Obama: Not the Great Stone Face

[Geee]

National Review:

Obama: Not the Great Stone Face
Obama could still restore his standing with the American people if he copied the Clinton of 1995 and abandoned his unpopular agenda. But he won’t.


In 1850 Nathaniel Hawthorne wrote an allegory about a series of small-town would-be heroes who the gullible public claimed resembled the Great Stone Face on the side of a New Hampshire mountain. The citizens assumed that these men would have a granite-like ability to stand firm against whatever dangers the people faced. (“About this time there went a rumor throughout the valley, that the great man, foretold from ages long ago, who was to bear a resemblance to the Great Stone Face, had appeared at last.”) The most confident and charismatic of these quick-fix characters — Mr. Gathergold, Old Blood-and-Thunder, and Old Stony Phiz — always in the end proved failures, as the people finally learned that they did not have the qualities they ascribed to the face on mountain.

When a once widely popular George W. Bush left office, he was polling about 35 percent approval and 60 percent disapproval. The country had two years earlier turned out the Republican Congress — to the tune of promises from Nancy Pelosi (in the pre-transcontinental-jet days) to end the wars, end the culture of corruption, and end the power of special interests.

In 2008 Barack Obama ran as a moderate liberal, offering assurances on instituting sound financial governance, getting out of Iraq, repealing the Bush anti-terrorism protocols, and making government work for the little guy by taking over some private enterprise — that is, offering government-run health care, subsidized student loans, and new and extended entitlements. A Newsweek grandee, Evan Thomas, declared Him “sort of God.” He caused another pundit, Chris Matthews, to experience leg tingles. And the world anointed Him a Nobel laureate for good intentions.

After 19 months, a once cool, laid-back Barack Obama — beloved by Oprah in his mesmerizing ability to make the enraptured faint at his sermons — now polls about 45 percent approval and 50 percent disapproval — nearly a 20-point swing in less than two years. Currently, a generic Republican challenger enjoys on average a six-point edge in the polls — quite a turnabout from the twelve-point spread that Democrats mounted in January 2009. Public approval of Congress ranges from about 10 to 20 percent — the Democratic-led Congress getting even lower marks than the pre-2006 Republican one.

One might say the public has changed its opinion of Obama, but it seems more likely that the public is beginning to see Obama as it finally did Bush. The hard Right always felt about Obama as the hard Left did about Bush, but now independents seem simply to have rechanneled their Bush anger to Obama anger — something that has bewildered Team Obama, who cannot gain any traction by blaming the current malaise on the Bush legacy. Voters apparently don’t see the corrective to Bush’s deficit budgeting in Obama’s yet higher spending and larger government.

[Pepper]

VDH bump.

 

Excellent article, thanks, Geee.

 

NCTexan

 

Here's more on the Grifters.

 

From the link, several more critical lines:

 

"The common denominator here is that a largely conservative electorate has always wanted lower taxes, smaller but more competent government, fewer overseas commitments, honest government, and officials who live like the public they represent — and it can’t seem to find that package in any party or candidate being presented to it. " --Victor D Hanson

 

 

"Indeed, the Obama medicine is now seen as worse than the Bush disease, in that he less competently oversaw the war in Afghanistan, blew apart the budget, and [Obama] lives more royally than any Republican." --Victor D Hanson

 

"The obsequious media have been left scrambling to explain this new Orwellian barn wall: Bush’s aristocratic golf is now Obama’s needed relaxation; Bush’s bumbling press conferences might explain why Obama wisely doesn’t hold many at all; Republican congressional corruption simply led to a “They all do it, even Democrats” narrative..." --Victor D Hanson

[nickydog]

"If we are lucky," VDH says we will end up with the candidate we really need. I am scared to death we are not going to be lucky. Who is this candidate?!

[Valin]

Obama: Not the Great Stone Face

 

Someone with less clss than I would post something like this....

 

or this....

 

 

 

But I won't, because that would be wrong.

[Geee]

I'm proud that you have integrity Valin

[Rheo]

I'm proud that you have integrity Valin

Me, too.

You have a lot of clss.

[Valin]

I'm proud that you have integrity Valin

Me, too.

You have a lot of clss.

 

 

 

WWDRD

(What would Don Rickles Do)

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dhjfbA-LqEo

[NCTexan]

Valin! Thanks for not disappointing me. I have high expectations for you.

[AceRimmer]

Valin, that is hillarious, but my favorite, in as bad taste as possible, has always been this one:

 

[Pepper]

Valin, you are not completely worthless. You can be used as a bad example.

 

 

 

Obama: Not the Great Stone Face

 

Someone with less clss than I would post something like this....

or this....

 

 

But I won't, because that would be wrong.