As he is quick to point out, President Obama is presiding over two wars, a sour economy and an epic fight to rework the nation's healthcare system.It was easy to get fired up over "hope and change". Now that reality has sunk in that Mr. Hope and Change is just another Chicago machine politician and no unicorns or rainbows have been sighted, the air has gone out of the Obama balloon. With falling approval numbers and rising dissatisfaction among voters, Democrats will have a tough time in the elections coming up in about 9 days.
Now tack on a trio of state and local political races. With an off-year election fast approaching, Obama is stepping up his commitment to Democratic candidates in hopes that an infusion of campaign charisma might pump up turnout.
What the party is finding, though, is that the electricity of 2008 is tough to recapture.
Some Democratic candidates running for local office around the country call the phenomenon the "Obama hangover." It is proving tougher to recruit volunteers and get people to vote.
"It's like the morning after the party," Michael McGann, a Democrat running for clerk of courts in the Philadelphia suburbs, said in an interview. "The party was wonderful and exciting. The day after it's like, 'Gee, I don't want to do that again for a while.' "
Combating the malaise, Obama is trying to galvanize voters by reminding them of the "fired up, ready to go" fervor that made last year's race riveting political theater.
A television ad for Virginia gubernatorial candidate Creigh Deeds released Wednesday showcases Obama, who is heard using some of the same rhetorical lines that helped get him elected: "Last year, Virginia, you helped lead a movement. . . . I need every one of you to get fired up once again."
Are voters buying it? Obama's party has a hard sell.
Thanks to an independent that's bleeding votes from the Republican in New Jersey, Gov. Corzine is still probably a favorite to win. And the race in NY-23 is also up in the air thanks to a very liberal Republican candidate and a conservative independent.
Virginia is another story. It went blue for Obama last year but will give Obama the blues on November 3rd. The Democrat will get crushed and the White House will have a hard time avoiding some of the blame.
Should the amazing happen and Corzine lose, the independent conservative win in NY-23 and the Republican win in Virginia - conservatives running the table - the outlook for Obamacare and cap-and-tax will become very bleak indeed. Moderate Democrats will not want to put their names on something that could get them voted out next year.
Should be an interesting election night.
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Virginia, for over 30 years now, has gone for governor a member of the party not in the White House.
George (Macaca) Allen and Jim Gilmore during Clinton's time,
then Mark Warner and Tim Kaine during President Bush's terms.
Maybe those energized workers have seen that The Won hasn't done what they thought (and hoped) he'd do, and so are now disillusioned.
Hey, Obama was a good talker prior to becoming president. He still has tried talking his way to get things he has wanted to happen, however the voters have wised up and now see him for what he really is, just a big bag of wind. He has accomplished very little good during the time he has been president, and this with the Dems controlling both the House and the Senate. In other words, he is a joke of a leader as are most of those on his side of the aisle.
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