Running on empty

National Review Online has a pair of outstanding looks at President Obama's terrible speaking style.
Like this:
It’s amazing that he has a reputation as a good communicator; what he perfected long ago is the art of saying nothing in a convincing fashion to “folks” who already believe — not in what he’s saying, but in him. Without that — and when the speech is not all about him — he’s limp, tired, petulant, angry, or all of the above.
That’s why he does so poorly without a sympathetic audience. What he needs, as his best campaign appearances showed, is an adoring crowd of true believers that he can whip up and then, as their enthusiasm crests, feed off their energy as he sings his song of himself. He’s like a surfer, catching one wave after the next for an exhilarating ride. But you can’t surf in a placid, shallow lake.
And this
In Obama’s speech last night, I couldn’t get past his relentless hand gestures, and especially the fact that after just about every compound sentence that is typical of his rhetoric, he would flop his hands on the podium, which the microphone would pick up as an audible “thump.” But at some point — and maybe that point was reached last night — his thumps made for cloddish rhetoric that made the speech land with an overall thud.
I wonder if the nickname Thumper will stick.
Sorry Democrats, he won't stick around for a second term. At this rate, I could get the Republican nomination and beat Obama.