Cataloguing Barack Obama’s mendacity is like attempting to isolate individual pellets during a driving hailstorm.

Each of his fabrications is astonishing in its sheer audacity, but quickly fades into anonymity amid the endless barrage. And because he issues them with such rapidity, the effect is a contagion of mass amnesia that soothes the fawning “watchdog” media and induces stupor among the public.

Obama’s preposterous “jobs saved or created” artifice is merely the latest vivid example.

In January, while advocating its proposed “stimulus” legislation, the White House issued a report warning that unless the bill was passed, unemployment could reach 8.5% by this month on its way to a peak of 8.8% in 2010. If the legislation was passed, on the other hand, the White House promised that unemployment would top out at 7.8% before steadily declining.

Obama also issued his absurd promise to “save or create” 3.5 million jobs, even though neither the Department of Labor nor any other governmental agency has any idea how to measure “jobs saved.”

Well. Congress passed Obama’s stimulus bill, but something has gone awry along the way. Since the date of passage, the American economy has lost approximately 1.6 million more jobs. And this month, the Department of Labor reported that the nation’s unemployment rate has reached 9.4%, some 1.6% higher than Obama’s expected peak.

So how did Obama respond?

By brazenly contending that he had somehow “saved or created” 150,000 new jobs, with 600,000 more coming this summer. Even the New York Times acknowledged that Obama’s concoction is “based on macroeconomic estimates, not an actual counting of jobs.”

That makes sense, of course, since “an actual counting of jobs” would reveal that Obama’s promise was demonstrably false.

It appears, however, that we’re beginning to hear the steadily-increasing murmur that “the emperor has no clothes!”

That adage, of course, derives from the classic 1837 fairy tale The Emperor’s New Clothes by Danish author Hans Christian Andersen. In the story, the leader of a prosperous city habitually places greater emphasis upon his fashionability and popularity than upon sound leadership or effective governance.

Sound familiar?

Consumed by his frivolity, the emperor unwittingly hires two swindlers who convince him that they can produce the finest suit from the most exquisite fabric. The swindlers tell the emperor that the cloth is so elegant that it is invisible to stupid and incompetent people. When the emperor finally receives word that his new suit is finished and goes to try it on, however, he cannot see anything. Afraid of exposing themselves as stupid or incompetent by being unable to see it, the emperor and his ministers simply pretend to be awestricken by the non-existent new suit.

Oblivious to the swindle, the emperor proudly proceeds to exhibit his new “clothes” to the town. Afraid to speak up, the town’s citizens similarly pretend to see the wonderful suit, until an undaunted child exclaims, “the emperor has nothing on!” Although the crowd realizes that the child is correct, the emperor continues in his vain oblivion.

Andersen’s tale about exposing the emptiness and pretensions of the ruling class is obviously instructive today. From his “jobs saved or created” fiction to his assertion that he has no interest in running an automobile company while he does precisely that, the sycophantic media imitates the timid townspeople.

Accordingly, we await the collective realization that Emperor Obama has no clothes. But the murmur appears to be getting steadily more audible.

After Obama delivered his latest “American Apology Tour ‘09” address in Cairo, for instance, an observer in the United Arab Emirates noted, “he seems to say everything without actually promising anything.”

And here in the United States, scientific surveys provide ominous news for Obama. For the first time, a June 5, 2009 Rasmussen poll revealed that Obama’s “strong disapproval” percentage has equaled his “strong approval” rating at 34% apiece. To provide perspective, Obama enjoyed a +28% margin the day after entering office, with 44% strongly approving and only 16% strongly disapproving.

And in Europe, voters this week overwhelmingly rejected left-leaning and socialist candidates. It appears that people who have actually seen socialism in practice have developed a distaste for it. Foreign leaders such as Israel’s Netanyahu, France’s Sarkozy and Germany’s Merkel have already begun to criticize Obama’s directives, and this week’s election results portend even greater friction.

The chorus of people pointing out the emptiness and pretensions of Obama’s agenda is growing larger, and the consensus that the emperor has no clothes draws nearer.