I guess that when President Obama leaves office, be it in 2013 or 2017, he can build a new career in standup comedy. Here he is wowing
a $30,000-a-plate audience in Connecticut the other day:
Democrats, just congenitally, tend to get -- to see the glass as half empty. (Laughter.) If we get an historic health care bill passed -- oh, well, the public option wasn't there. If you get the financial reform bill passed -- then, well, I don't know about this particular derivatives rule, I'm not sure that I'm satisfied with that. And gosh, we haven't yet brought about world peace and -- (laughter.) I thought that was going to happen quicker. (Laughter.) You know who you are. (Laughter.) We have had the most productive, progressive legislative session in at least a generation.
Lots of laffs there. Judging by that transcript, he had 'em rolling on the floor. Some call them elites, he calls them his base. But as Glenn Greenwald
pointed out, after quoting a
New York Times article about lack of enthusiasm for the Democrats as the November elections approach:
This may sound like a serious problem, but I'm sure it's nothing that can't be solved by just a couple more Obama speeches delivered at $30,000 per plate dinners in Connecticut, at which the President derides their concerns as nothing but the by-product of congenital grievances and insufficient gratitude -- maybe he can even throw in a couple strawmen: "these union workers won't be satisfied until I've seized the means of production and abolished capitalism" -- followed by a celebratory column in the Post from Stephen Stromberg giving the President a reverent high five for slapping down those petulant union ingrates. That'll do the trick.
It evidently needs to be explained, again and again and again, because the President and his toadies (to say nothing of the corporate media) don't get it. It isn't that there's a lot of enthusiasm for Republicans, it's that there isn't a lot of enthusiasm for Democrats. In the case of Obama, it's not what he may or may not have failed to do, it's what he has
done. But hey, I'm just a disaffected professional leftist who sees the glass as half-empty and probably needs a drug test, just a crank on the margins. The Democrats don't need my vote -- and they're not going to get it.
