It had to happen sooner or later. Once the emptiness of Obama’s “Hope and Change” campaign was realized by the voters, the Democratic candidate for president had precious little substance to fall back on.
Political attacks only resonate if the voter perceives a kernel of truth in them. And the way John McCain has been pounding away at Obama’s non-existent plans for what exactly he would like to accomplish as president, it was bound to have an effect on the polls.
It has.
Abandoning all pretense of being a candidate who can unite the country by reaching across the aisle to Republicans and reforming Washington, Obama has dramatically shifted his campaign rhetoric to the Bill Clinton strategy of telling voters “I feel your pain:”
Barack Obama sounds more like a man trying to shake a rain cloud these days, dispensing a teeth-clenching, I-get-your-pain stump speech in town after town that offers only snippets of the unbridled optimism that long permeated his campaign pitch.Beginning in the days before his party’s convention, the inspirational has given way to the traditional: attacks on John McCain, a register of policy prescriptions and partisan language with the sting of a needle.
Over the summer, Obama would often simply say that he and McCain “fundamentally disagree” on key issues. In New Hampshire on Saturday, Obama said the Arizona senator “doesn’t get it. He doesn’t know what is going on your lives. He is out of touch with the American people.”
The poetic defenses of hope, the playful jokes about being a distant relative of Vice President Cheney and the glancing attention to policy have been replaced by an emphasis on economic fears – an issue-by-issue argument of why the American dream is slipping away and the Republican ticket has no plan to rescue it. He furrows his brow, wags his finger and broadcasts exasperation at the idea that a 26-year veteran of Washington is co-opting his mantra of change.
The Obama campaign has even replaced the wistful slogan, “Change We Can Believe In,” with the more imperative “Change We Need.”
This is the sign of a desperate candidate who doesn’t have a clue how to go about regaining the momentum he enjoyed in the early summer. Gone is the messiah who will go to Washington and save us from partisanship and race hatred. Gone is The One who’s campaign once promised to transcend politics and enter the realm of a crusade.
Now the brawling, Chicago trained street fighter is emerging – and it isn’t pretty. One wonders how his younger, more naive fans are taking this switch. I would have to say that based on history, many of them will become disillusioned and could stay at home on election day – as their older brothers and sisters and even their parents did when they were young and impressionable and had their eyes opened about politics and politicians.
One group this change won’t affect is Obama’s African American base who would probably vote for him if he was found to be the devil himself. This part of the equation could still make the difference in some blue state races in Michigan and Pennsylvania (among other states) where large African American populations in Detroit and Philadelphia respectively could supply Obama with the margin of victory in very tight races.
But the millions of new voters who answered Obama’s call and saw him as a different kind of politician will, unless they are completely unaware of what is going on in the campaign, have second thoughts about this new version of Obama. This is the Machine pol who kicked his challengers off the ballot in his first state senate race by challenging their signature petitions. This is the “reformer” who walked into Illinois senate leader Emil Jones’ office and made a deal with the devil in order to have some kind of legislative record to run on for his US senate bid. And this is the Obama who threw the Chicago reformers under the bus by endorsing some of the worst Machine candidates at the expense of those running on a “hope and change” platform. All of these critiques will now resonate with voters.
That’s why Obama’s new strategy is so risky. Cynically, he is banking on the economy getting so bad that the voter will respond to his Clintonesque class warfare claims which will allow him to barely squeak out a win in November. He apparently feels that’s all he’s got left.
One thing is certain, however; Obama has totally abandoned all that made him different and exciting to so many voters and now appears to be just another Democratic politician.
This blog post originally appears in The American Thinker
UPDATE
As usual, Ed Morrissey and I are on the same page this morning:
Obama has had to turn back towards his base rather than make a play for independents and centrists. The base has begun to get dispirited, if not outright mutinous, and Obama needs an enthusiastic effort to win battleground states. Instead, he’s begun to fade in formerly safe states like Minnesota and New York, and Pennsylvania and Michigan may have already slipped through his fingers.
