A Trimphus For The Conquering Hero

Here we are, back at the beginning.

Four years ago I wrote an article, Panem Et Circenses On The Potomac, chronicling the epic overindulgence of the raucous coronation of our Lord and Savior King Barack Obama. The 2008 Obama inauguration was such a spectacle of waste and excess that this comparison is not difficult to see. In the midst of the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression, our president (who repeatedly blasted Bush 43 for his budgetary extravagances) threw the most expensive swearing-in ceremony in U.S. history. The tone-deafness of this sad display still sticks with me.

The returning conqueror.

In 2013 Obama broke the records yet again. This time the total is supposed to be over 170 million dollars egregiously wasted worshipping a Chicago Machine autocrat. This time, however, the hearty, party-it-up tone of bread and circuses, the ‘08 Bacchanalian orgy of food, drink and masturbatory back-patting, was not the dominate theme. This inauguration had the distinct quality of a Roman Triumphus.

This was the return of a successful commander to his capital, the American Dream soundly defeated for another four years. Obama, the conquering hero, took his victory lap in a cool, conservative stride, reveling in his disturbingly easy victory over the half-man half-sleeping aid Mitt Romney. The president showcased his transition from a petty, backbiting “community organizer” out to fix the world to a seasoned commander, distinctly proud of his shilling for an ideology that stands counter to the founding principles of the United States. His bloody battle to massively expand the scope of federal powers and rob us of Constitutional rights has been a long one, and he wore his hard-won salt-and-pepper laurel wreath like a war medal.