Obama Brought Back Down to Earth
July 15th, 2008 at 01:14am Mark Noonan
Victor Davis Hanson notes the shrinking of Obama:
think McCain will incrementally continue to close the lead for four reasons:
The hope and change rock-start moments are waning, and replaced by a new Obama composite:
1) Obama flips in furious fashion; the only controversy is over when the mutations will stop, and how well he can convince his base that they are only cosmetic adjustments of limited duration necessary for election and the implementation of their shared European-like agenda.
2) Obama is proving messianic; all the lectures about fainting, the Brandenburg Gate, his new seal, open-air address in Denver, oceans receding, etc. are cementing a portrait of a megalomaniac. Almost everyone has by now “disappointed”, or “disrespected” Obama, or is not the fellow prophet that Obama “knew,” “remembers”, or “recalls”. His sermons on our SUVs, lack of language fluency, diet etc. are as hypocritical as they are sophomoric, and confirm Michelle’s summation of the rest of us as “unaware, uninformed.”
3) Obama is ruthless — the numbers of those thrown under the bus — Wright, his grandmother, Ms. Power, former aides — are now resembling speed bumps. This is not unusual in politics, but contradicts the Sermon on the Mount imagery, and confirms the past narrative of his take-no-prisoners political ambitions.
4) Obama has a poor grasp of history, geography, American culture, and common sense — whether the number or location of states in the Union, basic facts about WWII or where Arabic is spoken, or his sociological take on Pennsylvania, etc. His advisors realize this, and are playing 4th-quarter defense by keeping him out of ex tempore, non tele-prompted hope and change venues, where his shallowness can manifest itself in astonishing ways.
Hanson wisely goes on to note that Obama is still the favorite in Campaign ‘08 - but it is clear that the bloom is off the rose. The big question is whether or not Obama’s handlers can keep him locked away from the electorate until November. If the election were held today, Obama would probably win - but the election is in November and Obama has nearly four months in which to continue stumbling from one gaffe to another. The key for McCain is to figure out a way to draw Obama out - either by goading him (he has a large amount of pride and might be snookered into going into an unfavorable venue with McCain) or by chipping away enough at Obama’s lead (which is already happening) to the point where Obama’s people understand that defeat looms and only a direct confrontation with McCain can possibly save the day.
What stuns the seasoned political observer is the vaporous nature of Obama - he’s really got nothing except a pretty good, set piece speaking style. I think we have to go back to the Wilke phenomena in 1940 (another political zero raised up as the next big thing) for a comparison. Every now and again in American politics someone comes along who is hailed as the saviour of a worn out America - the aforementioned Wilke, but also William Jennings Bryan, John Fremont…people who came out of nowhere to shake up American politics, only to be brought down to earth by the realities of life. We’ll see if Obama is different - but for him to be different he’s going to have to get down and dirty and fight this thing out like a man, not walk around like he’s already President-elect.
Entry Filed under: Campaign 2008, Democrats, Republicans
23 Comments
1. Kahn | July 15th, 2008 at 1:24 am
“shallowness”, thats the word I’ve been looking for. He’s the “Ted Baxter” in the race!
2. Jeremiah | July 15th, 2008 at 2:13 am
When Obama says, “Change”, he should be thinking on the lines of his own personal relationship with Jesus Christ.
As it is, he’s chaning to suit his own ends, switchining around on the positions to pull voters into his web of deceit; all around, on everything.
Instead of doing this, he needs to change his whole of life…and get out of that disasterous ideology of liberalism and then become a Conservative and then he can think more clearly what it is he’s supposed to do, or what he can do rather to truly help humanity.
The Social programs are going to hurt, which is likely his plan of Presidential policy. Most Americans do not realize how dangerous this would be, but the point of the matter extends to how many young people are being exposed to the truth in their school and work environment…the influence is the greatest where you have young folks who do not understand the difference in and complexities of economic and social policy…they’re used to one ideology of liberalism which teaches subsidies are all that is on the menu.
The only way to counter this, is by receiving permission to get into these schools…but how many liberal schools do you think would receive a Right based person into their facilities?
Granted, this is only the start, I think if colleges are fitted with Televisions in their classrooms, the teachers could allow their students a few minutes of their day to watch some of the debates that will take place, or tape then show them afterwards if possible. Then have group-discussion afterwards and sort of try to come up with a consensus on what issues are most important to the students, and then they can sorta figure out where they stand on the issues if they are more “Conservative” or “Liberal”.
