Barack Obama, Failed Storyteller

Don't read this post on a full stomach, as you may have the opportunity to re-experience its contents.  It seems that Barack Obama is letting down his base, and into the fray rides Drew Westen, an academic and Democratic activist (but I repeat myself) to explain why this is.  Apparently, the man who has used more words in public in 2.5 years than all of his predecessors combined (ok, that's not true.  But it feels that way and darn it, what I feel is what is important--not what is, dammit)  has failed in his job of constructing and retelling a compelling vision or narrative.  Dr. Westen would have had the President say the following at his inaugural in January of 2009: 

“I know you’re scared and angry. Many of you have lost your jobs, your homes, your hope. This was a disaster, but it was not a natural disaster. It was made by Wall Street gamblers who speculated with your lives and futures. It was made by conservative extremists who told us that if we just eliminated regulations and rewarded greed and recklessness, it would all work out. But it didn’t work out. And it didn’t work out 80 years ago, when the same people sold our grandparents the same bill of goods, with the same results. But we learned something from our grandparents about how to fix it, and we will draw on their wisdom. We will restore business confidence the old-fashioned way: by putting money back in the pockets of working Americans by putting them back to work, and by restoring integrity to our financial markets and demanding it of those who want to run them. I can’t promise that we won’t make mistakes along the way. But I can promise you that they will be honest mistakes, and that your government has your back again.” 

First of all, that someone with multiple degrees would believe this gack is incomprehensible.  But it is the standard liberal line never to "blame the victim" so it must have been the "Wall Street gamblers" (who supported candidate Obama in droves...) and not its countless co-conspirators, like Barney Frank, Acorn, Fannie and Freddie and George Bush's "ownership society".  And it certainly wasn't the grasping and rapacious American public who believed it was a human right to live in and and "own" a 3000 square foot colonial with granite counters.   But I digress.

Dr. Westen believes that the President has lost his passion, that his capacity to ride the fence and lead from behind is not serving the country well.  It is indeed sad that Dr. Westen's "thrill" is gone.  But Westen buries in his fourscreen cri de coeur a "possibility" for why Mr. Obama has turned out to be such a disappointment.  And here, Westen gets it right:

A second possibility is that he is simply not up to the task by virtue of his lack of experience and a character defect that might not have been so debilitating at some other time in history. Those of us who were bewitched by his eloquence on the campaign trail chose to ignore some disquieting aspects of his biography: that he had accomplished very little before he ran for president, having never run a business or a state; that he had a singularly unremarkable career as a law professor, publishing nothing in 12 years at the University of Chicago other than an autobiography; and that, before joining the United States Senate, he had voted "present" (instead of "yea" or "nay") 130 times, sometimes dodging difficult issues. 

Even a blind squirrel finds an acorn now and then.  And you've found it, Dr. Westen.