Obama Pummelled in Debate?

ossobuco wrote:

This is an interesting kernal. Me, I figure Obama knows how to decimate but chooses not to.
Not that I pretend to know his mind.

He knows, but he does not think that it is the right thing to do. He is afraid to use overt masculine power, ever. He does not yet have the confidence and the wisdom to know that he must use modulated force in the right places, that he will not be respected or respectable if he can not do it. Just as a dog that has been kicked one too many times will cower at the wrong times, Obama is a man who carries the weight of previous generations of men misusing masculine power. He is afraid to use it, does not figure that he has the right to use it, thinks that using it will make him like all the idiot men before him who have misused it.

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I disagree, as blowhardian demonstration of balls has gotten the world into virulent conflict of resultant unbelievable proportions.

Anyway, I don't take the fellow as a fraidy cat. I'm interested in actually seeing someone with a tempered brain that is at the same time active.

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hawkeye10 wrote:

ossobuco wrote:
This is an interesting kernal. Me, I figure Obama knows how to decimate but chooses not to.
Not that I pretend to know his mind.

He knows, but he does not think that it is the right thing to do. He is afraid to use overt masculine power, ever. He does not yet have the confidence and the wisdom to know that he must use modulated force in the right places, that he will not be respected or respectable if he can not do it. Just as a dog that has been kicked one too many times will cower at the wrong times, Obama is a man who carries the weight of previous generations of men misusing masculine power. He is afraid to use it, does not figure that he has the right to use it, thinks that using it will make him like all the idiot men before him who have misused it.

How did you dream up this fantasy?

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Roxxxanne wrote:

How did you dream up this fantasy?

I just watch him, and I read other peoples perception of him, like everyone else.

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I've been saying for a while that Obama is holding something in check in his debates with Hillary. Partly that is due to how she handled early debates (and is probably a strategic win for her) -- she made it clear that she'd play the "being mean to the lady!!" card at every opportunity (which was one of the earliest reasons I went from "*I* like her fine but I don't think she can win" to "she's pissing me off.")

This was interesting:

Quote:

My 82 Year Old Mother's Debate Reaction
By Andrienne Wilson - April 17, 2008, 8:03PM

Everyone on every network is missing the entire point of Obama's approach, and it is so basic I cannot believe no one has caught on. There is one simple and overiding reason that Obama does not go in for the kill with Clinton, and it has nothing to do with his ability to "close the deal". Obama has to gain this nomination without pissing off all of Hillary's supporters.

If he dives in to any of the critical comments pundits and so-called reporters think he needs to in order to show some killer instinct, he will totally lose the women who are currently pro-Hillary forever. The vitriol is bad enough now, can you imagine how Hillary's girls would feel about him if he had flattened her?

I asked my 82 year old mother, who hates politics with a passion because it is so negative, what she thought about the debate. She said "Well, he's being a gentleman, of course. Thank goodness, that is why I will vote for him." She then said "It's about time someone behaved properly." She then also asked me why I was making her watch the coverage. "You know this is why I hate politics, I'm going to go play mahjong on the computer."

Simple, to the point, out of the mouth of a lady who usually won't even pay attention to all of this. This is not unpreparedness, this is foresight so complete, and farreaching that gaming minds have missed it. He can't win without all of those women. He can't win those women if they hate him for destroying Hillary.

I really think that if he gets the nomination and it's just him vs. McCain, we're going to see a much more cutting side to his debate performances.

Basically, I think he's debating Hillary through a filter, and that the filter would be removed if/when he debates McCain.

I don't mean all-out aggression or anything, he'll still be Obama of course. But more stinging wit (of the "the wheels have come off the Straight Talk Express" type), more addressing him directly, ("John, seven years ago you said...") And I think more comfort too.

We'll see. (I hope.)

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That was in the back of my mind -- that he can't afford to go for the jugular because he's the one who's going to have to do the uniting. He has consistently refused to pile on when given the opportunity about Hillary's Bosnia lies, but she never misses an opportunity. I don't think it's hurting him to do this because she can attack him on his response no matter what it is. If he doesn't attack he's a girly man, if he does attack he's not Mr. Hope after all and worse, is beating up on a girl. Better to play it cool. She won't be able to move people to her court this way. The best she can do is move them out of his, which isn't good enough to get her the nomination. He's doing the right thing.

