DREW WESTEN: Leadership, Obama Style, and the Looming Losses in 2010

[yurbud]

Westen hits the nail on the head.

In the case of health care reform, it is not so much that the result won't do some good, but that the process was like a cop investigating a hit and run and when he finds the culprit, deciding to give him a new car. And the same is true with Wall Street and the oil wars.

He has repeated the old lies, added a coat of progressive niceties to them, and the corrupt corporations first way of government operations.

Somehow the president has managed to turn a base of new and progressive voters he himself energized like no one else could in 2008 into the likely stay-at-home voters of 2010, souring an entire generation of young people to the political process. It isn't hard for them to see that the winners seem to be the same no matter who the voters select (Wall Street, big oil, big Pharma, the insurance industry). In fact, the president's leadership style, combined with the Democratic Congress's penchant for making its sausage in public and producing new and usually more tasteless recipes every day, has had a very high toll far from the left: smack in the center of the political spectrum.

What's costing the president and courting danger for Democrats in 2010 isn't a question of left or right, because the president has accomplished the remarkable feat of both demoralizing the base and completely turning off voters in the center. If this were an ideological issue, that would not be the case. He would be holding either the middle or the left, not losing both.

What's costing the president are three things: a laissez faire style of leadership that appears weak and removed to everyday Americans, a failure to articulate and defend any coherent ideological position on virtually anything, and a widespread perception that he cares more about special interests like bank, credit card, oil and coal, and health and pharmaceutical companies than he does about the people they are shafting.

The problem is not that his record is being distorted. It's that all three have more than a grain of truth. And I say this not as one of those pesky "leftists." I say this as someone who has spent much of the last three years studying what moves voters in the middle, the Undecideds who will hear whichever side speaks to them with moral clarity.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/drew-westen/leadership-obama-style-an_b_398813.html

[MisterP]

1. Westen really cuts to the whole issue of "moderation"

Obama, like so many Democrats in Congress, has fallen prey to the conventional Democratic strategic wisdom: that the way to win the center is to tack to the center.

But it doesn't work that way.

...

People in the center will follow if you speak to their values, address their ambivalence (because by definition, on a wide range of issues, they're torn between the right and left), and act on what you believe. FDR did it. LBJ did it. Reagan did it. Even George W. Bush did it, although I wish he hadn't.

centrism assumes that "moderation" is a goal and a coherent ideology unto itself, and that moderate Americans strongly hold both left and right positions--not that they're the mushy middle, holding little ideology, and generally politically ill-informed. however, they are capable of seeing how their lives are going, and often turn to candidates promising prosperity (thus, they're extremely fickle: note how far Poppy Bush fell between 1988 and 1992). the best approach to the middle is EDUCATION (universal healthcare will be cheaper, Osama isn't threatening Cape Girardeau with anthrax, socialism isn't so inhuman and antiAmerican once you get to know it, etc.)--not pandering to the conservative ideas that they picked up

[politicaljane]

2. Governing

Mr. Westen, the reason why democrats do not stay in governing
mode in D.C is because of people like us. We bitch and whine,
and you have to understand you do not know how to govern. It
is give & take and compromises. That is what this
President is trying to do. You want him to remain candidate
Obama as the President of the USA. It does not work that way,
he is the President of the Left leaning Democrats,moderate
democrats (where this country is), right wing democrats
(reagan democrats), moderate republicans, right wing
republicans, and independents. Give the man a damn break, you
are no different from repubs.

This might not be aired, but it goes to all. Merry Christmas,
LEAVE MY PRESIDENT ALONE. He is doing a very good job with
what he inherited.

[Yuugal]

3. you know squat

Dean is the reason we won in the first place because it was his 50 state strategy that got the dems to where they are now. It will be Rahm and his DLC minions like you who ruin it all. Whatever they are paying you, it is too much.


Enjoy your stay.

[avaistheone1]

8. Very true.

+1

[dpbrown]

4. Member since May 2009 and this is your first post?

Interesting.

[Donnachaidh]

5. Jeez -- where's the youtube video?

"LEAVE MY PRESIDENT ALONE" :rofl:

[pundaint]

6. Read the whole article, it's terrific!

[4_TN_TITANS]

7. It doesn't get any truer than this....

"It isn't hard for them to see that the winners seem to be the same no matter who the voters select (Wall Street, big oil, big Pharma, the insurance industry)."

Obama is teaching a whole new generation about the political bait & switch. Promising change change change, but all that changes is the hand that is out feeding the corporate entities.

