Obama Schadenfreude
There is a word that I read on a semi-regular basis in articles. The only person I have ever heard use it in conversation is my dad who speaks German. It is the German word schadenfreude. The definition from dictionary.com is:
Pleasure derived from the misfortunes of others.German : Schaden, damage and Freude: joy. Damaged joy...I am not sure what it is about some German words...they just seem to pack a lot of awful intensity. Verbal Blitzkrieg. Heck, when I hear German spoken, it sounds like language emanating from the gut and spoken through a blender. It doesn't do much for the elegance and beauty of a language to have its most well-known speaker in history be Hitler.
Another German word, much less negative, is Zeitgeist which roughly means the "spirit of the age." Drop a "Zeitgeist" here and there in conversation and people will think you are an intellectual or a pompous blowhard...so do so cautiously.
I have had schadenfreude associated in my head recently with Obama's win. There seems to a "Zeitgeist Schadenfreude" going on with conservatives these days. Another word for it is "sore losers." I think some conservatives would like to see Obama suck as a president even if it hurts a lot of people. That's wrong. However, truth be told, the liberals seemed to have taken sick glee in the Bush presidency's failures and now the tables have been turned. Maybe the conservatives feel that it is time to dish back that steaming pile of malicious manure to their foes.
This win may wind up being the equivalent of "winning" a free lobotomy. This nation is unraveling and I think Obama may long for the days of Community Organizing in the south side of Chicago (when the surgical buzzsaw of this world's affairs starts to come a grindin' down on his skull). Bush's dunder-headedness and moseying good old boy mentality seemed to have both created and protected him from feeling some of the existential crushing blows to his cranium from the pressures of the job. No such luck for Obama...being a thoughtful and reflective man, he knows better. Bush ain't stupid but he ain't too smart either.
No matter how things go, Obama's win for the presidency is well-deserved. He ran a disciplined, focused, and intelligent campaign, both for his party's nomination and in the general election. Anyone who can slay the Clinton political "Grendel's Mother" Machine (like Beowulf) commands my respect....Barack Beowulf Obama...sounds better than Hussein in the middle...not as swarthy.
Particularly impressive in a general sense was the Obama campaign's usage of new technologies to advance his message. McCain the modernist who purportedly is a novice at rudimentary tech skills like email was the equivalent of Polish soldiers on horseback in World War 2 attacking German Panzer tanks. (Although, I think McCain's modernist mentality helped him understand the need for more boots on the ground in Iraq). Obama used 21st technologies to beat a 20th century man who is now too old and out of it to get the Zeitgeist. Palin was also a poor choice. The flannel shirt crowd loved her but that is hardly the electorate. Her interview with Katie Couric had her looking like a 9th grader in Civics class trying to BS her way through a test. A moose in the headlights? Painful, pathetic. And that winking thing really got to be toady-like.
It is our duty as Christians to pray for Obama...to want what is well for him and his family, that God would grant him wisdom in perilous times for the good of our country...even if that means that the Democrats trounce the Republicans in the elections to come. If Obama fails, we all fail. (Click the Obama Schadenfreude title for a link to an article that writes about Obama governing from the center)
Pleasure derived from the misfortunes of others.German : Schaden, damage and Freude: joy. Damaged joy...I am not sure what it is about some German words...they just seem to pack a lot of awful intensity. Verbal Blitzkrieg. Heck, when I hear German spoken, it sounds like language emanating from the gut and spoken through a blender. It doesn't do much for the elegance and beauty of a language to have its most well-known speaker in history be Hitler.
Another German word, much less negative, is Zeitgeist which roughly means the "spirit of the age." Drop a "Zeitgeist" here and there in conversation and people will think you are an intellectual or a pompous blowhard...so do so cautiously.
I have had schadenfreude associated in my head recently with Obama's win. There seems to a "Zeitgeist Schadenfreude" going on with conservatives these days. Another word for it is "sore losers." I think some conservatives would like to see Obama suck as a president even if it hurts a lot of people. That's wrong. However, truth be told, the liberals seemed to have taken sick glee in the Bush presidency's failures and now the tables have been turned. Maybe the conservatives feel that it is time to dish back that steaming pile of malicious manure to their foes.
This win may wind up being the equivalent of "winning" a free lobotomy. This nation is unraveling and I think Obama may long for the days of Community Organizing in the south side of Chicago (when the surgical buzzsaw of this world's affairs starts to come a grindin' down on his skull). Bush's dunder-headedness and moseying good old boy mentality seemed to have both created and protected him from feeling some of the existential crushing blows to his cranium from the pressures of the job. No such luck for Obama...being a thoughtful and reflective man, he knows better. Bush ain't stupid but he ain't too smart either.
No matter how things go, Obama's win for the presidency is well-deserved. He ran a disciplined, focused, and intelligent campaign, both for his party's nomination and in the general election. Anyone who can slay the Clinton political "Grendel's Mother" Machine (like Beowulf) commands my respect....Barack Beowulf Obama...sounds better than Hussein in the middle...not as swarthy.
Particularly impressive in a general sense was the Obama campaign's usage of new technologies to advance his message. McCain the modernist who purportedly is a novice at rudimentary tech skills like email was the equivalent of Polish soldiers on horseback in World War 2 attacking German Panzer tanks. (Although, I think McCain's modernist mentality helped him understand the need for more boots on the ground in Iraq). Obama used 21st technologies to beat a 20th century man who is now too old and out of it to get the Zeitgeist. Palin was also a poor choice. The flannel shirt crowd loved her but that is hardly the electorate. Her interview with Katie Couric had her looking like a 9th grader in Civics class trying to BS her way through a test. A moose in the headlights? Painful, pathetic. And that winking thing really got to be toady-like.
It is our duty as Christians to pray for Obama...to want what is well for him and his family, that God would grant him wisdom in perilous times for the good of our country...even if that means that the Democrats trounce the Republicans in the elections to come. If Obama fails, we all fail. (Click the Obama Schadenfreude title for a link to an article that writes about Obama governing from the center)
Comments