Today is a very special day: It’s President Obama’s birthday. He turned 48 — only 16 more “czars” to appoint before his age equals total “czars.”
Here’s the One Thing: It’s been an amazing life for the 44th president. I, like the rest of America, am inspired by his story, so I’d like to share it with you.
• What birthday present would you like to get from President Obama? Click here to sound off
The story of Barack Obama starts with his parents, Ann Dunham and Barack Obama, Sr. It began like any other classic American love story, when these two lovebirds met while taking a Russian language class in 1960 at the height of the Cold War. By 1961 they were married and later that year Barack Obama, Jr. was born.
President Obama so movingly told the story during a speech commemorating the anniversary of the civil rights march in Selma:
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, MARCH 4, 2007)
BARACK OBAMA: “But something stirred across the country because of what happened in Selma, Alabama… because some folks were willing to march across a bridge… so they got together and Barack Obama, Jr., was born….”
(END VIDEO CLIP)
Wait, didn’t that march happen in 1965? Obama was born in 1961. I’m going to cut him some slack — it’s his birthday.
When little Barack, Jr., was 3-years-old (still one year shy of the actual Selma march) his parents divorced. Dad moved to Kenya and mom married an Indonesian man. From ages six to 10, Barack Obama, Jr., attended school in Jakarta.
At age 10, now living with his grandparents and back in Hawaii, young Barack yearned for a father figure. He eventually gravitated towards a family friend named Frank — also known as Frank Marshall Davis, would become his childhood mentor.
Frank just happened to be a communist. The good news is, mom already spoke Russian. No one knows for sure what mentor and pupil talked about, probably baseball or something else teenage boys enjoy. But definitely not communist propaganda.
Now 19, armed with a new worldview and an eagerness to learn, Obama attended Columbia University. His mentor, Frank, would have been proud of how he made use of his time there:
(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP, ‘DREAMS OF MY FATHER’)
BARACK OBAMA: Political discussions, the kind at Occidental had once seemed so intense and purposeful, came to take on the flavor of the socialist conference I sometimes attended at Cooper Union.
(END AUDIO CLIP)
And when he wasn’t attending socialist conferences, Obama stayed on campus and chose his friends carefully:
(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP, ‘DREAMS OF MY FATHER’)
BARACK OBAMA: To avoid being mistaken for a sellout, I chose my friends carefully. The more politically active black students. The foreign students. The Chicanos. The Marxist professors and structural feminists and punk-rock performance poets.
(END AUDIO CLIP)
Once his “Marxist professor” friends completed his education, it was on to the real world. In his mid-20s, Obama moved to Chicago and became a community organizer.
While he was organizing things there, many friends and friendships budded. He met like-minded people like William Ayers. Ayers was a member of the Weather Underground and participated in the bombing of the Pentagon in 1972 and other bombings of government buildings.
Oh, Glenn! Stop your hatemongering! Ever hear of forgiveness? We make mistakes, own up to them and move on.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, FEBRUARY 23, 2009)
WILLIAM AYERS, FORMER WEATHER UNDERGROUND LEADER: I don’t regret anything I did to oppose the war. Anything I did to oppose the war. Don’t regret.
ALAN COLMES, HOST OF ‘THE ALAN COLMES SHOW’: You wouldn’t regret setting bomb at a police station or setting a bomb at the Pentagon or the capital?
AYERS: You know I don’t look back on those things and regret them…
(END VIDEO CLIP)
Nice, kind people kept popping up in Obama’s adult life, like slumlord Tony Rezko, who helped him buy a nice house. Obama shared many dinners with former University of Chicago professor and terrorist sympathizer Rashid Khalidi. Obama thanked Khalidi for opening his eyes to the problems of the Palestinians and praised him in a sendoff speech as Khalidi headed for Columbia University.
About the same time, Obama also sought a relationship with God and he eventually settled down in a quaint Chicago Church, where his worldview continued to sprout:
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REV. JEREMIAH WRIGHT: The government gives them the drugs, builds bigger prisons, passes a three-strike law and then wants us to sing ‘God Bless America.’ No, no, no, God damn America, that’s in the Bible for killing innocent people.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
Life was turning out grand for Obama: A communist family mentor, super radical friends, a wonderful church. It couldn’t get any better, could it? But it did, when he met his soul mate, Michelle:
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, FEBRUARY 18, 2008)
MICHELLE OBAMA: For the first time in my adult lifetime, I’m proud of my country because it feels like hope is finally making a comeback.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
Spiritually, physically and ideologically the two were a perfect match. They married and the faithful Michelle would stand by her man on his political journey from the Illinois Senate in 1996 all the way to the Oval Office.
Despite the meteoric success, Obama hasn’t forgotten his roots. He’s still honoring his communist childhood mentor with each policy he drafts and he’s still networking and organizing and meeting and new friends. Friends like:
• Green “czar” Van Jones, the self avowed communist
• Science “czar” John Holdren, who is pro putting sterilants in the drinking water, forced abortions and government confiscation of babies
• Regulatory “czar” Cass Sunstein, a champion for getting animals legal rights
• Energy “czar” Carol Browner
I could go on forever about your crazy, wacky friends, Mr. President, but that would take time away from you on your birthday.
I want to wish you a happy birthday, but that wouldn’t be sufficient. So, Mr. President, we — the collective — wish you a very, happy birthday.
— Watch “Glenn Beck” weekdays at 5 p.m. ET on FOX News Channel
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