Ignoring The Obvious

President Obama responded to Scott Brown's upset victory in the Massachusetts special senatorial election with this,

One thing I regret this year is that we were so busy just getting stuff done . . . that I think we lost some of that sense of speaking directly to the American people. . . . I think the assumption was, if I just focus on policy, if I just focus on the, you know, this provision, or that law, or are we making a good, rational decision here, that people will get it.

CBS News totalled up the few occasions that Obama found time to "speak directly to the American people".

Speeches, Comments and Remarks - 411 (52 on health care)
Interviews - 158 (including 90 TV, 11 radio)
Press Availability / Conferences - 42
Town Hall Meetings - 23

Charles Krauthammer noted that Obama was as ubiquitous as Big Brother. Yet the president thinks the problem was that he was too focused on working quietly behind the scenes, "getting stuff done". Alas, there was no time to communicate with his constituents.

Obama also said this.

Here’s my assessment of not just the vote in Massachusetts, but the mood around the country: The same thing that swept Scott Brown into office swept me into office. People are angry, and they’re frustrated. Not just because of what’s happened in the last year or two years, but what’s happened over the last eight years.

Oh right. Bush again. The "people" have a generalized, irrational anger which was built up over the past eight years and they will take it out on any incumbent (or incumbent stand-in). This anger is so overwhelming, so pernicious, that they'll even elect (in Virginia and New Jersey also) members of Bush's own party! Silly, stupid people. They know not what they do.

Krauthammer (NRO) delivers a reality check for Obama.

...the Democrats are delusional: Scott Brown won by running against Obama, not against Bush. He won by brilliantly nationalizing the race, running hard against the Obama agenda, most notably Obamacare. Killing it was his No. 1 campaign promise.

Bull’s-eye. An astonishing 56 percent of Massachusetts voters, according to Rasmussen, called health care their top issue. In a Fabrizio, McLaughlin, & Associates poll, 78 percent of Brown voters said their vote was intended to stop Obamacare. Only a quarter of all voters in the Rasmussen poll cited the economy as their top issue, nicely refuting the Democratic view that Massachusetts was just the usual anti-incumbent resentment you expect in bad economic times.

Brown ran on a very specific, very clear agenda. Stop health care. Don’t Mirandize terrorists. Don’t raise taxes; cut them. And no more secret backroom deals with special interests.

But Obama (probably) doesn't read National Review. He reads...what? Why the New York Times, of course.

There are many theories about the import of Scott Brown's upset victory. To our minds, it is not remotely a verdict on Mr. Obama's presidency, nor does it amount to a national referendum on health care reform.

Keep believing that Barack (and Harry and Nancy). Follow the course you're taking. See where it gets you.

Krauthammer (on his game - as usual)
http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=YzA1ZWRmYjgxOGVjM2YyZWYxYWIwNDY1MmJlYzEzMTY=