Pining for the imaginary man

To those who've known him longest, his confidence in the decision not to wade back into the political muck is the product of the same hyper-self-aware posture he's had since childhood, growing up straddling worlds and then writing a book about himself in his 30s.

Hyper-self-absorbed would more accurate. Anyone who thinks they're so awesome in their 30s that they need a book about themselves must have a god-sized ego. If he were Pitt the Younger or Alexander the Great maybe, but a law professor in a regular law professor career, nah.

According to Eric Holder, Obama's really encouraged:

But I think it's really been true - we've had conversations about this - he's been encouraged by the amount of progressive energy he's seen around the country."

This is code language for the usual suspects, organising the usual outrage fests with the usual fawning media coverage, so pretty much nada. If that's your encouragement when the current administration is eviscerating your legacy, you are truly desperate. Apparently, some democrat operatives want him to get arrested as this will really help things:

On the immigration stuff, if he were willing to go way over the line and get arrested, or something way out there, that would be a galvanizing event," says one frustrated leading Democratic operative in the midst of the 2018 campaigns.

Yep, that'd help. Please do.

He's been careful not to appear to be playing at international diplomacy, but people close to him believe his presence is often intended as a reassurance that the world isn't about to end.

Without doubt, this is the funniest line in the entire article. According to the author, world leaders (who Obama visits now and again) need assurance from The Great One that the world isn't about to end..... for some unspecified reason. Perhaps I'm unimaginative but I just can't imagine president Xi Jinping wringing his hands, waiting for his special visit this week. What is far more likely is that most governmental leaders are just actually being polite to him and by extension to the American people.

Party organizers have begun complaining that his focus on his foundation is sapping the coffers they're desperately trying to tap..... Nobody expects him to be out there bashing Trump or being on the campaign trail every day. But to be sucking up resources now is just tone-deaf, and self-serving."

It appears that Silicon Valley is giving more money to Obama's library than to democrat candidates and that's really unfortunate according to the author. Either the general public isn't interested in giving too much of their own money or the new laws restricting compulsory union membership in the public sector is severely constricting the massive tidal wave of union money regularly doled out to democrats.

None of the above is any surprise to anyone who regularly watches politics and doesn't let the monolithic media filter distort their vision. For Obama, it is all about Obama. It was all about his greatness as a candidate, it was all about his greatness as a president and now it's all about his greatness as an organiser (again).