Hope and change. These are the two words that candidate Barack Obama used to win the White House in 2008. They are simple and elegant. This mantra was the campaign’s biggest strength, but it will also prove to be its biggest weakness.
The words are simple, but they are hollow and meaningless. You must define them for yourself to make them relevant in the context of the election. People across the nation did just that. I remember seeing a video clip during the campaign that showed a woman overjoyed with the thought of Obama being elected president. She went on to give her definition of “hope and change” which included the new administration paying her mortgage. Thus “hope and change” became a like a blank list for Santa Claus in the minds of many Americans and the sky was the limit. Now the reality of “hope and change” is hitting them hard. People are now realizing the emptiness of the words they vigorously chanted in 2008. A once powerful phrase in which millions of Americans invested so much time, energy, and emotion for candidate Obama. It was an eloquently delivered phrase that stirred the emotion and optimism of a nation.
This same phrase that was once a honey pot for the Democrats has now become a time bomb. The fact that candidate Obama let people define “hope and change” for themselves will prove to be fatal. It was terrific during the campaign. It meant whatever you wanted it to mean. Unfortunately for him this has been a disaster since he took office with statewide elections in New Jersey, Virginia, and now Massachusetts being handed to the GOP. Obviously he is not meeting the stratospheric expectations of the independent and moderate Democrat voters who put him in the Oval Office. How could he? When people expect you to literally pay their bills for them and you have no way to deliver on that expectation you are in severe trouble.
Can Obama pull out of the political nose dive he finds himself in now? Probably, but the damage has already been done. His political capital runs lower and lower with each defeat at the ballot box and in the halls of Congress. President Obama has pledged he will aggressively “double down” regarding his agenda after Scott Brown’s senate victory in Massachusetts and there is no doubt the news media will assist him as much as they can. But, the emotional investment in “hope and change” by many was enormous and we are beginning to find out that Hell hath no fury like a voter scorned.
