Part 1—Last night, Sean Hannity did: Last night, in his State of the Union Address, Barack Obama said the following. We will highlight one anodyne passage—one apparently anodyne passage:
OBAMA (1/24/12): My grandfather, a veteran of Patton's Army, got the chance to go to college on the G.I. Bill. My grandmother, who worked on a bomber assembly line, was part of a workforce that turned out the best products on Earth.(Anodyne: Not likely to provoke dissent or offense; uncontentious or inoffensive, often deliberately so.)
The two of them shared the optimism of a nation that had triumphed over a depression and fascism. They understood they were part of something larger, that they were contributing to a story of success that every American had a chance to share: the basic American promise that if you worked hard, you could do well enough to raise a family, own a home, send your kids to college, and put a little away for retirement.
The defining issue of our time is how to keep that promise alive. No challenge is more urgent. No debate is more important. We can either settle for a country where a shrinking number of people do really well, while a growing number of Americans barely get by, or we can restore an economy where everyone gets a fair shot, and everyone does their fair share, and everyone plays by the same set of rules.
(APPLAUSE)
What's at stake aren't Democratic values or Republican values, but American values. And we have to reclaim them.
Later in his address, Obama authored another anodyne passage—a seemingly anodyne passage:
OBAMA: Let's never forget: Millions of Americans who work hard and play by the rules every day deserve a government and a financial system that do the same. It's time to apply the same rules from top to bottom: no bailouts, no handouts, and no copouts. An America built to last insists on responsibility from everybody.No bailouts, no handouts, no copouts—and everyone plays by the same set of rules! This would seem like anodyne rhetoric—until you ask voters what they heard when Obama presented this prose.
Last night, Sean Hannity asked! With the help of his favorite wordsmith, Frank Luntz, he assembled a group of voters who watched, then discussed, the address. Eventually, these voters were asked what they thought of Obama’s anodyne comments.
We thought their reactions were striking—sobering, daunting, though perhaps unsurprising. But then, so were the statements by the three voters profiled in this front-page piece in Saturday’s Washington Post.
The Post’s Marc Fisher was in the Palmetto State before its recent primary. He profiled three South Carolina voters, one of whom was a Democrat—the vice chairman of his county’s Democratic Party, in fact. There are roughly two hundred million Americans of voting age. What do they see when they look at the world? Quite often, the results are sobering, striking—when someone actually asks.
Let’s be clear: On the simplest statistical basis, three voters in South Carolina can’t constitute a “representative sample” of the wider electorate. Neither can 27 voters assembled by Luntz, even if 15 of these people say they voted for Obama in 2008. But as a liberal world has begun to emerge in the wake of the war in Iraq, we liberals have developed very few forums through which we speak with average voters.
What do average voters think? Funny you should ask!
Tomorrow: The Palmetto State 3
Do you seriously think a group of voters "assembled" by Luntz and presented by Hannity are going to be "average voters"?
ReplyDeleteThat may be why Bob included the following: "Let’s be clear: On the simplest statistical basis, three voters in South Carolina can’t constitute a 'representative sample' of the wider electorate. Neither can 27 voters assembled by Luntz, even if 15 of these people say they voted for Obama in 2008."
DeleteDid Obama say that an attack on Iran is our current course?
ReplyDeleteThat would seem implicit in "a peaceful resolution of this issue is still possible."
"It's not what you say, it's what they hear." - Frank Luntz http://www.amazon.com/Words-That-Work-What-People/dp/1401302599
ReplyDeleteOBAMA: Let's never forget: Millions of Americans who work hard and play by the rules every day deserve a government and a financial system that do the same. It's time to apply the same rules from top to bottom: no bailouts, no handouts, and no copouts. An America built to last insists on responsibility from everybody.
ReplyDeleteI think the point here is that Obama has bailed a lot of people out: the financial sector (yes, Bush put together TARP, but Obama didn't make any major changes to it), the auto industry, etc. I'm not saying that some of these bailouts weren't necessary; the financial sector was on the verge of collapse back in 2008 (the bailout they got wasn't the right one, but they needed something), but his actions cut against what he is saying in his speech. There hasn't been any significant re-regulation of the financial industry, corporations can still largely get their way on Capital Hill as they have in the past, ordinary people have seen government services they rely on diminish while the wealthy continue to stuff themselves, etc. It's hard to see what Obama has done (or is planning to do) that is going to change this situation. He hasn't held anyone accountable for their actions that got us into this mess in the first place.
