Obama Passes the Rock Star Test

This is the latest cover of Rolling Stone Magazine. There’s no writing on it – just the name of the magazine. It’s stark contrast to their usual practice of promoting several featured articles on the cover of the magazine. The tone is almost reverential. Look at Obama’s expression – he’s smiling, looking down. It’s a messiah-like posture. He’s a jubilant savior. We are the children.

Inside are two articles on Barack Obama – one an interview with the candidate, the other a report on the people running his campaign.

The interview is mostly pointless – publisher Jann Wenner did it himself, rather than delegating it to his usual political writers. It’s full of softball questions, leaving Barack the opportunity to ingratiate himself to the RS audience by connecting via music. Obama has an Ipod, you see, and as befits any politician who wants to reach out to a wide cross section of voters, he has on it Dylan, Stevie Wonder, Charlie Parker and Coltrane, Sheryl Crow, Howlin’ Wolf, Yo-Yo Man and Jay-Z. That list was probably crafted by his very agile campaign staff. It touches everyone except senior citizens, and no doubt had he gone on we would have learned he has some Lawrence Welk and big band on that Ipod too.

Interview sample:

Bruce [Springsteen] issued a pretty eloquent endorsement of you. What do you think of him and his work?

Not only do I love Bruce’s music, but I just love him as a person. He’s a guy who has never lost track of his roots, who knows who he is, who has never put on a front. When you think about authenticity, you think about Bruce Springsteen, and that’s how he comes across personally. We haven’t actually met in person.

That’s a bit telling – I guess, as with George W. Bush and Vladimar Putin, Obama was able to get a sense of Springsteen’s soul by means of a fleeting impression. It’s an unintended glance into Obama’s soul. I take from it that the man is not authentic, that he is putting on a front. He knows what he is doing. But that’s just my fleeting impression.

One line grabbed me. Speaking of globalization, Obama says

The American people are, I think, congenitally optimistic. Right now, they’re not feeling particularly optimistic about Washington – they’re genuinely concerned about the direction the country is moving in, they’re anxious about globalization and whether we’re going to be able to compete.

(Oh no, I’ve said too much?) Joe Schmeau, auto assembly line worker for GM who has a good wage and health care and retirement benefits, cannot compete with José Schmeauez, Mexican auto assembly line worker who has no health care or pension and barely supports his family. Obama here gives us insight into the insider’s view of globalization. It’s not about making life better for people, but rather about adapting to change, which is defined as a race to the bottom. When Joe and José compete, José always comes out on top down there on the bottom.

Can we compete? Only if we give up what we have. Can we instead help ourselves, protect ourselves? Apparently Obama, like McCain and Bush and Clinton before him, is not about giving us that choice.

It’s a fifty minute interview, has very little substance, and one insight worth gleaning onto – Barack Obama is not different in the matter of free trade and globalization than any of his opponents.

The article on Obama’s staff is also telling, if only in giving us the roots of the Obama phenomenon. Pete Rouse, Chief of Staff, is a long-time Washington insider and comes from the staff of South Dakota Senator Tom Daschle. Campaign Operative Daschle himself was “endeared” to the Obama campaign because Obama contributed $85,000 to his failed reelection bid in 2004. David Axelrod, Bob Schrum’s replacement, has worked for Democratic candidates going back to Illinois Senator Paul Simon. Pete Giangreco, direct mail consultant, is a veteran of six Democratic presidential campaigns. Campaign manager David Plouffe has come from Tom Harkin and Dick Gephardt roots. Alter-ego Valerie Jarrett is a long time associate of Chicago Mayor Richard Daley.

Obama’s campaign is staffed by old-time liberals. It should come as no surprise that Obama is playing for the center and ditching the left, just as Gore and Kerry did. It should come as no surprise because he is staffed by liberal retreads. We are getting a standard liberal campaign. Even if Obama does somehow pull off a miracle and wins in November, he will arrive in Washington without a constituent base, and like Bill Clinton, will be at ease among Republicans and uneasy with progressives.

As Bill Becker, president of the AFL-CIO in Arkansas, said of Clinton, he’ll pat us on the back as he pisses down our leg. He’s already done some of that, and liberals are doing their usual mating dance, accepting betrayal, internalizing contradictions. They’re good at that.