Barack Obama and the video store.

Sometimes, serendipity seems almost wise in what it presents to us.

Today, I came upon a most serendipitous sight. I was browsing in a video store, when I saw a video entitled "Barack Obama" in bold letters, with the subtitle: "The man and his journey". He seemed rather happy with himself, on the front cover, as you might expect. I was amused, however, at the video next to Barack Obama. It was entitled, "The Mesmerist". So, if you read left to right across the video shelves, it went: "Barack Obama, The Mesmerist". How funny and how telling, for what is he not, but a mesmerist who has captivated the mind of America and the world beyond?

There is something hypnotic about his presence on the stage, something that makes you think that what is being said is significant in the way Great Men say things of significance - and yet, when you look at the words, alone, when he is no longer there to say them, they seem pallid things of little strength and meaning. What we are witnessing, of course, is Barack Obama's charisma, at work, which invests his every word and every deed, with a seeming significance way beyond its actual import. More than any other President, he seems instinctively to understand the essence of stage presence and how to use it to his advantage.

Barack Obama has perfected the role of the President, as the President is envisaged by Hollywood. He comes across as a mature, solid, stable, reassuring patriarchal figure, the Father to a Nation, a man on whom all can depend. The only problem is, that it is difficult to discern how much of this impression reflects the true nature of the man, and how much is no more true of him, than an actor's characters are true of the actor themselves. It may be that the image Barack Obama projects is as distant from his true self, as that of Anthony Hopkins and Hannibal Lecter - or it may be that he is close to the role he portrays and that much of what we see is truly Barack Obama himself. At this point in time, it is not possible to know which case it might be: we will just have to watch and learn more of him, over time. However, it is true to observe that he has mesmerized his nation. Whether this mesmerism is an act, or comes unbidden from his natural character, the fact remains that he has an essentially hypnotic hold over his nation. In such a state, a nation cannot be expected to clearly assess his actions, words and deeds and judge the true quality of the President they have elected. It will take until the spell has broken, somewhat, and the nation is no longer fully enamoured of him, before they start to see him clearly, as he truly is, rather than as he projects himself to be.

(If you would like to learn more of Ainan Celeste Cawley, a scientific child prodigy, aged eight years and seven months, or his gifted brothers, Fintan, five years exactly, and Tiarnan, twenty-eight months, please go to: http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2006/10/scientific-child-prodigy-guide.html I also write of gifted education, IQ, intelligence, the Irish, the Malays, Singapore, College, University, Chemistry, Science, genetics, left-handedness, precocity, child prodigy, child genius, baby genius, adult genius, savant, wunderkind, wonderkind, genio, гений ребенок prodigy, genie, μεγαλοφυία θαύμα παιδιών, bambino, kind.

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