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Contributed by Sam Minervino 2009-03-22

Portland — Tongue-tied Barack Obama is turning into Jimmy Carter

taken from:

http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/tim_shipman/blog/2009/03/21/tonguetied_barack_obama_is_turning_into_jimmy_carter

Still don't believe that Obama is the new Carter? Michael Wolff writes: "It's instructive and humorous to remember that Carter ran a brilliant campaign that succeeded largely because his voice was new. Simple, direct, basic, human. And then, of course, he turned into a sad-sack twit."

He (Obama) speaks like the kind of lecturer who puts their students to sleep. His first prime time press conference (there is another coming this week) was colossally dull, with rambling ten minute answers.

Obama seems incapable of balancing the need to be a national leader and his childish desire to retain his image as the uber cool dude he so clearly believes that he is.

Mike Allen and Jim Vandehei at Politico wrote a characteristically insightful piece on Thursday that began: "Of all the pitfalls Barack Obama might face in the presidency, here is one not many people predicted: He is struggling as a public communicator."

Allen is the hardest working and one of the very best reporters in Washington. Vandehei has established a reputation, with his fellow executive John Harris, of writing pieces that successfully synthesise and lead conventional wisdom inside the beltway. When they speak, you should listen.

They point out:

The discipline and strategic focus of the campaign have yet to move into the White House. The story of the day often catches the president flat-footed or on the defensive - and regularly undercut by fellow Democrats.

To Obama's dismay, he is learning that successful presidential communications is only in part - often a fairly small part - about personal eloquence.

They condemn Obama's "mixed messages" on the economy, alternating gloom and hope, and what to me is the most damaging fact that he is "too cool for his own good":

Even when Obama went before the cameras to express outrage at the AIG bonuses, he seemed to nod to the contrived nature of it. During an East Room event, when Obama coughed, he drew laughter by departing from the teleprompter to crack: "Excuse me, I'm choked up with anger here."

Obama has never run anything other than his presidential campaign. He doesn't know the difference between governing and campaigning and he's sticking with what he knows.

You can afford to duck and dive between great hopes, dark fears and confected anger when you get three news cycles a day during a campaign.

Allen and Vandehei are not the only ones who have noticed that Obama appears out of his depth. Michael Wolff, America's premier writer on the media, a bit of a liberal, has just written a devastating critique of Obama's speaking skills, comparing him to Jimmy Carter and branding him a "terrible bore".

Here are some of Wolff's highlights:

Sheesh, the guy is Jimmy Carter.

That homespun bowling crap on Jay Leno, followed by the turgid, teachy fiscal policy lecture, together with the hurt defensiveness (and bad script for it) that everybody in Washington "is Simon Cowell... Everybody's got an opinion," is pure I'm-in-over-my-head stuff.

We're face-to-face with the reality, the man can't talk worth a damn.

This guy is leaden and this show is in trouble.

Wolff stresses that it is the president's sanctimonious self-regard that has shaped his inept message management.

Having been so successfully elected, he's acting like people actually want to hear what he thinks. He's the great earnest bore at the dinner party. Instead of singing for his supper, he's just talking-and going on at length. The real job of making people part of the story you're telling, of having them hang on your every word, of getting the tone and detail right, the hard job of holding a conversation, he ain't doing.

He's cold; he's prickly; he's uncomfortable; he's not funny; and he's getting awfully tedious.

He thinks it's all about him.

The most striking aspect of the Leno appearance is that while he's all smiles and self-regard, Obama is flat out not funny.

Michael Wolff is right to say that it was wrong for Obama's fawning admirers to proclaim his inaugural speech a triumph when to me and most others who followed him during the campaign it was a flat, featureless disappointment with not one single memorable line--and this from the man who thinks he's Abraham Lincoln redux.

Obama has been spectacularly unfunny. The man himself might have a sense of humour- and it's clear that he has a wry eye for the absurdities of being leader of the free world but the president himself is not quick witted. He mocks the oddness of being the most powerful man in the world, he never mocks himself.

As Wolff puts it: "The guy just doesn't know what to say. He can't connect. Emotions are here, he's over there. He can't get the words to match the situation."

Obama seems more interested in maintaining his cool demeanour than showing his country that he cares. Bizarre.

Obama's skills from the moment he stepped on the national stage have been strategic and reactive. He's fine when he's laying out some great policy he has spent months working up and he can be effective in responding to crises.

But he is absolutely hopeless at spotting where these crises come from, useless at predicting them and when they do pop along, like the AIG bonus issue, he is far, far too slow to act.

As Michael Wolff says: "The true secret of the power of language is in quickness. Barack Obama can't keep up. He evidently needs too much preparation."