Obama starts hitting the notes the base wants to hear
thecarpetbaggerreport.com
Posted October 3rd, 2007 at 9:30 am
If Barack Obama is going to catch up to Hillary Clinton — a scenario that becomes more of a challenge all the time — he’s going to have to build on what he’s done so far this year, and add a new dimension to his campaign. There’s no shortage of suggestions, but I’d argue that yesterday’s speech on foreign policy was definitely a step in the right direction.
One of the things that I’ve found most intriguing about Obama’s rhetorical strategy the last several months is that he emphasizes bringing people together, being able to work with people with whom he disagrees, and ending partisan bickering. This, arguably, is the right message for a general election, but the wrong message for a competitive primary — Democratic activists aren’t interested in working with Republicans; they’re interested in beating them. Primary/caucus voters don’t want to hear about a candidate’s ability to reach across the aisle; they want to hear about advancing a progressive agenda.
I think I understand the subtle message behind Obama’s pitch — “Vote for me and I’ll win in November” — but it may very well be too subtle for a mass audience.
With that in mind, I was impressed with yesterday’s Obama’s speech at DePaul, on both substantive and stylistic grounds. The main policy headline from the remarks emphasized nuclear proliferation, but I was also struck by the senator’s comments about the media and the DC establishment.
“[T]he conventional thinking today is just as entrenched as it was in 2002. This is the conventional thinking that measures experience only by the years you’ve been in Washington, not by your time spent serving in the wider world.
“This is the conventional thinking that has turned against the war, but not against the habits that got us into the war in the first place — the outdated assumptions and the refusal to talk openly to the American people.
“Well I’m not running for President to conform to Washington’s conventional thinking — I’m running to challenge it. I’m not running to join the kind of Washington groupthink that led us to war in Iraq – I’m running to change our politics and our policy so we can leave the world a better place than our generation has found it. […]
“I want to be straight with you. If you want conventional Washington thinking, I’m not your man. If you want rigid ideology, I’m not your man. If you think that fundamental change can wait, I’m definitely not your man. But if you want to bring this country together, if you want experience that’s broader than just learning the ways of Washington, if you think that the global challenges we face are too urgent to wait, and if you think that America must offer the world a new and hopeful face, then I offer a different choice in this race and a different vision for our future.”
He used the word “conventional” eight times in the speech, all of them in the context of criticism.
More here:
talkingpointsmemo.com |
