Valerie  Jarrett, Obama’s  Rasputin, unwittingly provided us an answer to the question of why the Obama  Presidency is such a man-caused disaster. There  are few people who are close to the notoriously insular Barack Obama (a former  aide, Neera Tanden, said that “Obama doesn’t call anyone, and he’s not close to almost anyone.  It’s  stunning that he’s in politics, because he really doesn’t like people”) but  Valerie Jarrett is among the select few.   They have been friends for  decades; she introduced Barack to Michelle; she is a constant presence in the  White House, and highly unusual for a White House aide, enjoys her own Secret  Service protective detail.

And when she described Barack Obama as  having been “bored to death his whole life” she helped explained what lies  behind a failed presidency. People  familiar with Barack Obama’s history realize he has a very low threshold for  boredom.  This is a trait shared by many millennials: they bore easily, and that character flaw is one reason  employers refrain from hiring them.   Yet they feel entitled to  promotions as a way for others to display gratitude towards them and to give  them an ego booster shot.  They want to be stimulated and entertained  all the time and find work tedious  and…boring.  Obama’s  boredom began early. When  interviewed upon becoming the first black Harvard Law Review President he told  the Associated  Press, “I’m not interested in the suburbs.  The suburbs bore me”; by  inference, suburbanites bore him, as well — and we know how he feels about  small-town Americans).  Ah…to be jaded and judgmental so early in life  and to feel free to spout stereotypes.

Upon  graduating law school he went to work for a politically-connected Chicago law  firm.  But instead of grueling hours spent working on cases or contracts,  his colleagues remember  him as engaging in less boring and mundane pursuits — his feet up on his  desk, doodling on his memoir on company time.  His fellow associates  probably did not appreciate his attitude, but the name partners indulged him —  as one suspects he has been indulged throughout his  life.  His  boredom continued; he quickly grew bored with his state senate job (after all,  voting present and relying on the work  of others to make a name for oneself  can induce ennui).  This was  a mere steppingstone on the way to greater electoral victory. He  parlayed the state senate job into becoming a United States Senator.  How  long did it take for that role to bore him? Not long at all, according to  Game Change authors John Heilemann and Mark Halperin who wrote of his  attitude towards being a Senator just one year:

The  glacial pace, the endless procedural wrangling, the witless posturing and  petifoggery, the geriatric cast of characters doddering around the place: all of  it drove him nuts.  To one friend in Chicago, Obama  complained, “It  is basically the same as Springfield except the average age in Springfield is  forty-two and in Washington it’s sixty-two.  Other than that, it’s the same  bullshit”.  After  listening to Biden during a committee hearing, Obama passed a note to Gibbs that  read “Shoot me now”. Time  and again after debates on the floor, he would emerge through the chamber’s  double doors shaking his head, rolling his eyes, using both hands to give the  universal symbol for the flapping of gums, sighing wearily, “Yak, yak,  yak”.

He  was angling for a bigger role. There  was a pattern becoming visible: throughout his career, Barack Obama has found  work too mundane, too boring to bother spending time on.  He was always  looking for the excitement of the next campaign — to be the star surrounded by  adoring crowds and a press eager to sing his praises, a veritable choir.   The only time he seemed to be exerting energy was when he was in front of  roaring crowds (his political ascent into the stratosphere began at the 2004  Democratic National Convention, where he delivered a keynote speech that sent  the media swooning; he was in his element, boasting that “I’m Lebron, Baby.  I can play on this level.  I got some  game”.)

After  that display, it was off to the races and what followed was a narcissist’s dream  (the Denver faux columns, the faux  Presidential seal, the faux presidency). There  is a surfeit of examples of Obama’s refusal to take his job with any degree of  seriousness. He  has repeatedly refused  to meet with economic experts, skipped  more than half of his daily intelligence briefings, turned his Cabinet  (trumpeted by an obedient media in 2009 as a Lincolnesque “Team of Rivals”) into  a Team  of Idolizers that he almost completely ignores — both as individuals and as  a group; and , if one believes his protestations (a big “if”) was out of the  loop or, as Charles  Krauthammer wrote, oblivious to the NSA, IRS, and AP scandals (as well as  Benghazi, Fast and Furious, the vendetta against James Rosen at Fox News — the  list is endless).  Of course, the most recent revelation is most revealing:  even as he staked his reputation and legacy on his signature “achievement” (he  called it his most  important initiative) ObamaCare, he reportedly met  only once with the official he chose to head the program, Kathleen  Sebelius.

