Senator Barack Obama made an excellent point the other day while campaigning. He recalled the answers given by Senators Clinton and Edwards in response to a question during a recent debate. The query was: "What is your greatest weakness?" Obama answered first by saying he kept a messy desk and at times required assistance in managing papers. Fair enough. Then came Clinton and Edwards. After searching the depths of her soul, Clinton revealed that her greatest weakness was that she often became impatient while waiting to deliver change to Americans. Edwards, not to be outdone, replied that his weakness was that he responds powerfully to people who are in pain. After the debate, Clinton and Edwards operatives suggested that Obama's reply betrayed a lack of preparation on his part for the nation's top job.
Obama had a nice retort to these vapid answers and to the criticism:
"Because I'm an ordinary person, I thought that they meant, 'What's your biggest weakness?' If I had gone last I would have known what the game was. And then I could have said, 'Well, ya know, I like to help old ladies across the street. Sometimes they don't want to be helped. It's terrible.' Folks, they [Clinton and Edwards] don't tell you what they mean!"
While Obama's liberal stripes are as clearly defined as Clinton's or Edwards' (or perhaps even a tinge more so), the episode here at least demonstrates that he's a straight shooter. He'll be upfront with you. The calculated responses proffered by Clinton and Edwards are dripping with sanctimony and arrogance. Basically what they're saying is, "My greatest weakness is that I'm too good a person and the knowledge of my superiority sometimes propels me to impatience with the rest of you who are too slow and stupid to support me."
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