There is no way that somebody as smart as Obama could not envision the surefire path to decimate the tea-party and dunk the tea bags in hot water. The blatant lies that the tea party was propogating, right from day one, can be exposed very easily by anybody who’s smarter than a fifth grader. I’ve seem his 2008 campaign and they did not let mud stick on them for too long and let it rip at the opposition if need be. I understand things have changed and he is in power, so he has to be more accomodating and also needs to keep relationships intact to get support for his policies. It must not have been too difficult to figure though, what he needs to do to win. It was way to obvious for too many, and for his seasoned campaign managers, that the despicable distortions of the right had to be debunked before too many people started believing that to be the truth. I’ve been laying out what he needed to do to win this election, in my previous articles, and I can’t believe there aren’t others who found it so obvious.

1) Defend the stimulus – how the economy was saved from disaster

•        How it is necessary to have an economic revival to reduce deficits, and a short-term stimulus is very important for reviving the economy
•        How the bill is not a bailout and how it involves investment in America’s infrastructure which also helped save 3 mil jobs
•        Most major economists agree that stimulus was required, and in fact many of them say that it was too less

2) Point out opposition hollowness and duplicity on deficits and the economy

•        They want to cut taxes for rich yet keep shouting about the deficits, neither are they willing to admit cutting spending on any specific item
•        How an economic revival is a prerequisite for deficits and how the repubs don’t have any plan for reviving the economy and getting the jobs back

3) Defend Healthcare and again point out hollowness of the tea party/GOP again.

•         They don’t have any plan to fix the increasing premiums, at least I have a plan even though I admit it’s not perfect
•        Republicans are just saying what the big healthcare companies want to hear, as they have received huge donations from big corporations. The truth is they have been bought out by the big pharma and big insurance companies and that is the only interest thye have in mind even though they put on this facade of foaming at the mouth due to the 'government takeover' of healthcare. Hello, this is plan based on the policies one of your most conservative brethren, Mitt Romney, so pipe down you fake foamers.

4) Point out hypocrisy on financial regulation – wall street nearly bought down the market and the country, and the republicans don’t want to ensure that it doesn’t happen again. Spreading blatant lies again about the bill promising bailout for companies, instead the bill provides measures to end taxpayer bailouts.

5) Point out all the steps and policies for economic revival taken up and how the steps are slowly taking effect, markets are up by 50%. He has to say "I understand jobs are not coming back completely, but we have been through a major recessions and it will take some more time to come completely out of the woods. Republicans have no plan, they are the party of no and they just want to stop any progress as they do not want the current administration to succeed at any cost, even if that means destroying their own country’s economy".

The fact that he did not say these things or even run any kind of campaign, shows that either he is too dumb or he is playing a very deliberate and seemingly (to him) smart game. The advantages of a divided congress is that he can share blame with the republicans and force them to cast votes that he can use against them later on. He’ll play nice with them for another year to get some of his agenda moving, and as soon as 2012 arrives he’ll take off the kid gloves. 

This may work, but by not defending himself against any of the accusations fired by the republicans and not cleaning his sullied reputation he is making the classic mistake that most politicians continue to make and yet nobody ever learns from them (such as Kerry and senior Bush to name a couple). You CANNOT let the opposition destroy your credibility and your image. Bush won in 2004 because they were successful is casting Kerry as a ‘french poodle’, who was wimpy and waffly. By not standing up strongly for his policies and actions and not defending them vigorously against the baseless attacks of the right, he has let the mud stick on him and has let the lies become the truth for too many people. If there are accusations flying fast and thick from one side and if there is no response from the other side, then there is a presumption of guilt. Once a perception about a perception becomes very strong, it cannot be shaken off no matter how much you try later. You got to fight the wrong accusations before they become the accepted truth. People respect a person who stands up for himself and believes in his actions. By 2012, even if the people realize the disgusting truth about the tea party, they would be too disappointed in Obama’s lack of interest in fighting for the truth in 2010 and will look for someone who can fight harder for himself/herself.

He had a sliver of opportunity after the election to point out the discrepancies and blatant lies on which the republicans and tea party had won the election, but he again got cowed down by those very same stupid voices saying ’He still doesn’t get why he lost the election. He’s is denial …’. He should have had the guts to say ‘I lost the election because a lot of lies were passed off as the truth, and I did not do a good job of correcting these distortions’. He has very little time to change course and start showing spine or else we’re looking at a one-term lame duck president.

2010 US Elections, Tea Party Expose, US Politics Obama 2010 election, 2010 democrats loss