Obamessiah is President of His Own Fan Club

Jonah Goldberg takes a look today at the Obamessiah's massive ego:

In his pre-campaign book, "The Audacity of Hope," Barack Obama proclaims, "I find comfort in the fact that the longer I'm in politics the less nourishing popularity becomes, that a striving for rank and fame seems to betray a poverty of ambition, and that I am answerable mainly to the steady gaze of my own conscience."

Some might think this odd testimony from a young and inexperienced freshman senator on the cusp of seeking the highest rank, and the most famous position, in the world. It's a bit like a parish priest saying he's happy with his modest lot in life and then declaring he's throwing his hat in the ring to become pope.

But a closer reading reveals a possible explanation. Perhaps he's an adulation junkie. Maybe the diminishing "nourishment" Sen. Obama receives from "popularity" is actually causing him to ratchet up his pursuit of more and more praise just to get the minimal fix he needs.

That would account for why a man who thinks striving for popularity is a character flaw has nonetheless decided to give his nomination acceptance speech in a 76,000-seat football stadium.

Or it might tell us why a candidate who hasn't even been nominated yet wants to re-enact some of the most famous scenes from both Reagan and JFK's highlight reels by holding a rally at Germany's Brandenburg Gate, even though he's not a head of state yet. (German authorities, aware of Obama's rock-star status with the German public, diplomatically suggested that it was up to Obama to decide what is in "good taste.")

Perhaps Dominic Lawson, writing in the British newspaper The Independent had it right when he recently wrote that Obama is "a man of stunning articulacy, but also stunning self-regard."

Last July, Obama explained to reporters that he would eventually overtake Hillary Rodham Clinton in the polls because "to know me is to love me." Some months later, according to The Associated Press' Ron Fournier, he proclaimed, "Every place is Barack Obama country once Barack Obama's been there."

Of course, Obama and his surrogates would say he's just being lighthearted, he doesn't really take himself all that seriously.

One problem with that interpretation is that there's little evidence that he's interested in dispelling or rebutting the cult of personality he's developed. Obama himself talks of reversing the ocean's tides.

The overarching theme to his entire campaign - "We are the ones we've been waiting for," and all that - is that voting for Obama is proof of the cosmic superiority of ... Obama voters.

In a speech in Madison, Wis., Obama told his supporters that rallying to his cause was today's equivalent of the "greatest generation" rallying to defeat Hitler and Tojo. Oprah merely calls him, "The One," saying he will help us "evolve to a higher plane."

Someone get that man one of those "I'm Kind of a Big Deal" T-shirts.

When I first heard that line "we are the one's we've been waiting for" I couldn't help but think of one of those cults that stands on a hill somewhere waiting for the spaceship that will carry their enlightened beings away to a their outer space home. It just sounds too weird to be true. But it is true, and we've seen many examples of Obama and his wife's incredible self-love and worship.

I just have to believe that this is going to wear thin on voters long before the November election gets here. We've already seen Obama lose 12 points to McCain in one month in the Newsweek poll (they're now statistically tied), and as more examples of his pomposity pop up voters will start saying things like "I can't believe I supported this rookie nutcase".

Obama's nose-in-the-air arrogance will no play well with much of America.