Poking the Obama

Aside from suffering the slings and arrows from the Clinton campaign, Barak Obama hasn’t had to face much criticism. In fact, Clinton criticism borders on insane stalker criticism like this in the Washington Times this morning;

Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton yesterday went after Sen. Barack Obama as inexperienced on matters of national security and as a politician with no record of accomplishment.

The New York Democrat said it was time to “get real” that only she has the credentials to face Republican Sen. John McCain of Arizona.

“That is all we’re asking for, we’re asking to compare our records, we’re asking to compare our years of service … our ideas, our solutions,” Mrs. Clinton said yesterday as her husband called Texas and Ohio make-or-break elections.

She’s probably right that she’s more qualified than Obama to face down McCain, but she still hasn’t come to grips with the fact that no one wants her as President and her sex has nothing to do with it.

But as Obama gets closer to becoming the crowned nominee, the Republicans can begin to level their (metaphorical) guns in his direction. According to Karl Rove in the Wall Street Journal this morning, that’s already begun ;

John McCain also took on Mr. Obama, with the Arizona senator declaring he would oppose “eloquent but empty calls for change that promises no more than a holiday from history and a return to the false promises and failed policies of a tired philosophy that trusts in government more than people.”

Mr. McCain, too, raised questions about Mr. Obama’s fitness to be commander in chief. Mr. McCain pointed to Mr. Obama’s unnecessary sabre-rattling at an ally (Pakistan) while appeasing our adversaries (Iran and Syria). Mr. McCain also made it clear that reining in spending, which is a McCain strength and an Obama weakness, would be a key issue.

Mr. Obama had not been so effectively criticized before. In the Democratic contest, John Edwards and Mrs. Clinton were unwilling to confront him directly or in a manner that hurt him. Mr. McCain was rightly preoccupied by his own primary. On Tuesday night, things changed.

With his wife under fire for her ill-considered remarks that up until now America hasn’t given her anything to be proud of, now Obama will have to defend his naive babbling about our foreign policy, which up until now has been a mirror image of his domestic policy – just the opposite of what we’ve been doing all along.

But, while Obama has focused his entire campaign on preaching feelings to moon-eyed groupies, he hasn’t been able to project any measurable depth of knowledge about the issues. Also in the Wall Street Journal, Daniel Henninger recounts one of Obama’s lost opportunities to rise to a level of competance;

One of Obama’s most disappointing moments was his comment, in a January debate, on reversing the black dropout rate. His answer could have been phoned in from the teachers union: after-school programs, summer-school programs, more money. He did say something about absent fathers. It fell to Hillary Clinton to suggest more schools like the Eagle Academy in the Bronx, an all-male charter started by the 100 Black Men organization. Embarrassing.

If Obama can’t even understand the politics of his own party, how can he be expected to pull together Democrats and Republicans as he claims he can every night on my TV screen? When Obama doesn’t have to share the spotlight with other Democrats, when he’s alone facing America, I suspect the color will drain from the mugs of those moon-eyed groupies rather quickly.

Category: Politics