I don't understand why these articles keep getting written. Moreover, I don't understand why they can keep getting written. Did progressives really think they'd woken up in Sweden on November 5th?
Liberals are growing increasingly nervous - and some just flat-out
angry - that President-elect Barack Obama seems to be stiffing them on
Cabinet jobs and policy choices.
Obama has reversed pledges to immediately repeal tax cuts for the
wealthy and take on Big Oil. He's hedged his call for a quick drawdown
in Iraq. And he's stocking his White House with anything but stalwarts
of the left.
Now some are shedding a reluctance to puncture the liberal euphoria at
being rid of President George W. Bush to say, in effect, that the new
boss looks like the old boss.
"He has confirmed what our suspicions were by surrounding himself with
a centrist to right cabinet. But we do hope that before it's all over
we can get at least one authentic progressive appointment," said Tim
Carpenter, national director of the Progressive Democrats of America.
OpenLeft blogger Chris Bowers went so far as to issue this plaintive
plea: "Isn't there ever a point when we can get an actual Democratic
administration?"
Not if you define an "actual Democratic administration" as one that is closer to OpenLeft than the median voter, no. Take comfort that we're probably not going to get an "actual Republican administration" either, for the same reason.
For a movement that grew out of the anti-corruption campaigns of the late nineteenth century, and was nurtured in the hothouse built by domestic Communism and Socialism, modern progressivism seems curiously unwilling to think about, much less cope with, institutionalist models of politics. Enacting legislation is not a matter of getting a president and a fillibuster-proof majority, unless you happen to have a congress filled with career-suicide bombers. It is a matter of getting a fillibuster-proof majority and a bill that either no one cares about, or is supported by close to a majority of voters. (Actually, it's much more complicated than that. But as a general rule, this simple model is much more effective than believing that shortly before electing Barack Obama, America collectively read Gunnar Myrdal and shifted about 20 points to the left.)
Occasionally, you can get politicians to buck the will of the voters when the matter is serious enough, as with the bailout. But this is very rare. And when you do buck the will of the voters in order to do something that most economists agree is vital to the health of the nation, apparently, many progressives get mad and say ridiculous things:
Liberals are growing increasingly nervous - and some just flat-out
angry - that President-elect Barack Obama seems to be stiffing them on
Cabinet jobs and policy choices.
Obama has reversed pledges to immediately repeal tax cuts for the
wealthy and take on Big Oil. He's hedged his call for a quick drawdown
in Iraq. And he's stocking his White House with anything but stalwarts
of the left.
Now it's Obama's Cabinet moves that are drawing the most fire. It's not
just that he's picked Clinton and Gates. It's that liberal Democrats
say they're hard-pressed to find one of their own on Obama's team so
far - particularly on the economic side, where people like Tim Geithner
and Lawrence Summers are hardly viewed as pro-labor.
"At his announcement of an economic team there was no secretary of
labor. If you don't think the labor secretary is on the same level as
treasury secretary, that gives me pause," said Jonathan Tasini, who
runs the website workinglife.org. "The president-elect wouldn't be
president-elect without labor."
He also wouldn't be president-elect without the drivers who piloted the campaign bus, but this is not a reason to make bus drivers the central concern of his new administration. Frankly, the knowledge that there are such lunatics out there, but that Obama is ignoring them, has heartened me greatly.
Mostly, though, it's just dire warnings that he couldn't have been elected without progressives, so he'd better not bite the hand that feeds him. This sort of ridiculous posturing pervades every post campaign let down. Oh, yes, Barack Obama couldn't have been elected without progressives. He also couldn't have been elected without lower-middle class Moms who like to drive to Wal-Mart in their SUVs to buy enormous flat-screen televisions for the family room. Guess which group is larger?
First rule of politics: small groups get favors from the politicians they support only to the extent that it does not annoy large groups who voted for those politicians. Check the progressive agenda. See which bits do not annoy large groups who voted for Obama. That is what the progressives are going to get.
The other group who is in denial, of course, is the conservatives. While the progressives are shocked, shocked that Obama hasn't made Bill Ayers attorney general and Ingrid Newkirk Secretary of Agriculture, many of the conservatives who were mad about my supporting Obama continue to assure me that he is making card check and confiscatory taxation the centerpiece of his administration. Maybe the hard conservatives and the progressives should be consoling each other.
