At recent campaign events in Pennsylvania, Virginia and again Monday in Ohio, Obama spoke to crowds in high school gymnasiums and at crowded outdoor events without his teleprompter, instead using written notes.
The difference is dramatic. Instead of turning in his characteristic manner from right to left and back again, reading from the two sloping, clear-plastic planes of his teleprompter, Obama has glanced down at pages in a binder on his podium.
Team Obama thinks the switch, or partial switch - the president is not giving up the teleprompter entirely - will help him better connect with voters.
"If you've been successful, you didn't get there on your own. ... I'm always struck by people who think, well, it must be because I was just so smart," the president says, as the ad shows Gilchrist saying goodbye to his family and heading off to work. "If you've got a business -- you didn't build that. Somebody else made that happen."
Yep. Way to go, champ. Way to connect, you marvelous communicator you.
For those who say that this is taken out of context, I give you these precious off-teleprompter tidbits as well.
So please... more moments of being off-teleprompter. He needs to spread his thinking around. He's doing fine when he talks candidly like this. This is who he is and how he thinks.
When I was a teenager, my friend, Rik Schwinden, told me that I was like a guy running who would fall into holes and then bound out of them with a big smile on my face.
"Don't you get tired of the holes?" he asked.
Yes, I do. But I also know that the one skill I have is to keep putting one foot in front of the other. Over those areas of my life in which I have control, I don't give up. I persist...
Rik defined it in terms of "holes," but prior to his definition, I looked at it as occasional rubber bands stretched across the highway of life. Sometimes, you run free and clear, with no obstruction. And other times, you encounter resistance. The more you push, sometimes you break through easily. Other times, it's everything you have in you to push and push and drive forward. But if you put one foot in front of the other, you'll eventually break through.
I'll be damned if a stupid rubber band will get the best of me.
A long time ago, I had this concept I called Four Adjectives. If there were four adjectives to describe me, they would be:
Driven
Giving
Principled
Independent
At the times when life is hard, you have to remember who you are and push like crazy.
France's socialist government announced a big one-off increase in wealth taxes on Wednesday, by far the biggest single element in a €7.2bn package of new levies aimed at meeting this year's budget deficit target that also included surcharges on banks and energy companies.
An extra €2.3bn will be raised by an exceptional tax charge on all those with net wealth of more than €1.3m.
Yep - that is so not going to work. Why? History proves again and again that it doesn't work, as explained in a separate article.
Henri de Castries, head of Axa, the insurer, is one of France's most respected business leaders. "I've listened to Mr Hollande. He wants to see more growth and lower employment. He wants to see business prospering. We want to see that, too," he says. "The question is how to achieve these goals? There is no example, in modern economic history, of a country that has succeeded in reducing its deficits by bringing taxes to a confiscatory level. On the contrary, it leads to a decline in activity, and an increase in the deficits."
Emphasis mine.
The left hates history. It proves them wrong over and over again.
By the way, this new level of tax? 75%. No one would want to work when 3/4 of their earnings will be taken from them. That's just common sense. But the left ignores all comprehension of the elementary psychology that no one likes their stuff taken from them. Duh.
What happens when the rich don't work and earn what they earn? There are fewer jobs created, fewer donations given to non-profits, and a lesser economy all around.
One more time, let's let France lead the way and show us why socialism doesn't work. Ever.
ETC: Hmm... is the tax rate in America already 75%?
I'd offer a raised glass to Independence Day, except that America seems bent to be dependent on an unreliable government.
Each leg of the government ignored the call of freedom from its people. ObamaCare is not liked, and as it is implemented in 2013 and 2014, it will be less liked. Nonetheless, it was pushed forward at each step.
There are those who celebrate the law being upheld who oppose the encroachment on individual liberty by such laws as the Patriot Act. But that's just hypocrisy. Both are invasive. Both have the "public good" given as a justification, but frankly both are subversive to the end of freedom.
This is very simple. If you give away your sovereign right, as an individual, to determine the direction of your own life, that is your choice. I can't understand why you think a bureaucrat in Washington is better able to make decisions for you than you are for yourself, but that's your choice.
I don't want that for my life, and I don't want a tyranny of others to force me into that arrangement. I believe I am much better equipped to make decisions for my life than anyone else. For that reason, I'll need to consider the best place for me to enjoy as much independence as I can. That might be America. And it might not be.
I love my country as founded. Other countries followed the example of America and carved out laws that respected individual sovereignty. Looks more like a level playing field, these days. Time to do some research.
