Obama: again with the orator
I am truly puzzled.
In this article by economist Laurence Kotlikoff, he criticizes Obama’s budget speech although he’s an Obama supporter. He thinks Obama offered no proposals of his own, and he thinks Paul Ryan’s approach to Medicare is pretty good.
That’s not the puzzling part, although it’s rare for an Obama-supporter to be fair enough to say anything good about Ryan. No, the really puzzling part for me was this:
I voted for and even campaigned for the president, and my jaw drops every time I hear him speak. But eloquence is no substitute for substance. We need real leadership now, not after the next election.
I read that paragraph several times in a vain attempt to parse it. The last sentence was no problem; it was the first that made my jaw drop. Whatever verbal spell it is that Obama casts—one that I seem to have always been immune to—this man is still at least partially under it.
No doubt he’s not alone.
[NOTE: Kotlikoff may not be alone, but more of America seems to be slowly emerging from the spell, if this new poll is any indication.]
[ADDENDUM: Unlike Kotlikoff, fellow economist Paul Krugman is busy excoriating Ryan and lauding the glorious specificity of Obama’s budget proposal. Noel Sheppard asks “whaaaa??”]
Can we just go ahead and say Obama has to be the top evangelist in the church of liberalism?
Krugman is a partisan hack.
Problem is, most economists are.
Obama’s a bore. I don’t like most political speeches, but this guy’s are so predictable that I actively avoid them.
I didn’t like Bush’s speaking style or his voice. I did like the content, especially Latvia.
Clinton had the ability to make a big venue seem small and intimate.
Most presidents look like after-dinner speakers, which is adequate. That includes Reagan, who was smoother than most. He, at least, looked like he was thinking about what he was saying.
Obama is a crashing, excruciating bore. As little as we know about him personally, I simply don’t want to know any more. His sppeches are a hundred variations on “Dig me.”
I think a good chunk of the confusion here – confusing Obama with a great orator – is owed to the jumbling up of what-leftists-like-to-hear with being an amazing speaker. Personally, I don’t even think Obama is very good demagogue – he’s too petty and vindictive, and boring – but that’s another story.
Another piece of the puzzle is the decay of great speechifying into sloganeering. It’s symptomatic of modern liberal democratic societies for highfalutin nonsense to become indistinguishable from substantive and elevating rhetoric (in the classical sense). Indeed, the way we use the word “rhetoric” today is a case-in-point.
Way back in the olden times of the Jackson era, Tocqueville saw, as he did so much else, the conditions that would allow an Obama to be fawned upon. The massification of the mind that democracy incentivizes would, he thought, all but inevitably lead to the worst of all degradations: the taking of what is degraded for what is superior. The classing of Obama with Lincoln, even if only at the level of speechifying, could not fit this template more perfectly.
In the economic sphere, what Tocqueville saw happening was a growth toward a system of fat corporatist cats and dull laboring classes – an ironic evolution of democracy into a grotesque caricature of aristocracy, while calling it something else (say, the Great Society). The same process, he suggested, runs concurrently in the life of the mind – we get an elite (it is inevitable), but not of valor, or virtue, or wisdom, or even of wealth. Instead, it is an elite of panderers and sophists, a perfect burlesque of an actually aristocratic elite.
Finally, Tocqueville takes that depressing thought to its logical conclusion in diagnosing art and popular culture, the excrescences of which then feed back into politics and close the circle, locking the whole society into a nasty feedback loop of ever increasing baseness. The image of democratic collapse isn’t the snake with its tail in its mouth, but the man with his head up his a**.
The ominous portents Tocqueville bore witness to, in other words, all pointed to democracy becoming a decrepit “popular” aristocracy, the worst of both worlds.
That being said, what folks like Kotlikoff have brewing upstairs that makes their “jaws drop” at Obama’s speeches is one part leftist tin ear (the Howard Fast syndrome) and two or three parts revenge of democracy against the values that first promoted it (and tore down the republican safeguards against it). To explain the baffling adoration for the One’s uber-partisan, mean-spirited, and yet oddly somnambulant “gutterside chats,” one has to explain the peculiar bad taste characteristic of advanced democracy – that which mistakes what it finds flattering for what is magnanimous and eloquent.