I have to say that the way she forwarded the Hannity smears in the debate really, really turned me off. I don't want to be one of those people who says I won't vote for her if she gets the nomination, but after watching her embrace the people and the tactics that I've come to despise (because they brought us GWB -- twice) I think I might stay home in November. That's one of the things that turned me off of McCain as well -- his ability to embrace (literally) the man who smeared his family. I can't stomach it.

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sozobe wrote:

I really think that if he gets the nomination and it's just him vs. McCain, we're going to see a much more cutting side to his debate performances.

Basically, I think he's debating Hillary through a filter, and that the filter would be removed if/when he debates McCain.

BTW, I seem to remember reading that he actually said something like this. I'm going to try to find it.

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Nobody, and I mean NOBODY, is better at playing the victim than Billary is....however, that only means that Barack needs to be smart about how he shoves them off the stage. He has refused to do it at all. He has refused to take control of the situation, which is a failure to use masculine power.

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here's a perspective....most here won't like it but it's interesting...

http://www.newsweek.com/id/132566

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hawkeye, what you don't seem to be seeing is that any kind of *pushing* her off will backfire. He's pushing her off in his own way -- steadily building up a big lead in pledged delegates and the popular vote, and steadily narrowing the superdelegate lead she currently holds. When he has 2,025 delegates, he's pushed her off. And he doesn't have to alienate a big swath of the Dem base to do it.

Patience, grasshopper.

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the fact that bush won in 2000.... and in 2004 the dems couldn't find someone strong enough to beat him.... and that today... even with all this mass love of obama he can't get track than a few percentage points (if that) above a bush clone..... if after some of the stupidest and worse 8 years of our countries history we can't find a candidate from any location who can walk away from our current policies and take the presidency by an ENORMOUS margin.... well.. we have met the enemy.... and he is us....

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BPB, it's interesting, but I don't buy it. (I know that's not a surprise.) We all knew there would be attempts to Kerryize him. I liked him from early on because I didn't think it would work, and it doesn't seem to have. Neither Wright nor "bitter" put an appreciable dent in him. People like him, and shrug that stuff off.

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Bi-Polar Bear wrote:

the fact that bush won in 2000.... and in 2004 the dems couldn't find someone strong enough to beat him.... and that today... even with all this mass love of obama he can't get track than a few percentage points (if that) above a bush clone.....

Mass love of Obama? Right now we have a whole bunch of Hillary people mass hating him -- and Hillary herself leading the pack. Meanwhile her attacks and his parries make up the bulk of the "news," and McCain's getting an almost complete pass. If Obama's doing this well in these circumstances, he's going to do much, much better once a nominee is decided, Dems start closing ranks, and the Obama- McCain fight becomes the main storyline, rather than Obama - Hillary.

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sozobe wrote:

BPB, it's interesting, but I don't buy it. (I know that's not a surprise.) We all knew there would be attempts to Kerryize him. I liked him from early on because I didn't think it would work, and it doesn't seem to have. Neither Wright nor "bitter" put an appreciable dent in him. People like him, and shrug that stuff off.

you can't judge that dent because he hasn't faced any measurable swift boating tactics .... but he will and it will be awful. Like it or not.... he's still not faced a large adversarial test yet. I'm not saying it's right that he will.... I'm not saying i agree with what's going to happen.... I'm just saying you've only seen the tip of the iceburg and his ability to deal with it is largely an unknown.

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Bi-Polar Bear wrote:

here's a perspective....most here won't like it but it's interesting...

http://www.newsweek.com/id/132566

I have no doubt that just as Barrack is sensitive to the misuse of masculine power in the past and thus often can not use it, he is also sensitive to the pathology in the party...does not want to offend. In both cases his sensitivity hobbles him. Sometimes the way to avoid an accident is to hit the gas, to not be hesitant or cautious. we can blame the party for what they have done to their candidate by allowing Hillary to bloody him, but just the same it is Barracks fault too, he could of dispatched Hillary on his own, but did not.

