AP put up a news article describing Barack Obama remaining popular because of his “likability.”
“There are a lot of people out there who like the president, who think he is a good, decent person who is trying hard. They may have issues about the economy. They may have issues about the direction of the country. But there are a lot of voters out there who are giving him the benefit of the doubt,” said Mo Elleithee, a Democratic strategist in Washington. “Heading into the election year being well-liked puts him in a good position as he begins to make the contrast with the other side.”
But this part stood out:
People like Christine Alonzo are keeping President Barack Obama afloat and giving his political team hope that he can win re-election despite high unemployment and sour attitudes about his policies and the country’s future.
Alonzo volunteered for Obama during the 2008 campaign. A few months after Obama’s victory, she lost her job. She’s still looking for work. Instead of blaming Obama for the economic crisis, she’s volunteering full time to help him capture a second term.
She lost her job, she can’t find another and she still likes him in spite of Obama being a failure. And…
This is a factor any Republican challenger must consider: Public opinion polls routinely show that Americans like the president personally even though they don’t agree with his policies, even if hurt by them.
They like the President even if his policies hurt them.
Then it hit me.
Battered wife syndrome. Obama supporters suffer from Battered Wife Syndrome.
What Is Battered Wife Syndrome?
This is a condition that you find yourself in with someone you love, or someone you have loved and are afraid to leave.
Why do they stay? Here’s one reason:
Promises of Reform: Our abuser promises it will never happen again; we want to believe this is true.
The first stage of battered wife syndrome? Denial.
1] Denial: The woman refuses to admit – even to herself – that she has been beaten or that there is a “problem” in her marriage. She may call each incident an “accident”. She offers excuses for her partner’s violence and each time firmly believes it will never happen again.
We need a new and more accurate term for this syndrome as it pertains to Obama voters- perhaps something like
“Obama Beaten Voter Syndrome”
or
“The Chicago Syndrome”
It could be defined as
“A condition that you find yourself in with someone you love and voted for, or someone you have loved and are afraid not to vote for.”
The thought of voting for someone else causes feelings of guilt in Obama supporters. They know Obama has broken countless promises to them but they believe him when he tells them he will really bring them change this time. And they do indeed suffer from denial.
Denial: The voter refuses to admit – even to himself or herself – that she has been beaten down or that there is a “problem” in the relationship. He or she may call each broken promise an “accident”. They offer excuses for the broken promises and each time firmly believe it will never happen again.
So don’t expect an Obama supporter to admit to suffering from this affliction. They’re still in denial.
DrJohn has been a health care professional for more than 30 years. In addition to clinical practice he has done extensive research and has published widely with over 70 original articles and abstracts in the peer-reviewed literature. DrJohn is well known in his field and has lectured on every continent except for Antarctica. He has been married to the same wonderful lady for over 30 years and has three kids- two sons, both of whom are attorneys and one daughter on her way into the field of education.
DrJohn was brought up with the concept that one can do well if one is prepared to work hard but nothing in life is guaranteed.
Except for liberals being foolish.
Ok, that picture and caption made me laugh.
Here’s some 80’s cheese pop for you.
Never had a doubt
In the beginning
Never a doubt
Trusted too true
In the beginning
I loved you right through
Arm in arm we laughed like kids
At all the silly things we did
You made me promises, promises
Knowing I’d believe
Promises, promises
You knew you’d never keep
Second time around
I’m still believing
Words that you said
You said you’d always be here
In love forever
Still repeats in my head
You can’t finish what you start
If this is love it breaks my heart
You made me promises, promises
You knew you’d never keep
Promises, promises
Why do I believe
[Instrumental Interlude]
Arm in arm we laughed like kids
At all the silly things we did
You can’t finish what you start
If this is love it breaks my heart
You made me promises, promises
You knew you’d never keep
Promises, promises
Why do I believe
All of your promises
You knew you’d never keep
Promises, promises
Why do I believe
Promises
Promises
Promises
Promises
Promises
NAKED EYES
“Promises, Promises”
(Pete Byrne and Rob Fisher)
http://www.oldielyrics.com/lyrics/naked_eyes/promises_promises.html
@Hard Right: Great comments and I am in total agreement. I might also add “fool me once shame on you”, “fool me twice shame on me”. America has heard all the garbage blame game stuff from 0-bama to the point of rediculous!! It’s time for America to wake up and make sure we don’t make this mistake again and vote for this guy. All he knows how to do is campaign but not lead!!
Not to mean this in a negative way, but there is a segment of the population who are truly ignorant as to what is happeing. they don’t read, listen or follow the news and if they did, they’d buy into BO’s premise that it’s EVERYONE else’s fault. He’s not even likable in my book. The curtain has been raised and we have seen the emporer without his clothes. He is a mean-spirited person and has shown in so many ways that he wants American to fail.
