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Sun., 2/3/2008, "Why Republicans Like Obama," Peter Wehner, Washington Post
"Barack Obama is not only popular among Democrats, he's also an appealing
figure to many Republicans. Former GOP House member Joe Scarborough,
now a host on MSNBC, reports that after every important Obama speech, he
is inundated with e-mails praising the speech -- with most of them
coming from Republicans. William Bennett, an influential conservative
intellectual, has said favorable things about Obama. So have Rich Lowry
of National Review and Peggy Noonan. And so have I.
A number of prominent Republicans I know, who would wage a pitched
battle against Hillary Clinton, like Obama and would find it hard to
generate much enthusiasm in opposing him.
What is at the core of Obama's appeal?
.
Part of it is the eloquence and uplift of his speeches, combined with
his personal grace and dignity. By all accounts, Obama is a
well-grounded, decent, thoughtful man. He comes across, in his person
and manner, as nonpartisan. He has an unsurpassed ability to (seemingly)
transcend politics.
Even when he disagrees with people, he doesn't seem
disagreeable. "You know what charm is," Albert Camus wrote in "The
Fall," "a way of getting the answer yes without having asked any clear
question." Obama has such charm, and its appeal is not restricted to
Democrats....
A third reason for Obama's GOP appeal is that unlike Clinton and
especially John Edwards, Obama has a message that, at its core, is about
unity and hope rather than division and resentment. He stresses that
"out of many we are one." And to his credit, Barack Obama is running a
color-blind campaign. "I did not travel around this state over the last
year and see a white South Carolina or a black South Carolina," Obama
said in his victory speech last weekend. "I saw South Carolina." That
evening, his crowd of supporters chanted as one, "Race doesn't matter."
This was an electric moment. Obama's words are in the great tradition of
Martin Luther King Jr. Obama, more than any figure in America, can help
bind up the racial wounds of America. In addition, for the past eight
years, one of the most prominent qualities of the American left has been
anger, which has served it and the country very poorly. An Obama
primary win would be a move away from the politics of rage."... .
"The writer, formerly deputy assistant to President Bush, is a senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center." via Mark Levin twitter
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