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Political Hay
Shadowboxing Cartoon Characters
The Obama comedy act comes to debate.
Quick, what’s the first line that comes to mind when you think of last Tuesday’s presidential debate?
If you’ve been slinking under the sodium street lamps of the leftist blogosphere for the past few days, your answer is probably this riposte by President Obama: “Governor Romney doesn’t have a five-point plan; he has a one-point plan. And that plan is to make sure that folks at the top play by a different set of rules. That’s been his philosophy in the private sector. That’s been his philosophy as governor. That’s been his philosophy as a presidential candidate.”
Politico listed that as President Obama’s best debate line. Salon.com and Talking Points Memo cheered. Greg Sargent said the quip “went some way” to “aggressively unmask Romney’s five point plan as a sham.”
It was also devoid of substance and wholly separated from reality. Even if you disagree with Romney’s tax plan, anything that closes (however vaguely) deductions predominantly on the wealthy isn’t some gilded heist. And Romney, who donated more than a quarter of his income to charity last year and decided to reform health care in Massachusetts after the CEO of Staples convinced him it was the humane thing to do, isn’t exactly a cackling plutocrat.
The line rang from liberal steeples not because it was true, but because it reinforced a cartoon version of Romney that the left has been drawing. Through their eyes, Romney is a lying robber baron hell-bent on bankrupting the treasury to benefit his rich buddies. They’ve become so contemptuous of this false image that they want it reinforced over and over again. And that’s what Obama did during the debate.
Joe Scarborough writes that “turning political opponents into cartoon characters is the work of fools.” That may be, but it’s also a proud tradition that dates back to the American founding. Thomas Jefferson was portrayed as an atheist Jacobin; John Adams as a raging Anglophile. Even George Washington took his lumps from the press as an American monarch in the pursuit of absolute power.
The modern right does this too. President Obama has been tarred with plenty of stereotypes and we’ve all laughed at Onion articles featuring Joe Biden as a cad.
But such attacks have become the all-consuming strategy of the Obama campaign. Team Obama’s primary objective is to paint Romney as something he’s not; to turn every one of his policies into a corporate misogynist plunder and every one of his statements into a blackhearted mendacity. Seeing Romney as a heel, the left then wants Obama to debate the heel, not the real Romney.
This mentality was at work during the vice-presidential debate too. Biden’s most praised lines weren’t rousing defenses of liberalism. They were ripostes about Paul Ryan’s hypocrisy on stimulus money or the 47% comment that Romney disavowed. And they were backed up by the smuggest display of smirks, sneers, leers, laughs, and quips that we’ve ever seen from a modern vice presidential candidate.
The most celebrated line was an interruption from Biden: “Oh, now you’re Jack Kennedy. This is amazing.” It was a meaningless comment and came while Ryan was making a serious point about tax policy’s history of success, including under JFK. But it confirmed the stereotype of Ryan as a greasy liar. So Ryan never got to finish and the Twittersphere reacted as if the vice president had just won the Battle of Midway.
This isn’t the stuff of visionary politicians; it’s the stuff of insult comedians. At a recent debate with Bill O’Reilly, Jon Stewart got adoring applause when he said conservatives live on “Bulls—t Mountain,” an insulated peak of untruth. Is there really much difference between that comedic stereotype and what the Obama campaign is doing to Romney? After Biden’s vacuous line, you could almost hear an audience of college students cheering in the background.
The Obama campaign is like a smarmy stand-up act. It tosses out barbs left and right. It derives humor by painting its political opponents as cartoonish fools. But it never assembles a cohesive plan or vision. It makes dents in Romney’s tax plan or political record (some of which are fair game) but it never does the mature work of creating anything itself. Where is the Obama-Biden debt plan? No one knows. But gosh darn, how about that Mitt Romney guy, huh? He says he’s worried about China so he’d better send Ann to the dining room to clean it! Boom! Folks, my name’s Jim Messina and I’m here all week.
And man, how about those evil oil companies, huh? And corporate jets? And Big Bird? Actually that might have been the moment when the strategy went off the rails. After the president got roundly thumped on policy during the first debate, his campaign decided to smirk away the entire thing by running an ad showing a silhouette of Big Bird in a corporate building. Having cast others as fictional characters, the Obama campaign now starred an actual fictional character.
They probably imagined people smirking at how clever they were while the narrative shifted with their joke. Instead the entire political world took a step back and said, “What the hell are you doing?” Having run into a wall of actual substance, the cartoon shadowboxing strategy disintegrated.
They’re still using it, of course. (Say, did you hear the one about binders of women?) And it has a certain appeal for progressives who buy into the portrayal of Romney-Ryan as vicious tycoons. Both Republicans are on Bulls—t Mountain, after all.
