Andrew Malcolm, IBD:
President Obama knows he’s in trouble with the American people.
Yes, his job approval has slipped further since Christmas, down to 40%, and is worse than G.W. Bush’s at the same point.
But you can tell Obama knows it anyway because he’s fallen back on his path of preferred political action. He’s giving speeches. Many speeches. Campaign speeches. Roll-up-the-sleeves speeches. Point-his-finger speeches. Call-on-others-to-do-something speeches.
It’s what Obama does, throw speeches at things like pop singers throw eggs at neighbors. What he’s always done because meeting, cajoling, joshing, building teams with Congress, bringing people together is not what he’s good at. Despite all the speeches in which he promised to do just that.
Obama believes he’s good at speechifying. And he used to be.
Trouble is, more and more Americans are tuning him out. Seriously, how often have you seen his face on TV, said, ‘Yeh, right’ and clicked straight on by because he’s always talking while never really saying anything? “I speak, therefore, I am.”
[…]
Obama has not said much about “Gates-gate,” the book-length, expose evisceration of his leadership and hollow troop support by former Cabinet member Robert Gates, who sat at Obama’s elbow at that same shiny White House table.
Gates, who served eight presidents and is the only Defense secretary to work for presidents of both parties, sat in his old cabinet chair in a rural house outside Seattle the last two years to write his new best-seller “Duty.” (C-SPAN2 will cover his book talk in Philadelphia Friday 6:30 p.m. Eastern.)
Today is Thursday. So, Obama is scheduled to give another speech. He’s summoned university and company presidents, educators and non-profit leaders to the White House to reveal his thoughts on how very important a college education has become in modern America.
And how everybody ought to have a fair shot at success. (Applause.)
And how determined he is to ensure that opportunity despite the differing views of that uncooperative equal branch of government he so often side-steps.
And how determined he is to fight for that opportunity for all Americans, even if he is the only one doing it. Which he isn’t, but that sounds good to be the Lone Warrior for fairness.
As a special treat, Michelle Obama will also give a speech on the same subject to the same crowd today. She’s back now from her extended Hawaiian vacation and turns a half-century old tomorrow.
[…]
Americans tend to be suspicious of things they can’t see. Like monsters in the dark. Hungry fish beneath the waves. Radiation in the air.
And honest promises by Barack Obama.
And yet the still preferred him to yet another liberal big business, big government Republican. Twice.
So is it any wonder he takes away from his strategy of endless blowing of smoke to cloud what are serial lies that it is winner? No, it’s not.
What is truly confusing is how the GOP can point these things out about Obama, then turn around and champion the next squish — the next big government, I-can-reach-across-the-aisle-and-work-with-my-Marxist-friends RINO (yeah, Huckabee. I said it) — and believe s/he is the best chance to take back the power they so crave, even as it would be taken in the name of a party base they so deplore.
I’ve called it losing more slowly in other contexts. But today I’m just going to call it what it is: surrender, and in the process, take what you can get for yourselves before the whole thing collapses.
There’s a phenomenon I don’t understand about the polling on ClownDisaster’s job approval, namely, the outlier shape which the Rassmussen organization takes in the RCP average (and slightly skewing it in consequence). While the general run of polling organizations has ClownDisaster at -12, -13, -15 today, Rassmussen shows him at +4. Now, Rassmussen also has an “approval index” number which aligns relatively well with other polling organization numbers, running -11, -14, -15, -17 lately. But this is not the number taken for purposes of the RCP average. It’s just odd.
Obama believes he’s good at speechifying. And he used to be.
That second claim is patently false, which is clear to anybody who has ears to hear.
Team R is sclerotic
they cling to the same tired-ass piece of shit losers like boehner and mcconnell cause they’re too cowardly to be accountable for changing directions
the only reason corn dog soprano was ever taken remotely seriously as a presidential contender is cause of how goddamned tired and uninspiring Team R’s bench is
which reminds me how that mary katharine ham propaganda slut at hot air was talking up John Cornyn’s conservative bonafides yesterday
yup yup he’s a peach
Both teams are sclerotic. And old.