Talk about being outside the beltway!  Actually, that is  where he can often be found: on the golf courses, on vacations, in front of  adoring crowds, or shaking the money tree at glitzy fundraisers in Hollywood —  a natural environment for a faux president.   A President has to set  priorities after all. When  Americans were dying in Benghazi, he took the night off to rest for a trip to  Las Vegas for a fundraiser to help his re-election efforts; when Americans were  engaged in the mission to kill Bin Laden, he went to play  cards with his body man.  Those events were boring because they were  not about him.  So  when he has no clue about the real world (there were no “shovel-ready” jobs  despite what he said when he pushed for a stimulus bill; “buying insurance”  is  actually complex — one suspects he has never had to do it) or about  the size of the national  debt ( a topic of mirth not concern on the Letterman show ; or how  taxes work; or how  the economy works — well, math is boring ;  when Paul Ryan revealed  how little, if anything, Obama  knew about health care reform, entitlements, and the budget, Obama could not  even fake a semblance of comprehension (now we know why he does not like news  conferences and only appears on fluff shows where he knows he is in a Gotcha Question  Free Zone); when he declared that the “private sector is doing  fine“; when his advisers discuss the Syrian massacres in front of our Nobel  Peace prize-winning President while he blithely ignores them as he spins  through his BlackBerry (checking sports scores?) we should no longer be  surprised.  All those topics are so boring.

Americans  should not be surprised that his decision-making has been reduced to a multiple  choice sheet handed to him by his ring of advisers or that he is so slow in  making decisions (“leading  from behind” — is there any American President who has proclaimed such a  doctrine as a guiding principle?) ; or that he outsources decision-making to  Vladimir Putin and the mad mullahs of Iran.  Learning geopolitics –all  those funny sounding names, all those groups, all those national security  issues, maps, facts-boring.  He outsources the work behind his goal of  “fundamentally transforming America” to radicals he appoints and who now have an  easy path to confirmation in the wake of Harry Reid’s abolishing the venerable  filibuster. Contra  to the sycophants who declared him the “smartest  president” ever,  or a “sort of  god,”  he is not omniscient nor is he particularly  bright.  However, the flattery and obsequiousness has inflated an  already outsized ego.  Why would a god find mere mortals of interest? Obama  admitted as much when he declared at a high-powered fundraiser that:

“It  is very rare I come to an event where I’m like the fifth or sixth most  interesting person.

No  wonder he finds no time for experts and advisers but has plenty of time for  pickup basketball games with NBA pros, glittering Hollywood celebrities, private  concerts in the East Room of the White House.  Everyone and everything else  is so…boring.  And he has no tolerance…or is actually rude…to  people he finds boring .  When Republicans and others, even donors hoping  for a photo  op, try to meet with him he considers it an act of  lèse-majesté.  If  he were interested in becoming a better president he would be forced to actually  work, and he has a severe problem with the concept of work when it involves him and  (perhaps) welfare  recipients, as well He does not understand why businessmen and professionals  would find his declaration that they did not “build that”  offensive. But  to him work is boring.

He  may be good enough for government work.  No wonder he likes Big Government  — where else can someone with his attitude and work ethic rise so high? The  administration operates with the efficiency of the DMV, writ  large. After  five years of watching a President just going through the motions, Americans  have seemingly had their fill.  This is what excessive adulation can do to  any celebrity — especially when Americans realize they have been conned (to add  to his election victories, selfies, magazine covers, Grammy, Nobel medal can be  added his most recent “win”-the Lie  of the year for his “you can keep your doctor” lie), The young have abandoned the man they elected.  There are few things youth can tolerate and one of  them is “inauthenticity.”

And Obama has that in abundance.  He is,  after all, in the words of Jeremiah  Wright, Jr., just “a politician.” His  poll  numbers in five key categories are plummeting.   Young people, so  crucial to the success of ObamaCare, are ignoring his pitches to sign up and are  tuning him  out, as have America’s adversaries.  Even  Democratic politicians are wary of being connected to him as they face  challenging reelection prospects. He  will continue bringing onto his team  journalists (and their relatives)  and spinners  to peddle stories, travel through the country to attack Republicans and  straw men, and pose false choices before ever-diminishing groups (see the end of  Spinal Tap for a preview), have more pivots and fewer divots, but it  all amounts to “noise” akin to Peanut’s parents, repeating endlessly the same  hackneyed phrases streamed to him from teleprompters.

Tens  of millions of Americans have muted him — as Nancy  Pelosi so presciently did early in his presidency.  Faux political  leaders know one when they see one. When  Obama speaks they are “just  words”  and don’t matter once they have served their purpose in fooling  people — they can be buried in the “memory hole” as was his faux “red  line” regarding use of chemical weapons  or explained away as the fault  of Americans failure to understand “nuance” as apologists have been doing  regarding his “doc promise”.  All clichés, all the time. They  are “empty words” from an empty man.  Obama  is bored and so are we.