Megan, is the second block quote what you intended?
*snort*
"...modern progressivism seems curiously unwilling to think about, much less cope with, institutionalist models of politics...the knowledge that there are such lunatics out there...it's just dire warnings that he couldn't have been elected without progressives, so...many progressives get mad and say ridiculous things"
Stringing all this together and it is hard to argue with the thesis that progrssivisim is just a manifestation of NPD or narcissistic personality disorder. They assumed they were important because they believe they are right about everything. How could you disagree with them because what they think makes them feel good. How can they be wrong when their own feelings are all that matters? They glommed on to Obama and were too deluded to realize he was taking their support and promising them nothing.
Couldn't agree with you more
the whining of the "progressives" is reaching new highs.....and I say this as a flaming liberal. I supported Obama because he seemed like a sensible pragmatic guy who can take this country away from the liberal vs conservative hyperpartisan envirnment that haven't served this country at all.
The people on open left and other blogs want Obama to be a replica of Bush , that is , they want their pound of flesh for the last 8 years regardless of how bad the situation is, and how much cooperation is needed from all Americans.
I don't think they really paid attention to what Obama was saying during the campaign( neither did the conservatives). He is going through his transition and cabinet appointments exactly like he said he would.
Obama's campaign was touting Gates months ago, he talked about pulling troops "responsibly and based on the conditions on the ground" for a year now.
I am a liberal. but I do recognize that this country is a centrist country, and I do hope Obama will continue this way...
If the economy is significantly improved in four years, he's a shoo-in for reelection.
If it hasn't, he has no chance.
Everything else is irrelevant.
Guess which group donated more of their time and effort to the campaign? Hint: it wasn't 'lower-middle class moms'. This is as ridiculous as giving equal importance to the religious right and the same middle-class demographic Megan describes: while as votes to be counted, this may be true, but as campaign grunts doing the foot- and phone-work, it's most definitely not.
many of the conservatives who were mad about my supporting Obama continue to assure me that he is making card check and confiscatory taxation the centerpiece of his administration.
I for one am tentatively pleased his campaign promises turned out to be utter lies from start to finish. Yes, getting Bush II^2 isn't ideal, but it's better than the leftist malarkey I thought we'd be getting.
I'm sure this sentiment is already shared above, but most liberals I know are perfectly happy with what Obama is doing, mostly because they see it as a path to the IMPLEMENTATION of change. Most grown-ups, and let's face it many in today's media are not, see P-E Obama's Cabinet as a real force for change, a place where the inner workings of Washington can be manipulated is pure genius. Once we get through the mid-term elections and some of Obama's bigger plans in motion, I would expect to see a more progressive Cabinet start to form. Also, IF he wins a second term, that Cabinet, I suspect, will be much more progressive.
Many liberal "leaders" wanted Obama to put in a radical cabinet, just so they could continue to deride Congress for fighting against Obama's mandates. This Cabinet hopefully circumvents that problem by being a cabinet of "doers".
I'm a conservative who was very nervous about Obama's connections to Bill Ayers, the fact that he fit in so well and so easily with corrupt Chicago politics, his spending decades attending a church that preached against 'middle-classism', etc. There are so many contradictory aspects to Obama's life up to this point that I don't think that anyone (perhaps not even Obama himself) knew what he would be like as President.
But that uncertainty also means there's hope. Now that he's going to be our President, I support him and hope he does well. These appointments are grounds for optimism.
I don't know that that's entirely fair. I was going to say, well, the progressives all turned on Cinton when he was elected too -- remember the blowout to Rolling Stone -- and he did have Reich and Edelman and so on in his Cabinet. But in retrospect they were right; Clinton stiffed the liberals pretty hard. So a priori they've got worries: Obama starts off less "progressive" than Clinton looked.
That said I have to admit I think they're (slightly) misguided: Ms. McArdle's probably right to suggest that the liberal wing will get some of its wish list, maybe even a broad health care reform. But you gotta think they have good reason to get nervous.
Not everyone is as disillusioned as you think. I won't reveal my source to protect the innocent, but I know an Obama voter who was counting on him "being a liar" once he got into office. She just liked his personality, not his policies. I agree, thank God she was right.
The different is that the TV Moms will vote republican if not appeased, whereas the progressives will not.
As a moderate, I took some reassurance from Clinton getting savaged by both the right and the left. He was more center than either group saw him.