3. What? | July 15th, 2008 at 3:36 am
One day Obama is Napoleon the next he is William Jennings Bryan. Noonan, I believe you are flip-flopping.
C’mon, just say it already. You know you want to. He’s Hitler. There, I said it for you. Now, let’s move on. Enough baseless comparisons, already.
Jeremiah,
I am going to blow your mind right now. On the very first day of college three campus ministries can to my dorm room trying to get me to join. This was at a public university.
Not only that, we had many prominent conservatives visit our campus to give speeches. I met Margaret Thatcher when she visited our campus. James Baker visited.
Universities aren’t the re-education centers you want them to be, Jer. Just because a professor teaches about Marxism doesn’t mean he promotes it.
4. Magnum Serpentine | July 15th, 2008 at 6:10 am
McSame flip flops the worse. One moment he is for Gay marriage the next he is against, one moment he hates the fundies, the next he likes them.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ioy90nF2anI
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BPyKpcivQYQ
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DUYTUbJy71k
No votes for a third term.
5. Tuneup | July 15th, 2008 at 6:53 am
Obama talks about responsibility. That scares the hell out of the status quo establishment. America is about to move in a whole new direction. None too soon for Republican lead Hubert Hoover II economy.
Unless states like WV turn off shows like Limbaugh and Hannity and think for themselves he probably doesn’t have a shot at winning there, but his message is getting to states like Colorado and Arizonia. It is going to get interesting
6. Tuneup | July 15th, 2008 at 7:02 am
I say to all my Democratic and Independent friends we can win this without such personal attacks on McCain and his family. Republicans eight year run has lead Iraq and the American economy to ruins. America deserves a better debate of the issues.
Obama is ruthless what a joke. Stalin was ruthless, so the writer is saying the two have the same characteristics
7. William Black | July 15th, 2008 at 7:34 am
Why Obama will win:
“LONDON (AFP) - The European single currency leapt to a record high above 1.60 dollars here on Tuesday as investor fears grew over the state of the US economy and its financial services sector, dealers said.
In late morning London deals, the euro jumped to 1.6038 dollars, which beat the previous all-time peak of 1.6019 that was set on April 22″
McCain is following the same economic policies as Bush. His economic mentor, William Gramm, is the cause of the sub-prime meltdown because he snuck what is called the Enron loophole in the Commodity Futures Modernization Act of 2000. McCain will just give us more of the same.
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Global_Economy/JG16Dj05.html
8. neocon | July 15th, 2008 at 8:44 am
“America deserves a better debate of the issues.” - Tuneup
I really have been enjoying those townhall debates. Oh wait, nevermind.
Kahn,
The “Ted Baxter” in the race!
Priceless. LMAO.
gracias
neocon
9. js | July 15th, 2008 at 8:47 am
i have to laugh when people say the republicans are at fault for the bad things in the world…its a streak of stupidity for them to even need to think it…unless they want to bring facts up that really show the demoncrats are at fault in truth….
for example….clinton spent 8 long years watching saddam make a fool of the UN and the US…it took a republican president to end that fiasco….and the world economy drives the cost of fuel through the roof…yet….from the time the demoncrats took power in both houses, it only took a year for the price of gas to go from 2.15 to 3.09, and another year to get to 4.07…which is exactly the opposite of what they claim….
why not detail fact….and attribute blame where blame is due? the republican congress sat down with the oil CEO’s and the price of gas dropped 20%…the demoncrat controlled congress sat down with the oil CEO’s and the price of gas jumped 40 cents….
not to mention the fact that a core promise made to the people during the election in 05 was that the demoncratic leadership would do something about the increasing costs of fuel….which they have completely failed to do….resulting in almost doubled costs for gas…
ya…we can stand that..hehe…two more years…we should be able to safely predict the price of gas to be over 8 dollars a gallon….thanks to the do nothing power brokers that control congress…..
