Over the last few months, Barack Obama has been variously labelled an "elitist", a naïve softie and simply "out of the mainstream" in his lifestyle and associates. And lately, in what appears to be the centrepiece of the GOP's attacks, Republicans have focused on portraying Obama as arrogant and self-interested.
...The "arrogant" label could well damage Obama. That's partly because, as with Kerry's rep for flip-flopping, it might contain a kernel of truth. At the very least, Obama is prone to gestures that can come off as cocky: his fist bumps, his habit of running up the steps to the stage before a speech, even his tendency to address a crowd by the name of their city or state ("Understand this, Houston,") as if he were in a rock band on tour ("Hello Cleveland!").
Hello London! Are all of your writers so vapid? Now comes Roth's comedy highlight. Obama is misinterpreted as being arrogant primarily because of his ability to produce "transformational change" unlike an ordinary politician of, say, a Chicago Machine variety:
But there's a deeper reason why the charge of arrogance could hurt. As McCain's clever stump speech line suggests, the label goes to the heart of the rationale for Obama's candidacy: that he can change how politics works. If the notion of Obama's alleged arrogance breaks through into the mainstream campaign narrative, he'll have to be far more careful about invoking his ability to produce transformational change, or risk reinforcing the "arrogant" meme. After all, portraying oneself as capable of changing politics as we know it does require a healthy self-confidence, to put it mildly. In this way, the "arrogant" label paints Obama into a box. Once that happens, the race becomes a more conventional contest between two politicians, neither of whom can truly deliver change, but one of whom is a war hero who's "tougher" on terrorism. That, of course, is a race that John McCain can win.
If Obama wants to avoid the "arrogant" label, he'll definitely have to avoid the condescending attitude of Roth towards what he calls "low-information" voters:
The tactic could prove particularly effective with those white working-class voters we've all heard so much about lately. It was this group that was most sceptical about Obama's promise of a new kind of politics during the Democratic primaries. They also tend to be low-information voters - a group that Newsweek recently proclaimed this year's "It demographic" - meaning they're more likely than their better-informed brethren to be swayed by negative character attacks.
Roth does take some solace in what he sees as Obama's political brilliance which could keep people from viewing him as arrogant:
That's not to say Obama is doomed to suffer Gore and Kerry's fate, of course. He's a far more skilled politician than either of them, and by continuing his efforts, launched during the primary fight, to engage with working-class voters on bread-and-butter economic issues, he can make clear that he doesn't see himself as too lofty to worry about the day-to-day concerns of ordinary Americans.
Almost hear those violins playing did I say? Listen carefully and you can now hear them play the new Obama theme tune, as conducted by one starry-eyed Zachary Roth: "You're Just Too Good to be True."
