Friday, April 18, 2008

Sometimes it feels good to be bitter

Obama was at a rally in Erie, PA, today. 3,000 people crammed into an auditorium, and experienced the usual Obama-mania. The questions were substantive - NOT the kind on ABC! And then the issue of being bitter came up:

One man stood up and said, "We have lost a lot of jobs here in Erie, and it's quite all right with us if you tell people that we are bitter." That brought the whole crowd to their feet in applause once again, and Obama said, "That's the biggest response we've had all day!"


What few pundits these days seem to understand is that what most people want from politicians isn't feel-good platitudes, but honesty. It's why John McCain claims to be a practitioner of "straight talk." You don't want a doctor to lie to you about your condition. If you're feeling sick, you know it, and you want a cure, even if it hurts. If you're out of a job, you know life sucks. If a politician says "guess what, these people think life sucks when you don't have a job," then that's called empathy.

2 comments:

Phil Ha said...

yes but, is it honest to promise that he can bring all these jobs back to the rust belt?

Unknown said...

I don't think he's promising to bring all these jobs back to the rust belt, because he knows that's not possible. I don't know what his solution is, but I don't think that's it. But I will pay more attention to this in the future.