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Wintonsweek
Obamania – Is There Anything Behind The Rhetoric?
Yes–High Tax, Big Government, Extreme Abortions, Union-Owned
Inexperienced, First Term Senator Will Fall To McCain
Obama wants to tax the “rich”; unfortunately that means you

“Obama is the least scary man I know whose middle name is Hussein” 

SCOTTSDALE, Arizona Barack Hussein Obama has come from nowhere to lead the race for the Democratic Party’s assault on the White House, but the media is relentless in missing the point about him.

All we ever hear is how he is for “change”; how he is brilliantly eloquent in leading the charge for “change”, how thousands queue for hours to hear him talk about this illusive “change”. We never hear anything about what kind of politician Obama is, what he stands for or what he would do if he became President of the United States.

Rush Limbaugh, the right-wing radio talk show host, is relentlessly negative about Obama, you won’t be surprised to hear. Limbaugh has compiled some hilarious faux radio ads to underline his view that Obama is void of content, that he is vacuity personified. Limbaugh suggests a campaign song for Obama – the Candy Man sung by Sammy Davis Junior, with its childish ode to free sweets for all. Limbaugh moans about what he calls the Oprahisation of America that all this shallowness represents. Oprah Winfrey, the high-profile talk show host, was an early adopter of Obama, to the shock and horror of the Hillary Clinton attack dawgs. 

Ann Coulter, right-wing commentator and author, mocks Obama along the same lines, but does have some positive things to say.

“Obama is the least scary man I know whose middle name is Hussein,” Coulter said in a speech to young Republicans, which is circulating, on the Internet. There are many negative stories trying to link Obama’s early years living with Muslims in Indonesia suggesting that he is some kind of Islamic conspiracy. But there is no point in trying to invent negatives when true ones are there in abundance.

Liberal’s liberal
Obama is a liberal’s liberal. In British parlance, he is a left-wing socialist. His voting record in the U.S. Senate shows he is the most left-wing of all the Democratic Party’s members in the upper house.  This of course plays well with the Democratic Party base. But as the race gets closer to the finishing line, both candidates are moving further and further to the left in a frantic bid to win. This bodes ill for the campaign proper. Most of these hostages to fortune will be jettisoned when normal Americans have to be wooed. Most difficult will be the attempt to nationalise health care led by Hillary Clinton and almost matched by Obama.

“A lot of silly people who don’t earn much money are in for a shock if Obama wins power. “

There is no secret about Obama’s politics if you look at his record. He is a tax and spend socialist, with a Little America view of the world. No foreign wars for Obama, even if that means the end of projecting power in parts of the world which are unpleasant like the Middle East, where America’s (and the West’s) interests are vital. If there’s another September 11, Obama, who voted against the war in Iraq, is going to look mighty foolish.

He constantly talks about how the Bush tax cuts have benefited the rich, but never gets close to defining what he means by “rich”. A lot of silly people who don’t earn much money are in for a shock if Obama wins power.

Union owned
Obama is in hock to the labour unions and holds extreme, uncompromising views on abortion. He appears not to think much of free trade, support of which would offend his union buddies, who have stumped up much money for his campaigns.

In a recent vote in the Senate, which sought to clarify some unpleasant aspects (come to think of it, everything about this subject turns the stomach) of partial birth abortion, even a left-wing nutter and extreme feminist like Senator Barbara Boxer agreed that it wouldn’t threaten a women’s right to choose if some babies born alive after being aborted were allowed to live.  Not for Obama. Presumably thinking that any concession on abortion might taint his left-wing position, Obama wouldn’t make even this small gesture to humanity.

His speeches don’t give much away, but his book “The Audacity of Hope” will tell you all you need to know. I have volunteered many hours of my vacation to bring details of this book to readers of WintonsWorld. Not a labour of love, I can tell you.

Obama was born in Hawaii. His mother was white, his father black. His father left home a couple of years after Obama’s birth. His mother married again and moved to Indonesia, as you do. He is a first-term Senator for Illinois, who won his seat in 2004.

Meaningless
His book contains much of the meaningless but flowery language that he has incorporated into his stump speech.

“The nation’s most significant challenges are being ignored, and if we don’t change course soon, we may be the first generation in a very long time that leaves behind a weaker and fractured America than the one we inherited,” says Obama.

Obama tries to persuade us that if we don’t go for his ultra liberal policies, we face some kind of cartoon cut-out conservative horror story of extreme solutions.

“There is the absolutism of the free market, an ideology of no taxes, no regulation, no safety net – indeed, no government beyond what’s required to protect private property and provide for the national defence,” he says.

Absurd
This absurd flight of fancy is typical of extreme liberals, and was nullified by George W Bush’s idea of “Compassionate Conservatism” in previous campaigns.

Detail is not one of Obama’s priorities. There are plenty of attempts to broaden the arguments, to try and include voters who aren’t died in the wool Democrats. Obama is very much like Jimmy Carter, who on the campaign trail never varied from his “On the one hand, on the other hand” sentences. Jimmy Carter was the “Yes, but,” President (I’ve been waiting since 1979 to use that line) .

That’s not to say that the man doesn’t occasionally have a powerful message to fire up the faithful.

“There’s the middle aged feminist who still mourns her abortion, and the Christian women who paid for her teenager’s abortion, and the millions of waitresses and temp secretaries and nurses assistants and Wal Mart associates who hold their breath every single month in the hope that they will have enough money to support the children that they did bring into the world.”

Obama also tries to reach out past the base.

“Spend time talking to Americans and you discover that most evangelicals are more tolerant than the media would have us believe, most secularists more spiritual. Most rich people want the poor to succeed, and most of the poor are both more self-critical and hold higher aspirations than the popular culture allows.”

McCain will win anyway
Nice line, but if he truly believed that, surely he should be a conservative?

Observing the Presidential campaign from close quarters, I get the feeling that this all may be moot anyway. With the Democratic candidates becoming ever more extreme, and with the Republican nominee likely to be former war-hero and all round mister nice guy Senator John McCain of Arizona, I predict another win for the GOP.

If there is an upset and Hillary Clinton, the Senator from New York, gets to run, McCain will demolish her. There is so much odious garbage in her past, which will quickly be made public if she were to run. Obama seems to present a more difficult target. He seems charming and likeable. But when you get past the rhetoric and into the detail, I think his campaign will unravel too. With a recession looming, a high-tax, fortress-America candidate owned by the unions who has no experience and is weak on defence and foreign policy, will be munched on by McCain.

Book Review Fascists Are Leftists Who Seek Control, Distrust People. Hitler, A Socialist, Wasn’t Trying To Hide His Libertarian Credentials.

 Neil Winton – February 18, 2008