10. Retired Spook | July 15th, 2008 at 10:27 am
4) Obama has a poor grasp of history, geography, American culture, and common sense
Hanson has a knack for saying a lot in a few words, and this particular statement is no exception. And, in the end, I think these flaws in the Obama persona are what are going to do him in. You take away his teleprompter and the guy is a dufus. I can see why Casper is drawn to him.
js, there is no way, of course, to prove that the Dems had anything to do with the rapid rise in the price of oil/gasoline, but what a delicious irony it’s turned out to be. In the end, it may well be as much what they didn’t do as what they did do. During at least most of 2007, and well into this year, the Dems spent so much time trying to figure out ways to get even with Republicans, that they really failed to govern in any significant way. It will be interesting to see whether or not their constituents of the moderate persuasion reward them this fall with their votes. I’m betting a lot of them won’t. The only thing the Donks really have going for them this fall is the economy going down the crapper. There’s a lot of blame to go around for the economic decline, on both sides of the aisle and in both the Executive and Legislative branches, but I suspect the majority of voters will blame the GOP. The problem is that the policies that Obama is advocating (doubling the cap. gains and dividend taxes, letting the Bush tax cuts expire, as well as a myriad of expensive social programs, are only going to send the economy into a steeper tail spin. On top of that, he thinks that $4.00/gal gasoline is a good thing.
Thank God we only have 112 days left till this is over, but it’s gonna be a long summer.
11. Tractatus | July 15th, 2008 at 11:11 am
Obama has a poor grasp of history, geography, American culture, and common sense — whether the number or location of states in the Union, basic facts about WWII or where Arabic is spoken, or his sociological take on Pennsylvania
Unlike John McCain, who still doesn’t know the difference between Sunni and Shiite, who still references Czechoslovakia as though it’s an existing country, who doesn’t seem to understand what Iran is at all, who’s rather unfamiliar with that whole Internet thing, and so on.
The flip-flopper charge against Obama is funny considering McCain’s list is over 60 and still growing. Is flip-flopping bad or not? If it is, you better get your guy to knock it off. If it’s not, then you should stop using it as an accusation.
12. neocon | July 15th, 2008 at 11:33 am
Tractatus,
That’s a strange defense of your candidate who has billed himself as above the politics of the past, a new kind of politician. Right?
Shouldn’t you be touting the virtues of your candidate rather than attacking the record of the opponent?
Wouldn’t that be in line with this new “brand” of politics.
Just saying
merci beaucoup
neocon
13. js | July 15th, 2008 at 1:20 pm
really funny….if a person really needed to know that there was a difference between shiites and sunnis….it doesnt matter…because they both follow the koran and the haddith…which both direct islam to conquer/destroy/kill/rape/enslave everyone but other muslims….
while they are becoming a serious problem in Europe…we get idiots like tractus who ignorantly believe that it matters….what a putz he is….
14. js | July 15th, 2008 at 1:23 pm
while we are laughing at how small obama really is…its a good time to note that he actually left the country to visit our brothers under arms….because we embarrased him with the truth…
15. BARRASSO | July 15th, 2008 at 2:15 pm
“Shouldn’t you be touting the virtues of your candidate rather than attacking the record of the opponent?”
He says in one of dozens of threads attacking the record of his opponent.
16. Xavier Cugat | July 15th, 2008 at 2:20 pm
Yes, JS, you embarrassed him the truth. Right now, Obama is on his plane, pounding his fist into his palm, saying to himself, “Curse that JS, forcing me to make this trip with the Truth.
And that comes after your doozy above in 9
I’m laughing so hard, I don’t even know where to start. Yes, Thank God our righteous President ended that old fiasco by creating an even larger one. And that damned world economy driving up the cost of oil? Who could have seen that coming? Geez, you’d have to have special powers to see that a destabilizing war in the Middle East would have that kind of effect. And who could have predicted that deficit financing of a Trillion Dollar war could have hit the dollar so badly?
And Obama is the one with no sense of history, geography, and common sense. Riiiiiight.
Here’s what’s going to happen. Obama is going to deliver his speech at Brandenberg Gate. It will be a very good, if not great speech. It’ll get good press. He’ll bump in the polls 2-3 points. VD Hanson and similar ilk will spout some nonsense, all the while silently wishing your guy was as smart or articulate. You fools will latch on some inane criticism, and you’ll shrink further into your desperate worldviews.
I shall enjoy watching this transpire.
17. js | July 15th, 2008 at 2:36 pm
really nothing there to worry about cugat…satyrically speaking…your hen is in the bush…because you dont have a lick of sense worth repeating….
the only think im laughing about is the ignorance in your post…
18. Xavier Cugat | July 15th, 2008 at 2:56 pm
JS, you know what’s funny about you and Neocon? You never defend your position with anything other than insults. Why?