Shorter hardindr:
DeleteObama's a lotta talk and little substance.
I agree, and would add only that what substance there has been quite often cuts against the grain of the talk. IOW, to stick with your concluding example, Obama not only "hasn't held anyone accountable" -- he has acted affirmatively to ensure there'd be no accountability.
Obama's own twin rhetorical hobbyhorses, Change and Bipartisanship, are both quite dead. Change, it's now clear Obama never embodied. As for Bipartisanship, Obama presided over its funeral, assuring us though that it was really a rodeo -- repeatedly propping up the dead thing and riding it nowhere while we stared in disgust.
All there is left for him is to borrow a very watered-down version of the Occupy (fair play) and Tea Party (no handouts) movements' rhetoric. That, and crossing his fingers that the economy gets better before it gets worse.
[I think it would be quite possible to write or mash-up a speech on the economy that could be delivered by either Obama or the eventual GOP nominee, equally credibly. The key is vague platitudes. But they know that.]
tl,dr: Faith-based politics never dies.
No one could hold the greedy rich accountable under our current system, because everyone in Washington except Bernie Sanders and a few others, a handful of others, are on their payroll.
DeleteDon't you get this? Where have you been? Wake up and smell the coffee! Stop putting it all on Obama or Clinton or anyone else. As awful as they might be at times they put people like Sotomayor on the court or create structures to empower people like Richard Cordray.
If you don't like the system, help change it, but stop trying to dump it all on Obama. He is a symbol of what the system is, but he's far from the worst of what it does to the American people on a daily basis. The grinning phony multimillionaire named Mitt Romney, who pays a lower percentage on his millions than I and every other working sucker I know does on my hard earned wages, is the establishment's trump card.
Put him in and you'll really get a whammy. Remember, W Bush was worse than his father or Reagan or Ford or Nixon, and the next Republican will make George W. Bush look like Teddy Roosevelt. This current crop makes that clear at every single debate. They are salivating over a war with Iran. Obama, as warmongering as he is, at least has the good sense not to rush into that debacle-to-be right now.
I could reply more easily if you had some specific criticism of my comment.
DeleteBut you merely whine.
Speaking of the financial sector collapse and its impact of Americans, I say Obama "has acted affirmatively to ensure there'd be no accountability," which you characterize as "putting it all on Obama," defensively calling him "far from the worst," as though this had anything, any relationship at all, to my point.
Specific criticism of Obama does not "put it all on him."
That sounds as though you don't want to engage on the ground of facts, and I don't blame you -- they aren't on your side.
To go beyond financial matters, and still without "putting it all on Obama," it would indeed be very easy -- too easy -- to enumerate many ways in which he has exceeded George W. Bush's record of abuse of executive powers, restriction of civil liberty, and arbitrary use of violence in foreign policy. In none of these was he bound by the "system" -- they were all affirmative Presidential actions, Obama's actions.
Obama won't attack Iran "right now?" That's your trump card? I think one should allow the possibility that determining the lesser of evils is not nearly so clear cut as you seem to imagine.
Look, I haven't said I'll never vote against Obama's opponent in the general election -- I almost certainly will -- but mischaracterizing criticism of him in the way you do here is really bad form.
I am average and I thought the President was scary on foreign affairs and empty on domestic affairs. The emphasis on militarism makes it impossible for me to ever support him again.
ReplyDeleteYou're an outlier. A post-speech poll showed that it went over very well with Democrats, Independents, and Republicans.
DeleteAlso, Obama is not running to be the president of New England, the Mid-Atlantic, California, Washington, Oregon and Hawaii. To be reelected he must win some purple and red states, like Colorado, Ohio, Virginia, Florida, and Indiana. Last time he won all of these. He also nearly won Missouri. This time he'll be lucky if he can win any of these, though Colorado, Nevada, Florida and Ohio seem likely, as does Arizona.
Don't support him but at least grow up!