This whining, narcissistic fool needs to begone!
People are waking up.
Obama couldn’t pull his, ”Blame Bush,” lie any longer so what to do?
He decided to try a new target.
Obama calls the Congress (Republicans, specifically) a ”Do-Nothing Congress.”
Really?
Though September 15, the Republican House had been in session for 120 days.
Though September 15, the Democratic Senate had been in session 115 days.
Through September 15, the GOP House had voted 711 times.
Through September 15, the Democratic Senate had only 137 recorded votes.
Republicans have approved serious legislation designed to get America moving.
None of the jobs measures passed by the House to date have been taken up by the Democrat-controlled Senate.
Senate Democrat Leader Reid won’t even take up Obama’s own American Jobs Act!
The Democratic Senate has not approved a budget since April 29, 2009.
This Democratic inaction seems to violate the U.S. Congressional Budget Act, which requires passage of an annual budget resolution.
Obama is trying to twist Democrats doing nothing into Republicans doing nothing.
That dog won’t hunt.
I never, ever understood what was so “likable” about him.
@Shauna Redding:
It is at least partly Barack Obama’s amazingly consistent smile.
People think he’s smiling at them when all it is is a same frozen expression he has found wins people over.
That old debate was still used in one of my communication classes as “things not to do”. And now I wonder if they use Obama films from 08 as “things to do”. I am not taking away from Obama’s charisma appeal, but he ran against a republican who had weak support even with-in his own base. Now the shoe is on the other foot, Obama is on the ropes and losing support, but he still has a strong base who will vote for him no matter what he does, but that holds true for both parties. The really scary part is that Obama like you said Skooum is that he is still liked by over 60% of Americans. Not saying that they would all vote for him, but many will for that reason, and he’s “better than the devil that they don’t know”. But then again we still have another year till we hit the polls, and Obama could continue his fall from grace, or even turn his decent around somehow, someway.
Obama’s dog and pony show has performed all its tricks. If you counted them on one hand you would have fingers left over.
Our candidates are not awe inspiring, except for one. He can deliver a speech and bring tears to the eyes of old men. We need a fiery orator that can stir the emotions: Obama has become boring with his one style delivery while bouncing from telelprompter to teleprompter. We have one man that isn’t boring. He can clean Obama’s clock in a debate and leave him eviscerated.
No, he hasn’t been in politics, but he wasn’t born with a silver spoon in his mouth either. He made it to the top from humble beginnings and has a record of actual accomplishments, a novel concept among this band of nitwits we have in Washington.
The choice is becoming more obvious with time. I refuse to say negative things about the candidates to promote one over the rest, but unless there is a major revelation, Cain looks like an excellent choice. He is also a man who can compete in the charisma department with Obama and we know that charisma will be the only ace Obama has to play.
People are reluctant to change presidents during a hot war, don’t be surprised to see Obama stir up the war machine next spring.
@Nan G: He’s not smiling at them, he’s laughing at them and at how easy it is for him to BS so many of them.
I see the problem as one on the ill informed, the misinformed, the MSM kool aid drinkers. If you watch this fraud give one of his speeches to a closed audience, like the Congressional Black Caucus, you will see the vile and divisiveness. He is not a nice person, What kind of a humanitarian would allow his half brother live in a box? What about his aunt, his uncle. With all of the money he and mooshell have you would think they could pass on a little to his unfortunate relatives. He preaches share the wealth, but only your wealth, not his. If you are exposed to the spoon feed BS from the likes of Wasserman Schultz, then as a good prog you support him.
I really don’t understand what is so likeable about Obama. So he smiles a lot. So did the brother-in-law who took my sister for everything she had, sat around in his underwear all day, pretending to look for a job while she worked to support them both, and didn’t even bother to change the baby’s diaper during the day while his wife slept so she could work the night shift again.
This guy, like that one, is a con man, a cold-hearted man who smiles and promises the world while he destroys the lives of those who trust him. The only way one could believe what this man says is if one wants to believe. He is a cheap rabble rouser, whose only talent is sowing hatred and division so that he and his can profit off the chaos he has caused.
You really ought to stay out of areas in which you have no experience, drj. Comparing an Obama supporter to a battered wife is an insult to battered wives everywhere. You are, in essence, calling every battered wife downright stupid. This is probably the most desperate leap for ODS I’ve seen of late.
In a domestic violent situation, there are two with distinctly different illnesses… those that have the compulsive need to batter, and that that have so little self esteem, or a death wish, they stick around for the battering. Love, devotion, respect or any other superficial emotion for others has little to do with it. It’s purely a self destructive tendency in the most personal sense. When a battered wife recognizes her own illness and weakness, and hopefully she has outside aid, she leaves. Believe it or not, there are many that do just that…. literally choosing life over death. Others are not so lucky as to get a grip on their own debilitating illness.
