Why Obama Is Losing the Political War

[onehandle]

Barack Obama is being politically crushed in a vise. From above, by elite opinion about his competence. From below, by mass anger and anxiety over unemployment. And it is too late for him to do anything about this predicament until after November's elections.

With the exception of core Obama Administration loyalists, most politically engaged elites have reached the same conclusions: the White House is in over its head, isolated, insular, arrogant and clueless about how to get along with or persuade members of Congress, the media, the business community or working-class voters. This view is held by Fox News pundits, executives and anchors at the major old-media outlets, reporters who cover the White House, Democratic and Republican congressional leaders and governors, many Democratic business people and lawyers who raised big money for Obama in 2008, and even some members of the Administration just beyond the inner circle.

On Friday, after the release of the latest bleak unemployment data — the last major jobs figures before the midterms — Obama said, "Putting the American people back to work, expanding opportunity, rebuilding the economic security of the middle class is the moral and national challenge of our time." But elites feel the President has failed to meet that challenge and are convinced he will be unable to do so in the remainder of his term. Moreover, there is a growing perception that Obama's decisions are causing harm — that businesses are being hurt by the Administration's legislation and that economic recovery is stalling because of the uncertainty surrounding energy policy, health care, deficits, housing, immigration and spending.

And that sentiment is spreading. Many members of the general public appear deeply skeptical of Obama's capacity to turn things around, especially, but not exclusively, those inclined to dislike him — Tea Partyers and John McCain voters, but also tens of millions of middle-class Americans, including quite a few who turned out for Obama in 2008.

http://www.time.com/time/politics/article/0,8599,2024718,00.html

I have been advised down below to say that Mark Halperin is the author. I would like to add that this is from Time Magazine.

Carry on.

[Mass]

1. You forgot to post the author''s name: MARK HALPERIN

[Parker CA]

2. "...the White House is in over its head, isolated, insular, arrogant..." Absolute garbage.

[zipplewrath]

5. Over the top yes

I think the whole article relied a bit too much on the whole "inside politics" angle. I don't think the vast majority of the nation sees Obama as in over its head. I do think there is a large plurality that has concluded he has failed on the economic front. He "promised" 8% unemployment and we are still at near 10%.

But I do think there is some "normal" insular problems in the White House. And you don't get into the White House without a certain amount of arrogance. Isolated and insular are a tad redundant, and where they are not, one can hardly claim that the White House isn't aware of their problems. But I have been disappointed that the core team still remains "team Obama". We saw Clinton bring in "outside" advisors after the '94 elections. Obama has alot of turnover coming and so far we're seeing alot of "promoting from within" instead of bringing in a "fresh perspective". And it is long past due to get rid of Gates and his whole team.

[Cosmocat]

23. its flaming horsesnot ...

In over its head, insular and arrogant describes to a T what the Bush white house was for 8 years, and all we got from jaggoffs like Halperin was how "resolute" he was, how they got all tingly over his "frat boy" routine with them and how you gotta love a president who operates from his gut ...

Sorry, typical MSM bad news for the Ds crap ...

Fresh perspective ...

Jesus, he has been on the job 20 months, not 6 friggen years ...

[zipplewrath]

25. Gates longer than that

And between executing the SOFA, and escalating the war in Afghanistan, not much has changed in at least 4 years. Now we have the "no real changing of the guard" in the NSA office. He's basically half way through his term and we're not seeing anything new here.

[Cosmocat]

36. 20 months ...

He was extremely wise to carry Gates over for all the right reasons, ranging from continuity to politics ...

It is troops in a foreign theatre, there is no quick action in this day and age with an operation that big ... For better or for worse, he had to let it play out longer under his watch ...

Again, it is 20 months, and the outtake from the rumblings is that he is battling the military to start to draw it down ...

[zipplewrath]

37. "Start"

He could have been COMPLETELY out of Iraq by now, but chose to execute the Bush SOFA instead. A decision connected to his choice to keep the architect thereof. He'll "start" in 2011, with as few as 2000 soldiers, OR LESS. He has no draw down plan beyond a start date. The UK PM came over here to say that UK soldiers would be leaving in 2015. At this rate it will still be going on when he leaves, even if that is after 2 terms.

Until he gets rid of the team that dreamed up these wars, and their current conduct, he's not going to end them.

[librechik]

3. Yes, this is Halperin's continuing song for the elections: Oh, those lame dems are such losers

But he's not partisan, even as he leads the mighty chorus in their combined raspberry at Obama (while standing behind a wall of COC cash and pretending to be "fair")

[ProSense]

4. Mark Halperin who

is busy making excuses for the Chamber of Commerce?

Halperin’s Take: The Foreign Boogeymen

Rove: “They Think the American People Are So Stupid”

[alcibiades_mystery]

6. Total shit from a conservative asshole

The opinion piece, of course, not the OP...........

It would have been nice, however, to hear the OP's position on the opinion piece by conservative asshole Mark Halperin, rather than have the opinion article from conservative asshole Mark Halperin posted without any commentary at all.

[bigdarryl]

7. He's not losing anything he's already going to win the popular vote in 2012

http://www.aolnews.com/politics/article/professors-13-keys-predict-obama-will-get-re-elected/19550593

[impik]

8. Halperin at his very best

Republican ass.

[Ozymanithrax]

9. You do know that "in over his head" is a code for for "uppity..." n/t

[CakeGrrl]

16. Yes, and some here buy right into it

It's gone on since the primaries. People have charged him with everything from not having enough experience to being a simpleton who is too naive and psychologically needy to recognize (as is totally clear to THEM) that Republicans are mean. People condescend to him all the time around here.

