Obama’s political skills just continue to impress.
The GOP under Bush has done this for years. They not only chose their side of the argument, but also who they were arguing against. Like an episode of Hannity and Colmes where Hannity always seems to have the better view when up against the “liberal.” Now Obama is making this fight between him and Rush. This does accomplishes a number of things:
It brings GOP background noise to center stage. When it was background noise it could do all the damage it wanted without anyone questioning it. Toxic rumors would be spread by the Rush, Drudge, and Hannity machine and no one would stop them until they did their damage. Now Obama is challenging them from the start. This gives them more focus, but that accomplishes something else…
It makes the most ignorant voice in the GOP the loudest. Therefore making everyone think that the GOP=Limbaugh and drowning out the more sane Republican voices.
This means that the moderate conservatives have to challenge Limbaugh instead of letting him do his damage in the shadows. Obama has turned one of the GOP’s most powerful weapons against them.
Profit!!!
He’s not only doing this with Limbaugh. In his recent Youtube address he made the enemies of his budget “the powerful and well-connected interests that have run Washington for far too long.” (See link above.)
It’s pretty awesome to see such shrewd political tactics used in favor of policies that I support. As long as his policies stay sharp I don’t think anyone is going to question his political game.
When this all started out, I thought it was a ridiculous ploy. It was clear from the outset that Obama was injecting Limbaugh into the discussion and taking him on explicitly. I thought this was crazy. I think now it was crazy like a fox, for the reasons you describe.
On the other hand, Limbaugh has no democratically conferred power. He is not a legislator. He is not a Supreme Court justice. He’s not an official in the GOP of any sort. He just has a radio show. So it’s troubling on some level to me that Obama is taking him on. It’s a waste of time to some extent.
Then again, look at the way prominent members of the GOP have tried to address Limbaugh’s (IMO) poisonous remarks and then later been forced to apologize and spin like crazy people. It does, I think, point to some systemic issues in the GOP right now, and they are worth identifying (and if you’re conservative, I think they’re worth correcting). And it has bought Obama a lot of political cover to enact his agenda, which I largely agree with.
I’m not interested in politics as bloodsport. I do recognize that sometimes it has to be treated that way. Obama has rather shrewdly maneuvered the GOP into a position where they have to address Limbaugh’s attack dog stance, and it has been difficult for them to embrace him while denouncing him, which is what I suspect they would like to do. I think the quickest remedy is for the GOP to figure out what its message is going forward and to do their best not to include Limbaugh as an official purveyor of that message (which returns him to the status he held pre-Obama). Oh, and kick Steele out, he’s been a huge embarrassment.
I have found the whole thing fascinating and highly educational though.
Given what we’ve accomplished together this past month, the difference between our party and Republicans leaders couldn’t be any clearer.
As President Obama noted yesterday, we’ve done more to advance health care coverage in this last month than we have in the last decade.
As a result of expanding SCHIP, 11 million children are now guaranteed health care. Through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, we’ve made unprecedented investments in health care, education, renewable energy, and transportation.
That Recovery plan will also create or save 3.5 million jobs and jump-start our economy through projects that will repair America’s crumbling infrastructure.
That’s a far cry from what Republicans leaders have been up to.
Nearly every Republican in Congress voted against the Recovery plan. Instead, they’re following Rush Limbaugh, who last week reiterated his hope that President Obama fails.
And yesterday, after doing the right thing and denouncing Limbaugh’s comments, the chairman of the Republican National Committee called Limbaugh to apologize.
Following Rush Limbaugh and the failed attack politics of the past – as Republicans are doing – is not the kind of leadership that’s going to get America back on a path to strength and prosperity. So it’s going to be up to us to lead the way.
I don’t see how Obama has provoked this fight, its the far right that has gone barking mad. Outside of a very mild jibe from the Press Sec. they’re following the time honored procedure for when your enemies are in a knife fight: deplore the incivility and make popcorn.
It makes some sense if you look at the partisan Republicans as only a symptom, and the inability to dismiss Limbaugh as just an entertainer as the real problem. Address the polemicist, remove that barrier, and perhaps more Republican politicians will be willing to work together with Democrats. Notice that he’s not going after Coulter; Coulter isn’t so big that Republicans stand to lose a great deal of their base if they dismiss her.
The Clintons should have done this in the 1990s, especially in reference to the Clinton Death List that was circulating around then. Instead, Hillary made the “Vast, right-wing conspiracy” remark and pretty much blew it. It doesn’t matter that the remark could be debated on its merits: This is politics, so what matters is public perception, and public perception painted Hillary as a loon jumping at shadows.
