Obama’s social skills and his political success
Commenter “Mrs Whatsit” asks how, if Obama is so lacking in understanding human interactions, can he be such a successful politician:
What mystifies me most is that the man is a politician and an extraordinarily successful one (until just recently, at least.) I would have thought, Before Obama, that any successful politician would know, if nothing else, what makes other people respond and how to manipulate that. Bill Clinton was a master of the form. But this one ”” how did it happen that someone could manipulate so many people so swiftly and successfully to get what he wanted, while apparently understanding so very little about how people work?
While it’s true that most politicians love being around people and pressing the flesh—Bill Clinton and LBJ were famous for this—some are quite different. Obama appears to fall into that latter, smaller group, which includes Richard Nixon. On the surface the two seem very different, and they certainly are. But what they share is a certain emotional offness, readily apparent in Nixon but hidden in Obama and covered over with a surface charm and smoothness, two words that could never have applied to Nixon.
Nixon received his nickname “Tricky Dick” early on, based on the way he dealt with political opponents. He had to work hard at charisma, and never developed at—he was elected in spite of his personality, not because of it. Obama is quite different on the surface. But, contrary to the hype about him during the campaign, he has always been at least as ruthless as Nixon was in mowing down the opposition (the Alice Palmer story comes to mind, as well as Jack Ryan and possibly Blair Hull). This accounts in no small measure for Obama’s political success, especially in the early years.
Most of Obama’s wins—from his very first state office to his US Senate race—were unusual and atypical, featuring the disqualification of his opponents prior to the election itself. Some of this was through luck, but much of it was by his own design and efforts. Remember, too, that all of these “disappeared” opponents except Ryan were fellow Democrats. Once they had been eliminated, by hook or by crook, Obama was the sole Democrat remaining in the race, usually in a safe liberal district, which made him the winner almost by default. This is a very unusual path to political success.
Because of these peremptory strikes and a little bit of luck, Obama never really faced a tough oppponent until 2008 (except for the only race he lost, contesting the US House of Representatives seat of the popular Bobby Rush). In addition, Obama’s “cool” characteristics—his articulateness in prepared speeches, cerebral mold, academic background, and his race, were profoundly positive and attractive to liberals, the main group to which he had to appeal until 2008.
During the 2008 presidential race, Obama’s luck held. Plenty of people liked those already-enumerated characteristics, and in addition he was helped to success by four more things: the financial crisis, a weak opponent, an incredibly helpful press, and his newcomer status, all of which made it difficult for people to see many of his flaws. Neither personal warmth nor psychological astuteness in the one-on-one sense were necessary for him to win any of these races or to become president. Town meetings were avoided, as was any other circumstance in which Obama got too close to people (those were the settings in which he seemed ill at ease, and where his more revelatory gaffes tended to occur, such as his “spread the wealth” statement to Joe the Plumber).
During the 2008 campaign, Obama’s coldness came out now and then: flatfootedness and the arrogance and petulance, as in the “Why can’t I just eat my waffle?” incident. But such things didn’t end up mattering, partly because the press refused to make a big deal of them. As always in Obama’s life, people were bending over backwards to give him the benefit of the doubt. And Obama certainly knew one big thing about the public and himself: how to accentuate his own positive characteristics—as well as keep some of them blank, the better for people to fill them in as they wished—in order to appeal to the widest possible number of voters.
Now that Obama has been president for nearly a year, some of those blanks have necessarily been filled in with deeds. Note, also, that many of Obama’s gaffes as president have been lapses of a personal nature involving ceremony. He is either too deferential (all those bows) or not deferential and thoughtful enough. This would appear to represent a difficulty in calibrating one-on-one human interactions and the messages they give.
Obama seems impatient with ceremony, which goes hand in hand with his arrogance. He thinks he doesn’t need that sort of thing. It’s possible that he’s truly afraid of one-on-one exchanges with people; after all, how many of his close friends have we heard about? He likes to be prepared in advance, and he likes to be in control, two things that cannot occur in more casual social interactions. But for the aforementioned reasons, this hasn’t stopped him from winning elections—yet. His appeal has been of a different sort.
He is only interested in where he is going, never mind all the burning bridges in his wake. He has the single-minded determination of a 911 highjacker.
My own opinion on the disconnect between Obama’s electability and his inter-personal skills is that he is and always has been a front man.
