Our first and greatest leader, George Washington, was not the most effective speaker of the Founders; that honor would be assigned to Patrick Henry, who turned out to be the greatest orator of the group.  Interestingly, Thomas Jefferson, though the Founders’ most gifted writer, loathed public speaking and was in fact an even less effective speaker than was General Washington.  Jefferson actually delivered very few speeches in his long public career, in any venue. 

The General did not feel quite so negatively about speaking in public, and did in fact deliver numerous speeches, as military commander and as President, some of them quite brilliant. 

There was a wonderful example of this when George Washington delivered a crucial speech to an audience that consisted of the rather fed-up soldiers of his army.  Mutiny was in the air, as they had not only received no pay for their services for some time, but they were still fighting battles in threadbare uniforms with scarce arms and ammunition.  Despite their love for their leader, they had had enough; the entire war effort was thus on the verge of being threatened.  George Washington gave an impassioned speech to his men, asking for patience on their part when it was beyond all reason for patience to be expected on the part of these beleaguered troops.  They revered their commander, but they remained unconvinced, until General Washington removed a pair of spectacles from his jacket pocket and put them on to read the remainder of his speech.  The entire audience gasped when they saw their hero do this.  You see, George Washington, who had never left the field of battle for the 8 and ½ years of the War, and who fought and starved and froze and despaired and hoped along with his soldiers every minute of that time, was the embodiment of physical strength, courage and resilience to his men.  They had, of course, seen George Washington (who never wore a wig) grow from his natural red/brown to gray during the years of the war, but aside from that had never demonstrated any sign of physical frailty.  The General, upon hearing this collective gasp, apologized and said to his men:  “As you can see, I have not only grown gray in the service of my country, I have grown blind, as well.”

In this group of seasoned soldiers, who had seen and lived through everything as awful as can be provided in the fields of brutal war for almost a decade, there was total silence.    Then, these battle-hardened veterans did as one what they had never done before – they sobbed.  That was their response to the General’s remarks.

There was no mutiny. 

Nonetheless, it was thought that the natural reticence of George Washington was as great a strength; he was always first the listener, then the decider.  General Washington was held in such profound respect by his nation, its people and its leaders that when he did speak, what he said, despite and perhaps because of its rarity, was considered to be of the greatest significance.

Washington also brilliantly understood power; both political and military.  This comprehension of power by Washington was of such depth and totality that he had no need to natter along with the rest of our more verbose Founders, or the other military leaders of the time.  He most often reserved expressing his opinion until the time of decision-making, thus not only was he always deferred to, but his decisions were also the right ones for his nation.  It was clear that he always considered both sides of every issue that were being debated, and on the few times that he did speak, it was equally clear that his decisions were based on what was best for his young nation and its people.

As a result, what George Washington helped create in his quiet and dignified way turned out to be the only such experiment that worked. This is not only because of the freedom this new republic was able to provide man, it was also because of its unique structure that it has been able to persevere in these freedoms for more than 220 years.  This basically is the definition of American exceptionalism, a concept thoroughly rejected by our current President and his fellow leftists.  To them, America is just another imperialistic nation that needs to be chastised and then whipped into shape by the elites currently serving in power, who regard themselves as eminently superior to our Founding Fathers, white slave-owners, don’t you know.

Contemplate the reticence, and effectiveness, of George Washington in building this nation.  Then compare it with the 500 + speeches that our current leader has given in less than a year and a quarter; all scripted fiction, (do you find that the word ‘lie’ perhaps applies here?), completely forgettable and delivered to a (or so Obama thought) gullible American public.  These increasingly ineffective professorial lessons in everything that is wrong with us were delivered by Obama simultaneous to his systematic dismantling of the United States of America as created by George Washington and the others.

At least 75 of these speeches (a finite number is impossible, as they keep coming, and coming, and coming…) alone dealt with the jewel in the crown of the Obama agenda, health care reform.  If enacted, this would enable the federal government under Obama to take over 1/6th of the economy of the US.  How effective has his incessant babbling in this regard been?  Well, let’s see, Democrats are in the majority in the House of Representatives by 253 to 178; in the Senate by 59 to 41, the Democratic Vice President has the deciding vote in case of a tie, and of course, the Executive branch is of the same party.  These are quite extraordinary numbers, in fact near unprecedented in history.  It is also the case that the Democrats have been in the majority, both House and Senate not only during Obama’s Presidency, but also for the last term of the GWB Presidency.

