A Basic Lack

The comments by Mr. Obama on the arrest of Mr. Gates is not merely another gaffe (recalling the Special Olympics comment on Leno). It's the lack of what used to be called Second Reflection; the ability to stand aside mentally and examine oneself and one's own actions and mental operations. As a matter of the fawning comparisons between the current occupant of the Oval Office and his predecessors, let me be brief: Lincoln had it, he doesn't.

The President of the United States has absolutely no role or business in making any comment whatsoever on the arrest of a person -however well known- in a college town in Massachusetts, or anywhere else. To do so shows a basic disconnect between the office and the person.

It is a basic lack of judgment, I am very much afraid. In terms of what transpires every day in our current culture, it has been called "living in hyper-reality," the sense that one hovers above everyone and everything, and is qualified -and entitled- to have opinions and make comments, no matter one's role or level of being informed.

It is most certainly not that Mr. Obama is unique in this regard. It does become both dismaying and worrisome when the President of the United States feels that he has to comment on matters at this level, instead of addressing the business of his office and the very real issues besetting this country.

Or- maybe that's the point.