This week I got a great example of campaign satire against Obama forwarded my inbox, titled A PAID POLITICAL ANNOUNCEMENT.
It starts by including Hussein in Barack's name, which spawned the question from the sender, "Is he Muslim?" What a great question. I answered it like so:
Obama's a practicing Christian who has a Muslim parent. It's like being a baptized kid, who goes to church and has communion every Sunday, and who has a Jewish mother and a Mormon father. What religion is the kid? Many Jews would say the kid is a Jew. Many Mormons would say the kid is Mormon. Most Christians would say the kid is Christian. So what's the answer to the question? And is the answer a good thing or a liability for the kid? It depends.
Obama's a practicing Christian who has a Muslim parent.
It's like being a baptized kid, who goes to church and has communion every Sunday, and who has a Jewish mother and a Mormon father. What religion is the kid?
Many Jews would say the kid is a Jew. Many Mormons would say the kid is Mormon. Most Christians would say the kid is Christian. So what's the answer to the question? And is the answer a good thing or a liability for the kid? It depends.
How wonderful that this piece of political satire should lead to that kind of question! I'm not particularly fond of forwarded e-mails, but I love them when they spark a dialog.
The satire has some of the old attack about lack of legislative achievement . It also has the relatively new attack that tries to downplay the charismatic effect.
IMHO, you cannot completely discount charisma. If charisma and popularity didn't matter to a President, then why do the press go on and on about presidential popularity polls? Are those meaningless too? Maybe.
But look at Reagan, and Schwartzenegger, and Bush -- all incredibly popular at points in their careers. Reagan still carries that mantle, as does Arnold, and even Bush in some circles. All of them have been able to cash in on some of their charisma to help other people get elected, and to get popular support for their agendas, which can translate into popular pressure on the other elected officials. The popularity account can be overdrawn, but it is a real asset for a politician.
The crowd responses that Obama uses so effectively in his big rallies (which are very different, I've read, from the smaller encounters) serve to unite and ignite that popular electorate that would be a real asset in the White House. It makes sense for his opponents to try to turn this asset into a liability, much as Hillary's opponents try to turn her seriousness and professionalism into coldness and unlikeability.
Hillary is even using this kind of flip side in her campaign now, saying that her lack of success against Republicans in Washington, her three-year unsuccessful fight for health-care, gives her experience, helps her to "know what she's up against". I refer to the example for Obama's success with the videos of police questioning in the Illinois legislature, so I don't buy Hillary's line.
I also found it really funny that the author of this political satire is portraying Obama as shallow. But that's the rub. Taking very black and white stands in a world that is shades of gray IS shallow, and only serves to polarize. Those of us that support Obama are tired of the polarization. We see it as an immobilizer for governments. If you want to talk about rhetoric, look at all the lovely rot we hear about "working together" at the start of every congressional term, that vanishes quick as a flash -- right after the commercials. But if you read Audacity of Hope, you'll see that it isn't just sound-bite rhetoric. It's who he is.
And it gets even funnier when you consider that among the first Obama supporter camps (according to the press) were the well-educated Democrats -- ones who probably read Audacity of Hope. Yeah, we like Obama because we're shallow!
These political e-mails are fun to read, and to pick apart. It reminds of how much I enjoyed literary analysis in school. Between e-mails like these and listening to NPR during my commute, it's lining to be a really entertaining campaign.
/sfm
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