Cross posted from
the European Tribune and other follies.
Oh no! Not another Obama diary I hear you say. ET has been a relatively Obama free zone in recent times despite some commentary on his European tour and his Irish roots. And yet the outcome of the US Presidential election could have very profound implications for Europe indeed.
Obama is almost universally applauded for running a very professional election campaign machine – in sharp contrast to McCain’s relatively inept performance. And yet Obama has consistently failed to achieve a clear lead over McCain in opinion polls – the Real Clear Politics average of polls shows him only a few percentage points ahead – and his favourable/unfavourable ratings are hardly better than McCain’s.
His triumphant Middle Eastern and European tour didn’t yield the expected bounce, and even the most ridiculous McCain attempts to target his “celebrity” status are not widening the gap in Obama’s favour. Maybe Paris Hilton set the right tone by targeting the white haired wrinkly guy and making a better fist of articulating an energy policy…
Incredible as in may seem to many in Europe, an Obama victory is anything but a foregone conclusion. Much greater swings in opinion polls occur regularly in US politics (witness Hillary Clinton’s demise after earlier 30 point leads). So what is wrong with the Obama candidacy, and why might McCain still win?
Beats me!
Ok, but here are some theories.
Firstly, however much Obama might wish to transcend race, to many he is still the black candidate. For the McCain attacks at his being “elitist”, read an “uppity” black who upsets the residual natural status hierarchy of small town US society in many states.
Secondly, despite Hilary’s active endorsement and support, many Clintonistas still bitterly resent her defeat and see it as part of the sexism endemic in US society. They may only be huffing and puffing and come round by November, but as yet many pumas have not transfered their support to Obama.
Thirdly, despite almost unprecedented economic collapse, almost no one, including Obama, is challenging the dominant MSM and political paradigm of free markets, less regulation, lower taxes, and greater inequality to get America moving again. In this paradigm he is an inexperienced left-winger who will do the opposite of what “America” “needs” to get the economy back on track. The greater the economic or national security anxiety, the more some Americans will run to the father figure.
Fourthly, xenophobia. Many Americans don’t know where Yurp is, and Obama’s popularity here smacks of a lack of patriotism and a potential betrayal of American interests rather than of a positive movement towards a more cooperative and consensual world order. If you think your security depends on having a strong military, you’re not going to be too happy with a conciliator, are you?
Fifthly, no one is effectively challenging “the surge is working” narrative, which makes Iraq – the original basis for Obama’s campaign – much less of an issue going forward, despite the fact that Iraqi Prime Minister Maliki effectively endorsed Obama’s withdrawal timetable proposal.
—-
So what can Obama do to address these issues and sharpen the campaign focus on his areas of strength?
Firstly he needs to soften and blur his “black” identity. I have already suggested a stop off in Ireland to highlight his Irish roots would do him no harm at all. Obama ancestor opposed corruption in Dublin – The Irish Times – Thu, Aug 07, 2008
BARACK OBAMA had a distant Irish cousin who went on to become provost of Trinity College and later bishop of Ossory, new research shows.
It has also been revealed that an Irish ancestor opposed political corruption in Dublin.
The Democratic nominee for the US presidential election is directly descended from the Kearneys of Shinrone and Moneygall, Co Offaly, the research has revealed. His ancestry had already been traced back to a shoemaker in Moneygall on the Offaly-Tipperary border. Further research shows a Tipperary connection.
—
The Kearneys prospered in the 18th century, with John Kearney, a distant cousin, becoming provost of Trinity College and later bishop of Ossory.
Michael Kearney, described as Obama’s sixth great granduncle, entered the guild of barber surgeons and periwigmakers in 1717, and was enrolled as a hairdresser in the freemen’s rolls in 1718. He had the right to vote in elections to the city council in Dublin.
In the 1750s, “when the aristocracy tried to gerrymander elections in Dublin city council, to put in their own candidates”, Michael Kearney was prominent among guildsmen in opposing them.
