The Great Change

[smokingboot]

Had a morning show, got home via bizarro transport changes...and am now settling in to watch history made. Even if it transpires that he is an ordinary man with great flaws and few gifts, Barack Obama's inauguration marks a moment I never want to forget, just as, when a little girl, I watched with awe the first steps of a man on the moon.

Comments

[smokingboot.livejournal.com]

I agree that a foundation in the real rather than the hype is what will keep him strong.

As to ordinariness, well I don't know, I feel we Brits are too keen on 'ordinariness.' We don't really like the extraordinary if it is capable. We fear it in our powerful, because we seem to think 'ordinary' means unassuming and modest, someone who knows they are no better than we are.

We would rather have that assurance combined with incompetence than a brilliant being who does it right without caving in to our constant need for reassurance that we're all worth as much as one another.

Cometh the hour, cometh the man. Churchill was considered an unreliable egotist (not a bad judgement of his character) until the moment when ordinary rational diplomacy failed. One thing he never kidded himself about; he was a real man with a real man's failings; but for sure he knew he wasn't ordinary.

[hybridartifacts.livejournal.com]

I think you are so right about us Brits preferring assurance and ordinariness. Which is why we end up with a bunch of idiots.

The flip side is that is we also produce some extraordinary people, incredible talent, and can really innovate... but because we have safe, dull, unremarkable people at the top, all of that gets squandered by the nation. We export our talent by necessity alas.

[smokingboot.livejournal.com]

Absolutely hit the nail on the head!