The Virtue of Obama’s Trials
- 04.28.2008 - 5:17 PMThe consensus is that Barack Obama’s candidacy has been wounded over the past six weeks. His partisans are enraged that he is taking heat for things said by his pastor (even as some Obama Kool-aid drinkers actually waste words trying to defend said pastor), and that he is asked questions of a non-substantive nature (as though there is anything remotely substantive in his own cotton-candy-and-brimstone speeches). Those who feared him now fear him less. Those who want Hillary to win are building strength for their case that she should be the nominee because he can’t make it to November.
Yes, these are bad days for Barack Obama, but the fact is, he’s lucky to have had them now. If he had knocked Hillary out of the race early and simply walked into the nomination, the media love affair with him would have been so profoundly deep that it would have taken months for the infatuation to dissipate even a little bit. At which point Jeremiah Wright and Bill Ayers and all of Obama’s baggage would have been hauled out of storage and become fodder not for a Democratic debate that angered liberals, but for a presidential debate in September or October with an audience of 100 million or more.
If Wright and Ayers had come to dominate the news in October, that would have spelled the end to Obama’s presidential hopes. The fact that they have dominated the news in April will, I suspect, prove to have been something of a lucky break. He was never going to get away without having to deal with his leftist and black-nationalist baggage, and if he had dealt with it three weeks before the election in the same manner he did in the weeks before the Pennsylvania primary, he would have collapsed faster than a left-brained person in a right-brained school system.
He’s not the Messiah any longer, but he can still win.
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April 28th, 2008 at 5:24 PM
Points well taken, though you’ve got to believe that Hilary will not back down until she takes the Dhimmicrat Party down in Denver. Add to that the Irreverend’s continued ravings as well as disaffected Hilary supporters voting McCain (or vice versa if the unthinkable but delicious-to-contemplate happens) as well as a McCain v Obama debate cycle where the latter gets totally destroyed and the prospects actually aren’t that bleak.
April 28th, 2008 at 5:26 PM
I have a question: let’s say Hillary had the same associations with Wright and Ayers that Obama has–would those supporters of Obama (Sullivan, et al) be so generous in their attempts to explain away, minimize or distort those assocations?
April 28th, 2008 at 5:47 PM
Down but not out, better bad news now than after Labor Day — that’s of course true, but I suspect that the damage to Obama is far deeper than JPod does. A candidate’s character tends to get set early on and then it’s an uphill struggle to change perceptions if the assessment is negative. That’s the position Obama is now in. It’s more of a problem for him than other relative unknowns who’ve come out of nowhere, b/c as indicated in the post his policy views are for the most part extremely unsubstantive.
April 28th, 2008 at 6:23 PM
Let’s say Obama had no Democratic opposition this year. The Democratic media would have been totally silent about his negative qualities, just as they will be later if he is nominated. They would have blamed all criticism of Obama on racism in the critic, just as they will do later if he is nominated. Hillary found the one way to get these media to go after Obama at all.
April 28th, 2008 at 6:26 PM
By the way, Obama won’t necessarily “lose” the “debates” this fall. With proper programming (new electronic chip?) and deferential questioners, he might sail through without losing his cool.
April 28th, 2008 at 7:07 PM
“The fact that they have dominated the news in April will, I suspect, prove to have been something of a lucky break.”
Nope, I am not buying this argument. The Rev. Wright fiasco will not disappear in a few months. Too many white people legitimately realize that “Barry” Obama and his Ivy league white left-wingers are out to cause them harm. Some have not forgotten what happened roughly forty years ago during the busing craze. Only the non-”elite” white parents had to bus their kids across the other side of town. The “elites” sent their children to private schools. Obama will stomp all over middle class white parents to appease his leftist friends. Non-Ivy league White men in particular should feel threatened by Obama. They are on the top of his hit list.
April 28th, 2008 at 8:04 PM
J-Pod’s a lot smarter than me, for sure. But I think it’s good all this came out now, for the GOP. If all this waited until the fall, we’d hear stories about how Obama was being “swift-boated” by the “right wing attack machine”, and the New York Times would run an article showing that, in fact, John McCain was personally responsible for the attacks because - gasp - John McCain once ATE AT THE SAME DENNY’S AS THE GUY WHO POSTED THE WRIGHT SERMONS ON YOUTUBE.
Swift-boating. Verb. “To damage a Democratic candidate for office by bringing up uncomfortable truths.”
April 28th, 2008 at 8:14 PM
Sully’s changed his mind about Wright. He finally watched the Q & A session from this morning.
Obama still hasn’t said anything.
April 29th, 2008 at 12:57 AM
No, I don’t think anything will change for Barack Hussein Obama.
He is now, and will be the Democratic nominee for POTUS and may even win in the general election.
Those who support him will “double down” on his candidacy and do not for one moment misapprehend their power or influence.
The Believers will remain thus.
And The Enablers will do everything they can to see to it that Senator Obama wins.
The war is no longer an issue. Nor really is the economy. Or global warming. Or immigration.
The election is about a Narrative of a generation. And should this Narrative be destroyed, it will cause a severe sense of existential panic.
No, Obama is The Man.
And this is their time.
And They are the Ones they have been waiting for.
Just sayin’.
April 29th, 2008 at 1:31 AM
Obama might still get the nomination but his general election chances are getting bleaker by the hour. I pity the superdelegates who are now stuck between devil and the deep sea.