Sunday, January 15, 2012

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From conservative writer John Kass:

President Barack Obama will win re-election in 2012.

The reason he'll win?

He knows who he is. And the Republican politicians don't know who they are. They've forgotten what they're about, or perhaps like some isolated tribe, they've lost the language necessary to explain it to themselves.

Their voters know this and don't really believe them anymore.

And that's why Obama will win.

Check out my friend Denise Oliver Velez's article today titled Pro-LGBT Latina ambassador Mari Carmen Aponte gets "DeMinted" for doing her job.

And two things to watch for tomorrow:

First of all, Attorney General Eric Holder will step into the heart of the fire.

Attorney General Eric Holder plans to deliver a speech on voting rights on Monday at a Martin Luther King holiday rally in South Carolina, a state where just weeks ago his Justice Department blocked a new voter identification law.

Secondly, this hits news stands tomorrow.



Here's a tease from Politico about the cover story.

[I]t remains simply a fact that Obama has delivered in a way that the unhinged right and purist left have yet to understand or absorb. Their short-term outbursts have missed Obama’s long game … [T]he president begins by extending a hand to his opponents; when they respond by raising a fist, he demonstrates that they are the source of the problem; then, finally, he moves to his preferred position of moderate liberalism and fights for it without being effectively tarred as an ideologue or a divider. This kind of strategy takes time. And it means there are long stretches when Obama seems incapable of defending himself, or willing to let others to define him, or simply weak. I remember those stretches during the campaign against Hillary Clinton. I also remember whose strategy won out in the end.

10 comments:

  1. I disagree that Republicans don't know who they are. They know who they are. Their problem is they can't campaign as who they are, because most Americans don't want the GOP vision.

    So they dance around who they are, trying to deodorize elephant dung. You can't get the stink out of that.

    Good day and good nuts.

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    Replies
    1. I agree. I also think that after decades of lock step goose stepping from the right side of the spectrum, we are finally seeing some cracks forming in their base coalition. The teahadists are at odds with the establishment/corporatist republicans and the talibangelicals are not too thrilled about a mormon as the inevitable corporately anointed nominee. For the first time in their careers republican politicians aren't sure who's butt to kiss for fear of losing one faction or another.

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    2. I agree with you wholeheartedly, BPI!

      For the last 40 years, the GOP has been running a con-game and now their cover has been blown. If they ran on what they really stood for, they would not only repulse the majority of the American public, but many of the rank-and-file members of their own party.

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  2. What an absolutely delicious post this is. Just full of goodness. The President has been seasoned by the challenges he has had to face, but his ideals and vision are as full of hope and heart as they ever were. He chooses where he wants to go and walks that path and he's been incredibly successful.

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  3. One of the things I learned during the campaign in 2008 was that when it came to this President, patience was a virtue. That is, every time someone was running around with their hair on fire about how he was "losing the election!" or he needed to "do something! Now!" a little patience on my part would see him do something when it was the right time to do it. He is a master at timing.

    In the time since then, I've learned to wait a while before reacting to whatever "horrible thing" is supposedly happening, since the actual facts turn out to be not quite what the preliminary hysteria was about.

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  4. 'Wait a while before reacting' definitely became my default mode too for this presidency! And the result, for me personally, has been a calmer (lower blood pressure) me.

    "This is where the left is truly deluded. By misunderstanding Obama’s strategy and temperament and persistence, by grandstanding on one issue after another, by projecting unrealistic fantasies onto a candidate who never pledged a liberal revolution, they have failed to notice that from the very beginning, Obama was playing a long game." A.Sullivan

    It's encouraging to see this increased realization that the President is goal oriented, not attention seeking, and to have Sullivan admit in so many words that he didn't initially realize this. My hope is that more and more voters will wake up BEFORE the elections and the country will give Pres O the next 4 years to get to his goal.

    [ps. SmartyP: I like the new 'New Year' reply format.]

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  5. Moderate liberalism, as understood by today's generation of hagiographers, would have been considered right wing thirty years ago. Obama's preferred position is actually right of center.

    If Sullivan thinks Obama hasn't been tarred as an ideologue, he hasn't been following the news over the length of Obama's administration. The right wing noise machine has the fundagelicals, the libertarians, and most independents believing that Obama is pushing socialism, gun control and anti-Christian policy in general.

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    Replies
    1. This comment is further proof of Sullivan's point. Once again, we have a situation where Obama critics prove their naysayers correct. You are confusing is ultimate political goals with his method of achieving them.

      Obama may be seen as an ideologue to those on the fringes of both left and right, but to the middle, he's not. And even when you talk to those on the fringes, you get conflicting messages about who he is. If you paid more attention at the whole picture and not just focus on who he's viewed on the right, you would see this.

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