I demurred, wanting to hear what Mr. W. would say, since I ask myself this same question all the time, with a different answer depending on whether I am calm and rational or ticked off at him at the time.
His answer was that as we can't look into a man's soul, it's impossible to know. "Whether God will forgive for what he's doing is not a question anyone can answer," he said. "You need to ask a different question."
This was deeply annoying to EW, who kept pressing: "But Da-aaaad, I know that, but just tell me if you think he is deliberately trying to bring the country down."
"Culpable ignorance is the same thing as wickedness," came the response. "Actions, not intentions, are how we judge public men."
EW was in no way satisfied with that answer, but the whole conversation reminded me that what I think Mr. Obama really is is the epitome of an American education. He is the precisely desired end product, with its qualities and deficiencies.
David Gelernter expounds on that idea here (scroll down):
He is a perfect walking, talking embodiment of today’s establishment just as surely as Robert McNamara was 40 years ago. Obama is a warning in plain language, and we are lucky he has come in time.
He speaks well, looks good, and is smart; he is even black and from Harvard — a royal flush! He hopes to be a citizen of the world, not a patriot. He is a connoisseur of all fine religions. He is Internet Man who puts his faith in global chatter, not in fighting for the things he loves. He believes in a world peopled by endless copies of himself.
He is the perfect thing for jarring us awake. We ignore our schools and colleges even as they graduate new classes of Obamoids year after year. Each year there is less Americanism and more globalism among our leading citizens, less knowledge and more sophistication. Among children, less interest in Thanksgiving and a small band of fierce Christians hanging onto a new world by their fingertips, more interest in Black Friday, the perfect post-Christian feast. Take Obama as the gift he is; look to your schools!
(Yes, speaking of being a connoisseur of all fine religions, did you get a load of his Thanksgiving Day proclamation?) When you value nothing, are "above it all," even your most innocuous acts become corrupting and irritating.