Make no mistake about it. Obama may claim this as going on the offensive, but this is a purely defensive move that ignores his one major theme: being different enough to transcend partisanship. John McCain has pushed him out of his comfort zone and forced him to play this election by McCain’s rules, and apparently he isn’t adept enough to figure that out for himself.
12:37 pm
Don’t forget our Bet Rick.
Actually, want to change the terms. After McCain is elected, I want to write a front page post explaining how I knew it all along. I will be owed that pat on the back – I’ve been saying this for over a year now.
12:53 pm
Why McCain is a bad idea for everyone:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0u-lvizDuL0
1:01 pm
Buzz, if McCain is such a bad idea for everyone, why don’t you tell us what the other candidate has done that proves he is effective. Just one example of accompolishment that benefits any group that is not his voting base.
1:10 pm
“Cynically, he is banking on the economy getting so bad that the voter will respond to his Clintonesque class warfare claims which will allow him to barely squeak out a win in November.”
Right on. No idea why a message about the economy would resonate with voters.
Big Banking Got Its Wish: no gov’t oversight, no regulations, tax cuts and a pro-corporation president. How’s that working out for you, America?
1:33 pm
[...] Rick Moran answers the question of why HopeAndChange appears under the wheels of the Obamination Express. [...]
2:11 pm
Obama still has hope – the HOPE that his past associations and transgressions don’t catch up to him before the election, HOPE that he will win the election (not gonna happen) or he’ll have to CHANGE into a prison orange suit – which is not a look that works for anyone!
When a candidacy is so mean-spirited that it makes fun of a war hero opponent whose injuries are the REASON he cannot type and use computers, then it is morally bankrupt and doomed to abject failure.
Welcome to your new reality Senator Obama.
2:21 pm
The election is close so it is going to get ugly. However, the one reason that I as a conservative would consider voting for Obama is that I really want the neocons and their concept of “nation building” go to hell. All this change mantra on both sides is obviously nonsense. However, I finally did see Sarah Palin’s interview on U-tube. That really is a shame, I mean what a bimbo. Doesn’t know anything about Georgia and Russia (as we all know Georgia first attacked) but she appears to be ready to defend a ‘NATO ally’. Sure Russia provoked Georgia but it sure wasn’t an ‘unprovoked’ invasion by Russia. I’m not sure I’m going to vote but not for that ticket!! Where have conservative values gone? Aren’t you guys ashamed at with all the conservative thinkers and experts on our side we come up with someone like her. We rightfully accuse Obama of empty phrases but then…enough venting
2:26 pm
I don’t believe that most of the voters Obama hoodwinked with his “I’m a new kind of politician” spiel will turn against him – or even become disillusioned – because they will not allow themselves to see him in this light or never have the opportunity to (the MSM hasn’t spent as much time vetting Obama as it has smearing Palin the last 2 weeks).
Even the Obama supporters who post here can’t even defend him – they just attack McCain. Which is fine – but it shows a complete lack of confidence in Obama.
And Chuck Tuscon – cries of ‘the economy is in the crapper because it’s not regulated heavily enough’ won’t resonate with conservatives. If these financial institutions were allowed to fail in a free market the problem regulation is meant to solve solves itself. So, either Bush is pro-corporation as you claim instead of being pro-free-market or perhaps Bush realizes it’s politically expedient to use the government to put these short term patches on the economy…I think any Democrat would do the same.
2:57 pm
Bald Ninja,
“cries of ‘the economy is in the crapper because it’s not regulated heavily enough’ won’t resonate with conservatives. ”
It’s not meant to. The truth rarely does. Plus, I don’t care. As an independent, I don’t need (so called) conservatives, they need me. Figuratively. And for the record, here is a huge difference between heavily regulated, and intelligently regulated. I favor the latter. Intelligently regulated capitalism would be the greatest system on earth.
“If these financial institutions were allowed to fail in a free market the problem regulation is meant to solve solves itself.”
Dizzying logic, to be sure.
