By Peter Wehner
In his appearance on ABC’s “The View,” President Obama was asked how tight he thinks the campaign against Mitt Romney will be. To which the president responded, “When your name is Barack Obama, it’s always tight.”
Actually, that’s not true.
Barack Obama’s victory in 2008 was the most sweeping since 1980. He became the first Democratic president since Lyndon Johnson 44 years earlier to garner more than 50.1 percent of the vote. In the process, he took seven states that had twice voted for George W. Bush, including two (Indiana and Virginia) that had not gone Democratic since 1964.
The implication of Obama’s statement is that there’s residual hostility to him based on his race and background. But if that were the case, how does one explain his smashing victory four years ago?
The reason Obama is struggling this time around is sheer incompetence. He’s not up to the job of being president. Much of the public knows it. And his name has nothing to do with it.
The president’s comments were simply the most recent in a string of never-ending excuses. His problems are never his responsibility; they always lie with something or someone else – whether it’s with the Arab Spring, the Japanese tsunami, Europe, his predecessor, the GOP Congress, the Tea Party, Super PACs, the Supreme Court, Wall Street, millionaires, billionaires, the Chamber of Commerce, Fox News, ATMs, conservative talk radio, or, now, his name.
Obama is in a nearly constant state of whining. That’s an unattractive quality in any individual, but especially in an American president.
He would do himself and all of us a favor if he took at least a pause from the blame game.
{Commentary Magazine/Matzav.com Newscenter}