Let me be clear: All you people who were playing the have-you-no-decency card under Bush, but who aren't screaming just as loud now - which is pretty much all of you people who were playing the have-you-no-decency card under Bush - were and are miserable lying hacks. And I thank Obama for making that perfectly clear, at least.
I've come to learn that most of the left is bereft of principle. They only care about being included in a Democrat party that has control, which is to say that they just want to be followers of those in control, abdicating their personal liberty for the sake of receiving a meager government handout and a pat on the head for being useful to the ends of their leaders.
It appears that I may have lost a friendship because I helped an opposing politician succeed. I'm certainly getting a cold shoulder, by appearances.
I don't get that.
So for what it's worth, here's what I know about political campaigns:
They're just like businesses. If a person sets up shop and gets no traffic to sustain the business, it's because the business owner hasn't created a compelling reason that reaches the market to convince them to buy. Let's say that two businesses compete with each other. They both have to buy office supplies. Should Office Depot only assist one of the stores? Of course not - what a ridiculous notion.
Ditto for political campaigns. If a candidate starts a campaign for their election and gets no fundraising or coverage or volunteers, it's because the candidate and campaign manager haven't created a compelling reason that reaches the voters to convince them to help and donate. Let's say that two campaigns compete with each other. They both have to buy web services and marketing. Should I only assist one of the campaigns? Of course not - what a ridiculous notion.
But that may have cost me a friendship.
Politics is a business. If a person chooses to winnow their friends based on win or loss, you stand only a 50% of retaining your friendships. That little circle will become smaller fast.
Being in the crow's nest for 247Toolset, I have an opportunity to see the insides of many political campaigns. There is overwhelmingly one characteristic of a campaign that indicates a victory, even if against a well-financed opponent.
Door-to-door.
That's it. Over 90% of the candidates who employed that strategy on a daily basis won their election.
Fancy marketing? Nope. Slick web site? Nope. Lots of money? Nope. Mass email? Nope.
The only thread that runs common through every winning candidacy is door-to-door.
Remember how the media and every liberal on planet crowed about the supreme ineffectiveness of the Tea Party, that neophyte bunch of loosely-organized people? Well, the Tea Party just handed Wisconsin's unions and liberals their collective asses on a plate. So much for superior organization...
Who knew being dead could lead to so nearly a double-digit victory in a blue state?
Just wait till November.
P.S. The key to victory? Fiscal responsibility. That's the big takeaway here. Not government handouts. Not entitlements. Just plain old fiscal responsibility.
Thank you, Gov. Walker, who will likely be president one day, and likely win that one too.
ETC: From Ed Morrissey, who comments on the one small win for the Democrats in Wisconsin, a Senate seat:
The Wisconsin Senate will be out of session until 2013. In November, 16 of the 33 seats will be up for grabs, and thanks to the redistricting that will be in place for the first time in that election, Republicans are supposed to pick up at least two seats. The unions spent millions of dollars and over a year's worth of effort to get a temporary one-seat majority in a chamber that will never meet in session. And that's assuming that their lone win from last night holds up in a recount. Congratulations, Big Labor!
Labor...
My grandfather was a union steward and he hated management and was not shy about his feeling on or off the job. Oddly, then he wondered why it was difficult for him to get hired and stay on the job. I never understood that. Labor should partner with management - for the good of labor.
Thankfully, union members in Wisconsin are opting out of the union and dues revenue has dropped considerably. Likewise, pension reform passed in, of all places, California. Why? Because it's hard to feel sorry for people in the public sector.
Voters like Howard Delano of Willow Glen were tired of watching their city shovel more and more tax money into government pensions far more generous than their own retirement.
"It's out of control," Delano, 60, said after dropping off his ballot. "Nobody gives me a pension."
Who in their right mind would feel sorry for these people? The public sector tends to have better benefit plans, competitive pay scales, and they don't have to contribute as much to their retirement as do the people who are taxed to provide these outrageous pensions. The rest of us have to earn and scrimp and save, and have to do so in an environment where being laid off is far more of a risk.
Really - public unions don't deserve sympathy, and Wisconsin showed that in a big way. Good night, labor.
Mr Obama, as noted above, likes to insinuate that there is a conflict between pursuing profits and creating jobs. In the long run, however, in a competitive economy, that is nonsense. Only profitable firms can sustain any jobs, and the more profitable they are, the more money they have to invest in new ventures with new workers. Mr Obama is guilty not of rhetorical excess but of economic muddle. That is far more worrying.
I've said from beginning when Obama showed up on the stage that he knew nothing about business or the economy. A person without experience or understanding in that area should have no place at the helm of our government. But people weren't paying attention as they should have been, and the media didn't work very hard to inform them.