“So, either Bush is pro-corporation as you claim instead of being pro-free-market”
I don’t see the difference, if you’re talking about a truly free market. All I want is an intelligently regulated market. When the people writing the legislation to regulate the market are the same people who would profit from said legislation, the “intelligent” part of the equation is lost. Well, unless you’re one of them.
” or perhaps Bush realizes it’s politically expedient to use the government to put these short term patches on the economy”
Sure, why not, I love the idea of my tax dollars being used to bale out corporate sided legislative failure. Hell, if I had any equity left in my home, I’d take out a loan and mail the money to Washington as a thank you.
Again, intelligently and fairly regulated capitalism would be pretty sweet. I’m not so much of fan of this new corporate socialism.
4:01 pm
But the millions of new voters who answered Obama’s call and saw him as a different kind of politician will, unless they are completely unaware of what is going on in the campaign, have second thoughts about this new version of Obama.
One of the funnier things you’ve written, Rick.
The Right invents a caricature of Obama, decides that he’s moved away from that caricature, and now we’ll have no alternative but to go rushing into the arms of the candidate you still can’t bring yourself to say a kind word about?
McCain’s got nothing. Zero. Nada. As evidenced by the fact that you folks on the Right spend 99% of your time attacking Obama, and 1% touting your candidate. And that only in glancing references in peans to Palin.
Yeah, now that Obama is adjusting his campaign message we’ll have to shift to the 72 year old mudslinger who picked an ignoramus for his running mate. Let the stampede begin.
5:17 pm
i know it doesn’t pertain to this, but i am just fired up over Rangel not even being chided for his “lack of good accounting practices”, a friggin felon many times over and he is going to still be in charge of ways and means, what a hypocrisy they are leading, yeah Craig touched someones shoe in the loo and Foley liked boys that were alas of age (hmmm, what about mr. frank?). WTF!! I hate the MSM…......
8:32 pm
If you think for one second the republicans and McCain and Palin are what is good for this country….you are really not very bright. It’s ok to be loyal to your party, but if you can’t see the writing on the wall here, you’re blind. McCain has no plan and Palin…well, she’s just not very bright. She didn’t even know what the Bush doctrine is, nor will the big bad lady with a gun address the press….because she knows better. Please….admit it when you’re party is WRONG!
8:58 pm
Yeah, Obama’s a “new kind of Politician.” Please. A politician from the Chicago democrat machine (that alone should preclude him from any serious considerations) who is the most strident ideologue on the left side of the aisle. That’s really change we can believe in. I could hardly wait for the “Winnie the Pooh Doctrine” of foreign policy and the reincarnation of the Carter presidency under the hypothetical Obama presidency….the Misery Index was sweeeet.
And here we go with the lefties with their meme of the day Palin’s not very bright. Of course, the left has that towering intellect who is Joe “the plagiarist” Biden as their VP pick. I don’t know know whether to start with his pathological lying, his proclivities for plagiarization, his racist views, or the fact that he’s been on the wrong side of so many winning positions during his ancient term in Congress (boy, another real pick for change and hope).
You lefties keep tearing down Sarah. We love that she has you guys so bound-up you can’t even see straight. Keep pissing and whining Michael and James, it’ll give you guys some consolation as you continue to circle the drain.
10:11 pm
“funnyman” writes “The election is close so it is going to get ugly. However, the one reason that I as a conservative would consider voting for Obama is that I really want the neocons and their concept of “nation building” go to hell. All this change mantra on both sides is obviously nonsense. However, I finally did see Sarah Palin’s interview on U-tube. That really is a shame, I mean what a bimbo. Doesn’t know anything about Georgia and Russia (as we all know Georgia first attacked) but she appears to be ready to defend a ‘NATO ally’. Sure Russia provoked Georgia but it sure wasn’t an ‘unprovoked’ invasion by Russia. I’m not sure I’m going to vote but not for that ticket!! Where have conservative values gone? Aren’t you guys ashamed at with all the conservative thinkers and experts on our side we come up with someone like her. We rightfully accuse Obama of empty phrases but then…enough venting”
At least your title is apt. Anyone who claims to be a conservative but would vote for a Marxist is a liar. Most likely one of Obama’s sock puppets spreading this lie across the land.
