As Joe and I have noted before, it was only a matter of time before the "left of the left's" disappointment with President Obama seeped into more mainstream voices in the Democratic party, and started to damage Obama's brand and the perception of his character. Today we have Cynthia Tucker, the Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, writing a story about how an expert is comparing Obama to failed presidential candidate Michael Dukakis and failed President George H.W. Bush, and not in a good way.
“It’s remarkable that a new president gets elected with super-majorities, that the president wouldn’t use people’s legitimate anger as a tool for change, when he ran on change,” Westen said....
“When people are anxious and angry, they look to their leaders for a way to channel that anger that is productive. That is part of what leadership is. (But) this president and his leadership team believe that leadership is channeling hope, and even touching anybody’s anger and anxiety is off limits. It’s the politics of Dukakis,” Westen said.
“What I think the White House hasn’t gotten is that if the public is angry and anxious and you don’t talk about that anger, and it doesn’t look like you feel it, you start to look like George H.W. Bush in the recession (of the early 1990s). Out of touch,” Westen said.
