BlogWonks

The New York Times and Democratic Party leaders (wait, aren’t they the same thing?) are  calling on the empty suit Barack Obama to  say something that actually means something.

Mr. Obama has run for the last 18 months as the candidate of hope. Yet party leaders — while enthusiastic about Mr. Obama and his state-by-state campaign operations — say he must do more to convince the many undecided Democrats and independents that he would address their financial anxieties rather than run, by and large, as an agent of change — given that change, they note, is not an issue.

“I particularly hope he strengthens his economic message — even Senator Obama can speak more clearly and specifically about the kitchen-table, bread-and-butter issues like high energy costs,” said Gov. Ted Strickland of Ohio. “It’s fine to tell people about hope and change, but you have to have plenty of concrete, pragmatic ideas that bring hope and change to life.”(emphasis mine)

Or, in the blunter words of Gov. Phil Bredesen, Democrat of Tennessee: “Instead of giving big speeches at big stadiums, he needs to give straight-up 10-word answers to people at Wal-Mart about how he would improve their lives.”

Sounds like these folks  are getting really scared, and they should be. Eighteen months of mouthing “hope and change” over and over again isn’t cutting it. The only problem is, if Obama starts to focus on the real issues, he’ll lose. People don’t want their taxes raised, they don’t want the military weakened, and they want more oil drilling. Obama is on the wrong side of every major issue. So it looks like Obama’s almost painted himself into a corner.