In the years since President Barack Obama took office, conservatives have attacked him along three basic lines.<\/p>\n
First, they claimed that he simply wasn’t a legitimate American.\u00a0 He was likely born elsewhere — in Kenya perhaps?<\/p>\n
This narrative was finally and absolutely debunked last week, when Mr. Obama took the remarkable step of releasing his long-form birth certificate.<\/p>\n
Second, they claimed that the president was a “socialist,” and hostile to the basic tenets of our capitalist system, pointing to the bailout of General Motors and the widely unpopular TARP program.<\/p>\n
But the Obama administration has been divesting itself of private-sector holdings as rapidly as possible, and TARP has now turned a $20 billion profit.<\/p>\n
There is no credible evidence — none, zero — that Mr. Obama wants to nationalize American industries.\u00a0 Even his controversial healthcare reform package uses primarily private sector solutions.<\/p>\n
His cabinet is dominated by corporate executives.<\/p>\n
Finally, the Right claimed that the Commander in Chief wasn’t credibly Christian (or perhaps wasn’t the right kind of Christian), arguing that his Muslim sympathies rendered him weak on the issue of terrorism.<\/p>\n
That narrative never held much water.\u00a0 But it imploded last night when Mr. Obama announced that Osama bin Laden had been found and killed by American Navy SEALS.<\/p>\n
It is abundantly clear that the White House has been pursuing Al Quaeda and its operatives zealously, using ground forces, Predator drone attacks and other measures.<\/p>\n
Some on the right will never abandon these increasingly marginal claims.<\/p>\n
Mr. Obama’s skin color, his middle name, the fact that his father was a Kenyan, and his generally progressive politics mark him in their eyes as a permanent outsider.<\/p>\n
There is also a cottage industry of right-wing pundits — from Glenn Beck to Michael Savage to Rush Limbaugh — who can’t afford to abandon these story-lines.<\/p>\n
Their audiences aren’t interested in the dull, wonky business of running a complex nation like ours, with all its shades of gray.\u00a0 They want black and white. They want us and them.<\/p>\n
But AM talk radio isn’t America and that’s not where elections are won.<\/p>\n
As we turn toward 2012, mainstream conservatives will have to shift their lines of attack if they hope to win Republican moderates and independents who occupy the vast political center.<\/p>\n
There is still plenty to talk about and criticize.\u00a0 Federal deficits, deep policy differences, social issues.\u00a0 All fair game.<\/p>\n
But the idea that Mr. Obama is a dangerous and alien “other”, a vaguely ominous Manchurian-style figure, has now been firmly consigned to the realm of racists and conspiracy theorists.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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