Yes, he’s a good speaker, with a script. He’s photogenic and has an attractive family, etc. but that’s all appearances. When he has to speak extemporaneously, he is as bad or worse that Bush. His ideas are the typical leftist pedestrian fare.
Additionally, his so called electability is in large part due to the fact that he has had the support of the Chicago establishment and the liberal wing of the democrat party (who have taken over and run the party). They have done his heavy lifting, what has he done on his own? Also, let’s not forget a fawning media that never questions and always supports and covers for him. No candidate has ever had as easy a path to office as Obama has.
I do not think for one minute that Obama would be anywhere near where he is today if he hadn’t been placed there. He has done nothing on his own. He’s the articulate non-threatening black man with the correct views. His race played prominently in his selection becasue the democrats had failed so miserably with their previous trojan horse candidates. They knew that they could threaten to tar anyone who criticized him with the epithat of racism. And that it would work, at least long enough to get him elected.
Thanks to our politically correct media, it did. That’s yet another reason why his administration and the left/democrat congress have tried to ‘rahm’ their program down America’s throat in the first year of his term. His cover is now blown and as the public discovers who he really is and what he really advocates, his support dries up like water on the sidewalk on a hot summer day.
This is a very unusual and very suspicious path to political success.
Emended that one a bit. I’m with Tim P – Obama is a spokesmodel, nothing more, nothing less. Left solely to his own devices, he’d have been hard pressed to being elected alderman in Chicago.
His appeal has been of a different sort.
As I said during the election: His supporters love him because they despise the American Middle Class and so does he.
Obama is the dirty left’s middle finger.
You guys over here have it all so backwards! You really do have to focus more on the bright side, Neo, like:
” WASHINGTON–In what is being touted by the Labor Department as extremely positive news, the nation’s available labor rate has reached double digits for the first time in 26 years, bringing the total number of potentially employable Americans to an impressive 15.7 million.
“This is such an exciting time to be an employer in America,” said Labor Secretary Hilda Solis, adding that every single day 6,500 more citizens join America’s growing possible workforce. “There’s such a massive and diverse pool of job-ready Americans to choose from. And each month the number only gets higher.”
More about the bright side @ http://www.theonion.com/content/news/labor_dept_available_labor_rate
Agree with Tim P.
But he is now POTUS and CiC, and he is on his own tyrranical path, unfettered, free to havoc. Who’s gonna tell him no? His running dogs? He has loosed the leashes of his enablers, and they’re right with him, on his heels, lest he snarl or bite. They’ve become hyenas.
“But what they share is a certain emotional offness, readily apparent in Nixon but hidden in Obama and covered over with a surface charm and smoothness, two words that could never have applied to Nixon.”
I don’t think Obama has surface charm or any other particular charm. He must have something, though, to have fooled all those people, but I don’t think it’s charm. To have charm, I think by definition you have to be charming, and he is not. Bill Clinton had it, Ronald Reagan had it, John Kennedy had it. Obama does not have it. He’s much to cold a fish to be charming.
“As I said during the election: His supporters love him because they despise the American Middle Class and so does he.”
I think this has merit. It doesn’t explain everything, of course, but it covers a pretty fair amount of territory for many on the farther left end.
“They have done his heavy lifting, what has he done on his own?”
I can’t believe you have the gall (wink) to say this on the day he accepted the Nobel Peace Prize for, for, for … what was that for again? Oh, that’s right, absolutely nothing. He has done nothing to warrant a Peace Prize seeing he hasn’t brought peace to anything. People, for whatever unfathomable reason, just throw things in his lap and give him credit for things he’s never accomplished. His Harvard Law Review days were apparently like that, as was his Illinois Senate career, as is his Nobel Prize. Slavishness to liberal orthodoxy and white guilt are apparently very powerful forces.
“Also, let’s not forget a fawning media that never questions and always supports and covers for him. No candidate has ever had as easy a path to office as Obama has.”
I’m look forward to the day, and I believe it will have to come some day, where the media (if there’s any left) will collectively step back and realize how thoroughly they’ve shamed themselves. Won’t it be sweet to watch them finally have an “Oh, s***, what we we thinking moment?” There dereliction of duty in the 2008 election was one of the most egregious public sins I’ve witnessed in my lifetime.
Apologies for two or three typos, I’m generally a stickler for that sort of thing.
too cold a fish
looking forward
Their dereliction
“Also, let’s not forget a fawning media that never questions and always supports and covers for him.”
