Has there ever been a victory lap like President Barack Obama’s? Day after day the affable, soon-to-be-former leader of the free world makes his rounds — sombre and a little sad, reassuringly calm. Progressives and classical liberals everywhere, not least in Canada, wipe away a single tear as we contemplate the end of this grand moment in American history, inaugurated with a Nobel virtually before the man set foot in the Oval Office.
Perhaps in the New Year, as citizens of Earth grapple with the rising tide of chaos and carnage, and cope with the immediate consequences of Obama’s failures, there will be time for a more sober assessment of his legacy. Don’t count on it, though. Attention will likely be focused on more pressing concerns.
Tuesday, German Chancellor Angela Merkel reacted to the mass murder in a Christmas market – 12 dead, 48 injured, at last count — after a man in a truck drove into a crowd of holiday shoppers in an apparent terrorist attack.
“I am, like millions of people in Germany, shocked, devastated and deeply saddened by what happened yesterday evening in Berlin,” Merkel told a news conference.
Shocked, devastated, deeply saddened; incomprehensible. It’s the now customary syntax in the aftermaths of these bloodbaths. But the words are no longer up to the job, if ever they were. Numbed, inured and resigned might serve better. For also Monday, the Russian ambassador to Turkey was shot dead in mid-speech at an art exhibit, by a young Turkish policeman — a member of the security detail — who then shouted “Don’t forget Aleppo! Don’t forget Syria!” and “Allahu Akbar!” over his corpse.
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