Barack Obama's campaign video

For the past year, Barack Obama has been running his re-election campaign on a quiet two-pronged strategy of “Killing Bin Laden” and “Doing Nothing While The Republicans Squabble.” But with the neverending GOP primary campaign moving ever closer to the inevitable sad-trombone victory for Mitt Romney, the president’s campaign is starting to shift into high gear. At least, that’s the implicit message behind a new video, a 16-minute hagio-documentary directed by liberal filmmaker Davis Guggenheim (An Inconvenient Truth) and narrated by renowned historian Tom Hanks. As far as propaganda goes, this is relatively restrained, with a tastefully emo soundtrack that sounds straight out of Friday Night Lights. (Wouldn’t you like to see a really in-your-face liberal propaganda video?) Check out the video (followed by a quick analysis):

After a prologue which establishes the apocalyptic mood in the wake of the financial crash of 2008, the video mainly focuses on three main points: The Detroit automotive bailout, the president’s controversial-just-because healthcare bill, and the Bin Laden thing. In each case, the video emphasizes that Obama stood against overwhelming opposition, although the actual face of that opposition remains relatively opaque. (The only vaguely oppositional note in the video comes during the auto section, when presumed opponent Romney gets singled out for his op-ed “Let Detroit Go Bankrupt,” which ran in the nation’s leading pinko rag.)

You might term those segments of the video “The Moderate Appeal,” replete with images of empty storefronts and sad-looking children. (Progressives who used to dream that Obama would be the second coming of FDR have to settle for a quick-hit montage of liberal causes at the end: Stem cell research, gays in the military, Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, boom boom boom!”) “Let’s remember how far we’ve come,” concludes Dr. Hanks, “And look forward to the work still to be done.” In short, this video is roughly as joyful and positive as the actual campaign will be brutally divisive.

What do you think of the video? Democrats, are you excited? Republicans, are you appalled? Communists, are you irate? Fellow nihilists, do you still believe in nothing? Space-fascists, will nothing stop your galactic quest for genetic purity?

Follow Darren on Twitter: @EWDarrenFranich

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