But for everyone else, the act is tired. The American people want a better economy, less government, and confidence in the future, not an animated comedy. The debates were instructive because they showed the world that Romney wasn’t the cartoon he’d been made out to be. For many swing voters seeking an alternative, that was all they needed to see.
About the Author
Matt Purple is The American Spectator’s assistant managing editor.
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spike59| 10.19.12 @ 6:18AM
It's a shame ObaMao et al didn't expend even a fraction of the effort to protect Ambassador Stevens as they have on protecting Big Bird...but, given their priorities, it's hardly surprising
TLP| 10.19.12 @ 9:24AM
Fortune Cookie sometime say - To understand the Contest of Today? One must sometimes look to the Past. Specifically to Yesterday, and go "Looking At Tunisia".
That is all.
Alan Obama Fan Brooks | 10.19.12 @ 7:38PM
"It's a shame ObaMao et al didn't expend even a fraction of the effort to protect Ambassador Stevens "
You can protect someone in Tripoli, not in Benghazi.
Appleby| 10.19.12 @ 6:51AM
I saw an ad last night that finally said what most of us are thinking, "It's time to vote the children out of there and put the adults back in charge." I remember that phrase from Reagan's election; it was on everyone's lips the next day. "FINALLY, the adults are back in charge!" Carter made a big deal out of the fact that he carried his own luggage, and he walked down the street with his family in the Inaugural Parade. Reagan brought back what was then called "the Imperial Presidency" by the liberals, and by the rest of us, common dignity and decency. I was travelling a lot in those days, and my friends in foreign lands asked me over and over, "How could you possibly elect those morons?" (Meaning Carter et al.) Somewhere in my collection of memoribilia I have a badge that says "I didn't vote for Carter." I wonder if there's a market for "I didn't vote for Obama" badges?
Skippy| 10.19.12 @ 3:19PM
Jimmuh never carried any bags that weren't empty.
Secret Service guys disclosed that Mr. Peanut's suitcases were props, and when out of camera view, he dropped them while real Agents carried his filthy shorts and smelly socks.
More bullshit from Democrats.
Occam's Tool| 10.19.12 @ 5:41PM
Jimmy treated his USSS guys like crap. Reagan was nice, and HW Bush was apparently a grown up and a mensch to them. His son was also decent, as he is decent.
C. Vernon Crisler | 10.19.12 @ 7:58AM
Really, I didn't get all that out of the debates. The line I remember is Crowley's "fact" checking line. The only thing I remember about Biden was his Mike Tyson imitation (vs. Holyfield), whereas Ryan remained respectful throughout the debate.
Mike G| 10.19.12 @ 8:17AM
Obama certainly has shown us his debt plan. It didn't receive a single vote in the Senate, probably because all it did was increase the debt.
TLP| 10.19.12 @ 9:25AM
Fortune Cookie sometime say - To understand the Contest of Today? One must sometimes look to the Past. Specifically to Yesterday, and go "Looking At Tunisia".
That is all.
RCV| 10.19.12 @ 12:57PM
Nobody gives a sh*t about your infantile "contests" TLP.
Skippy| 10.19.12 @ 3:20PM
RCV is truly an ass, but he's right about the f*cking contests, Tim.
Occam's Tool| 10.19.12 @ 5:51PM
RCV: on a different issue, THANK you for your Constitution for kids book recommendations. Very kind, and very useful.
TLP: G-d love ya.
Skippy: beautiful stuff.
I'm just feeling very good. We had our accreditation surveys completed today and we did beautifully well. I have one of the most emotionally satisfying jobs in all of American Medicine. I am paid in the top 5% of my profession to treat poor Native Americans (30% of my patient base) along with other indigent (for the most part) patients in a rural area that is drastically underserved. The area is very beautiful, the nurses and other staff I work with are lovely people and very supportive, my bosses both administrative and clinical are awesome. My wife is a Saint, my two kids are magnificent.
We will survive that socialist bastard if he is re-elected because we are Americans, but I sincerely believe that Obama and the MSM have shot their bolt. I think things are turning up again, and that we are not living through 181 AD and onward at this time, but before Nerva instead. I think we have at LEAST another couple of lifetimes at the top.
But I thank the L-rd for blessing me, and I hope he blesses 90% plus of you folks, too.
Kwan| 10.19.12 @ 9:00AM
Obama is starting to see that the wheels are coming-off his Marxist Revolution. This rogue government that he's been leading for 3+ years is on a bullet-train express to extinction. Hopefully we'll never have to hear anymore of this leftist nonsense about social justice, which is the left's justification for turning our country into a Totalitarian Socialist State.
