This is a difference I’ve had with Chris Bowers and a lot of other progressives since the primaries. Now, the term Bowers is using here is ‘hippie-punching,’ which probably originated with Duncan who likes to simplify for effect. I can’t do an etymology of the term right now, but I believe it was originally used in the context of anti-war demonstrators. When Democrats engage in hippie-punching it is usually to distance themselves from pacifists. You know, Obama famously said he is not against all wars, just stupid wars. Depending on your point of view, he could have been dismissing sandal-wearing, give-peace-a-chance granola-chompers (I’m not like them), or he could have simply been stating his position clearly and concisely.
But both Chris and Duncan used the term today to refer to Obama’s announcement on offshore drilling. For Bowers, he specifically highlighted this segment of Obama’s statement:
Ultimately, we need to move beyond the tired debates between right and left, between business leaders and environmentalists, between those who would claim drilling is a cure all and those who would claim it has no place. Because this issue is just too important to allow our progress to languish while we fight the same old battles over and over again.
Chris hears this as an insult to the left:
Rather than trying to placate green groups, President Obama is playing up how he is charting a unifying course of moderation in opposition to those groups. Much like Blanche Lincoln, he protrays himself as an independent, nonpartisan voice standing up to environmental extremists on behalf of his constituents.
He didn’t literally call anyone an extremist…not business leaders and not environmentalists. He did call the old debate between those groups ‘tired,’ which I can certainly see as somewhat dismissive. But, my ears hear something completely different.
I hear a savvy politician explaining that he needs to cut a deal to get anything done, and that anyone who insists that drilling is a sufficient solution or who won’t allow for any drilling at all is taking a position that falls outside of the realm of what is politically possible. He’s trying to treat me like a grown-up, not pander to me. But he’s also making the best of a compromised situation by making a virtue out of it. Maybe it’s just that my feelings aren’t easily hurt, but I enjoy watching politicians at the top of their game. I used to love watching Bill Clinton do his State of the Union address because it drove the Republicans crazy and he was really effective at communicating with the middle. Sure, I cringed a lot when he “punched hippies,” but it was all for the greater good.
I guess this all comes back to the long-running debates over Lakoffian framing and moving the Overton Window. I always thought those were bullshit issues, and that actual organizing and party-building were what mattered. Every word out of the president’s mouth isn’t, and shouldn’t be, an effort to counter Republican messaging and move the national mood in a more progressive direction. Sometimes, the president just needs to make the best case for what he’s doing. It isn’t personal, and it shouldn’t be taken that way.
A sad fact that some “progressives” don’t seem to ever suspect.
Although even the NYT was able to dig up the obscure fact that Obama said during the campaign that expanded oil drilling had to be an option, Duncan was shocked and felt betrayed once again. It’s a tired act.
If it was obscure, then he can hardly be blamed for not knowing about it. And there is no reason he has to be happy about it.
I was being sarcastic. It was obscure if you didn’t bother to listen to debates, read articles, or even use google retrospectively. That is, if you applied the research skills of Jake Tapper or Frank Bruni to the issue.
what’s that song?
Still a man hears what he wants to hear
And disregards the rest
I don’t know why 3 years of reading Black’s trenchant attacks on the slipshod, dishonest, craptacular, bullshit that passes for reporting should make me so angry when he enages in slipshot, dishonest, craptacular bullshit that passes as blog commenting, but there you go.
Fine, but it wasn’t as if Obama campaigned on opening up offshore drilling. He mentioned it had to be on the table.
I’m hoping that Obama’s entire reign will be a teaching moment about the necessity for compromise, how difficult it is to get ANY legislation passed, much less GOOD legislation, etc. We have to mature as an electorate, and certainly as a so-called progressive blogosphere, if we want to wield significant power over our country.
He changed to that position in August 2008. It’s not entirely fair to pretend that the primaries didn’t exist, and he was anti-drilling then.
Yep, rootless, it isn’t all about progressives. It’s all about oil companies. We’re fighting two wars and threatening a third against Iran because of oil. And they get some oil drilling today. Meanwhile, where’s my solar panels?
http://www.awea.org/newsroom/releases/01-26-10_AWEA_Q4_and_Year-End_Report_Release.html
http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/news/article/2009/12/this-year-in-geothermal-energy
http://www.marketresearch.com/product/display.asp?productid=2613916
The reality is that even moderate carbon tax plus continued investment in solar/wind/efficiency will make oil drilling economically unattractive by 2012. Instead of the usual feckless whining about how policy positions should be framed or clearly wrong advice to the master on how to negotiate with Congress, perhaps progressives could make a positive case for more solar investment.
