A Blank Screen and An Empty Suit

by Greg Garrison
In his most recent study in vapidity, The Audacity of Hope, Barack Hussein Obama does a remarkably terse and honest job of describing himself. If only Americans were to take him at his word: “I serve as a blank screen on which people of vastly different political stripes project their own views.” Indeed. Of course, one’s first reaction might be, “What the hell is that supposed to mean?” But, in point of fact, we find ourselves articulating such queries daily with Kid Wonder; all that blather about “change we can believe in,” “hope we can change with. . .change we can hope for. . ..beliefs we can change with” or whatever, seems to have mystified folks all over the fruited plain, making his “blank screen” metaphor spot on. It is just that entirely vacuous theme which keeps dogging the media’s most recent incarnation of the Great Liberal Hope; his suit is as empty as a beer keg after a frat party.There is a little-reported piece of polling data floating around from a recent Rasmussen piece that asked folks about their “comfort” level with each of the candidates. 55% of voters said they would be comfortable with John McCain as president, but only 39% said so of Obama. Hmm. . .could it be that at some point the American voter is going to come face to face with that -- well, uh. . .that blank screen? And when it happens, just how comfortable can we expect said voter to be? But there is more.Turns out that whole blank screen idea is far more accurate a self-portrait than the senator might have wanted to confess: time after time his descriptions of himself in print offer a painfully consistent look into the man. This blank screen not only seems to lack physical features, it also appears to be pretty barren of character as well, and two examples demonstrate just how empty that expensive suit really is. First was his cowardice as a state senator in Illinois. The issue was partial birth abortion -- or rather what to do with the occasional baby who slips past the abortionist’s knife and out into the air of earth without being murdered enroute. Of course, such a faux pas is a big-time no-no for the doc, but historically what they have done to remedy their slip-ups is set them aside and let them die. So the Illinois Legislature proposed a statutory answer that would require those little guys who had escaped the knife to be treated like the living human beings they are. Not a tough vote, right? Well, not so fast. Then-state Senator Obama voted “present.” Yup, he didn’t even have the courage to vote his pro-abortion philosophy, instead opting to occupy that tepid abyss reserved for those whose timidity precludes them from taking a stand at all. Sounds pretty much like a blank screen to me.Then there was the story out of Canada about a dissident journalist named Salah Uddin Shoaib Choudhury, a Muslim Zionist jailed in Bangladesh for his pro-Israel and pro-American writings. The Canada Free Press reports that the prisoner’s supporters garnered huge bipartisan support from our Congress, with polar-opposites like Dick Durban and Rick Santorum equally engaged in trying to free the guy from incarceration and torture, with one notable exception. When repeatedly and specifically approached, the best Senator Obama could do was to look confused and to respond in non-committal tones (Canadafreepress.com, July 29, 2008). Imagine that. Once again, the man faced a challenge -- in this case, a challenge simply to go along with a tidal wave of support from his own party -- but he just could not do it. Blank screen or empty suit, take your pick. Character does count, even in these latter days of licentiousness such as we faced through eight years of Slick Willie; and at some point before the polls open in November, I’ll bet we will all get a few really good opportunities to gaze into the face of Barack Obama and see just how blank a screen he really is.