ConArtists make their way into White House party!
C.Tudor
If they want to find a ConArtist in the White House, they don't need to
chase after reality TV party crashers.
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http://news.yahoo.com/s/politico/20091130/pl_politico/29993/print
7 stories Obama doesn't want told
John F. Harris
Presidential politics is about storytelling. Presented with a vivid
storyline, voters naturally tend to fit every new event or piece of
information into a picture that is already neatly framed in their minds.
No one understands this better than Barack Obama and his team, who won
the 2008 election in part because they were better storytellers than the
opposition. The pro-Obama narrative featured an almost mystically
talented young idealist who stood for change in a disciplined and
thoughtful way. This easily outpowered the anti-Obama narrative,
featuring an opportunistic Chicago pol with dubious relationships who
was more liberal than he was letting on.
A year into his presidency, however, Obama�s gift for controlling his
image shows signs of faltering. As Washington returns to work from the
Thanksgiving holiday, there are several anti-Obama storylines gaining
momentum.
The Obama White House argues that all of these storylines are inaccurate
or unfair. In some cases these anti-Obama narratives are fanned by
Republicans, in some cases by reporters and commentators.
But they all are serious threats to Obama, if they gain enough currency
to become the dominant frame through which people interpret the
president�s actions and motives.
Here are seven storylines Obama needs to worry about:
He thinks he�s playing with Monopoly money
Economists and business leaders from across the ideological spectrum
were urging the new president on last winter when he signed onto more
than a trillion in stimulus spending and bank and auto bailouts during
his first weeks in office. Many, though far from all, of these same
people now agree that these actions helped avert an even worse financial
catastrophe.
Along the way, however, it is clear Obama underestimated the political
consequences that flow from the perception that he is a profligate
spender. He also misjudged the anger in middle America about bailouts
with weak and sporadic public explanations of why he believed they were
necessary.
The flight of independents away from Democrats last summer � the trend
that recently hammered Democrats in off-year elections in Virginia �
coincided with what polls show was alarm among these voters about
undisciplined big government and runaway spending. The likely passage of
a health care reform package criticized as weak on cost-control will
compound the problem.
Obama understands the political peril, and his team is signaling that he
will use the 2010 State of the Union address to emphasize fiscal
discipline. The political challenge, however, is an even bigger
substantive challenge�since the most convincing way to project fiscal
discipline would be actually to impose spending reductions that would
cramp his own agenda and that of congressional Democrats.
Too much Leonard Nimoy
People used to make fun of Bill Clinton�s misty-eyed, raspy-voiced
claims that, �I feel your pain.�
The reality, however, is that Clinton�s dozen years as governor before
becoming president really did leave him with a vivid sense of the
concrete human dimensions of policy. He did not view programs as
abstractions � he viewed them in terms of actual people he knew by name.
Obama, a legislator and law professor, is fluent in describing the
nuances of problems. But his intellectuality has contributed to a
growing critique that decisions are detached from rock-bottom principles.
Both Maureen Dowd in The New York Times and Joel Achenbach of The
Washington Post have likened him to Star Trek�s Mr. Spock.
The Spock imagery has been especially strong during the extended review
Obama has undertaken of Afghanistan policy. He�ll announce the results
on Tuesday. The speech�s success will be judged not only on the logic of
the presentation but on whether Obama communicates in a more visceral
way what progress looks like and why it is worth achieving. No soldier
wants to take a bullet in the name of nuance.
That�s the Chicago Way
This is a storyline that�s likely taken root more firmly in Washington
than around the country. The rap is that his West Wing is dominated by
brass-knuckled pols.
It does not help that many West Wing aides seem to relish an image of
themselves as shrewd, brass-knuckled political types. In a Washington
Post story this month, White House deputy chief of staff Jim Messina,
referring to most of Obama�s team, said, �We are all campaign hacks.�
The problem is that many voters took Obama seriously in 2008 when he
talked about wanting to create a more reasoned, non-partisan style of
governance in Washington. When Republicans showed scant interest in
cooperating with Obama at the start, the Obama West Wing gladly reverted
to campaign hack mode.
The examples of Chicago-style politics include their delight in public
battles with Rush Limbaugh and Fox News and the U.S. Chamber of
Commerce. (There was also a semi-public campaign of leaks aimed at Greg
Craig, the White House counsel who fell out of favor.) In private, the
Obama team cut an early deal � to the distaste of many congressional
Democrats � that gave favorable terms to the pharmaceutical lobby in
exchange for their backing his health care plans.