Or we could wail about how we’ve been betrayed when Obama embraces policies that he won the nomination and election by supporting.
He won the general election that way, he won the primary on the other side.
Hmm. The stimulus is effective but unpopular. The health care law is a huge step forward, but the public is suspicious of it – and it’s complex enough that educating the public will be a very long process, and the start is long overdue.
Obama is a fantastic educator when he chooses to be. When he chooses instead to let PR types divert him into sales instead of education, the public loses trust.
So I hope that on climate change, he’s better at explaining complex proposals than he has been on health care.
“But, my ears hear something completely different.”
C’mon, don’t you want to engage in the incessant whining about being dissed? You’ll get more hits….
Bowers wants Obama to “placate” “green groups”.
I want him to accelerate installation of green generating capacity. The “green groups” who need a pat on the head don’t do anything for me.
Exactly, I’d rather see a deal signed than all the participants happy.
According to one commentator it will be at least two decades before there is any drilling (if at all). True that there will be explosions that harm the sea critters, but the oil spills are so far down the line they are not likely ever to happen. So Obama throws a bone at the companies, who are unlikely throw gazillions of dollars down a dry hole, to get his legislation passed through Congress. The odds of finding economically viable oil that far out to see are low. If he actually gets the legislation through Congress, he gets it for practically nothing. In the meantime, it helps to have all the environmentalists protest, because it makes the Thugs think they are sticking it to them if they allow the legislation to go through. That’s my take.
Which is why both Bowers and Atrios have nothing substantial to say about the Obama energy policy – which is a lot more than this announcement.
Drilling in Virginia will come soon.
in the same vein, Rahm is tremendously helpful with respect to middle east.
I forgot who said it but they said we have a center-right government for a center-left country. The conservatives in both Houses have a lot more power than the liberals do. I think that’s important to remember.
I think you’re under-thinking this, BooMan. Obama said we have a “tired debate” and then he sided with the right. We’ve moved beyond the debate, alright, and Obama told us we lost. I mean, he didn’t call us names while he informed us of that fact, but that’s some cold comfort.
Right: we have the largest public works bill in 50 years with a giant green energy component in it, and we lost because oil drilling will be, in theory, permitted in 10 years.
Look, you call it siding with the right. But, look at what he’s dealing with on the left.
That’s the Democratic chairman of the House Natural Resources Committee, who has partial jurisdiction over any energy bill.
So, what do you want Obama to do?
Ok i’ll stop after this one: but I believe a lot of “progressives” want rhetorical validation, even at the cost of substantive failure. And it’s fucking annoying.
goodnight.
Obama announced today last year’s mileage standards, the military using half biofuels someday, and oil drilling. There is nothing there. Nothing but the hope of votes someday. I hope the deal is really already made because if not, there’s nothing to bargain with and nothing gained.
And sure, I understand he is trying to hold onto Democrats. Bowers said that too.
We have a massive investment in green energy via ARRA. It’s not enough, but it’s concrete, existing, substantial. That’s a success we could build on or we could not.
That’s horseshit and you know it. We want Democrats to govern like Democrats. Not RomneyCare Republican-lite. Not Third Way/DLC horse manure. Democrats!! And why did Ben Nelson decide to become a Democrat? It’s not because he believes in anything in the party platform.
Point taken. I get that Obama has to buy off semi-rational actors like W.Va. sometimes (though not on cap and trade?). In general though I voted for Obama because I thought he could be persuasive, and not have to trot himself out to pre-emptively apologize to people who care about the environment and declare that he’s granting favors to the people he already declared to have the worse argument. It diminishes him.
On the list of things to get worked up about, I don’t think this oil thing ranks high. I only commented because you’re usually very persuasive in your defenses of Obama, and less so, I thought, this time.
That should read, “Point taken, BooMan.” Rootless, I assure you I prefer substantive success to rhetorical validation probably six days out of seven.
There’s a political gamesmanship complexity here that I’m beginning to think that because we have gotten drawn into the partisianship game aren’t quite able recognize. If you squint hard you can see the pragmatism that is Obama blending with some hard ass leveraging.
