Thursday, November 12, 2009

Of Fort Hood Speeches & Gestalt Moments

My friend James, @ Musical Musings posted Mr. Obama's speech from the Fort Hood Memorial Service.

Lovely speech. Nice touches referencing each person individually. Well done, Mr. President. You've proven to be an impressive speaker - again...

The speech was well deserved by those in attendance & those who, sadly, are no longer with us. But I submit the following: anybody w/ charisma & camera-friendly face can schmooze out somebody else's words. Anybody can be coached on how to feign 'appropriate' affect & somber tenor when delivering a rehearsed eulogy. My concern is not what this man did on a stage at a solemn event, where every move was prescribed. My concern is what he did/didn't do in response to a live-action terrorist attack.

A commenter to James tried to make this point, albeit with great gusto, & was dismissed as immature & a disgrace. The following was, & still is, my contention with that dismissal:

In the moment of discovery of the Fort Hood massacre (it was NOT a "tragedy," it was a TERRORIST act perpetrated by a self-proclaimed SOA - soldier of Allah), Mr. Obama took the stage at a Native American Conference. It took him 60 full seconds to even mention the massacre.

A full 60 seconds: wherein he casually thanked his staff, conference organizers, gave congratulations to attendees for their 'extremely productive conference' and also gave a "shout out" to a medal winner!! ---- NONE as critical as 12 DEAD soldiers, massacred in cold blood, perp'd by one of our own personnel, who, btw just happened to be muslim & happened to have SCREAMED 'Allahu Akbar' seconds before he blew his fellow soldiers away. (But never mind that.)

And though my friends @ the other blog were involved in congratulating BHO (& each other) on his eloquent speech, I emphasized that I frankly don't give a flip what Mr. O said at the Memorial Service. He could have sung "The Rainbow Connection" while doin' the Charleston, for all I care about his performance.

See, what the Left misses is that leadership, strength & compassion are defined by what a person does/says when they're operating out of their own spontaneous, raw character. That's what matters, not some eloquence dribbled into a microphone, read off a teleprompter.

Last Thursday we were scared, & were all replaying tapes of 9-11. We needed immediate, heartfelt Leadership. We needed what Martin Buber calls "the I/Thou" relationship moment; the basis for Fritz Perls' Gestalt Therapy . "The experience involves an appreciation of & a respect for the reality of the Other." It's based on being 'in the moment,' where one intimately identifies with another's circumstances to effect a reciprocal bond of trust, & to foster transformative healing.

And this guy, this guy showed himself in that moment to be a detached, cool, emotionless (even cavalier), unsympathetic (except to muslims), calculating Disconnect. Who but the same can trust or bond with THAT?

Mr. O gave a lovely speech 5 days later. All the families deserved it - as did the departed. But in his Gestalt, in his defining moment, Mr. O showed he cannot produce I/Thou. And when you're incapable of that, all you've got left is I/Me.

