Is Obama 'Uppity'? Examining His Experience
Eugene Robinson, Washington Post: "If this turns out to be more of a "change" election, the experience factor becomes less important. The real clunker is the charge (by Hillary Clinton) that Obama is possessed of unseemly ambition....No one is going to believe that Hillary Clinton is unambitious compared with Obama or anyone else. And that's fine. Our system basically requires that major party presidential candidates be pathologically ambitious. What normal person would suffer the indignities of a national campaign?
"The real problem is the implication that there's something specifically wrong with Obama's ambition -- that he has no right to be where he is, challenging her for the nomination. There's a suggestion that he's somehow a usurper, which allows Obama supporters to charge that Clinton, without using the word, is accusing the Illinois senator of being uppity-- which opens up a discussion about history and entitlement that I can't imagine any Democratic front-runner would welcome."
It's perfectly legitimate for Clinton (and by implication, Obama's eventual Republican opponent) to go after him on substance, Robinson says. But to assert that "the first African American with a legitimate shot at the nomination is overreaching is not the way for Clinton to stay ahead."
Some say Obama's relatively brief record in Congress works to his advantage. Nicole Schilling, chairman of the Democratic Party in Greene County, Iowa, told USA Today "he's kind of a blank slate, and people are projecting what they think onto him."
Maybe, but it could backfire in the long run if people set up too high expectations for him, to be all things to all people, expectations that he can't possibly meet.
The challenge for Obama is to be very clear about what people can legitimately expect from him and what they can't. In an interview with Vogue cited in the USA Today article, he said he wasn't running merely for the honor, power and prestige of being president, but because he "wants to change the country. You want to make a unique contribution. You want to be a great president."
And according to Reuters, Obama asserts that his lack of Washington experience is an advantage.
"I hear candidates say, 'Elect me because I know how to play the game
better in Washington.' We don't need somebody who plays the game
better. We need somebody to put an end to the game-playing," Obama said.
Drill Deeper:
- Obama on the Rise: His Campaign Reveals As Much About America As It Does About Him, by Jim Buie
- Does Obama Have Enough Experience to be President? From Obamapedia
- Why Should I Vote for Barack Obama? Obamapedia
- The Big Question About Barack Obama. USA Today
- Obama Forged Political Mettle in Illinois Capital, a Washington Post examination of Obama's experience.
- Obama and Clinton Spar Over Experience (Reuters)
