There Will Be No Living with Oprah Now

You might be surprised to learn that Barack Obama's victory in the recent presidential election was not due to his promises of change or polished speeches. Quite the contrary, Obama would have been spending election night as a pundit on some cable news channel had it not been for the immoveable force that is Oprah. Oprah willed it, and made it so. She demanded that we bend to her will, and we all fooled ourselves into thinking that we made the decision on our own.

She finally admitted as much the day after the election, during her show's "post-election special," when she reminded us about her endorsement of the Illinois senator last year, when he was lagging behind Democratic front-runners Hillary Clinton and John Edwards, among others. What followed was a rise to power not seen before in American history. The implication was clear: one would not have happened without the other. We just all forgot to thank Oprah, and thank goodness she didn't let us forget.

We have only ourselves to blame for Oprah's mindset. After all, the woman suggests a book, and millions of women with low self esteem go out and buy it. Dozens of mediocre authors have been set for life by just the word of the eternal O, and she knows it. She also demands complete loyalty from those whom she showers blessings upon. When James Frey admitted he exaggerated in his memoir "A Million Little Pieces," which was endorsed by her book club, the O-Ness demanded he appear in her presence. The public humiliation, the loss of his book deal, and the end of his writing career was not enough for her. She then sat him down in front of the whole nation and ripped him a new one for daring to lie to her.

If you can somehow manage to convince people to buy the cookbook of your personal chef with the promise that you will lose weight, even though you yourself remain "overly healthy," chances are you can convince anyone of anything. It may make one wonder: did Oprah really think Barack Obama would be a good president, or did she want to see if America could be persuaded to vote for her choice for president? Was it just the world's largest social experiment?

Perhaps the answer is a little of both. She obviously believes in the man, but she also knows the power her favor provides. No doubt that Oprah, whose ego settles over Lake Michigan every night, could exert her full force behind Obama, but she would fail to give his opponents, specifically Hillary Clinton and Sarah Palin, even a blink of exposure on the national stage of her talk show. She wields a mighty weapon, and she uses it selectively.

After Obama's appearance on her show, Oprah declared her show a politics-free zone, meaning she didn't have to stoop down to Clinton or Palin. Of course, like Obama going back on his pledge to take public financing during the election, such promises are revokeable without notice. The day after the election, to open her show, she declared: "I have been unleashed!" Her audience squealed with delight, until she mounted a pale horse, grabbed a sickle, and rode through her audience, screaming "and Hell follows me" as she began swinging and slaughtering her followers. At least that's how it appeared.

Ego can be an ugly thing. Just watch an episode of her talk show when she gives out her "favorite things." Watch her looks of disdain on the "peasants" in her audience as they lose all diginty and scream and dance over the scaps she throws down to them from on high. For someone who seems to think she is the voice of America's conscience, she sure takes a supercilious tone.

On election night, the media couldn't help showing Oprah celebrating live. TV viewers also saw shots of Oprah intercut with shots of Jesse Jackson openly weeping in the crowd, at least after he visibly checked to see if the cameras were on him. Perhaps he was weeping because he realized that he recently threatened to cut off the manhood of the newly-elected leader of the free world. Lets hope nothing "happens" to Rev. Jackson as he sleeps from now on.

The day after the election, Oprah appeared on her show wearing a t-shirt that stated "Hope Won." That's news to at least 46% of the voters in this country, unless they voted for the "despair" ticket. It's scary to think how she woud have reacted had Obama lost. Her actions prove ego and class cannot co-exist.

They say that character can be measured in how you accept failure, but it is perhaps better measured in how you handle success. Al Gore, John Kerry, and John McCain all handled defeat with grace and dignity. Barack Obama used his victory speech to reach out and assure the other half of the country that did not vote for him that he would be their president too. On her post-election show, Oprah did everything Obama did not: she showboated, she taunted the other side, and all but celebrated the triumph of good over evil.

For Oprah, the audacity of her condescension is only creating a new cultural divide where Obama's election should be bringing us all together. The comedian Sinbad once said that every TV should have a switch that allows us to block out Oprah. Let's hope someone gets on that. It would be a change we can all believe in.