Review: Looking at ‘2016: Obama’s America’

By Charles Albert Lawrence | gargoyle@flagler.edu

With the 2012 election coming up, the new documentary, “2016: Obama’s America,” seeks to paint a clearer picture of our current President and Democratic nominee Barack Obama. The movie follows producer and star Dinesh D’Souza as he dissects Obama’s book, “Dreams Of My Father,” and the last four years of his presidency.

D’Souza lays out a theory that President Obama has a very different dream for America than that of the American Dream, defended and fought for by our founding fathers.

The movie details Obama’s childhood. Born in Hawaii, he spent his childhood in Indonesia, then was sent back to Hawaii to live with his grandparents. During all of this time, he only saw his father once. Due to his father abandoning him and his mother before Obama was born.

Obama heard much of his father through his mother, who was then married to pro-capitalist Lolo Soetoro. Obama’s mother and husband fought frequently over Lolo’s political views. Obama’s mother told him frequently of his father’s anti-colonial views and his Father’s dream of the world. When his Father died in a drunk driving accident, Obama traveled to Kenya to visit his father’s grave.  At this time, Obama discovered his reason in life and that was to fulfill his father’s dream.

With this new view of his life and his goal to fulfill his father’s dream, he surrounded himself with an interesting group of mentors and teachers while studying at Harvard and throughout his life. D’Souza labels the following individuals as Obama’s “founding fathers”: Frank Marshall Davis, Bill Ayers, Edward Said, Roberto Unger, and Jermaih Wright. The film claims these individuals are pro-Marxist or anti-colonial — some of them even appear on the FBI watch list — and that these teachings from his founding fathers and the dream of his father explain the choices Obama made in the last 4 years of his presidency.

The Obama Administration has condemned the UK colony in the Falkland islands and said that it should be returned to Argentina to govern. The Obama administration has also weakened the American military by threatening relationships with key allies such as Egypt, Israel, and South Korea, cutting the nuclear weapons count, allowing international organizations such as NATO and the UN to deal with foreign issues concerning America, and allowing key competitors such as China to succeed in stronger economic power than America. At the end, D’Souza states that all of this is in fulfillment of his father’s dream of a world with countries of balanced and equal power with anti-colonization policies.

The movie was entertaining and thought provoking. The videography was well done and the editing was smooth. D’Souza does a good job taking you through the journey of Obama’s past while providing insight into the life of our president. The information in the movie seemed factual, and much of it taken straight out of Dreams of My Father. Before anyone votes this election, I encourage them to see this movie. I also encourage everyone to do the same research on the Republican candidate Mitt Romney’s past and what his dream is for America, as I did with Obama after watching “2016.”