As Obama Loses Momentum His Positions Change Faster

Obama’s in trouble.

His poll numbers show him losing popularity. Once people got to know him, they began to dislike him. He could no remain a blank slate on which people could project their hopes for the duration of the campaign. When his past began to define him and his politics his “coolness” has morphed into a negative. His self assurance has become obnoxious brashness.

McCain’s campaign, no longer immobilized by its desire to be “Mr. Nice Guy” has taken “The Messiah" and have begun to turn his own hype and his adoring acolytes against him. The one thing a pop culture icon cannot stand is ridicule, and that’s what he’s getting.



So he needs to turn the national discussion away from the cool image of a God leading his adoring people into a discussion of issues. And that, unfortunately for Obama is his second weakness. His issues are a cobbled together mess of positions that appealed to the left wing fringe of the Liberal Democrat Party. For the general election, he has to hustle back to the center, but Obama’s challenge is to reconcile the irreconcilable.

For example, his Iraq positions. Does he mean to withdraw in 16 months, or does he mean to withdraw based on conditions on the ground? He has taken both positions. Did he mean to withdraw in 2004 no matter what happened, or does he deny that it would have been all right with him if we lost the war? When he says he want to withdraw but leave troops behind to train Iraqi soldiers how many troops does that take: 60 to 80 thousand? Does that look like withdrawal to you?

And now we have the energy issue. People are upset about $4 per gallon gas. But he has said that this price is OK with him. After all, one way to reduce our energy consumption is to price it out of range of the average person. But that’s not a popular position right now. So yesterday Obama pulled the rug out from under the Congressional Democrats and declare himself in favor of offshore drilling, all the while maintaining that it would do no good.

Obama would consider off-shore drilling as part of comprehensive energy plan

U.S. Sen. Barack Obama said today he would be willing to open Florida's coast for more oil drilling if it meant winning approval for broad energy changes.
...
"I think it's important for the American people to understand we're not going to drill our way out of this problem," he said.

"It's also important to recognize if you start drilling now you won't see a drop of oil for ten years, ...."

So he’s in favor of more drilling and at the same time he’s opposed to it because more oil is not the solution to our problem. That’s the sort of material that's tailor made for John McCain’s next video ad.