A third team is in order or a break-out of newer thinking.
<double-take>
Oh, across. Okay. ‘Cause the other preposition I thought I saw isn’t generally done by the one in the position the Beltway Establicans usually assume with their Dem colleagues, is the thing.
Obama was never good at speechifying. They’ve always been lofty, yet lacking substance. He’s like the coach who revs up the team before the game, but isn’t really offering anything of substance. A soliloquy of untested arguments. He doesn’t (and never has ) swayed, because the whole time he is speaking, the listener has a “Yea, BUT …” in his head.
His speeches have always been empty, and his preferred preacher-style delivery is annoying.
Anyone catch Michelle’s speech today? You’d think that 18 year olds entering college were as helpless as toddlers the way she went on and on about all the extra (federal) assistance these special snowflakes apparently need. It was pathetic how much she thinks we need her to save us. Go back to Hawaii, lady.
It’s no longer “Team D” vs. “Team R”, it’s become “Team DC” vs. “Team Not DC”.
Two unrelated points:
1) “Obama has not said much about “Gates-gate…”
The only lesson Obama will learn from this episode is to never, ever have someone around him that isn’t either a sycophant, able to be intimidated or destroyed. We can safely assume the rest of his cabinet fits this description.
2) “And yet the[y] still preferred him to yet another liberal big business, big government Republican. Twice.”
We flatter ourselves that the citizens, the people of this country are better than others. That may be true in some respects (e.g. charity), but not in most ways that count.
The Pilgrims and others came here to escape persecution. After a few decades, the persecution followed them. A war was fought and the country was born. That was the context for the genesis of America; wisdom was paid for in blood, it was hard-won and recent in the mind.
America is suffering from an overabundance of peace and prosperity. These are not the natural state of man, and they obscure the kind of wisdom the founders knew. American citizens are neither better nor worse than average, contrary to the kind of mythology we’ve built.
America’s beginning was exceptional, but we squandered that capital a while ago. Or, at least some of us did.
@sdferr
Rasmussen used to be more neutral. Then, right before the 2012 elections, they started running poll results that showed Obama down by 1 to 2 points. They were threatened by Holder with an “investigation.” Since then, they’ve been a bit “off.”
Well, when your only tool is a hammer…
Next stop, Banana Republic.
Here It Comes: Obama Considering Executive Order To Raise Minimum Wage
Words that have lost all meaning in the past 5 years:
Fairness
Racism
Inequality
Loophole (money you don’t owe yet, but DC wants anyway)
Investment (now means confiscation)
Recovery (borrowing and crony subsidies)
Bill Clinton changed that one back in his first term. It meant taxes taken and spent by government on “better” things than we would do privately. Big Bubba looking out for us little children.
We’re also investing in Michelle’s vacations.
I miss the old days when politicians went into office with the idea of collecting graft, handing out a few patronage positions and pretty much left the rest of us alone.
But no, that isn’t good enough these days. The bastards have decided they need to “care.”
The only lesson Obama will learn from this episode is to never, ever have someone around him that isn’t either a sycophant, able to be intimidated or destroyed. We can safely assume the rest of his cabinet fits this description.
Don’t forget — it works both ways. Do you really think Sibelius would still be around if she didn’t have plenty of leverage against the White House?
Squid, either that, or no one else is stupid enough to take the job.
MAD, the political edition.
Obama is Lib’Splainin’ the NSA to B-clingers right now. Did you know that the NSA are your firends and neighbors? I mean…so were the effin’ Stasi but who’s going to worry unless they have something to hide(owns a non-hybrid SUV, drinks a lot of soda, wants Obamacare repealed, owns a gun, not being nice enough to that gay kid who wants people to sign his petition about something or other)?
Oh and don’t make any youtube videos that muslims might not like.
You might not want to be too public about denying settle AGW climate science either. And I’d err on the side of caution where ever income taxes and FICA are concerned. Best take only the really really common deductions. No reason. Just common sense right?