Barack Obama
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Really. He can take it. In some ways, the “How dare you criticize Obama!” people are the mirror image of the “I can’t believe Obama betrayed us!” people. Neither seem able to see him as first and foremost a politician. Read more
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Strangest thing I saw on my trip: a sidewalk pamphleteer handing out literature attacking President Obama’s “socialist” health care plan. In Canada. Read more
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Not a leftie, organic-arugala loving Obama administration, writes Tom Laskawy at Slate, but the constraints imposed by Mother Nature herself: The one threat that Big Food hasn’t proven itself very adept at handling, however, is the multiheaded hydra of climate change, drought, and the shrinking supplies of various natural resources. The industry is not ignoring Read more
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A good essay by theologian-historian Gary Dorrien at “The Immanent Frame”: today Niebuhr is back in public discussion because he symbolizes, notably to Barack Obama, the possibility of a progressive realism that defends America’s interests more prudently and advances the cause of social justice. Niebuhr, like Obama, blends liberal internationalist and realist motifs, contending that Read more
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Michael Lind, who I always find worth reading, argues that Obama’s liberalism is timid, compared not only to FDR and LBJ, but to Eisenhower and Nixon. Why? Because those guys were in office before the neoliberal dogma took hold which demands that even public goods should be provided by the private sector. Instead of this Read more
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That’s what it looks like anyway, based on Obama’s speech and the analysis I’ve seen. “Combat troops” will withdraw in 2010 with “residual” forces engaged in training and counter-terrorism activities (which, make no mistake, will involve at least some combat). But full withdrawal is supposed to occur by the end of 2011. Not ideal, by Read more
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The “Center for Consumer Freedom” has a hysterical (in both senses of the word) article about the looming threat posed by “radical animal rights activist” Cass Sunstein in his new capacity as President Obama’s “regulatory czar” in the Office of Management and Budget’s Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs. I knew but had forgotten that Read more
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Christopher makes an important point. To anyone who’s tempted to believe that the Bush years were a complete departure from an otherwise unbroken American tradition of “moral leadership” I’d recommend–for starters–getting acquainted with Andrew Bacevich’s The Limits of Power, which I blogged about here. Then we can move on to the collected works of Reinhold Read more
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Bill Moyers’ Journal hosted an interesting discussion with Thomas Frank and David Sirota on the bailout, the economic stimulus, and what people can expect and/or hope for from Obama. I think Sirota’s point (toward the end of the segment) about the longing some people feel for an “authoritarian capitalism” or a “czarist” model for fixing Read more
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An open letter to the President from Mr. “Come Home, America” himself (via A Conservative Blog for Peace). Read more
A Thinking Reed 