That wasn’t a town hall meeting Wednesday at the Costa Mesa fairgrounds. That was a campaign rally. He’s not courting voters now; he’s energizing his base and asking his supporters to pressure Congress to pass his budget. Complain all you want about the politics, by any measure it’s smart strategy.
And if Wednesday’s performance in Costa Mesa was any gauge, Obama served notice he’s in the zone. It was vintage Obama, cracking one-liners, taking great pains to demonstrate bipartisanship and heaving red meat by the armfuls to an adoring crowd.
The real statement, though, wasn’t to California or Costa Mesa. It was to Washington D.C. and the rest of the country.
UCI political science professor Mark Petracca put it best: The rest of the country still has this stereotype of Orange County as an ultra-conservative bastion, so it’s a highly potent message to send to Washington D.C. that even in this red zone the people have his back.
“The first best place for him to go would be where Rush [Limbaugh] takes his show, but actually this is even better. He’s going into the belly of the beast,” Petracca said.
Petracca’s been talking to national reporters all week since news broke that Obama would have the town hall here, and it was clear the national perception of Orange County still remains colored by its conservative past. Not many know that Obama carried Costa Mesa and narrowly lost Orange County.
“This is still known as the home of the John Birch Society,” Petracca said.
Obama’s other aim was to put some focus on the importance of lifting California out of the economic doldrums. California’s arguably in the worst shape, and as we like to say, the trends all start here.
