Failed Presidency

**MikeJones** · October 12th, 2009, 05:15 PM

Failed Presidency
By Geoffrey P. Hunt

Barack Obama is on track to have the most spectacularly failed presidency since Woodrow Wilson.

In the modern era, we've seen several failed presidencies -- led by Jimmy Carter and LBJ. Failed presidents have one strong common trait -- they are repudiated, in the vernacular, spat out. Of course, LBJ wisely took the exit ramp early, avoiding a shove into oncoming traffic by his own party. Richard Nixon indeed resigned in disgrace, yet his reputation as a statesman has been partially restored by his triumphant overture to China .

George Bush Jr didn't fail so much as he was perceived to have been too much of a patrician while being uncomfortable with his more conservative allies. Yet George Bush Sr is still perceived as a man of uncommon decency, loyal to the enduring American character of rugged self-determination, free markets, and generosity. George W will eventually be treated more kindly by historians as one whose potential was squashed by his own compromise of conservative principles, in some ways repeating the mistakes of his father, while ignoring many lessons in executive leadership he should have learned at Harvard Business School . Of course George W could never quite overcome being dogged from the outset by half of the nation convinced he was electorally illegitimate -- thus aiding the resurgence of the liberal wing of the Democratic Party.

But, Barack Obama is failing. Failing big. Failing fast. And failing everywhere: foreign policy, domestic initiatives, and most importantly, in forging connections with the American people. The incomparable Dorothy Rabinowitz in the Wall Street Journal put her finger on it: He is failing because he has no understanding of the American people, and may indeed loathe them. Fred Barnes of the Weekly Standard says he is failing because he has lost control of his message, and is overexposed. Clarice Feldman of American Thinker produced a dispositive commentary showing that Obama is failing because fundamentally he is neither smart nor articulate; his intellectual dishonesty is conspicuous by its audacity and lack of shame.

But, there is something more seriously wrong: How could a new president riding in on a wave of unprecedented promise and goodwill have forfeited his tenure and become a lame duck in six months? His poll ratings are in free fall. In generic balloting, the Republicans have now seized a five point advantage. This truly is unbelievable. What's going on?

No narrative. Obama doesn't have a narrative. No, not a narrative about himself. He has a self-narrative, much of it fabricated, cleverly disguised or written by someone else. But this self-narrative is isolated and doesn't connect with us. He doesn't have an American narrative that draws upon the rest of us. All successful presidents have a narrative about the American character that intersects with their own where they display a command of history and reveal an authenticity at the core of their personality that resonates in a positive endearing way with the majority of Americans . We admire those presidents whose narratives not only touch our own, but who seem stronger, wiser, and smarter than we are. Presidents we admire are aspirational peers, even those whose politics don't align exactly with our own: Teddy Roosevelt, FDR, Harry Truman, Ike, Reagan.

But not this president. It's not so much that he's a phony, knows nothing about economics, is historically illiterate, and woefully small minded for the size of the task-- all contributory of course. It's that he's not one of us. And whatever he is, his profile is fuzzy and devoid of content, like a cardboard cutout made from delaminated corrugated paper. Moreover, he doesn't command our respect and is unable to appeal to our own common sense. His notions of right and wrong are repugnant and how things work just don't add up. They are not existential. His descriptions of the world we live in don't make sense and don't correspond with our experience.

In the meantime, while we've been struggling to take a measurement of this man, he's dissed just about every one of us--financiers, energy producers, banks, insurance executives, police officers, doctors, nurses, hospital administrators, post office workers, and anybody else who has a non-green job. Expect Obama to lament at his last press conference in 2012: "For those of you I offended, I apologize. For those of you who were not offended, you just didn't give me enough time; if only I'd had a second term, I could have offended you too."

Mercifully, the Founders at the Constitutional Convention in 1787 devised a useful remedy for such a desperate state--staggered terms for both houses of the legislature and the executive. An equally abominable Congress can get voted out next year. With a new Congress, there's always hope of legislative gridlock until we vote for president again two short years after that.

