"Change"

I was wondering what “change” meant during the fall campaign, since Mr. Obama was a child of Chicago politics, which doesn’t change much. Today, March 17, 2009, St. Patrick’s Day, I know what it means. It means words mean the opposite of what they meant during 2008. Like the word “change,” itself. Before it meant you would do things differently. Now it means that things will be the same, but even more so.

Here’s some examples. John McCain said in the summer of 2008 that the economy was fundamentally sound. Obama said he’s nuts, he’s out of touch, the economy’s a disaster, a catastrophe, the sky is falling and pieces of it are hitting us right now.

This week the White House announced the economy is fundamentally fine.

About a month ago Obama used the word catastrophe to describe where we were headed economically if we didn’t pass the bail out bill.

This week the White House announced the economy is fundamentally fine.

John McCain said he was going to tax health care benefits, at least some of them. Obama said he’s nuts, he’s out of touch, health care is a disaster, a catastrophe, the sky is falling and pieces of it are hitting us right now.

This week the White House announced they’re looking into taxing health care benefits.

Obama said earmarks are an abomination, a catastrophe, the sky is falling and pieces of it are hitting us right now. He just signed an appropriations bill with 9,000 earmarks.

Obama said the deficits we ran conducting the global war on terror are bankrupting us. Deficits are a catastrophe, the sky is falling and pieces of it are hitting us right now. Obama just signed appropriations bills that will put us at $1.7 trillion in deficits for fiscal 2009. This is more deficit than we’ve run for the two wars during the last 7 years.

Big deficits were bad, in 2008. Now, much bigger deficits are good. This is an example of what “change” means - the same, only much bigger.

The old David Bowie song “Changes” gets this all just right. The song sounds like it means something significant while you are listening to the tune and humming along. Then you actually read the lyrics and realize it is totally incoherent. Same thing with ObamaChange. Good tune, but the lyrics are incoherent.

“We Are The Change That We Seek.” Which in ObamaSpeak means “We are the same thing, only much, much more.”

-Eternal Optimist