I actually hoped for that again, as I voted for Obama. If all went well, I thought, both sets of extremists would again feel wronged.
The most amusing part about it is when the rightists, who proclaimed Obama as a leftist, swivel to calling him a liar for being the moderate they denied.
I'm just wondering when he's going to shove an amnesty down our throats. After mid-terms? Second term?
As a conservative, I'm enjoying the coming Obama presidency far more than I thought I would. He's setting up a center-left administration with center-left goals, and is proving much more pragmatic than dogmatic.
Even better is that he’s already reneging on some of his campaign promises, thereby beclowning those who voted for him because they though he was not just another politician, and that he’d really change the culture of D.C. Turns out he's just another politician, and that he's probably not going to change D.C. afterall. Not too shocking to those of us in the reality-based community.
If Obama is beholden to any group of activists, it would be the youth, I haven't met an 18 to 25-year old since the election who didn't vote for him, Latinos, and African-Americans. Question to ask is do they self-identify as progressives who identify themselves on the blogosphere? Some, maybe. Not all. They were a force before the progressive bloggers caught Obama fever.
Progressives? They're wonderful, I'm one, and I recognize our weakness -- we're stuck in our own echo chamber. It's a nice echo chamber, we've got great ideas. But it's still an echo chamber. Progressive values slowly leak out into main stream, but seems a slow drip, not a deluge that folks like Bowers would like.
I also wonder how many of those loud voices in the echo chamber are pissed because they don't dare send in a resume to the Obama administration, due to the vetting process and it's disclosure requirements about blogging? Think there might be some sour grapes there.
What really makes me happy is that you're happier, nobody knows which cup the penny's under. There's a lot of room to move there. Just maybe, he's still out-thunk us.
I'm mightily pleased with Shinseki. Deep honor there, like an onion.
Oh. Crap. As a pro-lifer, this situation terrifies me.
Let me explain.
I realize Meghan and many other realpolitik players don't feel surprised Obama's reneged on campaign promises. They feel its obvious Obama would go pragmatic on us all. Well, count me as one who thinks a when a politician is strident in one direction, I tend to think they'll govern that way; in other words, I am surprised. Obama was stridently liberal in his voting record (when he bothered to show up) and in his campaign speeches (when he slipped and started saying crap besides "hope" and "change").
But let's back off for a minute. If Obama doesn't start repaying the extreme left who helped elect him, he'll divide the party and be easy pickens in 4 years. Now, it seems he's gone center on foreign policy and economics; as a result, he needs a broad stance in which he can assure his base he's still Obama who hangs with Bill Ayers, Obama who chooses only marxist professors and black people as friends, Obama, Obama who promised to spread the wealth around.
So what's left to throw to the base? Social issues. Gay marriage is off the table, at least from his point of view. It's a state issue now, and, more importantly, Congress would have to initiate anything about DOMA. Obama can lend supporting words, but not much else. As for drugs, Obama can reduce federal expenditure on drug enforcement, but that wasn't a big issue for him in the campaign.
But what's the other big social issue in America? Abortion. In what area is Obama more comitted that any other Democratic senator? Baby-killing--100% by the NARAL, more than anyone else, including Ted Kennedy and Hillary. And what was Obama's well known campaign promise about abortion? That his first order of business would be to sign FOCA into law, sending millions more children to their death. And considering how many feminazis jumped ship on Hillary to go with Obama and defended him as a resolute baby killer, Obama owes them big time.
It's the perfect storm: the base needs red meat, Obama needs to show he's still a socialist after making center/center-right compromises, and he promised that FOCA would be the first thing he signs into law.
Obama's going to declare war on children.
This terrifies me, and I hope I am wrong. On the bright side, Doug Kmiec is going to have his head explode trying to defend this one.
The left has grounds for disappointment and complaint. Remember the Clinton transition and early months? Clinton hadn't been elected on a particularly leftist economic platform, especially since Bush had already raised taxes, but even there, Robert Reich was relatively prominent in the early going, and he certainly seems more progressive than Geithner or Summers. Additionally, Clinton initially implemented (or attempted to implement) leftist measures on several social issues: he attempted to allow gays in the military, he pushed for the Freedom of Choice Act, and he consciously put aside welfare reform in favor of a broad reshaping of the health care system. Obama has nothing of that nature. Maybe he will soon, but for now, I can see why the left is disappointed.
