Saturday, October 06, 2012

Maybe Obama is actually up to something

David Seaton's News Links
If you study the effect of Obama's stunningly bad debate performance, all the sound and the fury is coming from Obama's supporters. They are electrified, galvanized... to use Samuel L. Jackson catchy phrase they finally seem to have awakened "the f**K up".
Take a look at this video from Jon Stewart and you'll see how electrified and awakened they may have become.

Thinking this all over and being a firm believer in the Occam's razor, I am left with only two possible conclusions: 
One. Either Obama doesn't care whether he loses the election or not and didn't prepare for the debate at all, or...
Two, that he gave exactly the performance he wanted to give in order to generate exactly the response from his heretofore apathetic base that he desired them to have. 
The third possibility, that the President tried his best and that was all he could  come up with is really too troubling to contemplate at this stage.
Since Obama is known to be obsessively competitive at even the most petty levels, I find it impossible to believe that he just let Romney walk over him. My opinion is that he threw the first debate in order to fire up his dormant base. They are now begging for him to draw blood in the next debate. If he comes out aggressively, nobody, but perhaps  Fox News and Matt Drudge, will ever accuse him of being an "angry negro".
Certainly if Obama gives a sharp and aggressive performance next time, nobody is going to feel sorry for Romney and Obama's campaign will catch on fire.
The only votes that count in elections are those that are actually cast, apathy is the greatest enemy of the 2012 Obama campaign. Now the possibility of a Romney victory becomes a reality and perhaps that will finally "wake" those 2008 voters up. DS

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

It's both pathetic and sobering that anyone is spending a moment's deliberation over these two pathetic candidates - those who insist on validating a corrupt, toxic system through their participation are voting for the continuance of the culture of death and perpetual decline, and shall reap what they sow.

Stephanie said...

It would be pretty to think so, as Hemingway would say. By performing as poorly as he did Obama let Romney back into the match, as they say in tennis, whereas if the President had won the debate or even drawn, the pundits would have begun declaring the election all but over. As it is Romney lives to fight another day. My guess is he didn't take his prep or Romney seriously and that his strategy was to look presidential and above the fray. As you noted in your previous post, he's also not very quick when speaking extemporaneously and he gets cross fast when things are not going his way.

I guess it did remind Democrats that Romney could still actually win this thing, but I doubt that was intentional on the part of the Obama people. It was just a blunder. Probably not a fatal one.

Base said...

The third possibility, that the President tried his best and that was all he could come up with is really too troubling to contemplate at this stage.

David, it seems to me that if you do, indeed, believe that Occam's Razor is correct then you would assume that the third (troubling) option is the correct one.

After all, it certainly seems more likely that he just blew this opportunity to put the nail in the coffin than conspired to motivate voters by blowing the debate only to come back and crush Romney tonight (if that indeed happens).

I do suppose that the first option is also possible, that he is really not that excited to remain as President and essentially demonstrated as such during the first debate. I must admit, I would not blame him. It seems like a pretty awful gig right about now.