After the 1780s, the fortunes of this line of the Kearneys declined because of economic changes after the Act of Union and a downturn in the fashion of wig-making.
A genealogy which includes a Bishop, a Provost of Trinity College, a fighter against aristocracy, and a family which experienced the brunt of British imperialism cannot be a bad heritage for Obama to highlight. Why should his African roots be allowed to dominate all discource?
Secondly, Obama needs to stop McCain setting the policy agenda on energy and the economy. Arguing that people should ensure that their tyres are correctly inflated may be technically correct, but hardly the best way to inspire the electorate. Is Gore really so politically toxic that Obama can’t embrace at least some of his sustainable energy proposals? Hell, Paris Hilton would make a better energy spokeperson that McCain, so this issue should be a big plus for Obama.
Thirdly, the vexed issue of his VP choice. He needs to diffuse the Hillary factor. McCain is actively targeting the predominantly older, less educated, male white vote she courted so effectively. Perhaps Obama should swallow his pride and give her the VEEP spot. His more hysterical supporters will go ballistic – but they’ll get over it come November. A VEEP has almost no effective role in the US political system unless the President gives him/her one – and Obama can effectively sideline Hillary later if she isn’t singing from the same hymn sheet.
But finally, Obama needs to take a real stand on some policy issues – and argue his case. His headlong rush to the the current political centre marks him out as a lightweight who can’t stand his ground and who will be easy meat when the Washington establishment gets to work on him. It isn’t all about getting to the White House first and then deciding what the political and economic realities of the day allow you to do. You also have to prepare the ground for a radical policy departure by “selling” it to the US electorate first.
By taking the road of least resistance now Obama also risks being seen as a weak President later – with no mandate for radical action and no means of managing a restless Democratic majority in congress. He needs to take a stand on a few issues now:
e.g.
- Adopt most of Gore’s sustainable energy plan
- No more bail-outs for banks. If they need money they pay for it with equity which can be sold (hopefully at a profit) for the taxpayers benefit later. Hell it could fund the Social security system if the Government had large shareholdings in many banks. That’s what pension funds do – they invest, and expect a return.
- Hire Paris Hilton to respond to “the white wrinkled ones'” more ridiculous attack ads. Gentle mockery and a sense of humour is the most appropriate response. Obama doesn’t need to go there.
OK – let see if I can’t provoke a little debate here. In what way is the current Obama move to the centre different from Clintonian triangulation? In what way is he articulating a clear revolutionary break from not just GOP but Clinton rule? He said Reagan’s candidacy marked a clear change in US policy direction. What’s Obama’s?
First look at the motivation.
The DLC became convinced that Democrats could not compete financially with the Republican Party unless they could reach near parity with corporate contributions and basically assuage corporate hostility (especially in the media) to the Left. They also became convinced that the Democrats could not compete in the South unless they took on their black constituency in a frontal assault and distanced themselves from the NEW LEFT on matters of national security and culture. Blacks and hippies became the crazy old uncle that you lock in the attic.
Obama does almost none of this. And what little he does is part of a strategy to compensate for the fact that he is black, fairly liberal, and urban. On the other hand, Obama is genuinely from a different era than the OLD NEW LEFT and he doesn’t subscribe to liberal orthodoxy on economic issues or on affirmative action and, for example, the death penalty.
Yet, take a look at his proposals on Urban Policy and Service to see how progressive he is on policies of concern to blacks. Even Obama’s positions of Faith-Based Charities, the Economy, and Education have major urban progressive notes.
What is confusing people is that Obama is an Urban Progressive, not an Academic Progressive. Academic Progressives are less practical and more doctrinaire. Urban Progressives want solutions NOW and they aren’t too picky about what is tried or whether it might offend teacher’s unions or people that are concerned with the separation of church and state.
Obama doesn’t campaign on these issues much because the swing voters are more concerned with the cost of energy, job loss, and the cost of health care. But his agenda is there for you to read. And it is completely contrary to the DLC strategy of throwing the urban communities under the bus.
