Obama Signals Trouble With His Base

Over the past two weeks, Obama has made it publicly clear that he knows he's in trouble with his political base of once-fellow Democrats.

On September 12, in an obvious attempt to win back lost Hispanic votes, he announced that his Administration will no longer deport any illegal aliens unless they have committed a felony; probably saving 300,000 from deportation. Then, there was the jobs bill to provide funding to keep unionized state government workers on the job and to provide "union" infrastructure jobs with billions in project spending. On Monday, there was his rose garden speech. In that "punish the rich" diatribe, he served up as much red meat to the left as he possibly could by playing the typical Democrat's class warfare card. Following that, his Attorney General, Eric Holder, announced in a press interview in Brussels, that Obama will seek to close Guantanamo Bay by the November elections of next year. Then, too, his U.N. speech of today was truly aimed at closing the wounds that he had opened with the Jewish community over Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiations. Lastly, within his U.N. Arab/Israeli speech, he oddly brought up the topic of Gay/Lesbian rights.

From all of the above, it is obvious that Obama is all out for Obama in 2012 and, could care less if his policies are good or bad for the country as a whole. With so much "base building" politics in just two short weeks, it appears the President is in panic mode and that he will do whatever it takes to "buy" his way back into winning next year's election. Now, who's putting politics before country?

Obama Loses Big In The NY-9 Special Election

Last night's New York Congressional District 9 (NY-9) win by Republican, Bob Turner, must have the Democrats and Obama shaking in their political boots. That's because, in so many ways, a Republican should never have won.

First and foremost, NY-9 is almost totally owned by the Democrats with registered Democrats outnumbering Republicans by a factor of 3 to 1. Secondly, the district is heavily Jewish and Bob Turner, a Catholic, won handily against David Weprin, a Jewish Democrat, in what can only be seen as a historically significant contradiction. Additionally, Turner didn't really run against Weprin in defeating him. Instead, he outwardly ran against the policies of Obama. Therefore, it is only logical to assume that Obama was the biggest loser of the night. Furthermore, Turner's win came only days after the President's "big" jobs speech; proving that the jobs plan had no influence in turning things around in this heavily Democrat district. In fact, Turner seemed to gain momentum in polls following the speech. It's also important to note that Turner didn't just squeak this one out. He won by a landslide: 54 to 46 percent. Lastly, by running against Obama, Turner disproved the old political adage that all politics are local.

All morning, Democrats have been trying to downplay the significance of the NY-9 loss. But, in their mind's eye, I'm quite sure they're seeing a potential for big political problems in 2012. To me, last night's Republican win in a heavily Democrat district just shows that the voter sentiment by which the Republicans won last fall has not abated. If anything, there seems to be a growing momentum "against" Obama. Certainly, last night's loss must have Democrat strategists scurrying to find a new tactical direction for next year's election; even though, I think it's too late to change their fate.