It’s an insult to battered wives everywhere because political beliefs do not lead to a self esteem problem that threatens one’s very life. Some could and would live quite happily under a Euro-socialist, or even pure socialist, country. Not in the least bit similar.
An Obama supporter suffers from ideological misguidance… which is not personally life threatening. Nor can it (i.e. a “political battered wife” analogy) be likened to threatening the “health” of a nation, because… as I said.. this is a personal conflict. There is no cognizance outside of your own death… or life.
A leap too far merely to draw hits, drj.
@MataHarley:
You leap to an incorrect assumption. I grew up with it- not my father, but my aunt who lived downstairs on our house. I have lots of experience with it.
In actuality, it has been necessary for the ‘thinking electorate’ to vote for the most unobjectionable candidate since I’ve been involved it politics–about 50 years–regardless of whether they’re left or right. So, this ‘battered voter syndrome’ is entertaining, but not very enlightening and does not reflect reality–in my experience.
@drjohn: And Mata.
You would do well to read up on ”Eros and Politics.”
I took a class called that in college.
Decades ago.
Basically, it taught that everything political between ruler and ruled over that can be also expressed sexually as between two humans.
The earliest of all fiction (Petronius’ Satyricon) used travelers and supposedly far away places and sexual escapades to cover for the writer’s expose on the way the Roman government of Nero’s day treated his own people.
Had Petronius been open in criticizing Nero and Rome, he’d have been forced to kill himself or be executed.
(Which is exactly what happened to him, later.)
Later many other writers have followed this pattern.
Voltaire.
Jonathan Swift.
Even Shakespeare.
To rightly notice a parallel between a sexual relationship and Obama is part of a long and respected tradition.
Nit-picking it for not being perfect is beside the point.
Of course it is not perfect.
But it makes a point.
Nan G, why you would consider wife beating “sexual” is beyond me.
drj, if you, as a child, observed your aunt being beaten and today have the audacity to consider her stupid and weak with love and devotion for a very sick or bad man (i.e. a gullible victim), you do her great disservice. You observed incorrectly, and came to the wrong conclusion as to why she was subjecting herself to such abuse. Profession of love and second chances is not about the abusive spouse… it is about excuses to return to feed your own illness.
I did not have the luxury of observing second hand. Been there, done that. And survived… along with many others who chose life.
I understand we need threads where everyone has the opportunity to bash Obama and the o’devotees without having a particular issue at hand. Sort of a release, I guess. But to compare their blind love and devotion for Obama as a political candidate … i.e. “an idiot”, as you often like to say… with women who feel the need to be abused for sundry reasons is genuinely too far, and an insult to battered women everywhere.
@MataHarley:
Mata, ANYTHING, even vaguely sexual, between two unequal partners is grist for the Eros & Politics mill.
Even rape, which is also not ”sexual” in any real sense.
The key point is the non-equality between the partners, be they two people or the ”ruler/the ruled over.”
Nan G, while I understand your point, rape and battering are still two different issues. Your key phases are “non equality” and “ruler/the ruled over”. There is a dominant party involved… ergo also a victim. Rape has a victim. They did not crave, nor invite, rape.
As I said, in the case of battering, there are two separate illnesses that coincide in the same household. One who must compulsively physically or mentally abuse, and the other who feels the need to be punished by willingly accepting that abuse repeatedly. There’s no dominant party (leaving out the obvious as to who is the more physically adept in a brawl) because they are both equally feeding the other’s illness. In the case of the one being battered, there is no lofty “for the good of the nation” or others thought…. i.e. liberal/progressive/socialist political beliefs. It is totally centered on self, and in a negative fashion.
@MataHarley:
Mata, I’m pretty sure the teaching of Eros & Politics started way back when ALL wives were chattel.
To attach modern-day, and very American ideas to it would be anachronistic.
Since slavery isn’t in vogue these days, Nan G, I’m not sure why Eros & Politics philosophy would even be relevant today when it comes to discussing reoccurring domestic violence. Did you not, by bringing it up, indeed “attach modern-day” context?
Not sure I get your gist… but then, ’tisn’t important. Its a philosophical difference, IMHO, to equate lib/prog/socialist political ideology with women who continually return to domestic violence because of their own issues.
I agree with your comment #4 that more are waking up, and also with lib1’s observation that elections, more often than not, come down to a hold your nose, pick the lesser evil choice. However because someone reluctantly accepts, or prefers, Obama’s lib/progressive direction for the nation over the political opponent does not make them a battered spouse.
@Skookum: I agree with you about Cain. But Cain is going to have to really continue with his break-out or the Big Money is going to be placed on another horse in the pack, which would probably be Rommey/Perry. There is such a disconnect between those two and what many Americans are wanting now in a candidate. They both walk the fence between the left and right, while measuring every word they utter for the political correctness of their solutions. Perry was blind sided when his once political correct solution for illegal immigration was rejected big time. Romney has flipped and flopped one time too many. Cain has that natural charisma, and has tackled the stupidity of political correctness in politics numerous times, and may meet that demand for a straight talking person with real solutions for real problems. But time is short.
