Jay Nordlinger writes:
You know the Cult of Obama? . . . I’d like to tell you about something in my neighborhood. There is a display at the big Barnes & Noble, at 66th and Broadway (Manhattan). Only it is not so much a display as a shrine. In any case, it is a window—the main window—and it is devoted to Obama. The window is religious in character, or at least worshipful.
It includes cardboard cutouts of Obama, and front pages hailing his election, and a video monitor. The monitor plays a loop of the Great Man in action, meeting the people, looking benevolent and leader-like. As we were walking past last night, a friend of mine took an iPhone picture: here. The picture does not do this display/shrine justice. You have to see it, to believe it and gag at it.
Frankly, Obama voters and fans ought to be embarrassed. This window is well-nigh North Korean.
As you may know, the Upper West Side—the neighborhood in question—is sort of home base for American left-liberalism. And you can learn a lot about this outlook and lifestyle from living here. My neighbors are clearly not cynical about politics and life. They are not part of the “adversarial culture.” They are certainly part of the secular-humanist culture—maybe its full flower. And they badly want something to believe in.
I believe they’ve found it.
You know that bromide attributed to Chesterton, about believing in nothing, and believing in anything? We may tire of hearing it; but it has a point—a big, big point.