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sozobe wrote:

Bi-Polar Bear wrote:
the fact that bush won in 2000.... and in 2004 the dems couldn't find someone strong enough to beat him.... and that today... even with all this mass love of obama he can't get track than a few percentage points (if that) above a bush clone.....

Mass love of Obama? Right now we have a whole bunch of Hillary people mass hating him -- and Hillary herself leading the pack. Meanwhile her attacks and his parries make up the bulk of the "news," and McCain's getting an almost complete pass. If Obama's doing this well in these circumstances, he's going to do much, much better once a nominee is decided, Dems start closing ranks, and the Obama- McCain fight becomes the main storyline, rather than Obama - Hillary.

There is mass love of Obama regardless and you know it. No one's picking a fight... I'm just stating a fact. And there is no more mass hating of obama from the clinton camp than vice versa... obama is just passive aggressive about it. I know I overuse that term when speaking of him and his tactics but to my mind there's no better description. I don't hate the guy... I just don't think he's the guy for the job right now.

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Well, no, it's not largely unknown. This isn't so bad, and it'll probably be worse -- but it's not nothing.

For my job I was tracking how the pundits were completely hysterical about "bitter" -- the vast majority of them thought it was HUGE. That he was done for, Hillary had found her chance, and that was that. I mean, really a lot of them thought it was Big News.

But what'd the voters do? Shrugged it off.

Same with Wright.

In both of these situations, it was shown that voters really liked how Obama handled things.

This tells us stuff -- even if it's not Republican Level Horribleness (though as Robert Reich said when he endorsed Hillary, it's not far off), it tells us stuff.

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look at it without the medias perspective period. they are going to make a big deal out of everything and anything... they have already... they are not in the news business anymore.... they are in the sensationalist business in order to bring in advertising revenues... they spent the early part of this campaign building Obama onto a Babel sized pedestal and then realized they'd done too much too soon and people might stop tuning in.... so they are now pulling bricks out of Obamas pedestal...

so which is it sozobe... voters love him or he's not the object of mass love? Laughing

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Bi-Polar Bear wrote:

sozobe wrote:
BPB, it's interesting, but I don't buy it. (I know that's not a surprise.) We all knew there would be attempts to Kerryize him. I liked him from early on because I didn't think it would work, and it doesn't seem to have. Neither Wright nor "bitter" put an appreciable dent in him. People like him, and shrug that stuff off.

you can't judge that dent because he hasn't faced any measurable swift boating tactics .... but he will and it will be awful. Like it or not.... he's still not faced a large adversarial test yet. I'm not saying it's right that he will.... I'm not saying i agree with what's going to happen.... I'm just saying you've only seen the tip of the iceburg [sic]and his ability to deal with it is largely an unknown.

He has everything thrown at him INCLUDING the kitchen sink. He has defeated the greatest political machine of our time. He has survived a three against one attack (the media, the Republicand and Hillary) and weathered the storm. He has endured the most biased debate questioning ever. And you say this is the tip of the iceberg? How much sleazier can it get? The thing is with Obama that has escaped you is the fact that these attacks only make Obama look (and, in fact, become) stronger.

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Bi-Polar Bear wrote:

There is mass love of Obama regardless and you know it. No one's picking a fight... I'm just stating a fact. And there is no more mass hating of obama from the clinton camp than vice versa... obama is just passive aggressive about it. I know I overuse that term when speaking of him and his tactics but to my mind there's no better description. I don't hate the guy... I just don't think he's the guy for the job right now.

I'm not saying there isn't mass love of Obama, no. I'm refuting it in the context that you used it, that even when there's this mass love he can't get more than a small lead over McCain. My point was sure there's mass love, but there's mass HATE too. And that hate -- or dislike, or disdain, or concern, or however you want to put it -- is emanating from the Democratic side and grabbing headlines on a daily basis.

Point being -- now is when Obama could be expected to do WORST in head-to-head matchups with McCain. If he's doing OK now, he's gonna do much better after becoming the nominee.

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Obama Pummelled in Debate?

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