Charisma is important in public speaking but it is not a substitute for it. Obama is a TERRIBLE public speaker. To be any good at all you should have something to actually say… which (outside the “fluff” of campaign mode) he clearly does not.
i mentioned this long ago..
maybe now the light will come on…
library.lawschool.cornell.edu/WhatWeHave/SpecialCollections/Donovan/Hitler/index.cfm
To most non-Nazis Hitlor has no particular attr~ction. He resembles a secondrate
waiter. Col XC sec 2
this was a point that i argued with others on…
they have this imagination that due to allthe flags and posters and stuff taht people did, that they liked and were in thrall with the man.
no… like here, and like Germany, the truth was that the same cargo cult, same image only people, as you described. fell for him..
but the rest saw what he was and didn’t like it.
in USING WHAT YOU LEARN FROM HISTORY…
they copy the points they think are salient.
wiemar just gave women the vote… and women are naturally more gullible (the ones who arent didnt get tricked into having babies as much). they ALSO side with their own, even if their own is wrong…
There is on essentially feminine quality about his person which is portrayed particularly in his strikingly
well-sh~ped Dnd expressive honds (2; 8; 13; et al.).
and so, if you want women votes, you can go with a strong male… or in the case of pacifist leftist useful idiots hitler and stalin were fighting over, you give them something more like them.
I read that paragraph several times in a vain attempt to parse it. The last sentence was no problem; it was the first that made my jaw drop. Whatever verbal spell it is that Obama casts–one that I seem to have always been immune to–this man is still at least partially under it. – neo
you probably look at hitler and say “who they heck would listen and follow that? germans must have been stupid”
and i bet you look a mussolini doubly that way.. “how dis such a brutal mook get loved by the people”
i laid this out…
but most were in thrall to some degree..
so they refused to tick off the similarities which were affected in his whole life, and so on.
contrast the descriptions now of people who work with him.. and how he said “can i eat my waffle?”
its also the same ideology, with the same targets!!!
with the same methods… and the same financial crisis… adn the same loose morals… and the same states dicking aroudn…
and no one thinks its the same..
read more and see parallels.
page 61:
This foo ling of being directed by great forces outside one, of doing the Lord’s work, is the essence of the feeling of the religious mystic.
heck, when yuo change the people the sentences all read the same…
No matter how pagan Obama’s
Hitler’sethical and social ideas may be, they have a quality comparable to a religious experience.change the name and tense and no one would even notice!!!!!!!!!
oh.. you mean like time magazine and others recently pointing out that Islams Koran is believed by followers to be written by god, and Christians dont?
what is inexplicable to you, is an open book for me who have taken the time to read the details of the history..
hitlers lip service is used by his real ilk here (not the fake skin heads), to do the same thing… get people to think hitler was not an atheist… and to get them not to ralize that they are in his footsteps.
Shoa II
Coming to a country near you soon…
For the Britain of the great war period he had great respect, but only contempt for the powerless revolutionaries who tried to oppose British imperial power
was that about Hitler, or Obadiah in terms of afrika and his uncles imprisonment?
For the masses over whom he has sway he feels only contempt.
which they are only finding out now… and are non plused and confused… the leader was only using them, not leading them..
but again… is that sentence about hitler or obama?
he loves to give speeches in the evening… when people are going to relax… he interupts their enjoyment to be heard.. (an exercise of power so he can FEEL it)…
He harangues the crowd at night when they are tired and less resistant to the will of another
as to the using of surface stuff and now everyone saying his last speech were lies.
He uses every psychological trick to break the will of an audience. he makes use of all the conditions which make in the people a longing for submission, their anxieties their fears, the feeling of loneliness. he understands his subjects because they are so like himself.
maybe their feeling of loss of purpose? dissatisfaction? after all, what was accidental in the past has now a prepared way.
again. was that paragraph about obama or hitler?
any one want to note the lefts constant asymmetrical idea that getting rid of people is ok…
“If life is to survive on this planet, there must be a decontamination of the Earth. I think this will be accompanied by an evolutionary process that will result in a drastic reduction of the population of males.” — Mary Daly, former Professor at Boston College, 2001
and do note that here they state openly as comon knowlege what we no longer know.. and that hitler was copying the russians… (and hint: the progenitors are still around, still in play, and still in power, and their freinds are in our state offices)
anti male bias is not an uncommon thing in america today. but in the case of the modern left, the white male ha been elevated, so to speak, to a degree of evilness that he had not before obtained. that this hatred of a more than usual pathological nature is suggesting by the morbid connection in which they are made responsible.
not hard to make their words fit today.. no?
the white male is not even a beast. he is a creature outside nature…
“The male is a domestic animal which, if treated with firmness…can be trained to do most things.” — Jilly Cooper, SCUM (Society For Cutting Up Men, started by Valerie Solanas)
“Whatever they may be in public life, whatever their relationships with men, in their relationships with women, all men are rapists, and that’s all they are. They rape us with their eyes, their laws, and their codes” — Marilyn French, The Women’s Room (1977) ISBN 0-345-35361-7 (p.462).
sounds a lot like the same things they applied to the jews. including disparate impact!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
from page 65 vol, xc, sec 2
Replaceing jew with white male (of which most Jewish men are part of)…
the white male is not even a beast, he is a creature outside of nature. he is at the root of all things evil, no only in America, but elsewhere and only through his destruction may the world be saved. is at this point that their feelings of race and gender find expression.
in truth..