Mind you, Clinton came to grief with most of the items I have mentioned. In particular, Basic Fact, I don't think the votes are there to pass the Freedom of Choice Act, no matter what Obama is willing to sign.
I hope you're right, y81, because I see a Democratic congress, which has a platform of "no limit abortions." But I understand not every Democrat wants to make enemies that quickly, especially since the Catholic Church (for the first time in years, finally) is making some noise about having its clergy actually get arrested rather than comply with FOCA.
But I see abortion as Obama's issue--the one with which he can secure his base. If not FOCA, what could he do?
Ugh. Why fetus empowerment is such an issue in this day and age is beyond me.
Oh well... I vote for divided government now, whatever my ideological sympathies to Republicans may be.
Um, Megan,
Since when do "lower-middle class moms" drive huge SUVs and by enormous flat-screen TVs.
Don't you mean "upper-middle class"? I'm upper-middle class and I can't afford a huge SUV -- they cost $35k or more!
I would think a more accurate description would be "lower-middle class moms driving used Ford Tauruses and buying diapers in quantity at Wal-Mart.
Or am I missing something here in my upper-middle class, suburban Seattle bubble? Anyone else think this is weird?
madman...
I don't think it's that weird. Large SUV's are the vehicle of choice where I live, across the middle class spectrum. I don't think Ford has made the Taurus in what, almost a decade?
From your characterization, you'd think lower middle class mom's are welfare queens or something. "Buying diapers at Wal-Mart?" You don't think they give them credit cards?
Benjamin: "Ugh. Why fetus empowerment is such an issue in this day and age is beyond me."
----Ah, liberalism. When giving a crap about the deaths of millions is a bad thing.
Does thinking that the abortion debate is a stupid waste of time mark me as a liberal?
This thread is the worst waste of bits I have seen in some time. The original article, Megan's comments, and all the commenters keep referring to a bunch of straw men. It seems obvious to me that the Politico writer is simply a concern troll, as are most of the commenters here.
It appears to me that Obama is trying to appoint smart, competent people. I assume, when they actually take office, they are going to run their operations according to the guidelines set forth by their managers, just like any manager in any organization.
When the guidelines are published, comments will be valid.
Benjamin:
"Does thinking that the abortion debate is a stupid waste of time mark me as a liberal?"
---Yes, Benjamin, it does, because it is only liberals who try to sweep 48.5 million deaths in thsi country alone under the table. You're certainly liberal on this issue.
Dick Monahan:
"It appears to me that Obama is trying to appoint smart, competent people. I assume, when they actually take office, they are going to run their operations according to the guidelines set forth by their managers, just like any manager in any organization."
----That's a pretty big assumption there, Dick.
I would argue that you're looking at it from an efficiency point of a view, not a political one.
By that I mean you're thinking Obama is appointing people who are good at their jobs and will do what he says. But in any organization, especially politics, the managers have their own agendas, and within their realms, their going to chafe if the man in charge wants them to do something opposed to their views.
This is not some military operation or business, where there is either obedience or reassignment. Expecting Hillary Clinton or Larry Summers to merely be just a manager, with the ideology they have and the politics they follow, is a bit naive.
If anyone swept 45.8 million fetuses under my table, I guess that probably would turn abortion into a voting issue for me.
Madman: yes. Go to most areas of the country that are not clustered around a few coastal cities, and you will readily observe lower-middle class moms driving SUVs, perhaps more elderly than the ones in upscale suburbs and not as well upholstered, to Wal-Mart, and you will find they, too, have flat panel televisions. One of the major class markers in this country is what you choose to economize on.
I'm confused at just what progressives think "progressive" means. In the U.S., it generally stands for believing that politics needs to be fluid rather than ideologically based and hence the whole liberal vs conservative thing is missing the point. (See, for instance, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Progressivism.)
In this respect, I'd consider myself a progressive, believing that it is the balance of ideologies that has to fit the circumstances since ideologies are axes into the political space, not the optimum point.
So how is Obama not being progressive by getting both liberal and conservative views, being more centrist, and making decisions based on aggregated knowledge instead of ideological policies? I don't know what campaign everyone else was watching, but he seems to be living up to exactly what his campaign suggested.