At least your comment was good for a chuckle.
11:14 pm
“Big Banking Got Its Wish: no gov’t oversight, no regulations, tax cuts and a pro-corporation president. How’s that working out for you, America?”
Are you really that clueless?!? The Fed, FDIC, SEC, Sarbanes-Oxley, Community Reinvestment Act, millions for ACORN, Govt bailout of Fannie Mae, the bear Stearns govt backstop, and the Fed manipulating money supply … meanwhile govt writing people checks to stimulate the economy supposedly. no regulations?!?
Everyone got drunk at the punchbowl. Govt most of all.
hindsight is 20/20, but let’s not be so stupid as to not recognize tomorrow’s problem NOW:
The #1 RISK TO THE ECONOMY TODAY IS THE IMPENDING END OF THE BUSH TAX CUTS.
We should demand the Congress save the economy NOW by passing a bill to make tax cuts permanent. If they cant do that they deserve to be defeated.
11:19 pm
“I finally did see Sarah Palin’s interview on U-tube.”
No, you didnt. Your distortions of that interview are beyond absurd, as is your silly claim that Georgia first attacked. You apparently can see through liberal media bias but not Pravda/Russia PR stunts and lies
?
you are only fooling yourself.
“I’m not sure I’m going to vote but not for that ticket!” – Yeah right, she state basic 50 year old NATO policy and you wont vote for her over it. How very trollish of you
“! Where have conservative values gone?” Truth is a conservative value. Try it.
“Aren’t you guys ashamed at with all the conservative thinkers and experts on our side we come up with someone like her.” Governor Sarah Palin as VP will do just fine hiring the best conservative thinkers and experts to advise her. Sheeesh!
11:24 pm
Retort to #9:
Obama’s got nothing. Zero. Nada. As evidenced by the fact that you folks on the Left spend 99% of your time attacking McCain / Palin, and 1% touting your candidate.
Of course any touting is such laughable hype, it’s understandable that you are reduced to negative mudslinging. All the claims that McCain is doing so is .. projection.
11:25 pm
#11: “She didn’t even know what the Bush doctrine is”
And you do?!? Come on tell us what it is?
Or are you going to screw it up and get it wrong like Charlie Gibson did (the tool!)?
Get schooled. Read Krauthammer. Palin got it more right than Gibson.
11:56 pm
Rick,
Everything you wrote I agree with. Obama has certainly had to change his message and get in the dirt and brawl with McCain more than he hoped.
Even still, Obama’s flip flops are relatively minor in comparison to McCain’s incredulous number of panderings to the hardcore wing of the republican party he used to despise.
Is it your sense of duty as a right wing blogger to not speak of McCain’s numerous panderings, factual lies, or reckless streak?
12:23 am
To Antimedia:
why don’t you try the “American Conservative”. You are probably one of these dimwitted Ann Coulter conservatives who trashes anyone who doesn’t stay ‘on message’. Let me take that back, Ann Coulter wanted to support Hillary…
which makes her? Never mind.
IMHO neocons hijacked the conservative movements, many of them former marxists btw. However, for you to have discussion about these issues is probably close to treason. Why don’t you tell me what a marxist and what a conservative is before you throw these terms around. I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt that you are smarter than our Sarah.
Travis Monitor:
so an army of ghosts marched into South Ossetia? Do you want to tell me that the American Conservative is also a ruthless liberal plot with Pat Buchanan at the helm?
4:47 am
Tuesday links…
VDH on Obamamania – the insane kindMoonbattery on Sarah Palin:...she is the Anti-Obama: not some slick package disguising a bogus ideology, but a real person. The reason establishment journalists in their condescending phoniness hate her with such sput…
9:20 am
Travis Monitor Said: 11:19 pm
“... as is your silly claim that Georgia first attacked. You apparently can see through liberal media bias but not Pravda/Russia PR stunts and lies?”
