Yet despite these polarizing shifts of the American political center, Barack Obama doesn't seem to notice as he pursues his Kumbayah moments of bipartisanship. So what if members of both parties sat together to listen to him sing his paean to enhancing American corporatism? One can't actually achieve such unity in action when one party dances about like Muhammad Ali in his prime while the other models the mob's concrete overshoes!
Joshua Holland illustrates several examples of Republicans reversing political magnetic polarity regarding many policies they themselves originally introduced as legislation, apparently a mandatory element of any bills Barack Obama now proposes for passage. It should be a slam dunk for a constitutional expert well versed in history to point out these hypocrisies regarding his presentation of past GOP proposals. Yet by failing to gain support for these issues merely by presenting them, it is also apparent that Obama is not up to the challenge of actually winning such battles. I return to The Greatest to explain why.
Ali's fighting style included a constantly shifting position, so that his opponent wouldn't know where the next punch was coming from and be able to defend against it. The more Ali danced about, the more punches he landed, until the ten count ended the fight. It is also thus with the Republicans vs. Obama. By constantly changing their own positions, they drag the discussions further to the right and away from any chance that Obama has of winning. They are aided in their efforts to confuse Obama's navigational bearing through claims that Obama is "moving to the center" with his very corporate-friendly SOTU speech and his corporatist Cabinet nominations of Wall Street executives. It is thus only a matter of time before they land the knockout blow on a dizzy Obama. He is a dope waiting to be roped.
Clive Crook, writing in The Financial Times, advocates that Obama also change the position of the political center, but away from the current Republican positions. In another article written for The Atlantic, Crook expresses his disappointment regarding Obama's failure to do so, stating that Obama failed to "prepare the country for the coming fiscal restraint" and neglected to provide "an outline of the path back to fiscal control." It's hard to know where you want to lead when you clearly don't know where you are and your navigational skills are affected by shifting standards. People will follow surety through times of travail, but will abandon the man who doesn't know what he's about even in good times.
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