Monday, November 10, 2008

Expectations, Arrogance, Messianism and All That

Close on the heels of the election results, an anonymous commenter on this blog claimed that the Republic would now be governed rather than ruled.

Yesterday, Valerie Jarrett, an old Obama friend and now co-chair of his transition team, used "rule" as the verb to refer to Obama's upcoming actions as POTUS.

We hope that such minor embarrassments will help the triumphant mute their smug disparagement of the outgoing administration's smugness.

6 comments:

Anthony Jones said...

hahaha that's hilarious...by the way, that anonymous post wasn't mine this time doc.

Martin said...

Some definitions of both words are practically the same. Some make govern appear more benign. Some of us are just happy to have someone else ruling/governing us.

Unknown said...

lead the free world, rule the free world, what's the diff?

Anonymous said...

Obama comes from Chicago. The city is ruled by a mayor who runs it in a similar way to many small dictatorships. Cook County is now ruled by a president that got in as a ballot replacement for his gravely ill father. The State of Illinois is under similar rule.

So it sould be no surprise that Obama will try to emulate that at a national level.

Jon A. Alfred E. Michael J. Wile E. SWNID said...

Two observations, Marty:

1. It's connotation, not denotation, that's at stake.

2. You're happy now.

One to Bryan:

Thanks for lampooning the grandiose and anachronistic use of "free world" in a post-Cold-War world. Let's add "free world" to the Oxford List of Irritating Expressions.

Anonymous said...

My favorite irritating expression is "international community." What's next, "intergalactic family?"