Posted on 11/02/2014 4:42:09 AM PST by Oldeconomybuyer
THE 2014 midterms have featured many variables and one constant. Whether they’re running as incumbents or challengers, campaigning in blue or red or purple states, Democratic candidates have all been dragging an anchor: a president from their party.
So when and how was it lost? When President Bush’s second-term job approval numbers tanked, despite decent-at-the-time economic numbers, the explanation was easy: It was Iraq, Iraq, Iraq. But nothing quite so pat presents itself in Obama’s case, so here are four partial theories instead.
He gets blamed for Republican intransigence. This is the explanation that many Obama partisans favor, because it lets him mostly off the hook.
It’s the economy — yes, still: This explanation raises an eyebrow at the last one and says, come on: If the economy were enjoying a 1990s-style boom, surely Obama would have a decent chance at Clinton-level approval ratings.
It’s Obamacare — yes, still. This is the closest equivalent to Bush and the Iraq War.
It’s foreign policy — and competence. One of the interesting features of the 2012 campaign was that as much as the economy made Obama’s sales pitch challenging, he had an edge that Democratic politicians often lack: The public trusted him on foreign policy.
In many ways, Republicans have enjoyed in 2014 the kind of landscape they expected in 2012: a landscape in which nobody save Democratic partisans particularly supports President Obama anymore. What we’re about to find out is whether, amid that disillusionment, just being the not-Obama party is enough.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
Barkobamatross
I really think all those socialists in Obama’s life built him up to really believe that he was going to transform the US and no one would take notice. Those college professors thought they knew best...they are now finding out, how wrong they really are.
I hope in a few days the US will chose to turn the US back towards more traditional - Republic - and proud nationalism than continue to go down this broken road of socialism.
I hope the Democrat party drowns in it’s own self pity.
1. He is a Marxist.
2. He is a wannabe dictator.
3. His policies have wrecked the economy and caused misery for millions.
4. He is incompetent.
<><> In Montana, Senator John Walsh bowed out after he was exposed as a plagiarist. His replacement: avowed “punktuator” and socialist Amanda Curtis.
<><> In Kentucky, Alison Lundergan Grimes won’t reveal her presidential vote or Obama, the constitutional right to privacy (more like her Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination).
<><>In Colorado, Mark Udall’s one-note War on Women strategy is so extreme, the press has dubbed him “Mark Uterus.”
<><> In Louisiana, Mary Landrieu is saddled with charges of dual voter registrations, claiming her parents’ home as her own, while residing in DC, raising questions of residency and whether she votes twice.
<><> But Landrieu stepped on a landmine when she trashed Louisisana voters as "conservatives" implying she had to dupe them into voting for her.
<><> In Arkansas, Mark Pryor couldn’t give an answer when a reporter asked if he approved of the president’s handling of the Ebola crisis.
<><> In Alaska, Mark Begich had to pull a scurrilous attack ad, under duress from outraged voters.
<><> In New Hampshire, Jeanne Shaheen is outraged by a Washington Free Beacon story revealing her involvement in a business that sold stolen goods.
<><> Big time loser Rep. Bruce Braley of Iowa is in a category all his own. His classless remark dissing Iowa Sen Chuck Grassley as "just a farmer" is resonating: months later, when Braley said his first call as senator would be to the Iowa Republican, the largely farming audience burst into laughter.
<><> Braley was stupid enough to bring in the Kiss of Death---Michelle Obama. The Princeton grad cant even read. Surrounded by his campaign posters, she kept calling him "Bailey."
==========================================
Harry gets Knighted Sir Sure Loser.
A slew of Dem candidates refused to say whether
they would endorse Harry Reid as majority leader.
"I hereby dub you a major loser."
To the average American (not political junkies, like us) it is:
Lack of Leadership (not my fault)
Lack of Competence (Obamacare website, Ebola)
Lack of Accountability (not admitting any mistakes)
Lack of Clarity (what is the agenda)
It is that simple and it applies to many Republicans and Democrats of low information.
These media guys are so predictable! The editorial seems to me thinly disguised friendly strategic advice for Democrats. It seems to me that the media has been doing this for at least 10 or so years.
Think of it: Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid....and for duhversity.... Al Sharpton and Luis Gutierrez.
Plus State Dept know-nothings---Susan Rice, Jen Psaki, and Marie Harf---standing by their side would emphasize "expertise" in Democrat (gag) foreign policy.
ROTFLMCO.
How painful it must be for NYT knee padded writers to write such articles...
A commenter named Brinda Gore at WSJ had stuff I didn’t even hear of (of course not, he’s not Bush):
First President to have personal servants (taxpayer funded) for his wife.
First President to keep a dog trainer on retainer for $102,000 a year at taxpayer expense.
First President to fly in a personal trainer from Chicago at least once a week at taxpayer expense.
First President to repeat the Holy Quran and tell us the early morning call of the Azan (Islamic call to worship) is the most beautiful sound on earth
First President to side with a foreign nation over one of the American 50 states (Mexico vs Arizona).
First President to tell the military men and women that they should pay for their own private insurance because they “volunteered to go to war and knew the consequences.”
Then he was the First President to tell the members of the military that THEY were UNPATRIOTIC for balking at the last suggestion. (Thank God he didn’t get away with THIS one.)
How is this hope and change’ working out for you?
FDR was seen as understanding the people. One person said, “I don’t know him but he knows me.” The impression of Obama is; he doesn’t know the people and he doesn’t care.
He is an empty suit with an empty head
This is actually a pretty fair article. I think the author captures the main reasons why Obama is a failure, IMO the economy being #1. Facts and figures may tell us the economy is improving, but if you don’t feel it personally or among your circle, you don’t believe it.
But there is one other reason that I doubt any liberal leaning journalist would get (because it would mean admitting their own failure, in part). That’s the concept that Obama’s electoral success and initial popularity was always a mile wide and an inch deep. His supporters (fed by an fawning and compliant media) projected onto him who they WANTED and EXPECTED him to be. After a few years, bits or disappointment and disillusionment were starting to nag them, but they still held glimmers of hope.
After 2012, it’s been a steady downhill from one bumbling crisis to another with little reprieve. The bubble has finally burst and scales have fallen from their eyes.
Nothing about Obama has changed since 2008 (or even before), but people are finally seeing him for what he really is and not who they WANTED and EXPECTED him to be. It’s hard to admit it when you got snookered, but man oh man, a lot of people bought the myth.
Doper Delusions
Not to mention Hagan, who steered stimulus $$$ toward family and has flip flopped repeatedly on Obamacare and and Ebola travel ban.
She may still win, dang it.
If Obama loses the NYT editorial staff, he’s lost the nation.
Actually the best part of the column was the comments section. Reading the posts of the true believers is hilarious. I guess they just can’t help themselves. Like all good little Democrat, they really do consider themselves the best and brightest and the rest of us, Just dumb and hateful.
and then the biggie.....
first President to be black in office
If the Republicans take control of the Senate, the first thing they need to do is ban the use of the TelePrompTer in the Capital building.
I would love to see Obama give the State of the Union speech without a TelePrompTer!
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