Obama as a Pharisee

There is a lot wrong with Max Blumental ’s sermon on Obama as a Failed Messiah..

During a time of economic decline, persistent cultural strife, deepening American involvement in far-off military conflicts, and rapid environmental deterioration, is there any wonder that some have turned to apocalyptic salvation narratives promising both a transcendent, everlasting future and violent retribution against perceived evildoers?

First Max  seems to confuse Jesus of History and the messiahs promised by many religions.
The historic Jesus was a failure in his own time. Aside from the Pauline use of Jesus to create a new message and a new promise, for his contemporaries the outcome of this messiah was the crucifixion, continued Roman repression. and the destruction of Jerusalem as a Jewish city.

Perhaps this is the radical Christian AND the radical liberal common hope for Obama.

Second, there appears to be a myth that Obamism of 08 was a messianic campaign. 

When the Democratic primary began, some progressives seemed to ache for a secular messiah to descend from the political heavens, reverse Bush’s disastrous legacy and save the country from itself. In their quest for a savior, progressives discovered Barack Obama. “I serve as a blank screen on which people of vastly different political stripes project their own views,” Obama proclaimed in his book, The Audacity of Hope. As Obama’s primary battle against Hillary Clinton intensified, his rhetoric and the language of his supporters grew increasingly messianic. 

 The only messianism I heard was in the derision of the Fauxies ... something eerily like the Gospels story of Romans mocking Jesus as "the King of the Jews." The Hannity/Beck/Billo trinity still seem to see this as a useful barb.

There is a real issue of Jewish history here too. While the Gospels blame the Pharisees for the fate of their messiah, Max may appears not aware that the Pharisees, the party of passive resistance that gave rise to Jesus, were VERY practical people.  Unlike the later zealots and messianics, the Pharisees taught being true to one own morals while living with the reality od a Roman world.  ... this is exaclty how most of us saw Obam in 08.