Who, again, is the disgrace?
~~~

16 comments:

Anonymous said...

Suz, that "shout-out" and fist-pumping gangsta stuff spins me up like a cheap toy gyroscope! I can almost understand that BHO is "youthful" to a degree and I could even understand wanting to "connect" with the hipsta set he bought his votes from. BUT - there's a time and a place for doing so ... and the terrible events at Ft. Hood and the associated discussion were NOT the time nor the place.

I saw no sincerity whatsoever in BHO's face when he finally got shamed into going to Ft. Hood in the first place.

USA_Admiral said...

I cannot stomach anything Obama does or says. He is a sneering pretender with a socialist agenda. Socialism needs fear to thrive. That is what Obama does, produce fear.

Jim said...

President Obama does not produce fear. I do not fear Obama. Most Americans do not fear Obama. President Obama has done absolutely nothing to incite fear.

YOUR fear is a product of your ignorance, bigotry or both. If this is the greatest country in the world (as I assume you will agree it is), then the political system of checks and balances and electoral process will preserve the will of the people in 2010 and 2012 as they did in 2006 and 2008.

And if you don't believe that, then you must believe we live in a banana republic and are no better than Honduras.

I loathed the Bush policies and i worried about his Supreme Court appointees. But I didn't go out and buy rice, beans and ammo. I believed in America and I believed that if a majority of people worked to change things they would. And they did.

Do crap in your pants, Adm. Vote your guys back in if you can convince enough people to join you. Or else find a banana republic more to your liking.

Susannah said...

RWL~ You know, it's not even the content of what he said at that podium that was so offensive, it was that he said ANYTHING except speaking of the terrorist attack that had happened only hours before.

USA~ Yes, fear that we're losing our country to the Socialist Left. Heaven help us.

Jim~ "Vote your guys back in if you can convince enough people to join you."
Did'ja happen to catch the election returns from last Tuesday? Oh, & I hear that Huffman (who had been in the race, what?, 3-4 weeks?) may be the NY 23 winner after all.

Looks like convincing people to 'join us' hasn't been the barbed wire crossing you think.
(Or did you not catch my last post about the 24 point swings away from BHO?)

Jim said...

2010 election is farther away than Obama's first inauguration. Lot's can happen with people's opinion either way.

I actually DID catch last week's elections. The Democrats won both congressional races handily and both voted for the House Affordable Health Care bill. And both are likely to support the President in education and energy policy matters.

The two local races went as expected since both NJ and VA historically cycle back and forth between GOP and Dem opposite the President.

I haven't been able to find anything about Huffman winning NY-23. Where did you "hear" it? Seems the two Dems were sworn in and voted for the health care reform bill.

Susannah said...

Jim~ Go right ahead & minimize a 24 pt. swing AWAY BHO in VA & a 20 point swing in NJ (a state so blue, it's almost black). Fine. Nobody said those numbers can't/won't change in a year. The public is a fickle prom date. But those elections are absolutely worthy of note & DO represent a substantial shift. If if makes you feel better, stick w/ your story.

I heard about the Hoffman/Owens story (sorry, I misspelled his name earlier): NY 23 absentee ballot counting on twitter (Newt Gingrich's), radio, Bill O'Reilly, & Huffington Post (in case you don't think my other sources are legit):
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/11/12/owenshoffman-race-tighten_n_355696.html

He hasn't won, btw, but he just might. And if he does, that'd put Mrs. Pelosi in sort of a bind on her health care stunt, wouldn't it?

Anonymous said...

God Bless you for this great post.. All the radical liberals on this board like w-dervish ..who are blindly spewing hate towards republicans are sicko's. Why does Barry Hussein Obama hate America and love Muslim terrorists?

And how about holding the trial for the 9 11 terrorist in NYC!
Stupid. A very stupid decision,made for political reasons, that will blow up in our face, he could wind up waling away .. All they need is a ultra liberal judge to throw out the evidence because of the waterboarding . . I suspect Holder's game is to get public testimony in a US court regarding waterboarding and "enhanced interrogation techniques

Anonymous said...

Hear that noise? thats obama flushing the country down the toilet.

Susannah said...

Mary & Amer.Girl! So glad to see you both back!

"And how about holding the trial for the 9 11 terrorist in NYC!"
An absolute travesty - it'll be a circus, literally. Gives those monsters an international stage to spew their venom - from the scene of the assault, no less. And that's not even to mention the safety concerns, the message it sends to the world ("this was an act of crime, not war..."), & the further trauma to the families and our country.

