John McCain, Tamer of Horses
(posted by Daniel Koffler)
I suppose Iowahawk deserves credit for putting in the man-hours it must have taken to put this together, but it succeeds as humor just in case there’s merit to the idea that there’s something exceptional to the extent to which liberal elites look down on the noble savages of flyover country as if from empyrean heights, specifically that there’s something exceptional to the extent to which liberals treat Barack Obama as some sort of demi-divinity, and moreover that Obama himself shares that view to any exceptional degree. And not to put too fine a point on it, not only is the conceit of exceptionalism in any of these cases fairly idiotic, so is, in ascending order, the idea that these propositions hold at all. Besides which, this election’s pidgin-poetry is already covered, is a heck of a lot more compelling than Iowahawk’s adaptation of Homer, and helps give the lie to the ideas underwriting his attempt at satire. To put it briefly, it’s tough to find “The Idiossey” funny without buying into several distinct, and exceptionally stupid anti-Obama sneers. (Which helps to illustrate the failures of conservative — or let’s be accurate, Republican — political satire* in recent years: if you don’t give credence to a series of dumb insults, watching the “comedy” routine doesn’t just fail to provoke laughs, it induces a vicarious mortified reaction.)
Ironically, and maybe most importantly, there happens to be a political faction that risibly treats present circumstances as saliently similar to the semi-legendary wars of ancient Greece (though even there, they misread ancient Greek history), and it’s not Obama’s faction. And indeed, there is even a standard-bearer for one of the two major parties who does resemble Achilles in relevant respects — namely being a decorated soldier with a grossly inflated reputation for knowledge and strategic wisdom, who contrary to that reputation is an impetuous hothead who has yet to demonstrate the slightest capacity for making decisions through rational quantitative procedures, who pursues emotionally-satisfying short-term goals to the crippling detriment of long-term interests, and who is prepared to burn down the world in pursuit of his vendettas — and again, that ain’t Obama. (Perceptive readers of the Iliad will have noticed, incidentally, that while Achilles is the protagonist of the poem, Hector is the hero; to the extent that ancient poetry has any lessons for contemporary politics, it’s that we want our leaders to be Hectors rather than Odysseuses, and not Achilleses under any circumstances.)
Tertiarily, fatuous sneers crowd out the argumentative space that might have been given to cogent substantive criticism of Obama, for which there is ample grounds. It’s really time to dissolve the conservative movement and elect a new one. Coming full circle, now that that freakout over the “Greek Temple to Obama” turned out predictably to be even more desperate unclever hackery than the similar buzz over John Kerry having a bright orange tan four years ago, might it be time for Iowahawk to adapt the Aeneid with, say, Jeffrey Hart as blind Tiresias and Sarah Palin as Dido? Or just Tacitus’ Annals with George W. Bush as Caligula ({Harriet Miers ∪ Alberto Gonzales ∪ Monica Goodling} = Incitatus, no?) and Joe B-b-b-b-iden as Claudius?
*David Cross (from memory) impersonating G.W. Bush on Dennis Miller: “Bring forth the court jester…What? You say Saddam Hussein makes Cromwell look like Churchill? Hahahahaha! You are the king of references.” See? It’s funnier when it’s true.
Tags: conservatism, Election '08, obama, Republicans
August 31st, 2008 at 2:48 pm
I think the best Iowahawk is the first I read, the Lombardi cartoon sparks violence in Midwest one.
A better version of the Obama-messiah meme is the Obama Messiah blog. It has that detached aspect so prevalent among ironic hipster d-bags that Obama-haters (and even Adbusters) love to hate.
September 1st, 2008 at 6:37 pm
Iowahawk is a gifted political humorist, no doubt about it. Just wish he would come over from the Dark Side.