Hubris on the US08 presidential campaign trail

It takes a healthy ego and full measure of arrogance to stay the course in any U.S. presidential election and, Barack Obama obviously has both.

He has built himself a considerable nation-wide volunteer campaign team, but is he in danger of losing control of this political beast or did he really O.K. the disastrous faux seal shown in this photograph?

The Los Angeles Times reports that Obama has been widely mocked for the seal.

Obama's people are in damage control.

From Mark Ambinder's blog yesterday:

I'm told that Obama recognizes that it was a silly mistake, that the universal reaction at Wacker and Michigan was, "Boy, was that dumb," and that they don't think the seal staging will matter to actual voters.
Does the press think Obama is arrogant? Yes. Does the seal represent arrogance? Only tangentially, actually. The worry for Obama's image managers is that it gives the press a pretext to call Obama arrogant, an example for them to add to a list of arrogant moments, and a way to distract them from what Obama is saying.

Photograph from The Los Angeles Times.