Are things beginning to change? Tina Brown, a liberal through and through, said this about the West Point speech:
“I have come to the conclusion that the real reason this gifted communicator has become so bad at communicating is that he doesn’t really believe a word that he is saying. He couldn’t convey that health-care reform would be somehow cost-free because he knows it won’t be. And he can’t adequately convey either the imperatives or the military strategy of the war in Afghanistan because he doesn’t really believe in it either. He feels colonized by mistakes of the past. He feels trapped by the hand that has been dealt him.”
Read the whole thing here.
http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2009-12-03/what-is-obama-talking-about/
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You might want to give this a read.
Pretty amazing. Some people have learned nothing from history:
http://www.chicagojewishnews.com/story.htm?sid=212226&id=252218
OBAMA AND THE JEWS: A look at why some Jews love him and some don’t trust him; and at the key role Chicago Jews played in getting him to where he is …
In a bold but risky year-end strategy, Democrats are preparing to raise the federal debt ceiling by as much as $1.8 trillion before New Year’s rather than have to face the issue again prior to the 2010 elections.
I’ll make a point about the physiognomy.
O.J. Simpson, when younger, had a round, even adolescent face. As does Will Smith. Nelson Mandela has some Bushman blood in him, giving him a round, youngish face with the slight fold making him look as if he’s almost smiling.
All non-threatening.
Given every single thing that Obama has and has had, if he looked like Samuel L. Jackson, he’d be nowhere.
I’m look forward to the day, and I believe it will have to come some day, where the media (if there’s any left) will collectively step back and realize how thoroughly they’ve shamed themselves. Won’t it be sweet to watch them finally have an “Oh, s***, what we we thinking moment?” There dereliction of duty in the 2008 election was one of the most egregious public sins I’ve witnessed in my lifetime.
kcom, whether this day ever comes depends entirely on what the media considered their duty to be. If it were “advance the socialist cause,” you’lre going to be waiting for a long time.
Neo, one of my favorite westerns was “The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance.” A reporter in the film interviews Jimmy Stewart’s character about the true hero of the film, which is played by John Wayne. The pertinent quote is this: “This is the West, sir. When the legend becomes fact, print the legend.” This is the business the media has been engaged in. The problem is that, for the vast majority, when dreams become reality it usually results in disillusion. Obama was a dream; now he is reality. Try as they might to print the legend, it won’t work long enough to save him.
Isn’t it amazing that after 10 months of presidency and an interminable campaign, we are still trying to figure this man out? Some things are just a slap upside the head as we realize that the far-left really does believe things that seem unbelievable.
But who would have believed the treatment of Gordon Brown? The refusal of lunch with the Royal Family of Norway? Honduras? The insistence on meeting with the Iranian government and the lack of interest in Iranian protesters? Dumping Eastern European missile defense? I was surprised, astounded.
My best guess is an unfamiliarity with the real demands and responsibilities of the office. That is, that he is responsible for the success and well-being of the country internationally and at home. The weight is on his shoulders, not on a bunch of czars or appointees. If he doesn’t know something, he’d better pass on the golf and study up. If his appointees are not serving him well, he’d better find better ones. And he needs to listen. It’s not about him!
Here’s a quandry:
I thought, quite reasonably, that due to the “Great Recession” there would be more hot out-of-work chicks stripping.
I thought there would be a renaissance in the art of stripping as “management consultants”, single mothers, and other office detritus would get the axe and climb the pole.
This has not been my experience. Unlike the military in an “economic downturn”, strip clubs are showing a marked decline in quantity as well as quality of recruits.
This makes no sense to me. While it is no longer my contemporaries flashing the thong and climbing the pole (“cougars” prowl more and display less apparently), “gen Y” is apparently not stepping up into the platform heels.
This is a shame. I fear that either “gen y” females are having less children (and thus less need to dance for daycare); are “not hot” (unlikely); untouched by the downturn (not likely); or more likely, living with their parents and “narrowcasting” their pole dancing skills on youtube from their permissive boomer parents’ basements.
The is not only a ‘jobless recovery’, it is a joyless recovery. A non-drinking, non-smoking, no-dollar-bills-inna-thong recovery.
Maybe we need to quit analyzing Obama and just admit he’s a pussy.
Maybe we need to quit analyzing Obama and just admit he’s a pussy.
That there is an insult to all honest Feline Americans.
