I voted for John McCain in 2008. I do and always will support conservative economic and social policies. Ronald Reagan speeches give me goose bumps and I gave Bush the benefit of the doubt. Regardless of my political views, I try to support our current president simply because I feel it’s the patriotic thing to do.

            This is not to say I agreed with the stimulus or the health care bill nor that I give blanket approval to Obama’s liberal tactics, but I’ve tried hard over the past two years to approach his presidency with an open mind. I figured that was a more productive way to spend the Obama years than simply trashing his every move out of habit, like one of Pavlov’s dogs.

            Disclaimer aside, I’m finding it incredibly hard to root for Obama. He is completely squandering his greatest gift: his image.

            Obama capitalized off his image to get elected. It couldn’t have been his experience. He rode that wave of popularity and stormed out of the gates in 2008 and even much of 2009, as he appeared on every major Sunday morning show as well as Letterman and Leno. But in the past year he’s performed a disappearing act.

            Many of the problems America faces today aren’t, at their root, policy problems; they’re culture problems. The root of the economic problem is personal greed and a lack of proper budgeting in much the same way our oil addiction is largely a product of our personal apathy towards environmental stewardship on a day-to-day basis.

            The best way to enact the cultural changes we desperately need is to give the average American a popular role model who can convincingly make a case for the importance of personal sacrifice. Obama has the ability and the platform to be that person. He just needs to sit down and talk.

            Perhaps the best example of “sitting down and talking” done right was Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s “fireside chats” of the 1930s and 40s. Though Roosevelt was certainly a legislative mastermind, he will be remembered most for humbling himself to the level of the average American as he led them through the Great Depression and World War II.

            His fireside chats were often no longer than forty-five minutes and he made a conscious effort to speak in layman’s terms. More than 80 percent of his vocabulary was in the top one thousand most commonly used English words.

            Obama gives a weekly address on the Internet (whitehouse.gov), yet these addresses are an utter failure. Most of them last about four minutes. I repeat, four minutes.

            Whereas FDR paid specific attention to building up the confidence of the American people (many of his fireside chats even began “good evening, friends”), Obama’s weekly addresses are boring and end up sounding more like impersonal infomercials than dinner-table conversations. When I see an infomercial, I typically change the channel.

            In his most recent Weekly Address, he merely provides another stale infomercial for his economic policies, though you’d hardly know it. Over half of his lengthy four minute address is spent bashing Republicans, who he even refers to as “the Republicans, who want to take over congress.”                    

            Though this recent address supposedly targets the average American, he uses the words you or your four times total. He uses the word Republican eleven times. Not once does he offer us practical advice on the importance of balancing our checkbooks and making financially sound housing decisions.

            It’s no wonder Americans are bored of what he has to say. He’s not talking to us, and we’re not listening. The stats show it. Obama brags that the videos are available on YouTube, yet even one of his more popular weekly addresses to date (the week of his inauguration in 2009) had only 243,000 views. That’s one view per every 1,200 Americans, or a mere 25 students on this campus.

            Obama needs to lengthen his weekly addresses, even if only to fifteen minutes, highly publicize them and air them on national television. Stations would be practically bidding for the chance to host the president.

America’s confidence is, to steal Ron Sparks’ vocabulary, “hurting,” and now is the perfect time for our president to re-appear in the mass media.

            To be fair, this lack of mainstream, down to earth, conversation with the American people isn’t so much an Obama characteristic as it is a characteristic of just about every recent president. It’s simply more frustrating with Obama because he is one of the few presidents in the last many years with the image and personal appeal to pull off such a feat.

            Obama needs to end his disappearing act, end his infomercials, and reconnect with the American people using 21st century fireside chats.

            Maybe then we’ll stop changing the channel.