Perhaps the far left expected him to turn the U.S. into a far left socialist (communist?) country. The far right certainly suggested it. And both were wrong to think that.
Ah, abortion humor! Nothing like the left to trivialize human death.
Thank you for joining us, Ms. Mcardle. I agree, and for you coasties: since SUVs have been big for a while now, plenty of cheap, used SUVs out there.
Pretty weird that you continue calling me "liberal" or of "the left" when the only issue I've really commented on is abortion, and the only thing you know about my abortion position is that I think the debate is stupid.
"career-suicide bombers"
Is someone auditioning for Michelle Malkin's job?
"The different is that the TV Moms will vote republican if not appeased, whereas the progressives will not"
Rob wins the thread...
The subject is so completely not 'new' news that I'm surprised it gets mentioned.
"Occasionally, you can get politicians to buck the will of the voters when the matter is serious enough, as with the bailout. But this is very rare. And when you do buck the will of the voters in order to do something that most economists agree is vital to the health of the nation..."
Honestly Megan, I thought you were finally coming around. I know you thought it was originally a bad idea, but then a couple weeks ago you seem to understand it was a mistake, though you still held on tight to the idea that it was somehow a "mistake that was rightly decided".
Maybe it's just that I never believed it was a good idea, and that I read of MANY economists who also thought it was a bad idea. I think you ought to at least be clear that only econcomists of one particular school of economics thought it was a good idea. Of course, those also tend to be the economists who helped create the problem in the first place.
DL, "progressive" is just a euphemism for "liberal," notwithstanding what the ever-authoritative Wikipedia might say. It's used because, as we can see from Basic Fact, "liberal" has become something of a derogatory term among some, and we all like to call ourselves things that are by definition good and which makes the opposition by definition bad. (After all, how can you be opposed to progress? Or choice? Or life? Etc. etc.) It allows you to define the terms of the debate in a simple way you are guaranteed to win, and not in the more complicated way that better reflects reality and which you are not guaranteed to win. (E.g., Basic Fact trying to define the abortion debate about killing children when the debate is really about whether a fetus is indeed a fully human life.)
Benjamin:
1. Yes you've only commented on abortion. Yes, those in favor of abortion are liberal, those against are conservative. If you're the few anti-gay marriage, supply side, tax cuts, iraq war hawks who happens to think killing babies is good, lemme hear it.
2. No, I know a bit more about your position than "the only thing you know about my abortion position is that I think the debate is stupid."
For instance, I know you degrade human life by describing it in clinical terms, and then state that wanting humans to live is "granting them empowerment: "Ugh. Why fetus empowerment is such an issue in this day and age is beyond me."
You continually use the term fetuses instead of humans or babies or children: "45.8 million fetuses."
And you've made callous remarks about babies, ahem, "fetuses" to show your disdain for even considering them human.
Face it, Benjamin: you language and tone betray all the trappings of a pro-baby killer. So give me a break with all this "you don't know me" b.s. I can read, ya know.
Oh, MDF, I love you argument that liberals want to have a "debate" about whether a fetus is a human life. Lefties want no such debate---any debate would entail deciding when human life begins by a set of objective criteria.
Pro-lifers would welcome, because all that would require then would be to show how a fetus meets those criteria. And any ridiculous standard proposed by the lefties (e.g. "can feel pain") would be shot down by clear logic (e.g. "lots of people already born can't feel pain, doesn't make them not alive, feeling pain is a non-issue").
Baby-killers try hard to keep this issue " a personal one" because they lose if there ever a consensus about this. Baby-killing is about one thing: making sure babies die, without anyone stopping it.
Abortion troll is trolling.
The overwhelming majority of economists thought that something needed to be done by the government. You can say that "only economists from a particular school of economics think that labor demand curves slope downwards", and thus defend the belief that raising minimum wages will raise employment, but that school is "everyone who is not a very, very heterodox labor economist"
Hopefully this also means he will abandon some of his previous ideas that are inherently flawed but got him elected..... such as his plan to "fix" social security.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ADdgmfVWAkM
I think what we are seeing is the whining of the progressive bloggers and writers. They tend to live in a bubble and they can be just as impatient as the conservative radio talk show hosts, and writers. I guess I am more of a liberal and I voted for Obama and I have been an ardent Obama supporter since 2004. I have listened to the man speak and in his speeches, he has always talked of the United States of America, a purple America. He has always highlighted our similarties and what we share in common. It seems that the progressive writers have missed all of that.