[Proud Liberal Dem]

17. Don't forget that some people still claim that "we just don't know who he is"

or "what he really stands for."

:eyes: :banghead:

I think that the people saying that (i.e. Sarah Palin) are only saying that because they've already turned over as many "rocks" as they can find about his past and, well, haven't found anything that they can use to seriously attack him on and everything they've already tried so far has been one epic fail after another. Issa (and the rest of his Republican colleagues) are delusional if they think that they're going to find some huge Whitewater/Lewinsky-ish scandal to seriously try to bring President Obama down with. Anyway, if they already had something HUGE on him, they'd have found it during the 2008 campaign or it would've already been blaring all over Fox News.

[Cosmocat]

24. he needs to be loved ...

by republicans ...

people believe that ...

the wingers think he is an anti-christian, socialist demon spawn ...

Our wingers think he wants to be loved by republicans ...

[Ozymanithrax]

30. Yea, they think he is a reagular Betty Boop...

`http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vSS5ZVk8W7I&feature=related

[impik]

20. Of course. Those who destroyed the country in 8 years were never

"in over their heads". Bunch of racists, all of them.

[AndrewP]

41. Exactly!

Where the f**k was the rage then?

[txlibdem]

27. Uppity graduates of Yale???

Yeah, they are pretty arrogant. Harvard grads as well.

The only thing a degree from one of those Uni's says is that your mommy and daddy had a pile of cash and you are an incompetent a-hole.

I've worked with enough "Harvard MBA's" to know that a Harvard degree is about as important as toilet paper.

[Blue_Tires]

28. +1000

[Speck Tater]

10. As much as I want to dismiss it as partisan BS, unfortunately, it rings true. nt

[Ikonoklast]

35. Then you are easily swayed by propaganda from a right-wing hack.

You have lots in common with Teabaggers...they are easily fooled, also.

[dionysus]

11. why don't you mention this piece is from a RW hack? what the hell

[Deep13]

12. It's partly because he fights fair. nt

[Enrique]

13. whatever Halperin advises, do the opposite n/t

[Cali_Democrat]

14. This is the same Mark Halperin that said McCain should expose Obama as a Manchurian Candidate

http://thepage.time.com/halperin%E2%80%99s-take-ways-mccain-can-beat-obama-that-clinton-cannot/

He also said McCain should "expose" Obama's unusual name and exotic nature.

ROFL :rofl:

This guy has no credibility.

[pansypoo53219]

15. the media gnews

are anti democracy and love zombie reagan.

[treestar]

18. I love it when people attribute their own personal opinion to "most" people

What proof does he have other than that's what he wants to be so?

[maxsolomon]

19. funny. i didn't see the words "avalanche of corporate spending"

anywhere.

[Beacool]

21. Wow, et tu Times?

:eyes:

[vaberella]

22. Where are these posts coming from?! Dear God almighty!!

It's one post after another talking about how Obama is losing this or that. Fuck this shit. Thank God DU doesn't reflect the majority of people.

[Arkana]

26. Halperin's a lying shitburger and anything he says should be taken with

an entire salt lick's worth of salt.

[Liberal_Stalwart71]

29. Brilliant response from Media Matters...

See Halperin's Time article here: Obama Is in the Jaws of Political Death: Can He Survive? - TIME

http://www.time.com/time/politics/article/0,8599,2024718,00.html

Obama's approval rating back up to 50% and woefully underreported by the M$M: WashPost forgets to report that Obama's approval rating is back up to 50% | Media Matters for America

http://mediamatters.org/blog/201010050015

Gallup confirms the uptick in Obama's Approval:

http://www.gallup.com/home.aspx

Time's Halperin to Obama: You're not allowed to fight back | Media Matters for America

http://mediamatters.org/blog/201010110027

-------------

But let the M$M tell it, nobody likes Obama, not even black people themselves, who because of one lone black woman who stood up to complain at a recent Town Hall meeting.

I was watching CNN in the gym this morning and every single story was about how Obama is dragging down Democratic races and his declining approval ratings among "working class whites," a constituency that he never had anyway. (These were Hillary and McCain's folks who essentially cannot handle a black man in the White House. Period!!)

[wpelb]

38. Gallup Daily tracking poll

Gallup confirms the uptick in Obama's Approval:

http://www.gallup.com/home.aspx

==========
Actually, I don't see much change one way or the other. Since December of last year, his Gallup numbers have been pretty steady, generally in the 45-50% favorable and the 47-52% unfavorable range. Those aren't figures to brag about, but I'd bet that, absent either a scandal or a national emergency, they are fairly typical for this point in a president's first term.

[Liberal_Stalwart71]

39. Nothing to brag about; however, his approval ratings are higher than Reagan I, Bush I,

and Clinton I at this time during their tenure.

[Mimosa]

31. Why should we give Time Inc any hits?

I basically see a Time link and ignore it. They've always been right wing and corporatist while pretending to be mainstream. The mag and site aren't doing too well. Why should we give them any hits?

[BlueIdaho]

32. Shit - thanks for the pep talk... nt.

[Bluenorthwest]

33. Posts containing Halperin should be clearly labled at the top

as some DUers are bullshit intolerant. He is a known carrier. Thanks for your consideration.

[JamesA1102]

34. Halperin is a GOP shill

and has been one for years. Don't trust a word he says.

[wowimthere]

40. He's full of shit just like Fox and all their friends