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Hope-A-Dope

by Jon Henke | July 8, 2008 at 12:40 PM
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Bob Herbert is shocked - shocked - to realize that a Senator and candidate for US President may just be a....politician.

Back in January ... there was a wide and growing belief — encouraged to the max by the candidate — that something new in American politics had arrived. [...] ...Barack Obama went out of his way to create the impression that he was a new kind of political leader — more honest, less cynical and less relentlessly calculating than most. [...]  This is why so many of Senator Obama’s strongest supporters are uneasy, upset, dismayed and even angry at the candidate who is now emerging in the bright light of summer. [...]

But Senator Obama is not just tacking gently toward the center. He’s lurching right when it suits him, and he’s zigging with the kind of reckless abandon that’s guaranteed to cause disillusion, if not whiplash. ...  He seems to believe that his shifts and twists and clever panders — as opposed to bold, principled leadership on important matters — will entice large numbers of independent and conservative voters to climb off the fence and run into his yard.

Ed Morrissey says "the disillusionment is clear."   Tom Bevan says Bob Herbert and Rich Lowry agree on this point .  For Obama, this is a "warning sign that you are in danger of damaging your brand and losing support among some portions of the electorate."

Unfortunately, we're having the wrong argument.

The fundamental problem is not the character of the politicians, but the nature of the system.  We have an electoral and political system that incentivizes bad behavior from politicians.  Barack Obama is not immune to this political culture. 

The fundamental question that the Right needs to address is how to fix (or ameliorate) the perverse incentives in our political culture.  Esoteric and subjective questions about which candidate is the "better man" do not, ultimately, help us to resolve the underlying problem.

Meanwhile, Barack Obama is just playing Hope-A-Dope with the electorate, promising a shiny new leader to replace the soiled leaders of the past.  Unfortunately, he doesn't appear to be doing much about the muck in which they all fight. 

We already know how that story ends.

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Comments

It's gotta be bad

Submitted by Keith_Indy on Tue, 07/08/2008 - 13:45.

It's gotta be bad if it's being noticed in an editorial in the New Yawk Times.

I think McCain's new ad says it briliantly.

"Don’t “hope” for a better life. Vote for one. McCain."

Everybody knows...well...now they do, anyway.

Submitted by GOP_Rebel on Tue, 07/08/2008 - 15:39.

This Week (actually Last Week) on George Stephanopoulos, Katrina "If the Republicans Were Dog Food We'd Have to Take Them Off the Shelf" Vanden Heuvel said "I'm shocked, …shocked that Obama has turned to the center."

To say the tone of desperation and rage is palpable over at The Nation wouldn't do justice to the words desperation and rage. There's also heartbreak and the unmistakable sound of therapists being speed-dialed...

Here is where the analogy must break down. In politics we all know that the game is so often rigged just like boxing and horse racing, but in this case I put the blame for our disappointment firmly with the horse. How could he so callously raise our hopes, and then so unceremoniously dash them as soon as the nomination was his?

If Barack Obama can't find it in himself to do the right thing and stand up for a progressive –and popular--agenda, then we need to do the right thing and vote for Ralph Nader.

Don't fear the election of John McCain, fear instead the machinery that would have us all in shackles with our noses buried in slop-filled troughs of fattening propaganda.  Should we vote for Obama? As a former Marine First Sergeant of mine was fond of saying, "Not only no, but f*** no!"

This is fairly typical:

Dear Senator Obama, I want to believe, but I find your support for this "compromise" FISA bill very troubling. I don't see how it doesn't give the Bush criminals and their telecom co-conspirators cover for their illegal anti-constitutional activities. I don't see how this bill slows them down at all in their collection of every piece of information on every single American.

I know there is political wisdom in running to the center and I know that you are extremely clever, but I think you may be miscalculating here. The bottom line is, what you've said on this issue has not persuaded me that the Peoples' interests are at the heart of this decision you've made. I urge you to reconsider your vote tomorrow. Energy and excitement and belief in the change that you represent have been the fuels for your remarkable candidacy. If you cave to telecoms here, what's to keep us from believing that you'll cave to Big Oil and Big Pharma and Big Money and other special interests as president. That energy and excitement and belief has already begun to dissipate. It is harder today than it was three weeks ago to speak confidently about why I support you.

Here's-a nice-a bone for you Republican doggies:

If Obama is not careful, he risks not only losing his race but lowering Democratic turnout, which could otherwise result in a nationwide top to bottom sweep for the donkeys.

My heart so went out to these tragic figures that I knew there was only one way to do justice to their achey breaky hearts:  the fabulous Johnette Napolitano singing Leonard Cohen's paean to irony ~ Everybody Knows:

Everybody knows that the dice are loaded
Everybody rolls with their fingers crossed
Everybody knows that the war is over
Everybody knows that the good guys lost
Everybody knows the fight is fixed
The poor stay poor and the rich get rich
Thats how it goes
Everybody knows that the boat is sinking
Everybody knows that the captain lied
Everybodys got this broken feeling
Like their momma or there dog just died
Everybodys hands are in their pockets
Everybody wants a box of chocolates
And a long stem rose
Everybody knows...