I’ve done a great deal of homework on this one. You might want to do the same.
1:18 pm
The Thunder Run has linked to this post in the – Web Reconnaissance for 09/16/2008 A short recon of what’s out there that might draw your attention, updated throughout the day…so check back often.
4:46 pm
this pretty much sums up my misgivings about Palin:
http://www.amconmag.com/blog/2008/09/12/non-te-amo-sabide/
11:59 pm
“... as is your silly claim that Georgia first attacked. You apparently can see through liberal media bias but not Pravda/Russia PR stunts and lies?”
I’ve done a great deal of homework on this one. You might want to do the same.”
I guess your homework hasn’t extended to learning that the Georgia Govt has recorded radio and telephone messages proving that the Russians set this whole thing up and had moved armor prior to the hostilities. Also, the timeline proves the Russians were preparing this for weeks prior. You dont suddenly have two divisions in a foreign country within 2 hours of a miniscule firing of a few artillery shells and call it self-defense.
http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2008/9/17/worldupdates/2008-09-16T235753Z_01_NOOTR_RTRMDNC_0_-355061-1&sec=Worldupdates
Georgia produced telephone intercepts on Tuesday it said proved Russian armour entered Georgia hours before the start of a Georgian attack that Moscow said forced it to send in its troops.
12:05 am
“so an army of ghosts marched into South Ossetia?”
The only people marching were Russian. And Russia’s version of events is about as convincing as Hilter’s claim that Poland attacked Germany on Sept 1939.
South Ossetia ‘leaders’ spent most of their time in Moscow. And they have a strange reluctance for real independence…
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2079843/posts
I thought paleo-cons were at least smart in their cynicism, and not dumb fools for the KGB/Putin/Pravda propoganda machine.
8:57 am
Chuck,
The subprime mortgage mess we find ourselves in is because of the regulatory policies of the Clinton administration that Bush was unable to get Congress to change.
I wonder how independent you really are with your obvious disdain for conservatives and our worldview. Maybe you have just as much disdain for liberals and that makes you independent?
As for the difference between pro-corporation and pro-freemarket: bailing out failed companies is ‘pro-corporation’, letting the incompetent die is pro-freemarket. I am also not a fan of corporate socialism as you aptly call it – but neither do I believe that intelligent regulation is the gold-standard we should be striving for. As long as government has a heavy hand in regulation it will always decay towards less intelligent regulation. There’s too many idiots and socialists in government for it not to.
4:43 pm
Travis Monitor:
why don’t you lay off calling people idiots just because they have a different take on things than you. If I want left or right wing morons screaming incoherent nonsense I have plenty of sites to choose from. However, I come here for discussions not shouting matches.
Now to the point of Russia and other things. Russia has had imperialistic ambitions ever since it grew out of tiny Viking settlements on the Volga hundreds of years ago.
In this case they wanted to show who is boss in that region and of course waited or the wrong move by the Georgians (which they did). Can’t really imagine you really believe there were no Georgian soldiers on the move.
Anyway, for some reading that I pretty much agree with here is some for interested parties.
http://www.amconmag.com/article/2008/sep/22/00006/
5:06 pm
Bald Ninja,
“The subprime mortgage mess we find ourselves in is because of the regulatory policies of the Clinton administration that Bush was unable to get Congress to change.”
I’m sorry, but I don’t believe one word of that. Congress gave Bush everything he wanted except Harriet Miers. You’re telling me that George Bush predicted this, tried to change it, and his own Republican congress denied him? I have read absolutely nothing to that effect.
“I wonder how independent you really are with your obvious disdain for conservatives and our worldview. Maybe you have just as much disdain for liberals and that makes you independent?”
Sometimes I have a hard time articulating my feelings about conservatism. To me, conservatism means: healthy distrust of government, sound fiscal responsibility, strong belief in liberty, property rights, and staunch privacy advocates. It is limited government that serves the people as best it can.