Yes, small presidents do fail, Barack Obama among them. The coyotes howl, but the wagon train keeps rolling along.
Reply With Quote

**R13** · October 12th, 2009, 05:45 PM

Wow, is this guy just retarded? Wilson is usually ranked a top 10 president, such a failure. And LBJ a top 15, along with Carter who is generally mid pack. I didn't know Obama's approval was falling this drastically, last I checked it has went up 6 points in the past week sitting at 56...never falling below 50. And where's this 5 point edge? lol...congressional approval rating doesn't show that, neither do any poll I've seen.

**MikeJones** · October 12th, 2009, 06:04 PM

I read were his approval jumped after he won the Nobel prize. But honestly what has he done to win that? Even comedians are now taking jabs at him the liberal ones to. He was at 49 in the Rasmussen a few days ago

**Milk3** · October 12th, 2009, 07:06 PM

So far he's doing worse than Bush was at this point in his presidency. Terrorist attacks or no terrorist attacks it's still better. I believe Bush was in the middle to high 80's at the first of Nov. in 2001.

**R13** · October 12th, 2009, 07:26 PM

No, terrorist attacks were the only reason, can't say if there wasn't he would be anywheres near it...that's what happens to approval ratings during a national event like that, can't compare the two.

**R13** · October 12th, 2009, 09:40 PM

Originally Posted by MikeJones

I read were his approval jumped after he won the Nobel prize. But honestly what has he done to win that? Even comedians are now taking jabs at him the liberal ones to. He was at 49 in the Rasmussen a few days ago

It was on the rise before, in the Gallup, which is the only approval poll I look at. Comedians take shot at everyone, that's there job, I don't get where liberals/dems/Obama have ever been exempt since he started. Rassmussen has had Obama about 5 points lower than every other poll since day one, they are a joke just look at their spread compared to every other poll, Gallup has never had him below 50.

**Milk3** · October 12th, 2009, 10:18 PM

Back to the original post...
although i've not agreed with hardly anything Obama has done and probably never will... i believe it's way to early to say whether he's failed or not. In 2 years maybe but not this soon that's dumb

**MikeJones** · October 12th, 2009, 11:45 PM

I agree Milk it to early and to be honest I hope he don't fail because i live hear to.

R13 comedians have pretty much stayed away from Obama. I remember when Clinton was elected SNL was still funny and they did a skit of him jogging and going into a McDonald's.

**sup-rbeast** · October 13th, 2009, 08:33 AM

haha..ok. Any more works of fiction available on the net? Anyone that starts off an article about Obama failing by praising Bush, loses credibility from the start. Cuz, that exposes their stupidity from the get go.

**Gotch** · October 13th, 2009, 09:09 AM

Originally Posted by R13

Wow, is this guy just retarded? Wilson is usually ranked a top 10 president, such a failure. And LBJ a top 15, along with Carter who is generally mid pack. I didn't know Obama's approval was falling this drastically, last I checked it has went up 6 points in the past week sitting at 56...never falling below 50. And where's this 5 point edge? lol...congressional approval rating doesn't show that, neither do any poll I've seen.

While I agree that it's far to early to declare this presidency a failure I disagree completely on LBJ and Carter, and especially this nations most over-rated president Woodrow Wilson.

LBJ was likely clinically insane, Carter was among the poorest leaders in this country's history.

Wilson, oh boy, Wilson, he campaign for re-election on the slogan "he kept us out of the war", lol. He instituted the first U.S. Propaganda department, he spoke of his dislike of the constitution, he secretly plotted to blockade Germany prior to WWI while claiming to be neutral, he insisted on the harshest of treatments for Germany at Versailles, which without a doubt allowed for the rise to power of Adolph Hitler. He created the Federal Reserve in a secret meeting on "jekyll Island".

During WWI tens of thousands of U.S. citizens were arrested for simply speaking disapproval of the war. I could go on and on, Wilson was a dangerous nut, which is one of the few things on which I agree with Freud who wrote an entire book chronicling Wilson's mental illness and basic insanity.