Is it that you’re afraid to search for any facts that support your argument because they just may not be out there, and that would cause you to reconsider your opinion?
Or is it simply that you get pleasure from firing blind ad hominems? If so, wow. How edifying for a man who claims to be Christian.
19. Retired Spook | July 15th, 2008 at 4:21 pm
JS, you know what’s funny about you and Neocon? You never defend your position with anything other than insults. Why?
Xavier, you know what I think is funny about you and MS, and BARRASSO and Tractus and Congressive and Tuneup, et all? It’s that you know the Conservatives here hold you and pretty much everything you believe in utter contemp. We believe your oft-stated extreme Leftist positions are seldom deserving of reasoned response/debate. Even on the rare occasion that any of you actually says something worthwhile, it’s usually couched in negative terms. I’m sure you feel the same way about us, and yet you continue to come here, totally ignoring the classic definition of insanity as repeatedly saying/doing the same thing over and over, each time hoping for a different outcome.
20. phnx | July 15th, 2008 at 4:50 pm
“its a good time to note that he (obama) actually left the country to visit our brothers under arms”
He has left the country on a whirlwind trip abroad to polich his foreign policy credentials. He will also visit Iraq, if only to say that he’s been there. What a joke.
He starts off by insulting the German people with his arrogant plan to conduct a political rally and speech at the Brandenburg Gate, as if he were the President of the United States.
Merkel’s spokesman was quoted as saying:”no German (chancellor) candidate would think of using (Washington’s) National Mall or Red Square in Moscow for rallies, because it would be considered inappropriate.”
So on the eve of his big worl tour B. Hussein puts his foot in his mouth. Nice move to earn the repect of our allies.
21. Xavier Cugat | July 15th, 2008 at 5:54 pm
Spook — touche’
Seriously — good point. I wonder why I keep coming here myself!!
I first started coming here because it was a right-wing blog but had an open comment section. (I’ve been slow to commend Noonan for that - Hat’s off to you Mark) I’m an independent who can’t find a comfortable home in either of our parties. I consider myself very fiscally conservative, anti-taxes, and anti-big government. I am liberal on social issues, but my views aren’t so different that those found in the Libertarian wing of the Republican party.
I’m against Bush and the current Republican incarnation because of their incompetence and hypocrisy. If they were more faithful to the central Republican tenets of small government, fiscal responsibility, personal liberty, and responsible foreign policy, and demonstrated some competence at governing, I just might be a Republican. (It’s like I said to a neighbor the other day: “I might be a Republican if the Republicans were Republican.”)
But here’s the thing. From day one when I started posting here, any criticism of the Bush administration was labeled as liberal. And it’s very rare that the discourse doesn’t degrade into insults. It’s a rare posting or comment that actually cites statistics or references. And I may be prejudiced, but I observe that most of the mindless categorization comes from the Right. Any opposition is simply labeled as “extreme Leftist” or “liberal”.
It’s really just an “us” vs. “them” mentality, without any insight into what the terms “liberal” and “conservatives” actually mean. For example, my buddy JS considers himself a “conservative” and then argues on another thread that we should nationalize the oil industry. He also has argued that financial speculation should be illegal. Those two notions aren’t conservative; they aren’t even liberal ; they are communist.
I think a lot of you guys are just comfortable with labeling yourself conservative. And you’re done - there’s no ongoing intellectual activity assessing what that means, or actually determining if the guys you’re putting into office are really who you think they are.
And you’re equally comfortable with blindly labeling anyone who disagrees with you as “liberal”. I’m sure you can admit that you don’t have to be a liberal to recognize that Bush has failed his cause by running a poor administration.
The “Us vs. Them” mindset may make your worldview easier to comprehend, but it ain’t accurate.
22. Retired Spook | July 15th, 2008 at 7:36 pm
Well thought out response, Xavier, and I apologize for lumping you in with the likes of MS, Tuneup and the others.
I give Casper a lot of grief on this site, but he and I actually agree on wanting to see a strong third party arise from the 60% or so of the electorate who either agree on about 80-90% of important issues or at least don’t disagree to any significant extent. It sounds like you might be in that group. I’ve thought, in the past, that we might call it something like “The Common Sense Party”. Wishful thinking, I suppose.
23. \'08ama | July 16th, 2008 at 12:53 pm
…4) Obama has a poor grasp of history, geography, American culture, and common sense ..
Well, DUH!, he’s an American .