Shoa II started back in the 60s
by expanding the target, you hide the target..
and who cares about collateral damage? not the leaders who can breed more of what they want using redistribution…
all one has to do is read DETAILS..
and what was not distinct enough to focus on
snaps into focus
page 68 – hitlers NEED to talk..
does obama have that need?
Ever since Hitler’s discovery
of his facility as a speaker, his own people and the
world have been deluged with his words. The number
of speeches is large, varying in length? from one and
a half to two hours, though there are several of
three and even four hours’ duration. In private,
moreover, Hitler seldom converses, for each individu~l whom he addresses +5 a new audience to be harangued, In his moments of depression he must talk to prove to himself his own strength and in moments of exaltation to dominate others
he sure does… but unlike germany, our peoples attention span is way to small today to talk that long.
is nevertheless a man of unusual ability,
particularly in certain areas where formal education
is of little value and even in areas where it is
supposed to be important.
Hore than once we find those who know him stressing his extraordinary ability to take a complicated problem and reduce it to very simple terms.
ever hear people write about him like that?
how about the author that has you confused?
It is hardly necessary to document His ability to understand and make use of the weaknesses of his opponentsm his ability to divide them and strike them one by one. his sense of timing so as to strike at the most opportune moment
Like a tv speech where they wont insult the office?
it is certin that his abilities have limitations.
as he becomes more insulated from contact with what is actually occuring, and has insufficient or correct data to be basing decisions. his own fram of reference is an unsatisfactory guide to an understanding of people outside his own melieu. consequently he misunderstands others points of view with unhappy results to his own program of expansion pg 72, vol xc sec 2
its like watching the red dawn remake and claiming its not the same since the invaders are asian (they were chinese, now they are remade into koreans).
It is said that Hitler began his speeches as if he were a respected neighbor stopping by to offer some good advice. The sort of thing you might have thought of yourself, but didn’t, quite. So it was acceptable and even laudable.
He once said that three hundred years of blood and terror stands in no relation to the Germany of “today”, that being late Thirties.
Every German who heard that knew he was referring to the time from the Thirty Years War onward and the horrors visited on Germany then and afterwards.
In other words, Hitler agreed with the German people, that war had been a horror and had done nothing good for Germany. WW I was not twenty years past. So they were relieved. Nobody who thought like that would ever think of starting another war.
It is hard to comprehend just how SENSIBLE and REASONABLE that statement sounded and how it fit with the Germans’ education and views.
But, to zero. I don’t think he’s a good orator. His emphases are predictable and thus useless, his rhythm is soporific. The only reason to try to pay attention is to see what’s coming next in the nation’s affairs.
Relevant posting, with insightful comments at Belmont Club.
Thanks Cap’n Rusty for reminding me of how tedious, sappy, rationality impaired, and completely vacuous hippies & liberals can be. We’re long past the point where there should be a simple intelligence test one must pass before being allowed to vote.
None of us drink the kool-aid so to us Obama is not a great orator. Sadly, millions keep drinking and wet their panties* whenever the messiah speaks.
*Women & men alike.
Occasionally, a couple of years ago, I was able to assume a non-judgmental state of mind when I looked at Obama. I managed to look at him as a fellow human being who seemed nice enough as a person. At such rare times, he appeared to be the kind of person who might be a good golf partner or someone to have a beer with. However, as he has shown his narcissism, ineptness, malevolence, pettiness, leftist Alinsky traits, and much, much more, it has become difficult to even watch videos of his speeches, much less in person.
With that in mind, our local news rag ran an editorial today lauding his speech on the budget. It was their position that it was about time he told the TEA Party and other such minded, ill intentioned citizenry that their ideas were not going to fly. It’s my guess that this was echoed in rags all over the country. This is the sum of it. The MSM are all on board with the transformation of the country to Agentina/Zimbabwe. I’m attending a TEA Party rally tomorrow. In spite of crappy weather, I rather think we’ll have a good tunrout.