Obama has embraced Bush’s war on terror. What’s progressive about that, whether “urban” or “academic”?
McCain wants to win the war in Iraq; Obama wants to win the war in Afghanistan. Big difference. Both wars are unwinnable, because third-world peoples don’t put up with colonialism any more. And the Brits couldn’t conquer Afghanistan, even when colonialism was still a going concern! But no, Obama is not “academic” enough to learn a little from history.
Instead, he has to triangulate. “Bush and McCain are right: WAR IS GOOD!” But they have focused on the wrong war. Instead, I will kill your spouses and children in THE RIGHT WAR!”
Finding an exit strategy that doesn’t look too much like a defeat in Iraq and Afghanistan is the most any Presidential aspirant can probably achieve. The key issue is how he will act with respect to Iran – especially if Israel starts to bomb big time. Here the signs are more hopeful.
The only viable exit strategy for Afghanistan involves negotiating with the Taliban. Instead, Obama still talks of “winning”. (But then, so do leaders of other NATO countries in Afghanistan.) By so doing, he’s setting himself up for failure.
Like Bush and McCain, he is still looking for military solutions instead of political ones. That’s not the kind of “change” we need. And given how Obama prostrated himself before AIPAC, I see no great signs for hope vis-à-vis Iran.
Negotiating with the Taliban?
I don’t think so.
The Taliban is basically helpless without Pakistan’s open permission to operate in Quetta and the funds and weapons training that ISI provides.
Their own tribesmen are basically hostile to them provided that they are not shut out of contracts and government jobs by other tribes (warlords) in the South. When they are shut out, they are willing to tolerate their own tribesman coming in and making trouble, but only for limited purposes.
What’s gone wrong in Afghanistan is that Karzai has been a weak leader when it comes to insisting on good government and tribal inclusiveness, at the same time that Pakistan has infiltrated every aspect of local politics and the local economies, while supporting the Taliban insurgency.
If there is no answer in Afghanistan it is only because we are stuck between a rock and a hard place in terms of our relationship with the ISI.
I think Pakistan is coming in for a rude awakening as the Afghan government increasingly turns to India and Iran for support.
America needs to face up to the fact that we need Iran on the eastern front and that we cannot continue to let Israel’s irrational fears dictate our policy with Iran.
I suspect that about the only thing the Taliban want from the US/Nato – is for them to get the hell out of there and leave Afghanis to fight their own domestic battles as they have always done.
If I recall, the original war aim was to get Al Qaeda. Now that they have gone to ground – mostly in Pakistan – a US “ally” – what is the point of continuing to try to occupy Afghanistan?
Get a deal to limit the drug trade and threaten to bomb/spray if Al Qaeda come back or the drug trade gets out of hand. Then get the hell out of there.
Whats the deal with US military occupations around the world? The US has troops in over a hundred “sovereign” countries. I thought the US didn’t do empire building?
Seems to me if Osama bin Laden were captured, Obama could declare victory and leave, and Americans would be satisfied. Would a large majority of the people of Afghanistan prefer that outcome?
No. I don’t think so. A large majority of Afghans want a functioning national government that is fair to all parties and tribes. And they will support whatever promotes that and oppose whatever inhibits it. The problem for America is that we did not get it right with the Karzai government. It’s not really a problem with Hamid Karzai per se. People accept that he was a natural choice. But Karzai is a weak leader and he tolerated some extremely bad governance in the provinces which caused him to lose support. And the Americans were seen as the enforcers that backed the corrupt governance, and so they became targets too. But the answer in Afghanistan is not to pick up and leave because there is some undefeatable and legitimate insurgency. The answer is to get the right leadership in place in the provinces so that there is no longer tribal warfare. Along with that leadership there needs to be a lot of goodies, especially jobs.
And Pakistan must pay a heavy price for their determination to keep Afghanistan an inhospitable and ungovernable puppet state. Afghanistan is not like Iraq in any meaningful way. We should be prepared to abandon Afghanistan if other pressing issues become more urgent (look at the war between Russia and Georgia for one possible flash point). But we would do better to double down and fix the problems that are undermining the central government. Without us the country has no chance.
