~by lisaed

I wonder if the young followers of Barack Obama remember a game show from yesteryear called “To Tell The Truth.“ It was one of my very favorites as a youngster. Hosted at the time by Garry Moore the idea was for a panel of judges often including Bill Cullen, Peggy Cass and my favorite Kitty Carlisle to determine with their questions which of three contestants was the show’s mystery guest. The mystery guest was typically a member of a certain profession or someone who’d done something otherwise notable. More specifically, two of the three contestants were imposters pretending to be say a commercial airline pilot while the third was the genuine pilot. If the imposters with their bluffing were able to fool the judges into believing they were the airline pilot the imposters would win prize money. It is watching Barack Obama all these months on the campaign trail that has me recalling this beloved game show from my childhood. Only in this special presidential edition of “To Tell The Truth” Obama plays all contestants and we the American people are the judges forced to guess which Barack Obama is the true one and which one is just bluffing.

Is he the Barack Obama from the democratic primary the one who limped over the finish line in the race for the democratic nomination by running to the anti-war left of Hillary Clinton? While his resume is quite thin for a Presidential candidate we have evidence from Obama’s voting record in the U.S. Senate that he rates as the most liberal among his peers. So in this his first incarnation we have contestant #1: Barack Obama the liberal candidate for the democratic nomination. This is the Barack Obama who was less than truthful to us earlier this year about his knowledge of the Reverend Wright’s hate filled anti-American rhetoric. This is the Barack Obama who said in his March speech on race he could no sooner disown the Reverend Wright than he could his “white grandmother” but then turned around and denounced Wright anyway by the end of April. This is the Barack Obama who said after disowning his reverend that he would stay at Trinity United Church of Christ his church of choice for over twenty years with the new young pastor Otis Moss but then turned around and walked away from it anyway by the end of May following the controversial Father Pfleger remarks about Hillary Clinton. Did I mention he’s a good bluffer?

This brings us to contestant #2: Barack Obama the general election candidate. Since locking the democratic nomination on June 3rd, Barack Obama has poof like magic transformed himself from the anti-war liberal of the democratic primary to the running as fast as he can to the center candidate of the general election. In just four short weeks we have seen this new Barack Obama change his mind about public financing. We’ve seen him embrace Antonin Scalia opinions on the death penalty for child rapists and the DC gun ban—changing his own previously held position that deemed that law “constitutional.” We’ve seen Obama thumb his nose at his base changing his mind about FISA and we’ve seen him pledge to expand our President’s faith based initiative. I wonder why Obama didn’t mention such intention during the primary? Obama seizes every opportunity to talk about his faith and I have to wonder is it because he really wants to talk to us about his love for Christ or is it rather that he really really wants us to know he’s not a muslim. And as an aside I wonder how inclined Hillary supporters are going to be to rally round this new general election version of Barack Obama. But I digress. Perhaps most shockingly of all this past Thursday we saw democratic nominee Barack Obama change his position on the war. Giving two press conferences that same day on the subject (the second no doubt for the purpose of damage control) Barack Obama sought to straddle both sides of the Iraq war issue beginning with this:

“I’ve always said that the pace of withdrawal would be dictated by the safety and security of our troops and the need to maintain stability. That assessment has not changed. And when I go to Iraq and have a chance to talk to some of the commanders on the ground, I’m sure I’ll have more information and will continue to refine my policies.”

Making reference in this first press conference to “training” and the Iraqi soldiers “standing up” Barack Obama was regurgitating the same pro-war Commander in Chief language that we’ve heard from President Bush ad infinitum since he won his second term in 2004. Obama’s words here were also reminiscent of his former foreign policy advisor Samantha “Hillary-as -Monster” Power’s wink wink comments made to the BBC last March about the junior senator’s 16-month plan to end the war in Iraq being a “best case scenario.” And then in his second press conference just a few hours later that same day, Obama backpedaled away from his flip flop I mean “refined policy” re-embracing both his pledged timetable for withdrawal and stronger anti-war rhetoric with this:

“Let me be as clear as I can be. I intend to end this war. My first day in office, I will bring the Joint Chiefs of Staff in, and I will give them a new mission, and that is to end this war - responsibly, deliberately, but decisively. And I have seen no information that contradicts the notion that we can bring our troops out safely at a pace of one to two brigades a month, and again, that pace translates into having our combat troops out in 16 months’ time.”

So we the judges in this presidential version of “To Tell The Truth” are left to wonder just where does Obama stand on the Iraq war particularly now when it has become evident to the American people that the surge has worked not just reducing the level of violence but to also placing this young democracy on the road to some form of political stability. We must wonder is Obama’s Iraq war policy the more nuanced position in press conference #1 (i.e., the new general election Obama) or is it the more cut and dry 16-month plan for troop withdrawal designed to placate anti-war voters from press conference #2 (i.e., the old democratic primary Obama)?

It has become quite clear over these first four weeks of the general election campaign that Barack Obama is an opportunist - a man with no obvious core convictions of his own who will say or do anything to win the White House. Indeed in these past few weeks Obama has given new meaning to the word “CHANGE” as in the only change we can believe in is that he will change his positions like the changing wind. He has also completely undercut his own strategy to paint John McCain as “Bush Third Term” by closely aligning himself in the general election with our President re: faith based initiatives, FISA, and a new found willingness to listen to our commanders in Iraq. And so I find myself wondering if this new Bush light version of Barack Obama could have beaten Hillary Clinton for the democratic nomination. And I also find myself remembering how that game show “To Tell The Truth” ended each and every episode and I ask the presumptive democratic nominee for President: “Will the real Barack Obama please stand up?”

Yes, Americans love their game shows and their reality shows but I hope they will expect more than just good political theatre from the next President of the United States. My guess is that a President Obama would revert to the liberal primary version of himself particularly with a strengthened democratic majority in congress. But given the different versions of the democratic nominee we have met on the campaign trail we simply cannot know which is the real Barack Obama. And so I find myself remembering another game show from yesteryear hosted at the time by Bob Barker that I hope not to play in 2009 with a President Barack Obama in the White House and that game show was called : “Truth or Consequences.“

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