I didn't think that he was going to get elected and nominate a bunch of progressives/liberals in his administration and I don't want him to! That is not the make-up of America. We are in uncharted territories here in this country....the bloggers need to stop the whining and complaining and give the man a chance to get in office and do his job!! Barack Obama does not owe the progressive bloggers anything.
There is a need for the voice of journalist and the media. They will have to hold him accountable, but he is not going to be the President so that he can do their bidding. He has to work for the entire country and they need to shut up and give him a chance to do that.
Chet calling someone else an abortion troll is pot meet kettle material.
lolagib1:
"Barack Obama does not owe the progressive bloggers anything."
----Falser words have never been spoken.
Basic Fact -
Please define "baby." Is it two cells? Four cells? Please educate me. Is it tadpolish? When?
Hell please define "life" for me. If you can consider it a life at conception, then we should have no problem removing it from the womb and allowing it to "live" right? Cuz that's part of life right? Living? If it can't live, it's not life? Am I missing something?
Potentiality and Actuality are two different things. So which do we use as a guideline? I prefer actuality.
I was very worried about the kind of people Mr. Obama was going to surround himself with. He did make statements that he would look at both parties for help and as a conversative like Ann above, feel somewhat encouraged with what I see.
Mr. Obama is walking into the White House with a huge mess on his hands and the fact that he selected many former Clinton people will help as he tries to bring the present economic crisis under control.
I will give him all the support I can. To others I say to simply give him time and realize the nightmare he faces for years to come.
After all, despite left or right, we are all Americans and in this mess together. We need to work as one to help get ourselves out of it.
As this point, even a slight mention of raising taxes for anyone would cause the stock market to drop 500 points.
God Bless America......we really need it now!!
Megan,
For a movement that grew out of the anti-corruption campaigns of the late nineteenth century, and was nurtured in the hothouse built by domestic Communism and Socialism, modern progressivism seems curiously unwilling to think about, much less cope with, institutionalist models of politics.
This quotation seems to me to be false. First of all, it's hard for me to tell whether you're referring to the intellectuals/their ideology or the voting behavior of self-identified progressives at large. The second interpretation seems to require more data than either of us have available to us, so I'll go with the first. But that also is wrong--there is a robust tradition of social change through institutional means in progressive/social democrat ideology starting with Eduard Bernstein over 100 years ago.
So, the point of this post is to express shock that progressives want the Obama administration to be more progressive?
Good to know, I never would have suspected that.
hmm...So...you're saying that it's laughable--even annoying!--that progressives are displeased that Obama, a month after being elected, has abandoned or changed his mind on many items that were central to his campaign, items that he repeated endlessly on the stump and in debates.
That seems a little cynical. You may LIKE his new positions better, you may think they seem more realistic, but that's not really the point. Liberals and progressives have a right to be angry--and I don't think they should really be blamed for thinking he's not acted honestly.
I mean, ideology is often arbitrary, so it's not as if the ONLY solution to the problems we face is to adopt the solutions that Obama is proposing, much as you may like those solutions better. The economy, Iraq, etc., didn't look radically different a month ago than it does now, and voters elected him at least partly on the basis of what he said he'd do then. They may have been liberal positions, but he was clearly not just elected by liberals.
I don't think they should really be blamed for thinking he's not acted honestly.
I think they should be blamed for expecting him to act honestly.
Anyone who considers a fetus a human being is insane.
Outlawing abortion ruins human lives. Which do you value more, living humans' lives, or genetic material?
I find these "liberal anger" stories to be quite strange. I'm as liberal as they come, and I'm happy as roses that Obama is governing from the center rather than becoming the next "Bush of the Left". I think its unfortunate that "some" are reporting on this "liberal anger" based on a few choice statements from random bloggers and the director of a progressive organization I've never heard about.
Doesn't Obama have something like 90%+ approval from self-identified liberals right now? Am I missing something???
I'm not oppose to abortion but I'm sick and tired of it being an issue. I am more of IDIOTS like Brian, who fuss about the definition of life when it comes to abortion, however are feverish advocate of "life begins with a single cell" evolution. Again, Brian you're an idiot.
I'm happy as roses that Obama is governing from the center rather than becoming the next "Bush of the Left".
