp), and thus don’t have an emotional investment in the events that surround her show the way those who march lock-step in the Winfrey brigade, heavily armed with touchy-feely, do. Second, I apply the adage “fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me” not only to myself, but to everybody else, so I could look past reports of one research failing on Oprah’s part.
But then Oprah and her producers were fooled again – this time by Herman and Roma Rosenblat, who yanked tears from the faces of many an Oprahbot with their touching tale of meeting at a Nazi concentration camp, who were then separated, only to meet again decades later and get married. It was a great story. It was heartwarming. It was … a hoax.
Said the Rosenblats literary agent Andrea Hurst, “I question why I never questioned it. I believed it; it was an incredible, hope-filled story.”
Ah, “hope,” that wonderful word we’ve been hearing with increasing frequency for the past couple of years. Hey, what’s wrong with “hope”? Hope can never be a bad thing, can it? Yes it can, but only if it makes Oprah look like an idiot, otherwise, “hope” is a magic elixir that we’re all supposed to swallow without reading the label of ingredients.
After James Frey’s book turned out to be a lie, Oprah said she felt “duped” and that Frey “betrayed millions of readers.” But, like the Rosenblats, his story gave us such hope! I don’t get it. We’ve had it engrained in our brains that “hope” is all we need! What gives?
Liberalism is “intent-based,” meaning that the result of the intention takes a back seat to the perceived motivation behind the outcome. In the case of the Rosenblats, that motivation was to “bring happiness and hope to people.” What’s the big deal? Any good liberal will tell you that the intent is all that matters. So then why is Oprah upset that people like James Frey and the Rosenblats created some hope? Because, as it turns out, the result of the intent does matter, provided the intention-based liberal in question is on the wrong end of the piping hot hope prod.
Oprah has fallen for a couple of hope-addled hoaxes in the past few years, so in case she wonders why some of us washed down her enthusiastic Obama endorsement with spoonful of trepidation and a grain of salt, maybe now she knows why.
Not that Obama is a hoaxer or anything – I’m certainly willing to give him a fair shake. It’s just that in politics, there are far more Rosenblats and Freys than I care to count, and I refuse to play the part of Oprah in another D.C. hope scam.
After reality hits, most of the promised Obama miracle (free gas, free houses, global harmony, free health care and cute little cartoon bluebirds that flutter around whistling “Shiny Happy People” while pooping government checks that smell like roses) fails to materialize, and blind “hope” is smashed into “A Million Little Pieces,” who’s going to apologize to Oprah so she’s emotionally free to go on and fall for the same thing all over again?
It wouldn’t matter one bit if Oprah didn’t have so many people aboard the gullible train, wrongly dubbed “The Hope Express” – but, unfortunately, she does.
Maybe Oprah can afford to be a sucker once in a while, but the rest of us can’t.
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Wayne Allyn Root