President Obama is a man of the Left. He’s is a fairly pragmatic center-Left social democrat, a Fabian who infuriates the hard Left as much as he does the Right.
The more he’s attacked as a kind of Stalin-lite, the more justified he must feel in thinking we “don’t get it” and … the louder he snickers. The Right keeps attacking Obama in ways that only reinforce his worst instincts.
There is a better way. A blogger, “Repulicae” writes on nolanchart.com: “The Fabian Society began in England in 1887 by a very small group of elitist socialist[s].” Key word? Elitist.
Obama, politically and psychically, is vulnerable not as a progressive but as, demonstrably, an overbearing elitist. America was founded on the self-evident truth that all are created equal.
Elitism is abhorrent to Americans. Elitist politicians flinch when called out. Obama is proudly progressive. He appears ashamed of his elitism, which he carefully and continually veils. Exposing him as elitist will be Obama’s apocalypse ( “apocalypse” meaning “to lift the veil”). This will trigger a series of immediate reactions.
First, it will rally, and focus, the voters. Obama’s elitism is an insult. “The thousand injuries of Fortunato I had borne as I best could, but when he ventured upon insult, I vowed revenge,” begins Edgar Allen Poe’s “The Cask of Amontillado.”
Americans are bearing up under the thousand injuries of Obama. It erodes his popularity but doesn’t trigger a focused reaction. (And as the business cycle begins to restore jobs, as it is, the sense of injury will fade.) But when people realize that he has ventured upon insult, they, politically, will immure him.
This will alienate Obama’s key allies from him. Democratic congressmen may swallow hard and vote with him in piling trillions in debt upon our children. That can be rationalized in the name of a crisis or of jobs.
But elitism can’t be rationalized. There is no way to rationalize insulting your voters. Obama is shielded by the massive apparatus of the White House and by guaranteed post-presidency fame and fortune. Members of Congress are not so shielded and sooner or later will distance themselves from insultingly naked elitism.
This will call out to Obama’s own conscience. Baring his elitism may force Obama into some overdue soul-searching. Dan Balz and Haynes Johnson, in “The Battle for America 2008,” report that in preparing Obama to run, advisor David Axelrod wrote to him:
“It goes to your willingness and ability to put up with something you have never experienced on a sustained basis: criticism. At the risk of triggering the very reaction that concerns me, I don’t know if you are Muhammad Ali or Floyd Patterson when it comes to taking a punch. You care far too much what is written and said about you.”
Obama presents himself as fundamentally decent, albeit infuriatingly smug and not nearly as smart as he thinks (nor as smart as what The New Yorker’s James Surowiecki calls “the wisdom of crowds”).
Baring Obama’s elitism will put him on the defensive. Obama is likely to begin to second-guess himself and even may begin to check his own worst excesses and begin a return toward embracing the common sense wisdom of the people.
Attacking Obama as a Leftist attacks him on his own turf. Attacking him as elitist attacks him on ours. Alinsky teaches us (Rule 3, Rules for Radicals), “Whenever possible go outside of the experience of the enemy. Here you want to cause confusion, fear and retreat.”
The simple truth? Obama is an elitist. The winning strategy? Rip away the veil and reveal the hidden truth. Naked elitism is Obama’s apocalypse.
Ralph Benko, a principal of Capital City Partners, of Washington, D.C., and co-emcee of last year’s Boston Tea Party, is the author of “The Websters’ Dictionary: How to use the Web to transform the world.”
