Obama’s Hot Air Balloon
By Pat Racimora on May 12, 2008 at 5:59 PM in Barack Obama

Can you name this tune?
“It’s time to put our cynicism down. Put it down. Stand with me and take that leap of faith. Because I’m not asking you to take a chance on me. I’m asking you to take a chance on your own aspirations. Take a chance on hope.”
How unfortunate that one of the earlier concerns about the originality of Obama’s words were characterized as “plagiarism.” That “fighting word” totally missed the underlying and much more significant point.
The theme of the Obama campaign, the seeming magic of “change,” is out of its owner’s playbook, and that would not be Obama. That would be David Axelrod, who also ran the campaign of Deval Patrick (current Governor of Massachusetts).
Oh, and the first paragraph is from a Patrick speech in case you incorrectly guessed Obama. (For more on the Axelrod playbook, see CJ Poliical Report and ABC News blog).
In short we have a lot of hot air held in place by charisma and media fawning.
So far the pins tossed at the Obama Hot Air Balloon have pretty much bounced off. But wait… The Republican attack machine is formidable and already in the sky. The Republican National Committee has a 1,000 page dossier on Obama, and operatives have reportedly been lurking around Chicago looking deeper into Obama’s past actions and his pals who helped push him up the political ladder.
And now anyone can play along with the Republicans. An RNC ad just out that asks Obama questions, starting with concerns about his razor-thin experience. Anyone can visit and add question that, we assume, will assist in planning the GOP assaults yet to come. See at Net.GOP.com Scary stuff.
Let’s hope the Democrats come up with a better solution as to who their nominee will be while an alternative is still available. Otherwise…well, my cartoon says it better than I can in words.






















