It must have seemed like a good idea at the time: President Obama would hold the NATO summit in Chicago as a consolation prize for his humiliating loss of the Olympics after flying to Copenhagen with Michelle to lobby the IOC. Back then, the possibility of hostile demonstrations seemed remote. Even if the Obama magic didn't work in Denmark, back then the One could rely on his invincibility within the mainstream media bubble at home.
How times change! When one tries be everything to everyone, four years is long time to keep the illusion buoyant. Kim Janssen of the Chicago Sun-Times reports:
They're here, and more are coming - lots more.
The first major busload of out-of-town anti-NATO protesters arrived in Chicago Wednesday evening.
Sixteen hours after they pulled off from a dark New York street corner at 4 a.m., more than 40 tired but excited Occupy Wall Street activists stepped down onto a leafy Lincoln Park block at 7 p.m. wearing Robin Hood masks.
"It's been fun to ride with you and I'm proud to march with you all," Shen Tong, one of the "bus captains" told the occupiers moments before they hit Chicago's streets.
"Let's rock and roll!"
Barack is no longer the rockin' place to be. Even for the biggest celebrity in the world, celebrity can be fleeting. What sort of rockn' time do you suppose they have in mind for the Windy City? Anyone old enough to remember 1968 knows that "Chicago" connotes what was later termed a "police riot" at the Chicago convention of the Democratic Party, a televised debacle that fatally tainted the Democratic Party's presidential candidate, Hubert Humphrey, and led to the "trial of the century" of the moment, the Chicago Seven.
Someone else, or to be more accurate, something else, may also be heading for Chicago: surveillance drones. The following short video was shot at a soccer field in Arlington Heights, a Chicago suburb:
The Arlington Cardinal, a local website, diligently considers the possibility that the recording could be an illusion. There may be a small theoretical possibility this is a fake, but to me it is a question of whether I choose to believe my lyin' eyes or the critics. If I had to bet, I'd say it was a drone.
In any event, it looks like the possibility of violence in Chicago at the NATO summit cannot be dismissed. The Democratic establishment and media gave a collective sloppy wet kiss to the Occupy movement, which unleashed the demons of hatred and acting out on the part of the young victims of the Obama economy.
I hope there won't be a hot time in the old town over the weekend. But if there is, the media can be counted upon to not connect any karmic dots. The Copenhagen fiasco that led to the NATO consolation prize went right into the memory hole, even though it was an early indication of the way the Obama administration was going.
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