I frankly don’t get all the Obamamania. But then, I never got all of the talk about Bill Clinton’s charisma, either. And to be fair, I never understood what the big deal was with Ronald Reagan, the great communicator. I guess I’m more into substance than style. I’m more interested in what people say than in how they say it.
Anyway, given the nature of his career, it’s certainly a legitimate point to question his experience and qualifications as president (ignoring the minimal constitutional requirements of native born and thirty-five years old). His speeches remind me of Gertrude Stein’s comment about Oakland–there’s no there there.
So is there more to it than his speeches? Well, he’s apparently left no paper trail to discern his views on much of anything:
A simple question: Does anyone know whether Obama, while serving on the Harvard Law Review from 1989-91, published anything? The law students on the Review all have the right to publish at least one piece (typically they publish at least their third-year papers, which they have to write anyway), and many publish at least two pieces. It would seem surprising if Obama published nothing at all in the very Review over which, he has so often boasted, he presided as President.
If Obama published NOTHING, that would tend to reinforce the contemporaneous impressions of his fellow editors (at least those a year behind him) that while “likeable enough” (to borrow a phrase), he was basically lazy in carrying out his duties. See my earlier comments here and here. It would be interesting if he was so lazy he didn’t publish anything during the two years he served on the Review — not even a short case comment or book review.
(Apparently, judged by the objective results of his work (later scholarly citations to the volume which he oversaw), Obama was the worst president of the Harvard Law Review in the past 20 years — there was a huge drop in the citations to the volume he produced compared to the years just before, and just after, he served as president. See here.
In his recent interview on “60 Minutes” (see here, about 2:50 into the video), Obama conceded that other than his Review presidency he has no executive experience — that the Review is the only thing he’s ever run, setting aside his own senate office and his campaign. Analyzing his job performance on the Review thus seems like a legitimate, indeed important, task.)
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So, his only executive experience is running a law school magazine, and not with any apparently distinguishment.
Here’s something else disturbing. He hasn’t performed that well in debates. His primary accomplishment, and talent, seems to be to make vaporous but inspiring (to some) speeches, that make (supposedly) grown men swoon and get funny feelings up their legs (are you sure that wasn’t something running down your leg, Chrissie?). And when he doesn’t have a teleprompter, apparently even his speeches aren’t all that great:
…the liberal commentators have gushed their praise nearly every time Obama has opened his mouth before a Teleprompter the past few months
It was thus interesting to see Obama climb to the stage at Virginia’s Jefferson-Jackson Dinner on Saturday night. As he strode to the podium, Obama clutched in his hands a pile of 3 by 5 index cards. The index cards meant only one thing–no Teleprompter.
Shorn of his Teleprompter, we saw a different Obama. His delivery was halting and unsure. He looked down at his obviously copious notes every few seconds throughout the speech. Unlike the typical Obama oration where the words flow with unparalleled fluidity, he stumbled over his phrasing repeatedly.
The prepared text for his remarks, as released on his website, sounded a lot like a typical Obama speech. All the Obama dramatis personae that we’ve come to know so well were there–the hapless family that had to put a “for sale” sign on its front lawn, the factory forced to shutter its doors and, of course, the mother who declares bankruptcy because “she cannot pay her child’s medical bills.”
The tone was also vintage Obama. The prepared text reached out to all Americans, including (gasp!) Republicans. It also evidenced Obama’s signature lack of anger. While his colleagues have happily demagogued complex issues and demonized the Bush administration, Obama always has taken pains to strike a loftier tone.
But Saturday night’s stem-winder turned out quite differently from the typical Obama speech. With no Teleprompter signaling the prepared text, Obama failed to deliver the speech in his characteristically flawless fashion. He had to rely on notes. And his memory. And he improvised.
I’d suggest reading the whole thing.