Barack Obama cares NOTHING for this country. Makes me sick, really.

Anonymous said...

"He hasn't won, btw, but he just might. And if he does, that'd put Mrs. Pelosi in sort of a bind on her health care stunt, wouldn't it?"

Good point, Suz ... I can understand why the liberals would want to skew the polling data a bit. It's almost a case of even if they win, they lose.

I Speak My Mind Out said...

He's not doing this stuff because he's stupid--although he is--he's doing it because it's his mission to destroy this country he hates.

Janie Lynn said...

Susannah you used the one word I find describes Obama's emotions the best - "disconnect". He simply has a disconnect from anyone who disagrees with him, or citizens who are opposing him - he just disconnects and focuses on his ideology - must. bring. socialism. must. bring. socialism.

Black Republican Women said...

Obama has not a clue about what America wants and repeated over and over that Americans are all begging for this health plan.. wow.. anyone I talk to say they are not interested right now as the cost is prohibitive.. where does he get his ideas?? MANY MILLIONS
of Americans are quite happy with their existing health plans.
He made light of the bluedog dems saying that they will go along with him and they will iron out the differences later.. oh, yeah?? really?? who would trust his lying word?

In all he just makes excuses for everything.. he lies .. and lies and lies..He even had the audacity to say that he is trying to arrange the same benefits for us as congress gets.. who the hell is going to believe that one.. those cadillac plans cost mega bucks and how could the country afford that?? I for one am so tired of it.. I hope we all let him and our reps and senators know our feelings.. let's get on with the business of improving our economy...something he has not done YET

Black Republican Women said...

Obama says that if he doesn't get his health plan through that the deficit will be out of sight!! HELLO.. IT IS ALREADY OUT OF SIGHT THANKS TO HIM AND HIS RIDICULOUS SPENDING..

His excuse for everything is the HUGE HUGE DEFICIT he inherited.. well if it is so damn bad why the hell did he quadruple it in a few months..??? and now he wants us to pay for it?? no.. no and no again..

He continually refuses to actually TELL THE DAMN TRUTH ABOUT HIS PLAN.. NOTICE how he slipped in the word "mandatory" here and there.. without saying what the penalty would be.. He continually says that we can keep our own doctors and keep our own plans but the idiot does not get it .. his plan will get rid of the other plans.. hence everyone will end up on the PUBLIC PLAN..
He also commented several times that the coverage we will have will be controlled and we will not be able to get required tests unless they approve of them.. or treatments .. unless THEY SHOW THAT THE PERSON WILL DEFINITELY GET BETTER.. Well that means older folks won't be covered for any end of life costs, that costs to make them "more comfortable" or that they have more peace of mind will not be available to them.. after all, in his mind, old people don't count and the sooner he gets rid of them the better so he doesn't have to pay them SS benefits.

tha malcontent said...

obama doesn't care what happens to those in iraq and afghanistan because he despises those with any Patriotic spirit.
Remember this when Barack Obama bowed before the King of Saudi Arabia at the G-20 summit in London last April? Even though the bow was captured by still and video photographers, the White House denied that it had taken place. "It wasn't a bow," an unnamed White House official told the Politico's Ben Smith. "He grasped his hand with two hands, and he's taller than King Abdullah." Yeah sure and I am the Pope of Rome. So the official word was: Obama didn't bow.

Well, then what will Robert Gibbs, the White House's mouth piece, call the little maneuver he made when he bent over up to his waist?
Yup, that is the Emperor of Japan. This kind of crap just doesn't sit well with many Americans. The president, as the elected representative of the United States, should not be in the habit of bowing to foreign leaders, royal or not. Obama's deep, subservient bow makes it even worse; this was no little nod.

So what will the White House explanation be? Emperor Akihito is certainly shorter than Obama, so perhaps the White House will roll out the old "he's taller than King Abdullah" story. Perhaps Gibbs will deny that it happened at all. Neither will fly. This is something that Obama should explain.

Isn't there some way that we can get this S.O.B out of office NOW! I mean, after all, enough is Enough!
The saddest part of all is that people actually think Maobama CARES what they think of him, now that he's already fooled the sheep into electing him.

Susannah said...

BRW~ Thanks for coming by. It's very interesting to read your viewpoint. I think we'll get along just fine!! ;)

Malcont.~ Glad you came by too! Yeah, that bowing to foreign leaders thing is getting a bit old...No?