Mata,
My point was about how all political unequals can be described sexually.
If and when we become a less-free society where free expression is criminalized THEN you will see the relevance.
The calls are coming:
1. North Carolina Democrat Gov. Beverly Perdue recommends suspending congressional elections for the next couple of years.
2. The White House asked Ford to pull a TV ad that seemed critical of the bailouts championed by President Obama. Ford pulled the ad.
3. The International Longshore and Warehouse Union filed a petition with the Cowlitz County, Washington elections office to recall Sheriff Mark Nelson. Nelson had arrested some union members in their dispute with a railway company.
4. (A REVERSAL!) Government Motors’ OnStar service just announced it was reversing plans to keep tracking vehicles of its 6 million subscribers if they cancel the service. Up until today that plan was on!
I think Skookum is on the right track by writing using illustrations.
The day may come when that is the only way one could get a minority-political viewpoint out at all.
We have had a nice season of freedom of expression going for over 200 years….here.
But the tide is against it.
See:
http://mypetjawa.mu.nu/archives/freedom_of_expression_go_to_hell.jpg
Obama will raise substantially less in the second quarter of his campaign than the first, according to the New York Times.
The paper writes that Obama campaign manager Jim Messina has told Democratic officials that the president will raise about $55 million in the quarter that ends Sept. 30, about $30 million less than he raised the first quarter of his campaign.
The news was buried within the Times story.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/27/us/politics/obama-addresses-linkedin-forum-in-california.html?_r=1&hp
So, Obama needs to get people motivated to send him their money.
Lately Obama has been calling Republicans un-American*, directing hate toward the rich, hate EVERYONE – maybe they’ll part with some cash.
(More likely they’ll riot or flash mob against some of O’s targts.)
Lots of times the battered becomes the batterer.
You-know-what rolls downhill.
@MataHarley:
Your comments here always are constructed in a similar fashion.
“If you think this then you are a dope.”
“If you mean this then you are a dope”
“If you believe this then you are wrong.”
Oh well. The article said
This describes my aunt. She kept going back even when my uncle did things over and over to hurt her, emotionally and physically. The parallel is clearly there. That also describes Obama voters, at least from an emotional/monetary perspective.
As for my ODS, just because you’re paranoid it doesn’t mean they’re not out to get you. Obama is bent on forcing his agenda on America no matter what the cost, no matter what the needs of the country. To wit- one thing that would help this country is cheaper energy and he’s determined to make energy a lot more expensive despite the fact that it sucks the dollars out of any potential recovery. Obamacare is going to be far more expensive than anyone imagines now. Knowing all that is a large part of what’s keeping anyone from investing.
Your own words:
“Others are not so lucky as to get a grip on their own debilitating illness. “
Obama voters- exactly.
@Liberal1 (objectivity):
How pervasive does the “unobjectionable” stench have to be from Obama before you pull the lever for someone else? Solyndra is a classic example of ‘crony capitalism’ and “Fast and Furious” is making Watergate look like amateur hour. Obamacare has already destroyed, before it’s been fully implemented no less, excellent health plans for employees. Stimulus’ “cost” is severely underrated at the $800+ Billion initial pricetag with much of the spending added to the annual budgets of various departments and agencies and with annual increases of 4-7% via baseline budgeting. And Obama’s answers to everything is to blame everyone but himself. Will you still continue to vote for failure?
I’ll vote for Obama in 2012. I don’t actually know anyone who voted for him in 2008 who has said they won’t do the same in 2012.
Near as I can tell, the people who can’t tolerate him now are the same people who couldn’t tolerate him in 2008. Nor have the people who had concluded by 2008 that the republicans could no longer be trusted had a change of heart since then. Basically they’re the same as they were before, only more so.
@Greg:
So…you know a lot of stupid people, eh?
Imagine that.
@Aye: Repeating the same behavior in hopes of a different outcome. Einstein had a word for that.
@Greg:
Solyndra. “Fast and Furious”. And you will still vote for him? What would it take for you not to vote for him? I imagine that even if he came out and stated that his goal was the destruction of this republic, that you still would vote for him.
P.S. If one wanted to destroy this republic, they would be hard pressed to find a better way of doing that than what Obama has done and is doing now.
Would you believe that Obama has the gall to call himself the “underdog” this election season? With all the support he’s gotten from the media and celebrities, the campaign advantages of being president, that’s like Bill Gates asking for food stamps.
Dr J. “Battered wife syndrome”?? The only properly dtagnosed syndrome on which we all agree is your ODS. I ask for the 4th time. What kind of Doctor are you?