Why Obama?

A Potential Second Obama Term, Ctd.

A friend of the blog writes:

O’s second term? It reminds me of the old joke about the hunter who makes his way up a tree and finds a rather angry cougar awaiting him. He tells his buddy below who can’t get a clear shot on the beast: “Shoot up amongst us! One of us has got to get some relief!”Obama doesn’t make me mad or scared the way the far-out-there’s do. Instead, the prospect of a second Obama Administration seems frighteningly boring. Reasonable people disagree about where the GOP’s unwillingness to play ball with the President was on the spectrum between rank partisan obstructionism and standing athwart history, yelling “Stop!”

Still, Tip O’Neal and Dan Rostenkowski had to come around to Reagan’s Way when the Great Communicator got the American people on his side. Obama wasn’t able to do that and got “shellacked” a whole 24 months after captivating a nation without any real political, business, or military experience.

Politicians are measured by what they get done, and once Barry lost the Democratic enclave that was the House, he’s been treading water.

It seems that to be a successful Democrat, you have to have some combination of the luck and talent a Clinton has, or the mercilessness FDR and LBJ had to beat your opposition to death with every tool you’ve got. Obama’s no Clinton—e.g., Obama’s convention speech was stunningly, boringly milquetoast. And while he doesn’t have to engage in LBJ-style legislative arm-twisting, he could have at least shown some stones by tenaciously prepping for the debate and then ripping into Romney’s soft underbelly of taxes, the “47%,” offshore bank accounts, Romneycare, the Ryan Budget, and the fact that Romney’s political career has had more waffles than an IHOP. (And for fuck’s sake, can you please look a man in the eye?)

I’m not sure I can take four more years of less-effective-by-the-day presidential speechifying followed by gridlocked congressional opposition. Part of me hopes that if Barry wins, they run the table and win the House and super-majority in the Senate back. If not, I’m a Romney/GOP man through-and-through.

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David Frum

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