Von Mises Jr| 10.19.12 @ 10:12AM
Dick Morris explained how narrow-minded liberal drones cannot even learn from their own mistakes.
Jimma Carta could not defend his record in 1980, and he failed to present a plan for the next four years. His entire strategy was to make Reagan look like a mean, evil insensitive boob.
Then the debates came and people started focusing on Reagan. Their whole strategy imploded.
Now you see them doing it again with Mitt. I had dogs that were better at learning.
Mitt is doing the same thing Ronald Reagan did in respectfully calling out the president's lies (There you go again). He is asking the seminal question (don't get excited Perp, there is more than one meaning) of "Are you better off than you were four years ago?"
How much did Reagan win by???
Kwan| 10.20.12 @ 9:24AM
These leftist dopes are not rocket scientists. They think they can make a mess of the country and still get reelected. They disrespect the electorate's intelligence with their lies and attempts to define their conservative opponents as greedy, Scrooge-like criminals. Obama no doubt considers himself some sort of Robin Hood figure, but his policies have actually hurt millions of people not helped them. Which is why the polls are starting to indicate that he will be defeated on November 6th.
Who Knows?| 10.19.12 @ 11:26AM
It’s entirely appropriate that Obama’s camp would flip the Big Bird cartoon.
Obama IS a cartoon!
Truth is eventually ALWAYS stranger than fiction. It was only a matter of time until the Redford movie character from “The Candidate” would appear, for real. To boot, the insight that politics is acting for ugly people applies.
What else IS Obama, than a self-made actor, who’s spent his adult lifetime perfecting his lines, his moves, his stance? Hitler spent hours before a mirror, perfecting his dance.
What is a cartoon? Essentially a FAKE. An exaggerated character, a bundle of programmed responses to various situations, meant to make you---laugh.
In Obama’s case, though, the laugh’s on YOU! Those who buy his act, pay through the nose---he stinks.
Also, it’s logical for The Phony One to hate America, since he is, HIMSELF, a paper tiger. Unlike the real mensch, Romney, whose actual life involves bodily sacrifice for fellow humans, Barrack’s life has been all about ME, ME, and more ME.
The Universe conspires to make us happy.
There are myriad ways to do this. Chucking up such a One as BHO to mirror back to us our OWN idiocy, bordering on suicidal activity, might be just in time to avoid total calamity.
C. Vernon Crisler | 10.19.12 @ 1:07PM
Isn't this poets day? My entry:
I've never seen a Big Bird,
as lovely as a Tree.
Skippy| 10.19.12 @ 3:24PM
Big Bird taught us how to read;
and why we're gay;
and smokin' weed.
Obama's gonna get a lickin';
and fried Big Bird tastes just like chicken.
C. Vernon Crisler | 10.19.12 @ 5:42PM
Needs work....
Occam's Tool| 10.19.12 @ 5:56PM
@Skip:
Big Bird taught THEM how to read;
That's why they're Gay, and Hooked on Speed.
Romney's Gonna Give Obama a Major Beating,
And no amount of Choom will Speed the Healin'.
pomdter| 10.19.12 @ 1:31PM
Ever wonder why those scammers consistently say they have millions in Nigeria? It's because they want to be obvious so they can filter out only the most extremely gulible that will fall for their scam. It's the same method the Democrats & media are using in this election. They are not talking to you, they are talking to those who are only half paying attention, and there are enough of those to win the election.
Their only issue is a careful balancing act of getting people interested enough to vote, but not interested enough to want to find out the truth.
Appleby| 10.20.12 @ 8:32AM
The Canadians adore Obama. My workmates know I am Republican and they say carefully, "I kind of like Obama -- he seems like a nice guy..." which is Kanukistan-speak for "he's a socialist like us." The thing of it is, most of the Americans people meet up here are Democrats who moved here because they hate America. Our student lawyer blurted out the other day, "You are different from any other American I have met in Canada." I told her that is because I am conservative and I love my country. Maybe she'll think about it.
As for fortune cookies, my favourite is "He who slings mud is losing ground."
gene| 10.22.12 @ 10:46AM
I have friends that are Democrats. They are going to believe everything the MSM tells them. Even when someone like Ryan tries to tell people that JFK, yes John F. Kennedy tried the same tax plan of Romney/Ryan and it worked, they will not listen. It is not about the facts or reality.
They BELIEVE.
Fortunately, there are enough people in this country to counter-act this Ideology, and the Obama/Biden Ticket, EVEN WITH the assistance of fraudulent votes and "Stick Carrying Poll Watchers", is going to sink like the "Titanic".