So the Obama team is smoother than the Clinton team was in the 1990s. This is news to anyone?
A President isn’t supposed to ‘choose enemies’. Obama is doing far too much blaming, too much campaigning, and too much attacking. Bush was savaged far worse than anything Obama has ever had thrown at him, and I can’t recall him ever calling out a critic by name and attacking him. I don’t recall Clinton doing it, either. Hillary came close with her ‘vast right-wing conspiracy’, but this continual singling out of people and hurling criticism at them for having a political viewpoint is really out of line.
And it demeans the office when the President engages in spitting matches with his critics. Obama needs to grow a thicker skin.
Oh, please. The Republicans ARE his enemy, and are far more interested in seeing him fail than in the welfare of the country. I realize that you would prefer him to do the standard Democrat thing and lie down and let himself be run over, but if he actually fires back that’s a good thing, not a bad one. The Republicans are part of the problem, and fighting them is part of any solution.
Oh ? Bush was called “far worse” things than the Antichrist, a communist, a terrorist and a traitor ?
Iraq, Gitmo, the War on Terror and all the evil that caused plus the current world economic crisis pretty much shows Bush has honestly earned every name he’s ever been called.
IMHO, this administration is all about media control so it comes as no surprise that their focus is on trying to discredit or quell any voice of opposition.
Economy be damned, Rush is on the radio :rolleyes:
All Obama is doing is giving them more credibility by paying attention to what they are saying.
The point is to give Rush credibility. He’s totally insane and people hate him. There’s a Politico article today that says the Democrat’s internal polling has Rush’s favorability rating among Americans under 40 at 11%. Over all he polled worse than Wright and Ayers. They’re trying to force the GOP to either admit he and his supporters are idiots and alienate their base, or accept him as their leader and continue to alienate the rest of America. (they’re hoping for the latter)
Exactly. I don’t see why this is so difficult for people to grasp. Limbaugh is FAR from an idiot, God knows, but his own position in the political world traps him here. He makes his money and influence by throwing red meat to the faithful. Well and good as long as he’s seen as a gadfly. But by treating him as a true ‘thought leader’ and engaging him in indirect dialogue Obama’s team create the perception that he IS the thought leader of the right and that the right is, therefore, filled with uncompromising die hards.
Leave that impression in place for a while and you end up with the middle of the political spectrum holding the perception that ALL conservatives are extremists who wish Obama to fail.
Obama and his team are redefining the terms of discussion for their own purposes. Near as I can tell in the short term they’re doing it well.
Cite on the “continual singling out of people and hurling criticism at them”? Exactly what comments by Obama do you consider to constitute these alleged “spitting matches”?
Once you substantiate these claims, then we’ll take a look at the issue of whether Bush did anything comparable.
Both of which Obama has been called on cable TV. Granted, the Daily Show makes it a point to seek out nutters, but still.
Sam, did you read the 538 column linked to in the OP? Obama isn’t attacking Rush at all. Turning the spotlight on him and treating him legitimately will accomplish the same thing, and probably more effectively, than actual attacks. “Kill 'em with kindness” and all that.
It seems to be working though, doesn’t it? And I’m not even talking about the Rush Limbaugh thing.
I haven’t even been paying that much attention to his speeches, but so far I’ve heard him or his people (e.g. press secretary) rail against, or make snide comments towards
Bankers (during the State of the Union speech)
Companies who send their top performers to Las Vegas
Executives who use corporate jets
Rick Santelli
It’s the old populist angle of concocting villians as strawmen and then promising to go slay them on the behalf of the little guy. They forget that a lot of bankers, top salesman, executives who use jets, etc. voted for him and pay their taxes.
I was driving with Talk of the Nation on NPR on the other day, and a caller came on from Kansas who worked in a corporate jet factory. He basically said please, Mr. President, tone it down. We employ 10s of thousands of people out here. What’s your beef with jets?
The thing that makes it especially depressing is that Obama earned a ton of my respect on the campaign trail for not playing the race card. Even though he was baited numerous times to do so. He just seemed disinterested and bored with the whole race discussion, which I found very appealing and I’m sure many Americans did as well. He didn’t want to be a victim. He never played that angle.
But now he seems to be stoking the fires amongst the voting public who WANT to be victims, through his populism. I think his skin is plenty thick enough. I think he’s doing this for purely political purposes.