Neo,
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/politics/In-trouble-White-House-searches-for-a-billionaire-to-blame-78953842.html
Gray,
It is a Man-session. Women are keeping jobs three times more than men. No, I can’t report on male strippers. I dont’ watch them.
I don’t think he’s a pussy. I think he’s a traitor. I use this word in full and dreadful knowledge of its meaning and without flinching. Time has come to call things by their name.
“My best guess is an unfamiliarity with the real demands and responsibilities of the office.” and ” “Maybe we need to quit analyzing Obama and just admit he’s a pussy.”
Don’t be silly, he knows exactly what he’s doing and the level of his “audacity” demonstrates he’s not scared. He simply doesn’t share our agenda; though there are goals that he does share with his fellow Dems, but only which reflect his early religious and political inculcation. He’s a chameleon who will tell you what you want to hear (Al Taquia). For America’s enemies he is everything they could ask (ie. the coming trial in Manhattan), while for America’s allies, he is an enormous disappointment (ie. Israel and Honduras). Like SAB said at the beginning: “He has the single-minded determination of a 911 hijacker.” He just has a different role to play. We’re a sorry bunch of suckers. One of the single best statements anybody can make now is to buy an effective gun, plenty of amunition, and get a membership to the NRA. It may even come in handy if our worst nightmares becomes reality…
He won’t go down without a fight. We will see ugly stuff yet.
The only thing which I am certain about, is that our President is truly a Man of Mystery.
Just as everyone projected what they wanted to project on him PRIOR to the election – they are still doing it. Here, there, everywhere.
Because outside of our little “he’s a marxist who wants to bring Euro-Left tyrannical socialism to our fair land” echo chamber, and based on the general dearth of trolls to argue with, this IS, with all due respect, an echo chamber ……..the folks over in the Progressive Wing are dissatisfied and with him because THEY are 100% convinced he is just another ‘corporatist,’ in the bag for those evil capitalists, and has turned out to be dissappointing CENTRIST.
“We” (quotes intentional – I sure as hell didn’t vote for the guy – I mean people like Peggy Noonan, Ann Althouse and millions of others like them) were “sold a bill of goods” thinking he would be a “pragmatic centrist,” like people keep telling me Clinton was. But instead he “really really IS Bill Ayer’s disciple!!” Oh No! Gasp. Horrors. Stalin!
But over on the LEFT, they are now pissing into THEIR beer because THEY are 100% convinced that he IS the “pragmatic centrist” instead of being the fullfillment of their progressive dreams.
Does ANYBODY have the Man of Mystery pegged correctly?
I agree with my fellow echo-chamber members. Because I’m a member of this echo-chamber, and a part of the choir to which I am preached.
But don’t be fooled into thinking “our” view is somehow representative of the idea that a generic mass known as “Americans” or “America” is somehow waking up. This nation is spiraling into Hell, and this guy maintains almost a 50% approval rating. Don’t forget that.
southernjames, fwiw I agree that we’re functioning in an echo chamber… but at least OUR echo chamber has the benefit of accurate observations of Obama’s behavior so far. Is he post-partisan? Nope, look at how he was elected in Illinois and how he’s governing now. Is he Spock? Nope, look at his adolescent tantrums when he doesn’t get what he wants. Is he the super-smartest President evah? Nope, look at… well, pretty much every public move he’s made – rife with judgment errors. Is he the Great Diplomat who will lead us out of the Bush wilderness? Nope, look at how consistently he’s dissed our allies and sucked up to those who don’t deserve ANY kind of up-sucking from an American President.
The Left could maybe claim that he’s governing as a centrist because he hasn’t fully repudiated many of the Bush-era policies he said he was going to do away with as his First Official Acts; but that (in)action is subject to an alternate explanation: he’s indecisive and not HALF as smart as he or his minions think he is, and can’t think of anything better to do. Thankfully there WAS a grownup in the White House before (not a god, but a grownup), and all President Obama has had to do so far is to “play house” by keeping up what was already in place.
Oh, and look busy about the financial crisis.
But again, look at the way he’s looked busy: by sponsoring and putting into effect ever more government programs. This is not centrist.
Nobody except Richard Aubrey seems to have touched on the obvious explanation — race. We all know this, but a reminder might be useful. Shelby Steele had it right: the deal Obama offered was absolution, relief from the persistent race guilt that nearly every white American (including me) has internalized. His cool cerebral personality made him non-threatening, an exception to the rule of the stereotype that both blacks and whites, to their shame, have bought into. But it was only symbolic absolution, of course, and now we’re stuck with an incompetent at best and a scary ideologue at worst. Or maybe both. His election has only widened the racial divide. And the cool, distant personality people found intriguing has been shown to be cold and callous and really rather repellent.
