Obama's Town Hall In Ohio

It just wrapped up so I'm testing the better late than never theory but it was...awful. The speech was disjointed, flat in a lot of spots and just, well, a mess. If this Obama ran in 08 McCain (or Hillary) would have beaten him. Easily.

At one point Obama said, "here in Michigan" alas it was in Ohio. No problem though, it's not like those two states are rivals or anything.

Then it got really bad.

The Q&A was filled with questions one would expect more for a mayor or city council candidate and he didn't hand them well.

Jim Geraghty was watching too.

I was left with a bit of sympathy for President Obama, as questioner after questioner asked about their own specific concerns, often way out of the president's duties, responsibilities, and realm of expertise: one guy was an inventor who wanted to give him a sales pitch, one woman lamented the impatience of the American people before complaining about a slow response from the state environmental agency over her toddler's lead poisoning, one guy wanted to read the president a poem, a woman who talked about the problem of finding students for her truck driving school, an old lady who was upset that her Social Security didn't have a cost-of-living-increase, and a guy who had the patent for some wind turbine issue that was in a fight with some company about. One poor soul raised his hand and just wanted to shake Obama's hand.

In some ways this was like therapy session for Obama. He seems absolutely overwhelmed by the job and the fact that his Awesomeness simply hasn't translated to this job.

The State of the Union on Wednesday is going to be very interesting.

posted by DrewM. at 03:10 PM

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