DAVID GELERNTER: What Keeps This Failed President Above Water? “Obama perfectly fits the personal profile of the Culture Machine that runs so much of the American elite nowadays. . . . If conservatives were serious, they would think much harder about the Culture Machine (aka the Establishment) and the ways in which Obama is typical instead of exceptional—typical of a new type of Establishment leader, the new Machine Man. We’re used to old-fashioned political (usually Democratic) machines. But those political machines compare to the modern Culture Machine like a stick of dynamite to an H-bomb. While conservatives worry about debt and taxes and huge problems abroad, the left is busy pulling the whole country out from under them. While conservatives fiddle around on the roof, robbers are rifling the house and stealing the children. Conservatives might consider climbing down and having a look. Obama is only the first of a new breed.”

The Machine, however, is quickly running out of the other-people’s-money that sustains it, both inside and outside of government. Conservatives, and libertarians, would be well advised to do what they can to speed the process.