Actually, his cool demeanor and arrogance (watch him look down at his audience, chin raised) remind me of a cold and calculated person who could just as soon shoot you as look a you. Very dangerous person, indeed.
mizpants,
On the international scene, Obama offered the Euros a chance to show their superiority to those racist Americans.
“kcom, whether this day ever comes depends entirely on what the media considered their duty to be. If it were “advance the socialist cause,” you’lre going to be waiting for a long time.”
Call me a cock-eyed optimist, I don’t mind. LOL It could happen. (Unfortunately the accent on that last line doesn’t come through in print.)
I’d agree with The Elephant’s Child, this is no longer preaching to the choir in Chicagoland, it’s dealing with the America that he’s neglected to learn about or chosen to ignore all these years. Given the educational pedigree, I’m not surprised, really, I’m not. However, when he was propped up for this gig, the handlers at the DNC knew how this was going to play out. What they’ve done has and will set this country back for some time.
mizpants: I mentioned race in my post:
Most people who voted for Obama are idealists. My generation that came of age in the 60s and 70s are idealists. They so want to believe that the world can be a fair and just place.
Waalaa – then appeared Obama.
He is one of us. Sits around and talks revolution, the feeling variety. Things can be so much better if we all just put our minds to it. And he’s black! Finally someone who represents the feelings of all those who have never had representation.
Hope and Change. The Audacity of Hope. Finally, someone has arrived who fills the bill to a tee.
Only problem is – feelings can carry the day only for a limited time. Eventually, gravity weighs down on even the most beautiful thoughts.
Put another way, people need to pull their heads out of their asses before it’s too late.
Neo,
Yes, sorry I missed it. But I do think race was more than an item in a descriptive list of what made Obama attractive, or rather I think that it was by far the most important item.
Hope and Change man is nothing more than the character, Chance (Being There).
The fools were fooled and saw what they wanted to believe and hear.
mizpants, I also methioned race in my comment.
“His race played prominently in his selection becasue the democrats had failed so miserably with their previous trojan horse candidates. They knew that they could threaten to tar anyone who criticized him with the epithat of racism. And that it would work, at least long enough to get him elected.”
I wholly agree with your statment that he provided absolution for liberal guilt.
Sorry Tim P. I’m a careless reader, I guess!
I mentioned it, too, obliquely, in talking about white guilt. But even though I mentioned it obliquely, I think it played a very prominent role.
As I’ve said before, take away Obama’s race (which is actually a whole other discussion in itself, what “race” is he?) and all you’re left with is John Edwards-lite. And neither the John Edwards part nor the “lite” part are a compliment.
I mentioned race, too and I haven’t even commented yet.
I suppose I ought to enter the who-mentioned-race sweepstakes.
I wasn’t mentioning race directly. Obama does not look like the average black man, much less the threatening, hard-nosed black man played by, among others, Samuel L. Jackson.
At the same time, he is not the decidedly unthreatening Amos or Andy, or Stepin Fetchit.
He is black by popular appellation but in no other way.
Keep in mind the physiognomy. Mike Tyson’s face wouldn’t be much help in pursuing higher office. But Mohammed Ali, in his younger days, was not only handsome,he was not a hard-nosed threatening type. He was personally popular.
Round-faced, perpetually (until late in life) adolescent, like Tiger Woods. Hell, Tiger doesn’t even look like he graduated from high school.
And Obama is a cheap thrill, anyway. His only connection to slavery or the Middle Passage is that some of his ancestors probably sold some of their neighbors west. Or east, into the Arab slave world.
He has no more of the American black experience than Paris Hilton does.
There are any number of black republicans and conservatives who look like grown men who could equally absolve the liberals of their guilt, or more so.
But there are two problems; ideology and physiognomy.
“There are any number of black republicans and conservatives who look like grown men who could equally absolve the liberals of their guilt, or more so.”
Actually, it’s just that point that puts the lie to all their pontificating. When it’s a contest between black achievement and liberal orthodoxy, liberal orthodoxy wins every time. They don’t acknowledge the achievements of black conservatives and, in fact, frequently disparage them in racial terms. It’s all about the ideology and what serves it, it’s not about actual truth and justice.