ITB - Analysts say Obama came up short -- Politico, Tim Mak

[bsteadman]

Analysts say Obama came up short

Politico
Tim Mak
9/7/2012

"The emerging consensus on President Barack Obama's convention address suggests the wear of four hard years has taken its toll: that it was a dispassionate, ordinary speech that lacked the soaring rhetoric that Obama had led most to expect; that it contained modest content and sober promises colored by the president’s experience with reality; and that it featured the deficiency of setting out goals without offering out the specific means to achieve them.

The president, brought to national prominence by an exceptional oratorical ability, gave a relatively flat speech, some commentators argued.

“Let’s be blunt. Barack Obama gave a dull and pedestrian speech tonight, with nary an interesting thematic device, policy detail, or even one turn of phrase,” wrote Michael Tomasky, the editor of the progressive journal Democracy, at The Daily Beast.

“This was the rhetorical equivalent, forgive the football metaphor, of running out the clock: Obama clearly thinks he’s ahead and just doesn’t need to make mistakes. But when football teams do that, it often turns out to be the biggest mistake of all, and they lose,” concluded Tomasky.

“(I)t got the job done. But I didn’t feel any real passion in the delivery. It felt more like an actor soldiering through his lines,” wrote Kevin Drum at Mother Jones. “There was nothing memorable, nothing forward looking, and nothing that drew a contrast with Romney in sharp, gut-level strokes. Obama was, to be charitable, no more than the third best of the Democratic convention’s prime time speakers in 2012.”

“In the shadow of Clinton’s performance, the president often felt flat, rote, and unconvincing — almost as though he wasn’t quite convinced by his own arguments and promises, and felt a little awkward selling them to us,” wrote the New York Times’ Ross Douthat.

“I’d still give Bill Clinton props for the best speech of both conventions,” agreed ThinkProgress’ Joe Romm.

Those on the right were even more pointed:"
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View the complete article at:

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0912/80913.html

[bsteadman]

WaPo editors: Where’s the beef?

Hot Air
Ed Morrissey
9/7/2012

Excerpt:

In case one wonders whether the criticism of Barack Obama’s speech will get much play today, at least the Washington Post makes its displeasure known. In an editorial today, the paper scolded Obama for a lack of “hard truths,” and pointed out that the President’s pitch for a second term didn’t include, er, a plan for the hazy, gauzy goals Obama provided:

An acceptance speech is not a State of the Union laundry list of specific proposals. Its role is to set out a vision of the country’s future path. Mr. Obama was correct that he and Mr. Romney have dramatically different visions of government’s role, and that the Republican prescription of tax cuts to address any woe has left the country in terrible shape. Mr. Romney has been inexcusably vague in outlining his program, fiscal and otherwise, and he did nothing to mend this deficiency in his acceptance speech. But Mr. Obama’s speech also fell short — of his own proclaimed standards.

He vowed, “I will never turn Medicare into a voucher,” but he gave his audience no indication that his solution — controlling health care costs — might involve sacrifice on the part of seniors. He promised “responsible steps to strengthen” Social Security, which he has neglected throughout his first term. As to which steps those might be, not a word. “My plan will continue to reduce the carbon pollution that is heating our planet,” Mr. Obama said. What plan would that be? …

But the attractiveness of that vision made all the more frustrating Mr. Obama’s refusal to fill in any substance, his once again promising hard truths that he did not deliver. “They want your vote, but they don’t want you to know their plan,” he said of the Republicans. If Mr. Obama has a plan, Americans who listened Thursday don’t know how he would achieve it.

Actually, the two candidates had much different goals in their speeches. Mitt Romney had to introduce himself to the American public, especially after a summer of brutal personal attacks from Team Obama and Democrats. The Post doesn’t acknowledge that both Romney and Ryan have proposed very specific economic policies for the next four years; Ryan passed his plans twice in the House of Representatives, although he’s backing Romney’s plans now. Romney needs to continue to offer those specific policies in the campaign and discuss them at length — especially since it’s clear now that Obama won’t discuss his own second-term agenda in any detail at all this fall — but the real goal of his speech last week was to show that he wasn’t a scary, blood-sucking capitalist who wants to get rich by crippling the middle class. Based on the initial boost in favorability after the convention last week, Romney at least made some progress on that front."
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View the complete article at:

http://hotair.com/archives/2012/09/0...eres-the-beef/