This is truly significant power. Yet our Communicator-in-Chief has failed for one and a quarter years to get his J-I-C passed.

Is anyone listening to this person?

I would say no, both on the right and center-right, and surprisingly, the far left.  Do you think our Orator-in-Chief hears somewhat of an echo out there?

Yet this ineffectual hubrist cannot stop talking.  As a matter of fact, all he seems to be able to do is talk, and oh, I almost forgot, he has lots of meetings, too, (the only two things community organizers are able to do).  There seems to be nothing else to the persona of Barack Hussein Obama.

Somehow leadership and governing haven’t made it to this equation. Nor has listening to the American people. 

No nation’s citizenry has been louder or more vocal in telling its elected representatives what it wants them to do.  Witness the town hall meetings, the Tea Party gatherings, the electronic and attempted telephone contact with Congressional offices that shut entire systems down.  Witness also New Jersey, Virginia and most stunningly, Massachusetts.  Witness the poll numbers providing the truth on the near complete rejection of all of Obama’s and Emmanuel’s policies on every aspect of their agenda. Witness the numerous defections by members of Obama’s own party, and witness even some defections by (gasp) the formerly universally sycophantic mainstream media.

And yet, as he keeps on talking in large part so he doesn’t have to stop and listen, one can tell that he doesn’t even believe himself anymore.  As he plummets in popularity in every poll in this country, he has to turn more and more to speeches filled with lovely, patriotic words, meant to convince the American people that he is a real President who wants, and is determined to get, the best for his country.  He has become increasingly insincere in these pathetic utterances, delivered, as the great Mark Steyn once said, as if he were part of a “demonic tennis match.”

Mr. Obama and his people have obviously forgotten, or perhaps in their ideological and hubristic bubble, never knew, that Americans treasure their country.  They also treasure their Founders.  That we were founded by an individual such as George Washington, a true colossus of a man, along with titans Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, Governor Morris, Patrick Henry, Alexander Hamilton and Benjamin Franklin, makes what passes for leadership today almost incomprehensible. 

Shall we compare the aforementioned gentlemen to say, Harry (the war is lost) Reid, or perhaps Nancy (the CIA lied) Pelosi.  Then we could roll right along with Adolphus Towns, House committee chair recently revealed as lying about Toyota, or perhaps Charlie Rangel, the former head of the House Ways and Means committee, overseeing taxes in our country, found by his peers to have been cheating in various ways regarding said taxes.  We could continue with Eric Massa, the Congressman from New York accused of sexual harassment of several male staffers, or perhaps the soon to be departed Governor of New York, David Patterson, who was recently accused of witness tampering, and was generally found to be somewhat less than competent in his position. 

And we haven’t even started with the people Obama has brought into government to help him in his dismantling of the United States of America.

Perhaps Mr. Obama and his fellow nation wreckers might want to pause in their feverish activities to pay some attention to what George Washington and the aforementioned other Founders said and did about their nation, rather than to, oh, I don’t know, say, Saul Alinsky, William Ayers, the Mrs., the Reverend Wright, Rahm Emanuel, Van Jones, Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, Barney Frank, Chairman Mao, Hugo Chavez, Andy Stern and all your other real and ideological best friends. 

Unlike Barack Hussein Obama, General Washington never sought power on any terms other than those upon which he had initially accepted it, that is as “a servant of the people.”  Washington was “fighting not simply for independence, but for an independent republic.”  He fought “a people’s war,” and he knew that he would lose what he and the others were fighting for if he tried to take more power than the people would freely give.  As George Washington said: “One of the difficulties of republican government is that the people have always to feel an evil before they can see it.”

In the end, General Washington truly believed, “the people would to the right thing.”

Barack Hussein Obama, if you are able to, please pay attention.  We don’t want a new country. We really liked the old one.  Actually, the majority of us really loved the old one. 

What we don’t love, or even like, is you.  And we feel the same way about the progressive ‘elites’ whom you have installed in our Executive branch buildings to help you in destroying this nation that the American people cherish.

And this, Mr. President, is true no matter how many veracity-challenged, teleprompted speeches that you increasingly ineffectively give.