To defuse anger in the tea party and across the electorate, President Obama and his administration must first acknowledge it, argues Arianna.
Arianna and Howard Fineman, HuffPost's newest senior editor, appeared on "Hardball" Monday to weigh in on the midterm elections and President Obama's town hall remarks.
For too long the White House has touted its accomplishments and ignored middle-class suffering, Arianna explained.
"The president and his administration have for so long said how much they've done right that they're not really addressing where people find themselves," Arianna said. "They need to address that reality in which people are living. It's not just a matter of communications."
Beyond acknowledging voters' tempers and the high unemployment and foreclosure rates that they're living through, Obama and Democrats must offer real solutions and present them clearly, Arianna said. "They talk about jobs being a priority, but they haven't really produced a long list of suggestions."
Fineman argued that Obama must take a page from former President Clinton and lay out his plans more clearly.
"I hate to say it, [Obama] is still a professor some of the time," Fineman said. "He's trying, you see him trying. You want him to get over the hump with these people and really say as Bill Clinton would tell him to do, 'OK here are the three things we've done for you now.'"
During a town hall-style meeting on MSNBC Monday, Obama fielded a question from a middle-class supporter who confessed that she was "exhausted" from supporting him despite a lack of change.
Arianna said the president lacked a compelling response.
"100 million people in this country are now living at a standard of living that is not as good as their parents at the same age," Arianna said. "The middle class life has become a game of chance."
WATCH:
Video: Obama's Town-Hall-Style Meeting - NYTimes.com
Obama town hall focuses on the question: Is the president anti-business?
Obama hits China, tea party in town hall
“All men hate the wretched; how then, must I be hated, who am miserable beyond all living things! Yet you, my creator, detest and spurn me, the creature, to whom thou art bound by ties only dissoluble by the annihilation of one of us”- The Monster, Ch. 2
"You are my creator, but I am your master—obey!" -The Monster, Ch. 20
FRANKENSTEIN Novel- Mary Shelley
These folks appear throughout our history, ordinary people that got through the layers of insulation wrapped around Washington and delivered the message. It's not always face-to-face: Rosa Parks got the message through from a bus in Montgomery, for example.
The question before us is whether Obama will get the message, and if he does, whether he will understand its importance. His supporters find themselves always playing defense, and it's not because of Obama's 'professorial' delivery or apparent lack of emotional connection. It's because he seems to be perfectly content with a sort of Potemkin Village approach to legislation: as long as it's called health care reform, who cares what's in it? But for the public, half measures are less than nothing.
If he heard the question, and he understood its significance, he will devote himself to solving problems, rather than merely addressing them. That, it seems to me, is the central issue of his administration so far. We don't need acknowledgment, we need action.
Come November, if there isn't a full court press going on to get America back to work, a lot of Obama's supporters will be too exhausted to get out and vote.
Humphrey to Nixon
Carter to Reagan.
Gore-Lieberman to Bush 2.
Kerry to Bush 2/2
We need a democrat with guts and integrity and fire.
And now Obama. Diddling around with wall street fat cats while unemployment soars.
Spending two billion dollars a week on the war in Afghanistan.
You now, friend, It always matters - who is a judge. You do not fit this position on this issue.
You can not continue to use Bush as an excuse. Obama has carried on nearly ALL Bush era policies. So if Bush was bad, Obama is worse.
But again, what exactly has Obama done?
But I suppose anger about that is BS right?
Give money to the progressive of your choice, and vote against the GOP this fall. Just shuddup and do it. Please.
Another difference is that Obama understands that these are the UNITED States of America and embraces the differences between religion & ethnicity. Palin, Angle and their ilk want everyone to think like they do (which is NOT at all) and to believe as they do and if you don't, well then you are just anti-American.
Voter anger and its ugly sister "incumbent backlash" are amorphous nothings. The catastrophic Republican policies that brought us here and their obstruction of recovery policies get no mention (we have to look forward!), the better to lay the blame with Democrats.
Things will only get worse as long as people continue to watch TV news, and believe what they hear.
I concur......and, with all due respect to Arianna, I think she sometimes does not help the cause of that reasoning.
{{fanned}}
Friends?