Newsweek can’t figure out how Obama lost his mojo, and how the gap has narrowed so quickly.
The perceptible tone of disappointment and chagrin peeking through the facade of objective journalism is delightful. How can this possibly be happening?
A month after emerging victorious from the bruising Democratic nominating contest, some of Barack Obama’s glow may be fading. In the latest NEWSWEEK Poll, the Illinois senator leads Republican nominee John McCain by just 3 percentage points, 44 percent to 41 percent. The statistical dead heat is a marked change from last month’s NEWSWEEK Poll, where Obama led McCain by 15 points, 51 percent to 36 percent.
Obama’s overall decline from the last NEWSWEEK Poll, published June 20, is hard to explain. …
At the time of the last poll, pundits also noted that a large lead in the polls doesn’t always guarantee a general-election victory. Many warned that Democrat Michael Dukakis led George H.W. Bush by as much as 16 points in some 1988 polls and then went on to lose that year’s presidential contest.
But perhaps most puzzling is how McCain could have gained traction in the past month. …
Despite Obama’s precipitous decline, the poll suggests underlying strengths for the Dem.
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Meanwhile visiting Dublin to receive an honorary degree from Trinity College, aging cinema idol Robert Redford told the Irish Times that in his opinion the downfall of one more ultra-liberal presidential candidate could prove fatal to the democrat party.
I think Obama is not tall on experience . . . but I believe he’s a really good person. He’s smart. And he does represent what the country needs most now, which is change.
“I hope he’ll win. I think he will. If he doesn’t, you can kiss the Democratic Party goodbye. I think we need new voices, new blood. We need to get a whole group out, get a new group in.”
Isn’t the definition of insanity doing the same thing over and over again, and expecting different results?
Scott D
But, in fact, new voices is precisely what the Democrat party needs (though it’s not the voices Mr. Redford hears). They need to throw out the 60s generation, who saw all liberal ideas through a prism of long-discredited Marxist theology. Just as the Republicans needed to throw out the Rockefeller/Javits thinking in the 60s. Unfortunately that thinking seems to have reasserted itself of late. Another clean-up is needed there also.
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