Doesn't that presuppose that Mr. Medicare Part D/NCLB governed from something resembling the far right, as opposed to Democrate Lite (all the spending, with none of the credit!)?
Fritz-
Perhaps I would consider your point if I could undertand what it is.
But until you can write a coherent sentence, you should probably refrain from calling other people idiots.
I think this is a case of where lacking stories after years of having them laid in their laps (face it, Bush was a godsend for reporters and comedians), the media is having to actually work. The easiest way is to create a controversy, even where there seems to not be one at the moment. Learning from Bush, if you say something enough times people will think it is true, it is easier to create a problem than to actually do research for news stories.
That said, I believe the majority realized from the beginning that Obama would attempt to govern from the middle, and I also believe that is one of the significant reasons that he was elected. After the last eight years of madness they are willing to give him some time and see the administration he builds before strong reactions will come from anywhere save from the extreme left and extreme right.
Let's at least wait until he actually in office, okay?
I'm curious, who are these progressives who are shocked that "Obama hasn't made Bill Ayers attorney general"?
A link to them would be great.
YES! YES! YEEEEEESSSS!!
Thank you for saying what needed to be said.
The people on HuffPo, and OpenLeft, and DK have been like a pack of wolves foaming at the mouth to rip apart any person named as a "POSSIBLE" cabinet choice in BO's administration.
Its as if the left has become the new right.
There is no way these people were listening to Obama all these months, because if they REALLY were there wouldn't be all this confusion. They are in denial and it is just plain sick.
The man hasn't even been sworn in yet and already they are jumping down his throat for so called policy changes when he doesn't even have the authority right now to do so.
This is just more fooder for the right and the media.
They are just pitiful.
Any chance we can get a dedicated thread for Basic Fact? Someplace where he can rant about abortion, call people names, and generally make an aggressive, paranoid nuisance of himself?
Because that act is getting pretty tired here.
Also, if BF is as concerned about abortion as he/she claims, and doesn't just like to fight, he may want to rethink how he spends his time.
Spending hours screaming "Baby-killer!!!" on a blog that skews lefty and libertarian may not be the most efficient way to enact the social/legal/political change he wants.
I'm a conservative who was very nervous about Obama's connections to Bill Ayers, the fact that he fit in so well and so easily with corrupt Chicago politics, his spending decades attending a church that preached against 'middle-classism', etc.
1. The connection to Bill Ayers was nonsense. He served on a board and lived in the same neighbhorhood. If you had done any investigating about Hyde Park, you would have realized the diversity of folks that live there. How unique Hyde Park has been, seeing Chicago's history as one of the most segregated cities in America. Also, I'd like to know why Obama was held responsible for being on a board with Ayers, but not one of you frigging conservatives said JACK about Annenberg giving his money and selecting Ayers to be on said board.
2. 'Corrupt' Chicago politics - like politics everywhere else is so clean. Spare me. Once again, I'll say if you had done any serious investigation, you'd find out that Obama had found a way to be least connected to Chicago politics.
3. 'A church that preached against middle-classism' - once again, your ignorance shines through. Anyone who had done research - and not listening to right-wingers, but actual research, would have found out that Trinity UCC is a church full of Black STRIVERS - members like the Obamas - Black professionals. Black people who were the most educated, and the most connected to what folks call ' The System'.
I'm sure you work with some Black professionals. They are no different. Having no 'context', and no desire to understand any ' context', you would have found out that being against ' middle-classism' isn't being against success. It was being against the mindset of ' I've got mine, so I don't give a crap if you get yours', that runs rampant in today's society. If you had actually researched Trinity, you would have found out that a lot of Wright's appeal was his very conservative (small c) approach to thing - don't beg people to give you what you can do for yourself. And, that begins with taking care of your family, taking care of your children, educating yourself and your children, and looking out for your community. But, of course, if all you know about Wright were Youtube Clips, and what you found out about Trinity were from right-wing blogs, well...that's how we get comments like that above.
What I find most amusing is all this hand-wringing about what he's GOING to do, based on his appointments. He's given some speeches, and hired some people. That's it.
Has anybody noticed that he isn't actually POTUS, yet? I mean, that sign he has out front looks cool and all, but it says "Office of the President-Elect". Can we at least wait to critique the legacy of the Obama Presidency until he has, like, been President for a day or two?
