The criticisms voiced by many of us during President Obama’s first year in office are finally beginning to register with the general public. Here’s an observation I made on December 14, 2009:
As we approach the conclusion of Obama’s first year in the White House, it has become apparent that the Disappointer-in-Chief has not only alienated the Democratic Party’s liberal base, but he has also let down a demographic he thought he could take for granted: the African-American voters. At this point, Obama has “transcended race” with his ability to dishearten loyal black voters just as deftly as he has chagrined loyal supporters from all ethnic groups.
On June 11 2010, Maureen Dowd gave us some insight as to what it was like on Obama’s campaign plane in 2008:
The press traveling with Obama on the campaign never had a lovey-dovey relationship with him. He treated us with aloof correctness, and occasional spurts of irritation. Like many Democrats, he thinks the press is supposed to be on his side.
The patrician George Bush senior was always gracious with reporters while conveying the sense that what we do for a living was rude.
The former constitutional lawyer now in the White House understands that the press has a role in the democracy. But he is an elitist, too, as well as thin-skinned and controlling. So he ends up regarding scribes as intrusive, conveying a distaste for what he sees as the fundamental unseriousness of a press driven by blog-around-the-clock deadlines.
The voting public is just beginning to digest the sordid facts of the Solyndra scandal. Rest assured that the Republican Party will educate even the most intellectually challenged of those “low information voters” as to every detail of that rotten deal. The timing of the Solyndra exposé couldn’t be worse for Team Obama.
On August 15, the Gallup Organization reported that during the week of August 8-14, Obama’s job approval rating dropped to 40% – the lowest it had been since he assumed office. Another Gallup poll, conducted with USA Today during August 15-18 revealed that, for the first time, a majority of Americans – 53% – blame Obama for the nation’s economic problems. Forty-seven percent still say he is “not much” (27%) or “not at all” (20%) to blame.
A new McClatchy-Marist poll, taken on September 14-15, revealed that Obama’s sinking popularity has placed him just 5 points ahead of non-candidate Sarah Palin (49-44 percent). The Miami Herald noted that the poll results show the President just 2 points ahead of Mitt Romney (46-44):
Overall, the gains among Republicans “speak to Obama’s decline among independents generally, and how the middle is not his right now,” said Lee Miringoff, director of the Marist College Institute for Public Opinion, which conducted the national survey.
“This will require him to find ways to either win back the middle or energize his base in ways that hasn’t happened so far,” Miringoff said.
By a margin of 49 percent to 36 percent, voters said they definitely plan to vote against Obama, according to the poll. Independents by 53 percent to 28 percent said they definitely plan to vote against him.
With that sentiment permeating the electorate a little more than a year before the general election, most Americans think Obama won’t win a second term.
By 52 percent to 38 percent, voters think he’ll lose to the Republican nominee, whoever that is. Even among Democrats, 31 percent think the Republican nominee will win.
The most devastating development for Obama has been the public reaction to Ron Suskind’s new book about the President’s handling of the economy, Confidence Men. Berkeley economics professor, Brad DeLong has been posting and discussing excerpts of the book at his own website, Grasping Reality With Both Hands. On September 19, Professor DeLong posted a passage from Suskind’s book, which revealed Obama’s expressed belief (in November of 2009) that high unemployment was a result of productivity gains in the economy. Both Larry Summers (Chair of the National Economic Council) and Christina Romer (Chair of the Council of Economic Advisers) were shocked and puzzled by Obama’s ignorance on this subject:
“What was driving unemployment was clearly deficient aggregate demand,” Romer said. “We wondered where this could be coming from. We both tried to convince him otherwise. He wouldn’t budge.”
Because of Obama’s willful refusal to heed the advice of his own economic team, our nation’s unemployment problem has persisted at levels of 9% and above (with worse to come). As Ron Suskind remarked in that passage:
The implications were significant. If Obama felt that 10 percent unemployment was the product of sound, productivity-driven decisions by American business, then short-term government measures to spur hiring were not only futile but unwise.
There you have it. Despite the efforts of Obama’s apologists to blame Larry Summers or others on the President’s economic team for persistent unemployment, it wasn’t simply a matter of “the buck stopping” on the President’s desk. Obama himself has been the villain, hypocritically advocating a strategy of “trickle-down economics” – in breach of his campaign promise to do the exact opposite.
Reactions to the foregoing passage from Confidence Men – appearing as comments to Brad DeLong’s September 19 blog entry – provide a taste of how the majority of Obama’s former supporters will react when they learn the truth about this phony politician. Here are a few samples:
moron said…
. . . This disgraceful shill for global capital has destroyed the Democratic party for a generation.
kris said…
The President sure does come across as awfully arrogant, dogmatic and not very smart from this excerpt (and as someone who does not like to listen to his advisors- especially the female ones.).
mike said…
Wow. Romer was oh so right. And Obama was oh, so so wrong… What a pathetic display of arrogance and bad leadership. . . .
Th said…
And I was always joking about Obama as the “Manchurian Candidate” from the U of Chicago. Productivity? Really?
Dave said…
I’ve lost any last shred of respect for Mr. O.
Now that Confidence Men and the Solyndra scandal are getting increased publicity, we can expect that large numbers of voters will be losing their “last shred of respect” for Mr. Obama. It’s past time for the Democratic Party to face reality: If they seriously want to retain control of the Executive branch – someone will have to ask Obama to step aside. DNC Chair, Debbie Wasserman-Schultz is obviously not up to this task.