The Slow, Steady Implosion of Barack Obama
By
pparets
on May 31, 2008 at 05:10 pm
Here is a man who said from the outset that he was not politics as usual. From the start, Senator Obama presented himself as a fresh, new face with a gift for oratory and armed with the audacity of hope. No less a personage than Oprah Winfrey - whose own fortunes are now suffering - stumped for him.
But from the beginning, those who watched and listened carefully to Barack Obama - free from the messiah-complex which seemed to affect so many of his adoring followers - saw something quite different.
Here was a socialist, plain and simple, and a newbie whose own personal traits and experience - much less his political acumen - seemed fragile and contrived.
There was the ‘sweetie’ gaff. The silliness about his uncle liberating Auschwitz. The 57 states thing and the eyebrow-raising endorsement from Hammas.
But there was more, much more. There was his off-camera analysis of rural white Americans as bitter people clinging desperately to their guns and bibles.
There was his stunning pronouncement that he would hold unconditional talks with America’s enemies.
From the beginning he has firmly maintained that the war was a mistake and that he would bring the troops home, apparently without regard for the consequences.
His wife publicly stated that for the first time in her life she was proud to be an American.
He has declared that as president he will names judges and justices who ‘empathize’ with the plight of the little guy.
In an effort to clarify his position on race, he defined his own grandmother as a racist, thus throwing her under the bus.
He has embraced and then denounced his life-time mentor, Rev. Jeremiah Wright.
He has defended and now withdrawn from Trinity United Church of Christ, his spiritual home for 20 years where - to the utter amazement of many - he managed never to have heard the blatantly racist sermons of it’s rector.
He has unexplained, long-term associations with socialists and radicals the likes of William Ayers, co- chairman of the Woods fund with Obama and Father Pfleger, chairman of Catholics for Obama until his hasty resignation yesterday.
In his brief tenure in the senate, Barack Obama has earned a 100% rating from the ADA for his liberal voting pattern.
Add to this, the disturbing sense that when he is not orating, but responding in Q & A sessions or interviews, Obama frequently flounders, seeming uncertain when unscripted.
No doubt others can and will add to this list. But as the weeks and months go by, the once monolithic campaign of Barack Obama seems more and more a devious and deceptive paper tiger and less and less the audacity of hope.
But from the beginning, those who watched and listened carefully to Barack Obama - free from the messiah-complex which seemed to affect so many of his adoring followers - saw something quite different.
Here was a socialist, plain and simple, and a newbie whose own personal traits and experience - much less his political acumen - seemed fragile and contrived.
There was the ‘sweetie’ gaff. The silliness about his uncle liberating Auschwitz. The 57 states thing and the eyebrow-raising endorsement from Hammas.
But there was more, much more. There was his off-camera analysis of rural white Americans as bitter people clinging desperately to their guns and bibles.
There was his stunning pronouncement that he would hold unconditional talks with America’s enemies.
From the beginning he has firmly maintained that the war was a mistake and that he would bring the troops home, apparently without regard for the consequences.
His wife publicly stated that for the first time in her life she was proud to be an American.
He has declared that as president he will names judges and justices who ‘empathize’ with the plight of the little guy.
In an effort to clarify his position on race, he defined his own grandmother as a racist, thus throwing her under the bus.
He has embraced and then denounced his life-time mentor, Rev. Jeremiah Wright.
He has defended and now withdrawn from Trinity United Church of Christ, his spiritual home for 20 years where - to the utter amazement of many - he managed never to have heard the blatantly racist sermons of it’s rector.
He has unexplained, long-term associations with socialists and radicals the likes of William Ayers, co- chairman of the Woods fund with Obama and Father Pfleger, chairman of Catholics for Obama until his hasty resignation yesterday.
In his brief tenure in the senate, Barack Obama has earned a 100% rating from the ADA for his liberal voting pattern.
Add to this, the disturbing sense that when he is not orating, but responding in Q & A sessions or interviews, Obama frequently flounders, seeming uncertain when unscripted.
No doubt others can and will add to this list. But as the weeks and months go by, the once monolithic campaign of Barack Obama seems more and more a devious and deceptive paper tiger and less and less the audacity of hope.