[justinaforjustice]

9. Westen's Article is Superb. Thanks for Posting it! n/t

[Doctor_J]

10. It will be bloody, and I will blame him more than I blamed WJC in 1994

Clinton barely scraped out a win in 92. Obama won handily last year, and had the electorate in the palm of his hand. I honestly don't know what's come over the guy who stared down Limpballs in March

[PurityOfEssence]

11. a failure to articulate and defend any coherent ideological position on virtually anything

So many people see this. It isn't like the primaries anymore, it's becoming the norm.

This is just depressing. Even though it's true, it's deeply depressing to watch the slowest of slow-motion downfalls, and with every feeble excuse made by the stalwarts, it just reinforces the reactionaries' screed that we don't really believe in anything.

Just as his hero Reagan made selfishness not just accepted but a virtue, Obama is making tactical expediency that's devoid of any real ideology an art form.

Much as I can't stand a lot of ideologues, at least they believe in SOMETHING.

[Vidar]

12. K&R.

[certainot]

13. westen, like most dems strategists, columnists, media critics, live in a radio vacuum

westen misses an important factor-- dems can't frame an outhouse if they ignore the radio- today dems are playing without a front line and don't know it.

i like westens's writings but he misses a major factor in the calculus. less reading, more listening would do progressive strategists good.

he wants the obama admin to be doing better framing and he wants obama to fight harder but like most political analysts/strategists/media watchers they read and see the results after karl rove's most important tool has already done its work.

it doesn't matter much what obama says or does- with their uncontested talk radio monopoly the GOP gets to have it both ways and as long as the radio is uncontested the MSM will not call them on their hypocrisy.

GOP and the lobbyists frame with a nail gun and the dems use rocks as long as they keep ignoring the 1000 UNCONTESTED radio stations blasting at obama's administration every day.

a failure to articulate and defend any coherent ideological position on virtually anything, and a widespread perception that he cares more about special interests like bank, credit card, oil and coal, and health and pharmaceutical companies than he does about the people they are shafting.

a widespread perception that he cares more about special interests

the think tanks and lobbyists, through the limbaughs and hannitys, defined special interests long ago. special interests are george soros, acorn, greenpeace, unions.

that's exactly what limbaugh and hannity say EVERY DAY to a crowd the size of the one that voted for obama. their ability to do that is what has enabled the incredible hypocrisy and irrationality from the GOP the last 20 years.

senator menendez just told the GOP to ignore limbaugh. more of that would go a long way (but he should have added that the dems need to ay him more attention). limbaugh played that clip to get the dittoheads to harass him.

today i listened to a few minutes of limbaugh and it was clear what the GOP strategy was. limbaugh followed the menendez clip with a call or all his listeners to bombard the congress and senate with calls as long as necessary to kill HCR. usually he is more subtle- he was calling for a full charge through the holidays.

if the dem party was smart it would have heard that and sent out alerts to everyone that the next wave of anti HRC calls were probably due to limbaugh and therefore ignore them.

those 1000 radio stations control a fluid made-to-order constituency of millions of political and media intimidators that hang on every talking point the lobbyist think tanks send through the limbaughs and hannitys every day. teabaggers are dittoheads.

fox is just visual icing at the end of a long day of hours of coordinated uncontested repetition. it's not fox.

sure there's the common sense reality out there, and the internet, etc. but that should be the baseline- a big mix that can sort itself out with free speech and democracy even with the big money that will always be there. but the right has a extra weapon and dems ignore it because they don't have time, they can't stand it.

for 20 years dems have been analyzing and strategizing in a talk radio vacuum, wondering why they get beaten. as long as they keep ignoring the talk radio monopoly they shouldn't bother.

did anyone notice what happened after obama named limbaugh head of the GOP? - all the GOP media and political operatives had RUSH tattooed on their foreheads and were paralyzed for weeks. obama admin needs to keep invoking limbaugh- obama gave talk radio prime credit in the health care speech but no one seemed to notice. obama said fox was behaving like talk radio and no one noticed.

as long as there is no searchable database of talk show transcripts it seems the GOP will get to keep its invisible political 2x4 and the last 20 years will just go down as some cyclical shift to the right, followed by more until dems finally wake up.

since the talk radio monopoly makes it unlikely there will be any demonopolization any time soon and has convinced most dems a new Fairness Doctrine would restrict the corporate free speech rights of the united talk radio message, the only hope dems have left if they want to stop the great framing hammer is to recognize the limbaugh megastations as the centers of GOP power. obama already implied that- anyone listening, anyone getting his back?

if liberals want real progress they need to take their demonstrations and boycotts to the limbaugh megastations.

but that would require recognizing the problem. but that might require listening once in a while. plug in another CD.

US social and political reality is largely determined by 1000 radio stations blasting coordinated UNCONTESTED repetition all day long.