Posted by
Andrews on Tuesday, July 01, 2008 4:01:01 PM
Ever since the end of February
I have been predicting that if Obama gets the nomination he will have problems getting any support outside of his
narrow cult of followers. My argument has been that the center will not be swept up in the Obamania and his
supposed charisma will not be enough. To get votes from independents, or even moderate Democrats, he will need to take stands on issues. And worse, he will have to take moderate stands. And once he does so, he will begin to alienate the true believers, his base will evaporate, and he still may not win over the center.
And sure enough,
David Limbaugh reports that is precisely what is happening, his followers are becoming disillusioned with his shift to the left.
Since my track record is so good, so far, let me make another prediction. Obama will start seesawing back and forth to try to keep his base, panicking as he sees his numbers slipping. As badly as he responded to criticism, it will be nothing compared to the panic we will see. He will try to please everyone, end up appeasing no one, and he may not even get the
49 electoral votes I previously predicted for him.
POSTSCRIPT
I realize that Limbaugh argues that the left "understands" and won't hold his shift to the right against Obama, but he is thinking of the political insiders. I would argue that those idealist college kids, unreformed hippies and other Obamaniacs will not have the political perspective of the talking heads on the left and may be heartbroken when they hear "right wing" talk coming out of their new messiah. Just because mercenary hard left political junkies can see the Obama tactic for what it is does not mean the followers do. And as Obama has brought to his movement a lot of naive types previously uninvolved in politics it seems especially likely they will not be sufficiently cynical to forgive him his transgressions.