Obama’s dog comparison is a really and truly weird thing to say

Showing that he can go off teleprompter — and that he probably shouldn’t — Obama whined (pun intended) about the treatment he feels Republicans are meting out to him:

“Some powerful interests who had been dominating the agenda in Washington for a very long time and they’re not always happy with me. They talk about me like a dog. That’s not in my prepared remarks, but it’s true,” he told a crowd largely consisting of union members.

Do I even need to mention here the fact that, the moment Obama goes off teleprompter, despite the fact that he’s the most genius of all geniuses ever to occupy the White House, evah!, he becomes completely illiterate and unintelligible?  I mean, what the heck kind of construction is that first sentence?  But getting back to the dog thing….

Accusing his opponents of demeaning him by treating him like a dog is a truly bizarre thing for a president to say.  In our two party system, the norm is for the opposition to be in attack mode, especially when a president sets out to be “transformational.”  For Obama to whimper because he’s on the receiving end of political challenges is just . . . well, peculiar, not to mention narcissistic, not to mention really scary coming spontaneously from the muzzle, er, mouth of our Commander in Chief.  The man isn’t just a whiner, he’s a weiner dog.

But there’s more to it than that, and my good friend, Earl, in a comment left to an earlier post, nails it:

I admit it – I couldn’t listen to the whiner-in-chief.

But his remarks about the dog really made me sit up straight….a DOG?  Who is it that has such a hard time about dogs?  Americans (mostly) LOVE dogs!!  Who refuses to allow even a Seeing-Eye dog in the same room?  Who won’t carry an assistance dog in their cab?  Who?

Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm?

No wonder the American people are so unsure about this guy……..!

Earl’s absolutely right.  Americans are nuts about their dogs.  Recessions or not, Americans spend about $45 billion annually on their pets.  Those pets include dogs, lots of dogs.  Dogs who get fed premium food, sleep on the owner’s beds and couches, and frequently (whether the dog likes it or not) wear natty clothing.  Dogs are cuddled, pampered, played with and praised in American culture.  They are our companions and our helpmates.  We think well of them.

The Muslim world, however, does not like dogs.  To call someone a dog is an insult.  Dogs are unclean.  Periodically, sharia-mad nations enact laws banning dogs.  And, as Earl pointed out, even within our own country, Muslims periodically exhibit hostility to dogs.

Now, I’m not saying Obama is a Muslim.  I’ve repeatedly said that I believe he is not a Muslim.  I don’t think he’s a Christian either, even the kind of weird Christianity you find in Black Liberation Theology.  I don’t believe Obama worships any God other than himself — and to the extent his religion of self has a distinct doctrine, it meshes harmoniously with Das Kapital.

I also freely acknowledge that Obama has a dog, although I have no doubt whatsoever that this dog exists in the White House for two reasons only:  publicity and his daughters’ happiness.  There’s nothing wrong with having a dog for either of those reasons.  Neither reason, however, indicates that Obama is, in the grand American tradition, a dog lover.  The one photograph of Obama and his doggy that I recall seeing shows him being completely helpless, as if in the presence of an alien species.  The guy doesn’t even know how to hold a leash, for goodness sake!

Nevertheless, even though Obama is not a Muslim and is a dog owner, he doesn’t have that cozy mental space in his head that Americans reserve for dogs.  To him, calling someone a dog is an insult.  To him, dogs are not loving creatures with thousands of years of inter-relationship with humans.  They are the other.  And by making that statement, off-record, and from his heart, Obama once again makes it clear that, as to ordinary American sensibilities, it is in fact he who is the other.  He’s not a Muslim, nor a Kenyan nor an Indonesian born man, but is still very much a stranger in his own land.