I think one aspect of the Kotlikoff reaction is that academic types frequently think hard only about their own very narrow field of interest, ie, the Ryan medicare proposal. When the topic widens, ie, Obama’s eloquence, they defer to the opinion of other credentialed people. If everyone says Obama is eloquent, then he must be. They don’t have time to critique his speeches, so they go with what the Ivy League faculties and NYT columnists seem to say.
I am always amazed at the inability of my husband’s colleagues to see that the emperor wears no clothes. They read horrible books, attend terrible plays, and visit terrible art exhibits that are must dos for their set, and rarely admit that they hated them. They just assume that the professional critics know better.
Perhaps re Obama, there is something about the prejudice of low expectations. So long as he doesn’t sound like Jackson or Sharpton, he meets the standards for black eloquence.
Let’s not forget that Hitler extensively rehearsed his speeches, including the parts where he “spontaneously” became highly animated. He also was careful to match his speech to the audience–German bankers or industrialists would get the low-key, rational Fuehrer, while an SA rally would get the full-blown rabblerouser. He knew exactly what he was doing.
Those who are “amazed” by Obama’s oratorical skills must never have heard a Churchill speech from beginning to end. The Last Lion could do it all–substance, allusions to history and literature, wit, humor, poetic turn of phrase–in a speech and leave his listeners no doubt where he, and Britain, stood. From Obama, we get fluff, phony history, pettiness, whining, sarcasm, and instant gaffes should he stray from his prepared text, all which leave America and the world saying, “Huh? What did he just say?”
People who think Obama is a great orator are living in a land of make believe or have never heard a truly great speech. Obama’s first act as president was to return the bust of Churchill to Great Britain… maybe because he knew he would always suffer by comparison.
“People who think Obama is a great orator are living in a land of make believe or have never heard a truly great speech. Obama’s first act as president was to return the bust of Churchill to Great Britain… maybe because he knew he would always suffer by comparison.”
Touche!
In recent speeches, I am finding Barry’s sibilance annoying. I never liked his style, but he’s sounding more like a sssnake with every ssspeech. Isn’t there some gear that could prevent him from activating the cultural memory of satan?
And I agree his delivery has become as clichéd as his words. Maybe he really wasn’t listening to Rev Wright all those years.
Churchill loved stout Saxon words. Obama would surely prefer those of Latin root.
In my adventures listening to Progressive radio, I learned they think the bust kerfuffle is one of those things that crazy conservatives blew out of proportion. The host insisted Barry did not send it back to England, but just moved it from the Oval Office to a hallway.
I believe that Obama’s reputation as an orator was manufactured from the beginning. How could any “right thinking” person not praise that convention speech, delivered as it was by a “bright” and “attractive” young black politician? Are you racist?
Now it has become an article of faith. Even conservative pundits, when critiquing his speeches, mouth the obligatory flattering words about his delivery, before attacking the substance. That commentary is simply automatic and unthinking, or to borrow a phrase from the world of the Beltway Bandit, “boilerplate”.
Compared to Rubio, to name just one, he sounds like a stilted hack. That is with TOTUS as a crutch. Without TOTUS he is simply pitiful. I am trying to be kind here. Even G.W., who got that deer in the headlights look, and became very stiff when he was speaking formally; was quite good when relaxed and speaking extemporaneously. The “Little O”, formerly known as the “Big O”, can’t even match that.
To pick up on the thread about Churchill; I believe the Brits simply put a lot more emphasis on oratory than we do. I suspect the Parliamentary system has something to do with that. Churchill was the Master in a time when oratory was universally valued; but, the trend continues. I think Tony Blair is a superb speaker, and very pleasurable to the ear.
I’m perplexed by people who seemingly want their feelings manipulated when the subject matter is the cold hard mathematics of government budgets. Who are these aliens and how did they get here in such large numbers?
From the moment I heard about his teleprompter, and how he stutters whenever it isn’t at hand, I’ve been nothing but shocked at anyone calling him an orator, much less a great one. If he’s a great orator for being able to read well from the teleprompter, then most people are great orators. This is a case of both grade inflation on a national scale, and a con job of epic proportions.
All the rest we have seen follows naturally from that.
Every time I hear Mr. Obama give a speech, I come away from it saying, ” But he didn’t say anything “. How has he ever managed to aquire a reputation for a skill he does not have?
Obama uses unethical sub-conscious hypnotism in his speeches, which tends to influence the minds of the gutless, the gullible, and the guilty.
Those that are less suggestible, foolish, and prone to listening to other people tell them what is or is not reality, are far less capable of being held under Obama’s spell.
Fortunately, it includes a bunch of tough minded conservatives in that ball park. Unfortunately, it does not include 80% of the Left.