Some Interesting Insights on How Obama Gets It Wrong

Read all 4 articles. Even if you are a big Obama supporter, they ware well worth reading.

First, as always is Paul Krugman, who teaches an important lesson, don't pick a useless fight with someone who buys ink by the truckload. He looks at Bill Clinton's election of 1992, and he finds the message of Barack Obama to be a classic example of people who neither know, or understand, their history.

He makes the point, an accurate one, that Clinton ran as an agent of change and an outsider from Washington, and notes that the partisanship of that era was the result of, an "all out assault from conservatives determined to use any means at hand to discredit a Democratic president".

He makes the point that the deliberate vagueness of Clinton in his 1992 campaign was a mistake, which, "left the business of producing an actual plan until after the election".

His warning is that, "Otherwise, even if a Democrat wins the general election, it will be 1992 all over again."

He's right.


Then, on Open Left, we have a number of very good critiques of Obama and his (mis)understanding of history.

First up, Paul Rosenberg explaining why the history is wrong.

In the wake of the disasterous Bush presidency there are two possible responses. One is that, just like the last time conservatives controlled the country--1920-1932--they are destroying the country. The second is that both sides are to blame. They're both fighting, instead of solving the problems we face. Obama represents the second response, and he is, quite simply, utterly, totally and dangerously wrong. Whatever his intentions may be, action based on this worldview cannot fundamentally reverse the damage that movement conservatism has done to our country. Because of the fierceness of movement conservative opposition, his worldview demands that we change things only modestly in the grand scheme of things.

Then we have Rosenberg (again, it's a 2-fer) explaining why it's wrong through rhetorical analysis. He takes a typical Obama quote, "....The believer condemns the non-believer as immoral, and the non-believer chides the believer as intolerant", and explains a very simple point: what if someone is actually intolerant? What if one side is simply wrong, and the other is right?

Some are lying. And some are telling the truth.

And when Obama condemns both equally, as equally destructive?

That's a lie, too. However rhetorically neat it may be.

He's arguing, effectively to my mind, that in embracing the idea that the problem is not the problem, but that the dispute is the problem, he is enabling those who would be the least moral and least tolerant and least honest amongst us.

Chris Bowers looks at Obama too, and it's not pretty:

Second, Obama puts forth one of his central arguments that change has not happened because we are bitterly divided:

[about 5:10 in] We are looking to fundamentally change the status quo in Washington. It's a status quo that extends beyond any particular party. And right now, that status quo is fighting back with everything it's got, with the same old tactics that divide and district us from solving the problems that people face, whether those problems are health care that folks cannot afford or mortgage they can not pay.(…)

[about 6:40 in] We are up against decades of bitter partisanship that cause politicians to demonize their opponents instead of coming together to make college affordable or energy cleaner.

The lack of affordable health care, the ongoing mortgage crisis, the lack of renewable energy, and the cost of college were caused by bitter partisanship? That just doesn't make any sense to me. The failure to pass progressive solutions on all of those areas of policy might be due to partisanship, but it is due to Republicans in the Senate and the White House staunchly opposing solutions to all of these problems. Unless one believes that Republicans oppose solutions on these issues simply out of spite and resentment from the vicious attacks we Democrats have sent their way, I have a difficult time seeing how partisanship that goes beyond one party is responsible for the lack of positive legislation on these issues.