Sunday, May 27, 2012

Thrill is gone with Obama, sounded like he was playing catch-up to Mitt Romney-Willie Brown

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5/27/12, "Obama's re-election campaign - the thrill is gone," SFGate.com, Willie Brown

"The president's trip to the Bay Area last week made it painfully clear that the Barack Obama re-election campaign has lost its mojo.

There was no life, no personality, no memorable line or moment and no real enthusiasm in the entire fundraising foray. In short, there was no buzz.

It was like a summer rerun of a show that wasn't very interesting to begin with.

Worse yet, Obama sounded like he was playing catch-up to Mitt Romney. I can't think of anything that should have him in that role, but he's acting like the underdog.

Obama was more than a candidate last time out. He was a popular and cultural phenomenon. A rock star. But the trouble with rock stars is that they drop like a rock once fans conclude they are "over."

The trick in politics is not to be a one-hit wonder, but to be more like the Grateful Dead. Jerry and the boys were never what you'd call stars, but their Deadheads were legion and good days or bad, they always turned out in record numbers."

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2009 piece from Willie Brown on Obama's casual treatment of the NAACP:

6/28/2009, "Obama's courtiers a royal pain for NAACP," SF Gate, Willie Brown

"Barack Obama's staffers are getting a little too imperial for their boss' good.

A year ago, when Obama was running for president, he appeared before the national convention of the NAACP and was a great hit. His biggest crowd-pleasing line was how much he was looking forward to coming back in a year as the first African American president. It got him a five-minute standing ovation and millions of votes.

Fast forward to this year. The NAACP invites the president to speak to the group July 16, the last day of its six-day convention at the Hilton in New York.

The White House's response: Absolutely, he's coming.

Then the Secret Service comes and says, "No," the Hilton is not suitable.

Mayor Michael Bloomberg says, "Why don't I give you Yankee Stadium?" It would be the president's biggest event since his inauguration.

A couple of days later comes the answer from someone in Obama's operation: We don't want to project that kind of image. We want something bigger than the Hilton, but not as big as Yankee Stadium.

The NAACP people have to bust their ass to come up with another place - and they do, finally, finding an armory in Harlem. There's no air conditioning, however, and we are talking New York in July here. The governor steps in and says he'll provide temporary air conditioning.

The White House then says, "OK, but we want to change the time - 2 p.m. for the president's speech is not acceptable anymore. We want 5 o'clock."

The NAACP says, wait a minute - this speech is supposed to take place on the biggest day of the convention, the day we hold the awards banquet. If Obama goes on at 5 p.m., we'll have to bus hundreds of people from the downtown Hilton all the way up to Harlem, two or three hours before the president arrives. Then we'll have to bus everyone back and get everyone into their black ties for the awards dinner.

We can't do that.

So those little bitty people in the NAACP send back the message: Advise him that it's 2 o'clock and we hope he shows."


via Free Republic

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