Iraq, on the other hand, is about as ready as they are ever going to get to deal with their own security. They have tens of billions in the bank. They really want us to leave. We can’t help much by staying and may even retard their progress.
Booman Tribune ~ Comments ~ Obama’s election to lose? (Europe is gobsmacked)
Everyone (almost) wants a fair and functioning Government, but what evidence do we have that Afghans see the USA as part of the solution and not part of the problem?
I get the feeling you don’t really know much about the Afghan people. I’ve probably read more about Afghanistan this year than any other topic. I can tell you that Afghanistanis are not suffering from too little ‘imperialism’, but not enough. They will tell you the same thing as long as we’re not talking about Pakistani imperialism, of which they have had quite enough.
I guess you haven’t read this piece by Anatol Lieven or, if you did, it didn’t make much of an impression on you:
But that assumes that the Taliban exists as some cross-tribal entity. It really doesn’t. I would dispute that the Taliban, as such, currently exists at all. It’s really shorthand for a conglomeration of Pashtuns that are self-organized along strictly tribal lines and that are pissed off at the government of Kandahar or Jalalabad, or whatever because their tribe doesn’t have control of the local quarry or the highway tolls or the police department or the sanitation department.
And they cause problems.
What’s roiling southern Afghanistan is Warlordism, where one tribe dominates to the exclusion of all others. It’s a total misunderstanding to think you can negotiate with ‘The Taliban’ without actually getting a fair deal for the excluded tribes.
Your author simply misunderstands the data. He discovered that the insurgents have no allegiance to the old Taliban leadership but did not discover why.
I have a high regard for Anatol Lieven, so I’d be surprised if he “misunderstands the data”. But since I don’t want to catch up with you on reading about Afghanistan, I won’t argue the point.
In any case, the view seems widespread in NATO that Afghanistan is unwinable: officials simply aren’t coming clean with their publics. So if there’s no one to negotiate a NATO departure with as you suggest, so much the worse for all concerned: but that doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t leave.
Fair points. Obama doesn’t sideline blacks and hippies but neither does he confront the economic orthodoxies of neo-conservatism. Perhaps that’s a bridge too far, and too much to expect in the heat of an election campaign where the “wedge” issues are defined by others. However it puts Obama in a poor position to confront the causes of peak oil, peak credit, income inequality and public bankruptcy once he does get into power.
I’m trying to think beyond the tactics of winning the election and into the dynamics of Government once he gets into power. He is building a powerful organisation but has it got the staying power and ideological coherence of the neo-cons?
Unless he brings a defining new motif to world politics “Obamaism” – his Presidency is going to be defined by the mess he inherited from others. He will then be seen – at best – as a transitional figure. I believe he has the potential to be more than that.
We need to challenge the orthodoxy of continually lowering expectations of what political leadership can achieve.
I have attempted to sum up the debate – and my take on it – on ET as follows:
So what’s the consensus here?
That Obama is further ahead than the polls suggest, that he has a number of different routes to an electoral majority, that McCain’s campaign is getting a little desperate, that clear blue water will appear in September/October when the economy tanks further and Obama’s better organisation/funding makes it’s presence felt?
Maybe.
However I won’t want this one to be a toss-up come the TV debates. People don’t necessarily like the smart new kid on the block taking shots at lovable old grandpaw. Expectations will be so high for a resounding Obama win in the debates he won’t be able to fulfill them.
I’m not convinced the centre ground has yet shifted sufficiently for Obama. They need to like him more. A bit more self-depreciating humour, a bit more modesty and humility might go a long way. People need to be able to identify with you. It’s not about winning the intellectual argument, its about winning hearts.
Obama has to show that he is a regular guy – one you would want to go out and have a drink with. If he can make this transition, grandpa will be left to swing gently on the porch.
How does this conclusion sit with the Booman babes?