W

Barack Obama's oratory loses its oomph

The President's eloquent yet vague rhetoric is not enough to drive through difficult health care reform
- and there is a lesson here for David Cameron, says Janet Daley.

By Janet Daley
Published: 5:40PM BST 25 Jul 2009
Comments 75 (#comments) | Comment on this article (#postComment)

America is discovering the truth about

universal health care: it isn't cheap. And
Barack Obama is discovering the truth
about the power of oratory: it can only get
you so far. There is a lesson here for us
all.

Opposition to the president's health care

reform is gathering a startling head of
steam that threatens to engulf his
presidency in early onset disillusionment.
Health care is now being described as a
potential "Waterloo" for the administration,
and Mr Obama's personal poll ratings are
dropping in tandem with the declining
popularity of his health care policy.

Barack Obama cannot keep avoiding the details Photo: Reuters

Related Articles
The Republicans can take heart as Barack Obama staggers to the Left
(/comment/columnists/janetdaley/4995968/The-Republicans-can-take-heart-as-Barack-Obama-staggers-to-the-Left.html)
Barack Obama ratings fall as polls show honeymoon may be over
(/news/worldnews/northamerica/usa/barackobama/5880717/Barack-Obama-ratings-fall-as-polls-show-honeymoon-may-be-
over.html)
US election winner will face 77 day wait to take power (/news/newstopics/local-elections/3381097/US-election-
winner-will-face-77-day-wait-to-take-power.html)
Voters must hear the truth about the BNP before it's too late (/comment/personal-view/5325723/Voters-must-hear-
the-truth-about-the-BNP-before-its-too-late.html)
Barack Obama to release up to 2,000 photographs of prisoner abuse
(/news/worldnews/northamerica/usa/barackobama/5215068/Barack-Obama-to-release-up-to-2000-photographs-of-prisoner-
abuse.html)

The momentum of this resistance is not a simple partisan matter, although to hear Mr Obama tell it at town hall meetings,
you would think that his proposal was being sabotaged purely by Republican wreckers. In fact, the most trenchant and
indefatigable critics are within his own party: the "Blue Dog" Democrats who come from states where working people
resent increased taxes and federal interference as much as they fear being caught without health insurance.
What the Democratic congressmen have been demanding more and more vociferously is "clarity" about how the public
(state-funded) option of Obama health care is to be paid for: which is to say, who is going to do the paying.

Thus far, Mr Obama's response has been judged rather unsatisfactory: the approach he has taken is the one that worked
so well for him during the presidential campaign. He makes yet another eloquent speech that is long on general principle
and short on concrete detail. He gives another prime-time press conference – he has held four of these in the six months
he has been in the White House, which is as many as George W Bush held in eight years – in which his answers are
emotionally engaging, articulate and vague. He visits Blue Dog states such as Ohio and holds town hall meetings with
crowds of adoring supporters, who cheer his moving appeals to the social need for expanded health care provision – but
who fail to exact from him any specifics about how exactly this is going to work. (Or even about what he himself would find
acceptable in the Bill that he is allowing Congress to construct.)

Mr Obama is really very skilful with words (except when he slips into demotic accusations on the subject of race). He
reminds me of the best sort of enthusiastic university professor, who is able to make complex abstract ideas accessible
and whose own love of disputation is infectious and enlivening. The trouble is, as he may be realising, government is not
an endless seminar. That is not to say that verbal facility is some sort of confidence trick: the currency of democracy is
argument. Presenting and defending a position is the proper and entirely legitimate way of winning a mandate from what
should be an informed electorate. And even once that mandate has been won, the continuous business of governing by
consent of the people must involve ceaseless explanation, discourse and debate.

Exceptionally articulate politicians begin with a great electoral advantage because the opinion-forming class is in love with
words: to adapt WH Auden, it "worships language and forgives / Everyone by whom it lives". Mr Obama's linguistic gifts
are peculiarly stunning by contrast to his predecessor – one of the least articulate men ever to occupy the office of
president. The ecstasy that followed the Obama election victory was at least partly due to relief at having a national leader
who could utter a coherent sentence.

But politicians who rely on their gift for oratory have to hope that they will preside over good times. Tony Blair had an
extraordinary run, considering how broad-brush (to put it politely) his political vision was. Determined to stick to the "big
picture", notoriously uninterested in detail, Mr Blair fudged and feinted his way through years of underachievement and
incompetence. As we now know, his rhetorical whitewash was concealing the most appalling economic misjudgment by
his Chancellor.

Gordon Brown must now try to defend his record with a verbal style that is tiresome, clunky and ill-judged. But even
superlative verbal dexterity cannot rescue a leader whose ideas do not connect with reality when times are bad.

The growing disenchantment with Mr Obama is a salutary tale. Faced with real crisis and insecurity, the people demand
substance. They want to know precisely what mechanisms you are proposing to install to bring about that glorious and
beautifully evoked future that you advocate with such forceful sincerity.

Which brings us to David Cameron, who is no slouch in the rhetoric department either. Mr Cameron and his friends are
convinced that his personality – and the credibility of his leadership – is what matters now. They will put all their efforts
into pushing the man and his gift of persuasiveness, rather than the solutions that he and his colleagues might bring to
actual problems. They apparently believe that there is a sound precedent for this as a successful electoral formula in a
time of crisis. Margaret Thatcher, it is often said, did not outline her policies in any detail before her great victory in 1979,
even though the economy was imploding and the country forced to a standstill by industrial disruption. Instead, she relied
on inspirational speeches and the power of her palpable conviction.

This is true only up to a point; but even to the extent that it is historically accurate, I have doubts about its applicability in
the present circumstances. The election of 1979 was not held at a time of unprecedented cynicism about all politicians.
Now, the voters' level of suspicion and disillusion (and the belief that they have been taken in by charlatans before) makes
them much more likely to want to see the colour of a prospective government's money before they hand over the goods.

And we have to ask whether Mr Cameron's expressions of personal conviction could ever have quite the authentic ring of
Mrs Thatcher's. Hers were convincing because they were of a piece with her background. When she spoke of the virtues
Mrs Thatcher's. Hers were convincing because they were of a piece with her background. When she spoke of the virtues
of aspiration and self-improvement, you knew that she believed it because she had lived it. Mr Cameron, alas, cannot talk
of his favourite themes – a broken society, the economic struggle of everyday life – with quite the same credible
familiarity, so we are inclined to demand more from him than a personal testament. Indeed, we may be entering a political
era in which the over-riding question will be: "What does all this amount to?" And the answer will need to be short and
tough.

Hot topics

Swine Flu (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/swine-flu/)

Recession
(http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/financetopics/recession/)
UK Politics
(http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/politics/)
Afghanistan
(http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/afghanistan/)
The Ashes
(http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/cricket/international/theashes/)
Tour De France 2009
(http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/othersports/cycling/)
Formula One
(http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/motorsport/formulaone/)

News

UK News

World News

Obituaries

Lifestyle

Motoring

Property

Health

Jobs