Opinion: David Brooks on Obama
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Other Times columnist David Brooks says he wants to play Dr. Doom in his column today, aiming to strike fear in the hearts of both parties. But one of his points on Barack Obama mystified me:
Peter Hart did a focus group for the Annenberg Public Policy Center with independent voters in Virginia that captured reactions you hear all the time. These independent voters were intrigued by Obama’s “change” message, but they knew almost nothing about him except that he used to go to the Rev. Jeremiah Wright’s church. It’s as if they can’t hang Obama’s life onto anything from their own immediate experiences and, as a result, he is an abstraction.
Maybe it speaks more to the limitations of polling (er, focus-grouping, which is of course more limited), but the ‘change’ message relies almost entirely on Obama’s life. That is, how can voters appreciate one without relating to the latter? Obama’s position as a relative political outsider -- compared to a former First Lady and a long-time senator, both scandal-plagued -- should make him that much less abstract to a typical voter.
And of course, what made him so inspiring earlier in the campaign is his American dreamy story -- the immigrant father, the mixed-race heritage, the poverty, the absentee father, the youthful indiscretions and the rise to the top, with a bullet. Of course, some of what makes him appealing can (and has, and will) also make him downright alienating, rather than abstract. He becomes especially ‘other’ when voters rely on misinformation -- as it seems some in the Annenberg group did.
If I can play devil’s (angel’s?) advocate to Brooks’ Dr. Doom, there’s another poll (older, but broader) that suggests independent-voting Virginians once favored Obama over McCain.