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Source: Reuters -
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So the youngish black guy won, as opposed to the old-ish white woman, and Barack Obama has been president now for almost a year.
But people are finding themselves unable to decide whether Barack Obama is simply a slipperier, less charismatic version of Bill Clinton, or a rather pedestrian retail politician from Chicago who, while having a good line in nuance and speeches, simply campaigns to the left, and governs in the middle.
Is he a putz, or a genius? I can't tell. But as the President increasingly speaks on both sides of his mouth (he was for how US security dealt with the terrorist attack at Christmas, before he was against it. He is now most definitely against it), a chorus is rising: 'See, Hillary would have been different!'
Chief in the Commander-in-Chief's domestic political problems are the Hillary Clinton supporters of his own Democratic Party. Very vocal last year, they have never forgiven the first Black POTUS (President of the United States) from preventing the first Woman POTUS from ascending -in their view- to her Rightful Throne.
I met one outside the David Letterman show when La Clinton was making an appearance on the campaign trail. She had been chanting 'Madame President! Madam President!' Our relations were cordial until she determined that (1) I didn't think her candidate was going to win (2) I was a little too evidently bemused at her dismay that I didn't share this view.
'I don't like you,' she said, and the scowls, sideways looks, and sour comments commenced.
Fair enough, I am an unlikeable cuss, though trivial enough to be easily ignored. Only, she couldn't ignore me. I hadn't just questioned the electoral chances of a politician she liked, I'd insulted her, and everything she stood for.
It was personal. These (mostly middle-aged, and late-middle-aged women) felt Obama had used the race issue to jiu-jitsu the Clintons (they were right), that he didn't really believe anything (they may have been right), and that he had no spine for engaging the hard issues in a hard-headed way (ditto).
Their life experience had taught them that no politician could have such attributes and be trusted.
They were so angry, they were nick-named PUMAs, or 'Party Unity, My Ass!' These people disliked Obama so much they were prepared to savage the Democratic party that had bred them in order to stop him. Much hot air was expended last year debating just how this group would vote. Most of them held their noses and voted for Obama.
Now, the PUMAs are releasing their fingers. Predictably perhaps, they don't like what they smell.
The PUMAs are becoming TONRs. That is they 'Tried Obama, but are Now Republican'. A colleague happens to be a TONR. He had campaigned for Obama after the knife fights last year, but when the President blithely said he would pour returned bank bailout money into job creation schemes rather than paying down the bloated Federal debt, something snapped inside him.
'I realised this guy didn't believe in anything,' said my friend.
I though of him when I read the following out of a local newspaper in Pennsylvania.
It's the same refrain, 'TONR! TONR! TONR!'
Meanwhile, Hillary Clinton continues to keep her head down, work
hard as Secretary of State, and disavow any political ambitions.
Without a Democrat Party outlet for their anger, the PUMAs will
continue to become TONRs. And they will make their voices heard
during this year's congressional mid-term elections.
Read more of Tim Wilson's blogs
here
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