So, does he even write the speeches? If so, then he must be more aware at the time he’s writing them how important the tone is. It seems to me, though, if there’s a big difference in tone between a read speech and an extemporaneous one, that someone else, who better understands the nature of his campaign and appeal, is writing them. And when you take away the magic words, the magic candidate disappears as well, and his true voice emerges.
If this is the case, then we are on the brink of taking a cipher, with no notable accomplishments in running anything, who is persuasive and compelling as a speaker only when reading others’ words, and putting him in charge of the armed forces and other government institutions of the most powerful nation in the history of mankind.
Is this really a good idea?
As I’ve said before, the Dems grossly overestimate their chances of regaining the White House this year. Both of their remaining candidates are seriously flawed, in different ways. If you look at the last few decades of presidential elections, the Democrats have won resoundingly only once–in 1964, when the Republicans ran someone perceived to not only be, but someone who was proud to be, an extremist. Since then, the few times the Dems have won have been in very close races. Jimmy Carter might have lost in 1976 if Ford hadn’t pardoned Nixon, and made the foolish faux pas about Poland in the second debate. Bill Clinton couldn’t have gotten into the White House without the help of Ross Perot. People forget that he only got 43% of the vote in 1992. The only reason he won was because George Bush only got 39%. Even in 1996, he couldn’t muster a majority–even in beating Bob Dole, he only got 49+%.
Maybe that long jinx is about to be broken, but it sure doesn’t look to me like they have the candidates to do it this year.
[Late afternoon update]
Is Obama a liberal fascist?
I think the most obvious place to start is whether Obama is promoting something like a political religion. The messianic nature of Obama’s campaign has been noted by many for a long time now. He often sounds like he’s reviving the social gospel. There’s even a website called “Is Barack Obama the Messiah?”
Many of the tropes of a political religion/liberal fascism are evident. He exalts unity as it’s own reward. His talk of starting new and starting over often sounds like more than merely “turning the page” on the Bush-Clinton years. It sounds a bit like starting at Year Zero.
But what I find most intriguing is his rhetoric of destiny and “choseness.” He often makes it sound like he has been selected by forces of providence or God or simply history for this moment. He is, in Oprah’s words, “The One.” But even more interesting, he tells voters they are the ones. “This is it,” Obama proclaimed on Super Tuesday. “We are the ones we’ve been waiting for, we are the change that we seek.” That’s pretty oracular stuff.
Well, there’s little doubt that Hillary is.
[Early evening update]
Leon Wieseltier has some related thoughts:
…into this unirenic environment strides Obama, pledging to extract us promptly from Iraq and to negotiate with our enemies. What is the role of a conciliator in an unconciliating world? You might think that in such conditions he is even more of an historical necessity-but why would you think that all that stands between the world and peace is one man? George W. Bush was not single-handedly responsible for getting us into our strategic mess and Barack Obama will not be single-handedly responsible for getting us out of it. There are autonomous countries and cultures out there. The turbulence that I have described is not caused by misunderstandings. It is caused by the interests of powers and the beliefs of peoples. Beijing, Moscow, Tehran, Pyongyang, Islamabad, Gaza City, Khartoum, Caracas-does Obama really believe that he has something to propose to these ruthless regimes that they have not already considered? Does he plan to move them, to organize them, to show them change they can believe in? With what trick of empathy, what euphoria, does he hope to join the Shia, the Sunni, and the Kurds in Iraq? Yes, he made a “muscular” speech in Chicago last spring; but I have been pondering his remarks about foreign policy in the ensuing campaign and I do not detect the hardness I seek, the disabused tone that the present world warrants. My problem is not with “day one”: nobody is perfectly prepared for the White House, though the memory of Bill Clinton’s “learning curve” is still vivid, which in Bosnia and Rwanda cost more than a million lives. My problem is that Obama’s declarations in matters of foreign policy and national security have a certain homeopathic quality. He seems averse to the hurtful, expensive, traditional, unedifying stuff.
Indeed.