The Blamer versus the Problem-Solver

The poisonous nature of so much of today’s political discourse is in large part due to the climate of blame-casting encouraged by Barack Obama. Given any difficult situation whatsoever, it is clear that Obama’s primary instinct is to use it as an opportunity to demonize a selected group. The man has remarkably little interest in problem-solving. Despite his faux reputation as an intellectual, there is nothing of the scholar or analyst in him. It’s all about speech-making…”the use of his vocal chords is to him inseparable from thinking, as Freud and Bullitt wrote about Woodrow Wilson…and the speeches, especially these days, are usually mainly about an attack on a targeted group.

A strong contrast is offered by presidential candidate Herman Cain..a man who has lived in an environment of problem-solving….ballistics problems for the US Navy, programming problems while getting his CS degree, marketing and production and management problems at the pizza company. You can’t solve trajectories or write code or make and sell pizzas by seeking out someone to blame.

This is a contrast that it would be wise for the Cain campaign to emphasize strongly.

9 thoughts on “The Blamer versus the Problem-Solver”

  1. I wonder if the current media assault on Cain indicates the media are well aware of Obama’s faults as stated but will do all they can to cover them up. It probably will be a cold day in hell before the media would ever admit they backed a seriously flawed horse in 2008.

  2. “It probably will be a cold day in hell before the media would ever admit they backed a seriously flawed horse in 2008.”

    Would be nice if they did, in my opinion – they might thereby retrieve a little of their fast-eroding credibility. Seriously, though – I have always wondered how on earth they managed to take Obama at face value in 2008. I’m a retired military veteran and pink-collar worker, passingly-well read and not connected politically in any way, and I could look at him and see BIG problems from the very beginning.

  3. Sgt.,

    “I’m a retired military veteran and pink-collar worker, passingly-well read and not connected politically in any way.”

    Which is another way of saying that you have infinitely more sense than pretty much anyone in the professional news business.

    As I’m fond of saying, “Any sufficiently advanced stupidity is indistinguishable from malice.” Whether Obama and his media enablers are doing this “on purpose” or whether they “believe” their slander is ultimately imponderable, because they don’t have a clear enough concept of economic or psychological reality to make purposeful decisions on those subjects.

    And I don’t I’m being one bit too harsh when I say that. I’ve know various people who managed their individual lives about the same way that Obama has managed the economy. They have all been substance abusers, mentally or emotionally ill, or mentally impaired to some degree.

  4. It’s true that Cain is a problem-solver and that this is one of his more endearing qualities.

    However, he’s wise to save his emphasis on it for the general, as emphasizing it in the primaries would do nothing to distinguish him from Romney, another problem-solver.

  5. “Where’s the contrast?”

    Degrees of awfulness. Supremely awful versus awful. If you must eat a shit sandwich, select the smallest one.

  6. One of my father’s sayings is that “Losers always have someone to blame”.

    Sounds harsh but I have learned over the years how true it is – not everyone is born with the same opportunities but only that person can make the opportunities.

    The losers always have someone to blame – implying that it is out of their control and they are “victims”.

    Come to think of it that sounds like the Left’s playbook.

  7. When there was discussion of how Obama seems to be hoping for a Truman-style victory in 2012, I started to think of all the ways Truman is not like Obama. Truman knew how to run a farm, captain an artillery company, work on a railroad, run a haberdashery business, be a judge, and rise through a political machine. He experienced both successes and failures in these endeavors. Throughout his entire life, he engaged in the sorts of things that ordinary Americans do, and worked on teams with with ordinary Americans. When he was on the campaign trail, he knew how to talk to ordinary Americans because he had lived the same experiences.

    Obama has none of these characteristics. And I think that will be his undoing.

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