[May 14, 2025] The famous political commentator Thomas Sowell just released his “expose” on what he calls The Obama Cult of 2008. For those familiar with Thomas Sowell and who follow his commentary, you know that he is a regular critic of past-President Barack Obama.
He claims that too many Americans treat politics as an emotional therapy session and, consequently, reject logic, analysis, and good decision-making. The point of elections is to determine who welds power, how responsibly they will weld it, and what policies are put in place. The results are serious, carrying real consequences.
“Barack Obama didn’t just run for President; he was embraced as a kind of secular savior, not because of what he had done, but because of what people wanted to believe about him.” — Thomas Sowell
We’ve heard the reasons before. Obama was clean-cut, articulate, and composed, and he fit the narrative Americans desperately wanted to tell about us. We had transcended our racist past and were now enlightened. This thinking meant we could finally rid ourselves of historical guilt with a vote for Obama.
“This emotional wave swept across the nation … because of how he [Obama] made them feel. He didn’t present an agenda; he presented an aura, and millions projected their fantasies onto it.”
Selecting someone to represent you in politics is supposed to be about getting the right results, competence, consequences, and trade-offs. But Obama’s lack of a record should have been a warning.
Americans were not concerned at all. They were euphoric because they were voting with their emotions instead of their minds.
“There is nothing more dangerous than emotional politics.”
Sowell believes this was a triumph of symbolism over substance. This emotionalism played an outside role White liberals, young voters, black Americans, turned deafout in record numbers so they could be part of a moment. They were casting themselves in a “social justice fairy tale.”
These folks wanted to be on “the right side of history.”
“They saw Obama …for what he represented. He was calm, polished, and, most importantly, he was black. And for many liberal voters of all races, that was enough to feel morally superior. They weren’t looking for a sound policy. They were looking for personal absolution.”
The accomplishments of Obama are thin and minor. Ask any of his voters what were his greatest accomplishments and they struggle to answer. When they do answer, it’s often in platitudes and vague phrases. These are “feelings masquerading as political analysis.”
It was “blind faith” that elected Obama. Emotionalism in politics is dangerous because it makes people deaf to facts, immune to logic, and utterly incapable of seeing the long-term consequences of their choices.
“This wasn’t just a temporary lapse in judgment. It ushered in an era of politics dominated by feeling over thinking and by narrative over evidence. It laid the groundwork for the DEI bureaucracy. For the social justice crusades. For the weaponization of identity as a political tool.”
We were repeatedly told that electing Obama would be the beginning of a new kind of racial orthodoxy where everything is seen through the lens of race, identity, and inequality.
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Please read my books:
“Blind faith” elected President Obama and we are all still paying a heavy price for that terrible choice.
Gen. Satterfield, once again hits the proverbial nail on the head with this leadership post. Thank you, sir for highlighting Thomas Sowell who emphatically points his intellectual finger at Barack Obama for laying the foundation of the highly destructive ideology of Wokeism and it’s associated DEI initiatives and subsequent damage to America’s educational culture. Listen closely to Thomas Sowell and you will gain enormous knowledge and respect for him and you will also be convinced that Barack Obama was a lazy, self-egrandizing president who was the most destructive president in American history.
Thomas Sowell, an American icon.
An interesting article from 2008 regarding the cult of Obama.
Obama as Cult
By Robert Lalasz February 22, 2008
Barack Obama explicitly compares his rallies to revivals — telling a South Carolina audience, for instance, “At some point in the evening, a light is going to shine down and you will have an epiphany and you’ll say, ‘I have to vote for Barack!’”
https://www.chronicle.com/article/obama-as-cult/?bc_nonce=5gprzdbndktwelp12opv5&cid=reg_wall_signup
… from this article ….
“Kathleen Geier, blogger: The language used here is the language of evangelical Christianity — the Obama volunteers speak of “coming to Obama” in the same way born-again Christians talk about “coming to Jesus.”
But he’s not Jesus! He’s not going to magically enable us to transcend the bitter partisanship that is tearing this country apart.…
So I say we should all get a grip, stop all this unseemly mooning over, see him and the political landscape he is a part of in a cooler, clearer, and more realistic light, and get to work.
Good posting.
Thomas Sowell is not a great man because he is smart and educated, he is great because he is wise. The difference is staggering. I’ve met all kinds of highly educated people just out of college and they are often some of the dumbest people I know, or probably will ever know. Thomas Sowell is different. When he speaks, I listen.
This wonderful man likes to tell truth about the evil of our Democrat Party and its insidious corruption and how Barack Obama became the symbol for that party’s demise. Obama is now a multimillionaire from his gritting off his time as President. And his wife Michelle (aka Mike) is an anti-white racist to her core. How he puts up with her is a mystery. Thanks Gen. S for this article.
TRUTH
Right! The corruption of the Demorat Party is staggering. How did they get all the money for advertising and culling the favor of the legacy media? Money stolen from the taxpayers of our nation. Time to stop it. Thanks to Trump, their theft is finally coming to an end.
absolutely true
Thomas Sowell, a great man of vast integrity and brilliance.