The lesson that many Washington insiders have drawn is that Obama wants
to buy off the people he can and bowl over those he can�t. If that
perception spreads beyond Washington this will scuff Obama�s brand as a
new style of political leader.
He�s a pushover
If you are going to be known as a fighter, you might as well reap the
benefits. But some of the same insider circles that are starting to view
Obama as a bully are also starting to whisper that he�s a patsy.
It seems a bit contradictory, to be sure. But it�s a perception that
began when Obama several times laid down lines � then let people cross
them with seeming impunity. Last summer he told Democrats they better
not go home for recess until a critical health care vote but they blew
him off. He told the Israeli government he wanted a freeze in
settlements but no one took him seriously. Even Fox News � which his
aides prominently said should not be treated like a real news
organization � then got interview time for its White House correspondent.
In truth, most of these episodes do not amount to much. But this
unflattering storyline would take a more serious turn if Obama is seen
as unable to deliver on his stern warnings in the escalating conflict
with Iran over its nuclear program.
He sees America as another pleasant country on the U.N. roll call,
somewhere between Albania and Zimbabwe
That line belonged to George H.W. Bush, excoriating Democrat Michael
Dukakis in 1988. But it highlights a continuing reality: In presidential
politics the safe ground has always been to be an American exceptionalist.
Politicians of both parties have embraced the idea that this country �
because of its power and/or the hand of Providence � should be a
singular force in the world. It would be hugely unwelcome for Obama if
the perception took root that he is comfortable with a relative decline
in U.S. influence or position in the world.
On this score, the reviews of Obama�s recent Asia trip were harsh.
His peculiar bow to the emperor of Japan was symbolic. But his
lots-of-velvet, not-much-iron approach to China had substantive
implications.
On the left, the budding storyline is that Obama has retreated from
human rights in the name of cynical realism. On the right, it is that he
is more interested in being President of the World than President of the
United States, a critique that will be heard more in December as he
stops in Oslo to pick up his Nobel Prize and then in Copenhagen for an
international summit on curbing greenhouse gases.
President Pelosi
No figure in Barack Obama�s Washington, including Obama, has had more
success in advancing his will than the speaker of the House, despite
public approval ratings that hover in the range of Dick Cheney�s. With a
mix of tough party discipline and shrewd vote-counting, she passed a
version of the stimulus bill largely written by congressional Democrats,
passed climate legislation, and passed her chamber�s version of health
care reform. She and anti-war liberals in her caucus are clearly
affecting the White House�s Afghanistan calculations.
The great hazard for Obama is if Republicans or journalists conclude �
as some already have � that Pelosi�s achievements are more impressive
than Obama�s or come at his expense.
This conclusion seems premature, especially with the final chapter of
the health care drama yet to be written.
But it is clear that Obama has allowed the speaker to become more nearly
an equal � and far from a subordinate � than many of his predecessors of
both parties would have thought wise.
He�s in love with the man in the mirror
No one becomes president without a fair share of what the French call
amour propre. Does Obama have more than his share of self-regard?
It�s a common theme of Washington buzz that Obama is over-exposed. He
gives interviews on his sports obsessions to ESPN, cracks wise with Leno
and Letterman, discusses his fitness with Men�s Health, discusses his
marriage in a joint interview with first lady Michelle Obama for The New
York Times. A photo the other day caught him leaving the White House
clutching a copy of GQ featuring himself.
White House aides say making Obama widely available is the right
strategy for communicating with Americans in an era of highly fragmented
media.
But, as the novelty of a new president wears off, the Obama cult of
personality risks coming off as mere vanity unless it is harnessed to
tangible achievements.
That is why the next couple of months � with health care and Afghanistan
jostling at center stage � will likely carry a long echo. Obama�s best
hope of nipping bad storylines is to replace them with good ones rooted
in public perceptions of his effectiveness.
Harry Dope
Phlip
> Obamaturd is the real con artist
Are you really so braindead you didn't notice that inference in the second sentence?
Don Albasani
"Harry Dope" <ret...@nc.rr.com> wrote in message
news:c2862d4e-6483-4f9b...@s31g2000yqs.googlegroups.com...
> Obamaturd is the real con artist
Well, I wrote Bush and begged him to ship your punk-@ss off to war
....Unfortunately the Generals wrote back refusing to take you, citing they
already had enough terrorists to deal with in the middle east.