Chet calling someone else an abortion troll is pot meet kettle material.
Well, except for the part where you thread-jack under any pretense to spout pro-life platitudes and accusations of "baby-killer", and I don't do any of those things, yeah, right, I guess we're exactly the same.
Obama has reversed pledges to immediately repeal tax cuts for the
wealthy and take on Big Oil.
Has he? I haven't heard him say "we're not repealing the tax cuts" or "we're not going to change American's dependence on oil", anytime soon. What's the basis for this accusation? The fact that he hasn't done these things yet, when he's not yet the president?
This sounds a lot like "Obama broke his promise to accept public campaign funding", when of course he hadn't actually made that promise. There's a substantial amount of bullshit surrounding what Obama has promised, or not promised, to do; you can usually tell this bait-and-switch is going on when Obama is claimed to have made or broken a promise, but no actual quotation of the "promise" is made.
There are countless volumes of philosophical literature on what constitutes moral considerability, both from the political left and the political right, from consequentialists to virtue theorists. The notion that:
(a) there is no debate going on
(b) there is already some identified objective criteria that would produce a consensus
is sorely mistaken.
As for whiny progressives, being a progressive myself (which, contrary to a commenter above, is not synonymous with 'liberal' as it implies none of the latter's metaphysical assumptions), I can assure you that the strawmen-pummeling and compulsive need for outrage is not a quality shared by all of us. In fact, those of us who supported Obama from the beginning did so precisely because we recognized the destructiveness of smug ideologues. Though few will admit it now, the majority of the progressive online community supported John Edwards, a fact that underlines how willing they are to overlook personal virtues and competence in favor of ideological posturing.
I ask again:
Who are these progressives who are shocked that "Obama hasn't made Bill Ayers attorney general"?
A link to them would suffice.
Rikyrah -
I said in my post that, now that Obama has won, I'd like to move past this. But it's ridiculous to pretend that there's nothing in Obama's background to make people nervous.
"'Corrupt' Chicago politics - like politics everywhere else is so clean."
I live in Chicago, and tonight on the way home I heard that our Governor is out on bail, after being caught trying to sell Obama's Senate seat (I think Megan has a new post asking what the heck is wrong with our state, and it's a good question). Blagojevich replaced a Governor who's now in prison, as are (or at least were) several other of our former Governors.
Obama personally has kept his hands clean (except for one foolish error with Rezko), and he cut his ties with Blagojevich before he began his run for the White House (which Blagojevich reportedly is still really sore about). But Obama is known for never challenging the machine in our state. He supported Stroger against Forrest Claypool and also endorsed Dorothy Tillman and, of course, Mayor Daley (who Michelle was working for when she and Barack got married). Obama has never thrown his weight behind a reformer in Illinois, although many have tried to get his support. He found a way to prosper in an incredibly corrupt environment, never challenging it the way, for example, Sarah Palin challenged corruption among Alaska's Republicans.
"The connection to Bill Ayers was nonsense. He served on a board and lived in the same neighbhorhood."
Obama and Ayers both served on the board of the Woods Foundation for several years. But before that, there was the Chicago Annenberg Challenge (CAC), in which Obama and Ayers worked closely. [And by the way, many conservatives asked why the heck Annenberg would fund a crackpot attempted murderer like Ayers, whose goal was to radicalize students rather than educate them!]
Ayers was a founder of CAC and wrote the proposal and the guidelines. He was part of the five-person group that assembled the board which hired Obama as CAC chairman. Obama and Ayers worked closely in the first year of the CAC, with Obama in charge of fiscal policy and Ayers in charge of shaping educational policy, while the two of them wrote the bylaws together. During that first year, CAC under Obama gave money to organizations founded by Ayers and also by his wife, Dohrn (who served on panels with Obama), as well as to ACORN and other similar groups. Finally someone pointed out that it didn't look good for Ayers to be openly running CAC while it was funding his and his wife's projects, so he stepped back into a less public role.
The relationship between Obama and Ayers running CAC was much more than them just happening to sit on the same board, and running CAC was in many ways Obama's first big break (and one of his few chances to get executive experience by actually running something).
Nevertheless, the election is over. Let's move on and see what he does as President.
"While the progressives are shocked, shocked that Obama hasn't made Bill Ayers attorney general..."
C'mon, you are better than that. Sounds like Corner hyperbole.