Birthdays

Yesterday was the 7oth birthday of a very great personality, indeed. Bugs Bunny no less and how many politicians can compete with him in savviness and long-lasting appeal. He is, of course, seriously conservative and politically incorrect as Rand Simberg and other commenters point out.

Here is one delightful film - Bugs Bunny as the Barber of Seville.


And now on to another birthday and planned celebrations thereof. Jim Lindgren on the Volokh Conspiracy has a slightly creepy tale. Apparently he has received an e-mail from First Lady Michelle Obama who is asking all and sundry to sign a birthday card for the President. Millions of signatures are being collected from all Americans. Ahem, isn't that what they do in North Korea?

At another level, asking millions of Americans to sign a birthday card for the President suggests a tone-deafness about the cult of personality. If we lived in a dictatorship, getting millions of subjects to celebrate the Dear Leader’s birthday would be routine, but in a free republic this appeal to get millions of citizens to celebrate a current president’s birthday strikes a discordant note to my ear.

No, I am not saying we are in a dictatorship; I am saying that because we are not, we should not be emulating the trappings characteristic of that fundamentally different sort of regime. Nor do I think this is particularly ominous, just a very small step in the wrong direction.

Last, it seems strange for Michelle Obama to be trying to get us to sign Barack’s birthday card when she is scheduled to be in Spain with [at least one of] her daughters during the President’s birthday.

Now if this were a card for Bugs Bunny!!!