from NY to Israel Sultan Reveals
The Stories Behind the News

Posted: 03 Nov 2009 09:15 PM PST

If the gubernatorial elections in New Jersey and Virginia were
to be seen as a way of taking the pulse of Obama's popularity, the White
House spin machine has to be just about ready for a trip to the ER.
Obama's people were already braced for a loss in Virginia, writing off
Deeds for being insufficiently willing to turn over his campaign and
office to Obama's people to do with as they please. New Jersey's Corzine
however had followed every ugly step in the White House playbook, from
backing their radical agenda, running petty personal attacks against the
opposition and relying on ACORN's gangbangers to bring out the
vote.

But tonight Deeds and Corzine are out, and Obama's political
star has taken a beating. Obama alone isn't to blame of course. Deeds was
hardly a political superstar and Corzine was an arrogant and abusive
politician whose favorite hobby was raising taxes on an already overtaxed
state. Both men though would have had a much easier time with Bush in
office and the perception that Republicans were asleep at the economic
wheel. That is why Democrats have kept trying to run for office as the
minority party pushing for change. The problem is that tonight's election
was indeed about change, and change meant giving the Democrats the
boot.

In the twilight of 2009, most Americans still have the same
concerns they did a year ago. The concerns about the economy haven't
changed, neither has their desire for a set of policies that works. Only
the party in power has changed. The same independent voters that helped
make a difference in the 2008 election, once again showed up... still
wanting change. And change this time around means bad news for the
Democrats, who have become the bosses.

The 2009 Democratic party
playbook hinged on three elements, Obama's charisma, painting the
Republican party as radicals, and relying on ACORN style Get Out the Vote
operations. And now all three have failed. The value of the Obama charisma
dollar has been dropping with each unnecessary TV appearance. The average
American doesn't hate Obama yet, but as with most celebrities who have
stopped doing interesting things, is bored by him. Painting the
Republicans as radical is one of those tactics in which Democrats believe
that painting their beliefs across a giant canvas is a can't miss
strategy.

While Democratic media propaganda has obsessively pushed
the line for a whole year that the Republicans are a radical party, the
public hasn't much paid attention or cared. Louder opposition has actually
paid off for the Republicans with independent voters looking for a vocal
opposition to a crummy state of affairs. Denouncing your enemies as
extremists may play well among a party whose ideological base is a toned
down form of radical socialism, but it doesn't connect beyond that base
and the chattering classes on the coasts. Instead, as the media found out
during the Town Hall protests, it actually makes them more
appealing.

Finally ACORN was seriously wounded, but it certainly
had the same organizational abilities it had beforehand. ACORN was
aggressively pushing into New Jersey to prove that it could do in a
statewide election, what it had accomplished in local Democratic primaries
in New York. Instead all it generated was complaints about gangbangers
going door to door. No doubt there's a hefty amount of voter fraud in New
York and New Jersey with ACORN's name on it in both states, but it wasn't
enough to tip the scales. Because you can't steal every election. You can
only help steal an election that's already close and trending your way.
But stealing an election against the current is a much tougher challenge
worthy of a Huey Long. ACORN and Obama don't quite have that kind of power
yet. At least they didn't tonight.

The Democratic playbook for 2009 is in tatters.
And best of all those who wrote it will not understand how or why. After a
year of furious efforts targeting the Republican party, the only damage
dealt to the GOP has been self-inflicted, while every attack has actually
made the Republicans more popular. Using Obama as a magic totem who can do
anything just wore out his charisma batteries that much faster. And
relying on dirty tricks can only help so much when the voters are already
turning on you.

The real story is told by the independent voters
shifting away from Obama. Change to independent voters meant a more
functional set of policies and an economic bounce. If Bush was to blame
for the economy going south, as the Democrats had insisted in 2008, surely
the Democrats could fix it. And if they couldn't. More
change.

Americans treat most politicians like diapers, changing
them when things turn bad. An election is often a way for an electorate
that is ignored between elections to send a message to those in power to
either get things right or get out. Obama and the Democrats treated 2008
as a historic victory and a mandate, when it was a message that the public
was unhappy with the economy. They took their win as an open invite to
loot the treasury into the trillions, to pass gigantic unpopular bailouts
and nationalizations. And they were wrong. Deeply
wrong.

Obama's constant trips abroad made him seem like a
mayfly, flitting about here and there, useless but bright and colorful. In
better economic times, that might have been enough, but unless the media
can somehow spin unemployment into gold, to allow Barry Hussein to hang up
a Mission Accomplished banner on the economy, the polls will not go the
poppinjay's way in 2012. Just as they didn't go his way
tonight.

Obama's charisma was not able to salvage Corzine. It
cannot sell his health care agenda to the public. It cannot hang on to the
independent voters. The only real question now is what the Democrats will
do after tonight. The moderates will pull back further, but Obama and his
radical allies are likely to keep going in the same direction they have
before. Which should be welcome news for everyone who enjoys a good
lemming stampede.

The independent voter is abandoning Obama and his newly
reradicalized party, and the moderate Democrat will soon follow. Tonight's
election also will serve to make Democratic congressmen from more
conservative districts cautious about following Obama's agenda. More
cautious than they already have been. And when combined with Obama and
Pelosi's determination to keep working on ObamaCare, the result is likely
to be a boondoggle that will drag on indefinitely, which in turn will only
feed the perception of a do-nothing congress and a failed administration.

Change is not an open ended mandate or a blank check. Change is a
warning to either perform or meet the same fate as the last incumbent. And
while Obama was clutching the keys to the kingdom in his dirty little
hands, flying endlessly around the world, taking Air Force One on dates
and primping and posing for magazine covers; ordinary Americans were
losing jobs, families were cutting back, credit card bills piled up,
vacations vanished and people came to work every day not knowing if it
would be their last. Tonight was a major warning sign to Obama that these
Two Americas cannot co-exist forever. And sooner or later Americans will
want their White House back from its current lazy and debauched
tenants.