As Jim Geraghty notes, it goes right along with his complaining about borrowing and spending:
Other NRO folk who have much more knowledge and background in the relevant matters have commented on President Obama’s address at the graduation ceremony at Notre Dame. I’ll just add that perhaps the man who said his foes “take pride in being ignorant”, who said his opponents wanted to “do nothing” in the face of the recession and who characterized rural voters as clinging “to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren’t like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment” is perhaps the wrong person to call upon the public to stop “reducing those with differing views to caricature.”
Again, the cognitive dissonance of his supporters is a wonder of nature.
It’s reflexive with these people. Look at what Axelrod said about Miss CA. They hold those “not like them” in contempt and how they treat others bears that out.
Obama also spoke at Notre Dame about how his own website had caricatured the views of anti-abortion voters, and how he was grateful to be called on that. He seems more open to self-criticism on this score than most politicians.
He seems more open to self-criticism on this score than most politicians.
Riiiight
Some kind of closing the gap or meeting of minds between the pro-choice position and the pro-life position was attempted by Rudy Guilianni. Something along the lines “I am on record as pro-choice, but I am going to appoint judges and Supreme Court justices who will strictly interpret the law which is the action that the pro-life people want anyway, whether the President is pro-choice or pro-life.”
I guess it didn’t help him in Florida, but it is not a completely goofball position for someone with a pro-choice identification to take with Republic primary voters.
So Mr. Obama has supported in some form another with his voting record the most permissive position on abortion imaginable and he gets up to speak at Notre Dame to say to pro-life people something to the effect that “I am not going to give up my pro-choice position, but I am going to meet you half way by giving you . . .” what? Ultra-liberal Supreme Court nominees? Support for FOCA? FBI investigations of anti-abortion demonstrators?
What ground is Mr. Obama going to cover to close the gap with the pro-life voter? To moderate the Alinsky-inspired demonization of the pro-life position?
“Again, the cognitive dissonance of his supporters is a wonder of nature.”
Cognition. Aye, there’s the rub.
He seems more open to [criticism] on this score than most politicians.
Of course he appears more open to criticism, Jim. He doesn’t internalize it. It has zero effect on his actual attitudes and plans for action. He just nods his head gravely and thoughtfully yes, yes I see your point. How important it is that we’ve talked like this! — and then goes and does exactly what he’d planned to do anyway.
Criticizing Obama is like criticizing your psychotherapist. He just projects an air of concerned, serious attention to you, while inside his own head he’s finagling his tax returns or planning a birthday surprise for his wife, or whatever. He’s “listening” to you, not listening to you. Since it’s a very low-cost proposition for him — he bleeds off your anger while changing exactly nothing of his own plans — it’s easy to do.
The person who reacts strongly to criticism is, typically, the person with stronger tendencies to self-criticism and self-doubt, either because his convictions are weak, or because he really does care about what others think, and even his strrongest convictions are subject to challenge if criticized by others. In either situation, criticism becomes difficult to handle, personally, because it brings the possibility of wrenching change. For Obama, who intends to change nothing because of what other people say, criticism is very easy to hear. Might as well be the bites of a million microscopic dust mites for all the pain it causes.
Carl:
The Bush-Cheney team spent 8 years barricading protests a couple blocks away from Where Bush’s motorcade would go, and would arrest people wearing T Shirts in any way unsupportive of the administration.
I noted at Notre-Dame, there were protesters in the stands, disrupting his speech.
Obama seems to spend less time trying to stay in dissent free bubble.