armchair cultural observation since 1995

Tag Archive for ‘Barack Obama’

Best Obama rumor ever

Obama was in the most annoying video of 1993? No way!

Praying over cardboard presidents

The Jesus Camp kids are back, praying over a cardboard Obama.

Online overkill – Week of March 16

Good, bad, annoying and indifferent, these were the topics that burned a hole in my RSS feed this week. AIG. The best thing about this outrageous story being EVERYWHERE this week were the photos like this one of Manchester United’s Cristiano Ronaldo accompanying blog posts about the insanity of taxpayer-funded bonuses for poorly performing executives.  Barack Obama’s NCAA picks. […]

Bad art you can believe in

I have a friend who attributes much of the bad art he sees to a “world famous artist” named Gary Gooper. I don’t know Gary Gooper’s political affiliation if he even has one, but I’m pretty sure he approves of the staggering work of genius No. 44 has already inspired less than two months into […]

McCain 2.0

The Republican Party has been using a grab-bag of strategies to counter Obama’s policies over the past month. They rail against the stimulus package for its (supposed) pork. They hammer home their points with gimmicky videos and props. They speak in warrior rhetoric and revel in heroic, fighting-man stunts. But if there is one strand […]

What we need now

Profound truths can be simply said, but what we need now are concrete solutions, not quotable verses. President Obama may be speaking at a higher grade level than President Bush, but so far, he appears no more adept at offering us precise answers. The President can use his words – simple or complex – to […]

The GOP’s useful idiots?

At 36 years old, the pro-life movement is still energetic and indignant—and trapped. Every year of Republican rule has increased the suspicion that pro-lifers are the GOP’s useful idiots. Planned Parenthood still received federal dollars, and Congress never stripped courts of their ability to overturn parental notification and conscience laws. A human life amendment was […]

Obama’s astericks

During almost two years on the campaign trail, Barack Obama vowed to slay the demons of Washington, bar lobbyists from his administration and usher in what he would later call in his Inaugural Address a “new era of responsibility.” What he did not talk much about were the asterisks. The exceptions that went unmentioned now […]