Obama the schvitzer

“Schvitzer” is a wonderful Yiddish word. Its literal meaning, derived from German, is “to sweat.” Yiddish, however, has layered something entirely different on top of it: a Schvitzer is an empty boaster, one who doesn’t actually do anything, but who presents himself at the end of the project covered with righteous perspiration. A recent Obama report provides the perfect (and true) anecdote to help one fully understand what a schvitzer really is:

After weeks of arduous negotiations, on April 6, 2006, a bipartisan group of senators burst out of the “President’s Room,” just off the Senate chamber, with a deal on new immigration policy.

As the half-dozen senators — including John McCain (R-Ariz.) and Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.) — headed to announce their plan, they met Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.), who made a request common when Capitol Hill news conferences are in the offing: “Hey, guys, can I come along?” And when Obama went before the microphones, he was generous with his list of senators to congratulate — a list that included himself.

“I want to cite Lindsey Graham, Sam Brownback, Mel Martinez, Ken Salazar, myself, Dick Durbin, Joe Lieberman . . . who’ve actually had to wake up early to try to hammer this stuff out,” he said.

To Senate staff members, who had been arriving for 7 a.m. negotiating sessions for weeks, it was a galling moment. Those morning sessions had attracted just three to four senators a side, Sen. Arlen Specter (R-Pa.) recalled, each deeply involved in the issue. Obama was not one of them.

Hat tip: American Thinker