Looking at Obama Art, in light of Howe and Strauss American Prophesy Theory

OBAMA ART ; American Prophesy;

Inheriting the Fourth Turning: crossing partisan and ideological lines,  even while inheriting 
W's messes. . . 

I thought I would place some Obama Art here, while pondering the daunting tasks which lie ahead for him.

Using Howe and Strauss as a guide, recall that Obama was born during an Awakening, which makes him a Nomad. Therefore, he is up to the mess he has inherited, and will take an innovative stance toward solving it.

He said he was going to take a bi-partisan approach, and cross ideological lines. This is already evident in his choice of the Reverend Rick Warren to do the invocation at the inauguration. Obama was fated - by his generation and his position within the crisis - to cast off the old script of 90s liberalism. It is finished. Done.

We are in a period where that old script with its divisiveness no longer delivers the goods, in any case. That which we formerly turned to for guidance simply will not serve us here, or stand us in stead as a tool. To go against the historical saeculum and its turning is to be out of step with the authentic moment: a serious infraction in the existential sense. It is as silly as wearing summer clothes in the chill of late autumn. This is why the wild howls of protest coming from the LGBT camp about Warren is leaving Obama cold. Their message falls on deaf ears. He is nomadic and heroic. He does not have ears for the Boomer 90s cries of indigancy. You do not like his stance? He shrugs. Forward march, and it is forgotten, so far as he is concerned. . . His is the Nike generation : "Just DO it". 

Shepherd-Fairey's Barackified Art is NOMADIC in content and theme

Now W has OKed the Auto Industry bail out, which is going to leave Obama facing tough choices after the swearing in of our 44 th President. Again, he is primed for such.


The constellation of the Unravelling Third Turning has shifted, now, into the Crisis period. Multiculturalism gives way to unity; individual mellowness gives way to passion, swift action, a national stance. We have already seen the "Millennials Rising" phenomenum taking place with the register to vote and Change platforms which swept through college campuses during the primary and general election seasons.


Unlike the downbeat and alienated mood of the Generation Xers on college campuses during the late 80s and throughout the 90s, the Millennial generation's support of Obama has been a shift toward the upbeat, engaged style of the heroic youth. Thus it is that the Obama Art cannot be seen as mere propagandizing silliness. Rather , it is a reflection of a deeply-rooted change which wells up naturally from within the human psyche as it shifts into the pattern of generational constellation aging , of which Obama himself is only symptom, sign, cipher.

Of course this itself is no guarentee of a good or heroic outcome. It could be said that the Hitler Youth were similarly inspired. Many factors play into the scenario as it unfolds; chance playing as big a part as Change itself. We know we are on the cusp of change: We do not know if this change will be violent and disruptive, and leave us worse off than we were before. That is the thing about history: it is human, chaotic, wild and whirling as the storms of nature. But it is inevitable, even as they are.

Third Turning solutions are folly in a Fourth Turning