So called conservatives have had nearly complete and total domination of the United States government for eight years. Your so called worldview isn’t exactly what I’ve seen. Quite the opposite really.
The past eight years have taught me that my view of conservatism is about as opposite as you can get to what the Republicans have given us.
When the Republican party does not act conservative, it’s members tend to say, “I’m a conservative, I don’t know why they’re spending so much money, etc.” I can’t stand that. If you’re a Republican, then you’re supposed to be a conservative. Act like it.
I view government regulation of business like I view building codes. Almost every rule in building code is there, literally, because someone died or lost everything when it wasn’t. The codes are there to prevent loss of life and money. For the most part, the codes are not unreasonable. They make sense, and following the codes will give you a structure that you can make reasonable assumptions about and expect that it will not fail. Note, I said reasonable, not stupid.
I think that business should be regulated in the same reasonable and intelligent way. When it becomes possible to gain a sales commission on a loan you have no stake in, a loan that basically requires only a signature and a smile from the borrower to get approval – then you’re screwed.
To me, it is unreasonable to blame the Democrats for this. Nor do I blame Republicans for that matter. I believe that greed is fairly non partisan. I could be wrong though.
9:17 pm
funnyman writes this “why don’t you lay off calling people idiots just because they have a different take on things than you. If I want left or right wing morons screaming incoherent nonsense I have plenty of sites to choose from. However, I come here for discussions not shouting matches.” shortly after he writes this “To Antimedia:
why don’t you try the “American Conservative”. You are probably one of these dimwitted Ann Coulter conservatives who trashes anyone who doesn’t stay ‘on message’.”
Yeah, you convinced me you’re interested in intelligent discussion.
This may come as a shock to you, but I’m not a conservative, I don’t listen to Rush, Hannity, et. al., I think Bill O’Reilly is an obnoxious jerk, and Ann Coulter is deliberately provocative because she knows she gets under liberals’ skins. (I’ve also never heard her speak nor have I read anything that she’s written.)
More to the point, however, you wrote “I finally did see Sarah Palin’s interview on U-tube. That really is a shame, I mean what a bimbo. Doesn’t know anything about Georgia and Russia (as we all know Georgia first attacked) but she appears to be ready to defend a ‘NATO ally’.”
First, the claim that Sarah Palin is a “bimbo” can only have come from a liberal. It’s purely a liberal talking point promulgated by Andrew Sullivan and Daily Kos and Huffington Post and other slime holes like them. For you to repeat the claim belies your fraudulent claim to being a conservative.
Second, you display a profound ignorance by stating “she appears to be ready to defend a ‘NATO ally’.” First of all, the NATO treaty obligates the US to defend the member states of NATO when called upon. (Although the behavior of NATO allies in Afghanistan strains the terms of the treaty excessively.) Secondly, the member states of NATO are often called ‘NATO allies’, but your derisive use of the term (characterized by the scare quotes) is another liberal talking point. Ooow, she called them allies. She doesn’t realize they’re members.
Finally, the use of the phrase “as we all now” belies a certainty about events that typically comes from a liberal mouth these days. “As we all know, the Swiftboat vets were proven wrong.” “As we all know, McCain’s ad about sex education is a lie.” Of course, we don’t all know that, and some of us have actually looked at the facts and concluded the opposite.
The least you can do, if you’re going to lie, is not be so transparent about it. And yes, I AM accusing you of being a liar. And a liberal sock puppet as well.
11:42 pm
Antimedia:
don’t expect me not to respond when someone calls me a liar. That’s why I said the things about you (you still didn’t answer my request regarding ‘conservative’ and ‘marxist’; smile). Seems to me you are a bit paranoid these days. Still think Palin is a bimbo cause she doesn’t know anything about foreign policy. Wtf is liberal about that, that is just obvious. Defending Georgia is just not in our national interest and that in my opinion is ‘conservative’ foreign policy. If you beg to differ that’s fine just don’t bore me with what and what does not come across as liberal talking points. I also have a day job and family so I just don’t have the time to visit a gazillion web pages.
12:13 pm