He is one by one taking the semi useable points that the Rep have had and is staking them as his own, for his Party to use in the Fall. One of these days the Rep will wake up and realize there is literally nothing left on their page, the lies are useless because actions are now in the face of their base.
Obama “changing the culture in Washington” not so much about getting Rs and Ds to make coalitions across the aisle and stop insulting each other but changing the congresscritter culture of reflexively rubber-stamping or opposing what the prez wants. change the culture so that congress stands up and pulls its own weight as a 3rd branch of gov. The so-called progressive call for Obama to lay out a progressive agenda and push it through congress annoys me no end. Obama started out as a community organizer and he’s still community organizing, this time trying to recover the constitution with 3 branches of gov from the assaults of bushco. it’s a difficult, painstaking process and one of the things that worked really well in the hcr ordeal (witness the contribution of and celebration of Pelosi’s work not “Obama got what he wanted”). Booman and Tarheel Dem have laid out intriguing details of the process in this new one (step 1: put the east coast repubs in a classic double bind – love it!) which promises to be more complex after all the “energy reform is dead” talk. (had an interesting conversation with an administrator recently who described this aspect of Obama’s presidency as “changing the culture”.)
It’s not realistic to believe that our government will not end up taking every readily available drop of oil out of the ground eventually. It won’t matter if it’s a Republican or Democratic administration. The oil IS coming out. As the oil era winds down, it will become too valuable to leave in place, and demands for it’s removal will come from every part of the political spectrum.
So Obama is compromising to get something, but he is also compromising something that is inevitable, and because of that has no value to hang onto.
The oil will eventually come out. That statement is based on the rules of supply and demand.
nalbar
that you wouldn’t have written any of that if there was a Republican in the White House.
Knee-jerk approval of everything Obama does is just as silly as the Republicans’ omnipresent “No”.
You would have lost your bet.
Like I said in my post, it has nothing to do with who is president.
When it’s time for the oil to come out, it’s coming out. All of it. Everywhere.
nalbar
“So Obama is compromising to get something…”
And that something would be…what exactly? Right now it appears to be a gift to Republicans with a fancy bow on it, in the hopes that they stop being jackasses. But I think we can all agree that they have no intention of stopping.
A better plan would have been say that he will open up more off-shore drilling triggered by oil companies actually drilling on all the land they have right now but refuse to drill. The fact that the oil companies COULD increase production, but don’t because it would drop their bottom line, is an arguement that people can understand and rally against. He could have said “If you start using the land you already have, then we’ll start the process of allowing you to expand off-shore as well.”
Instead, DC rejoices in punching the hippies yet again…for nothing but a couple non-hatred filled letters from GOPers who aren’t going to vote for this in the end anyways. Besides, coal-state Dems aren’t going to be appeased by this move…and they are the biggest hurdle to this bill anyways.
For me, the problem with Obama is that he comes down on the centrist-leaning-toward-conservative position every time, on every issue. I cannot think of one single thing he has done that could properly be called progressive. I agree that in general, he is moving things in the right direction. But it sure would be nice if just once in awhile he ditched the incrementalism and took a strong, clear stand for some of the values he preached during the campaign. What we’re seeing IMHO, is a re-run of Clintonism, which is a hell of a lot better than Bushism, but it’s a far cry from what might have been, and I think a huge political opportunity is being squandered.
this seems to be a common view, and I can understand it to a degree.
But, honestly, I think things are colored by a few big things that kind of distort the picture.
Yes, Obama didn’t nationalize the banks and he allowed the scoundrels to get a sweet deal they didn’t deserve. And, yes, Obama didn’t go all-in for a public option. And, yes, Obama is making some pretty deep concessions on the front-end of the climate change debate. I think these are the big three in terms of progressives feeling put out. I guess the are other elements related to Iraq, Afghanistan, detainees, and the war on terror, too, that make up a big part of the disappointment.
Those are big, important issues that are very contentious. And while he initially took the progressive position on some of them, he hasn’t ended up there.
I understand that.
But, people ignore a tremendous amount of progressive accomplishments. I’m not going to make a comprehensive list right now, but he appointed a Puerto Rican woman from the Bronx to the Supreme Court who immediately began questioning corporate personhood. His first order of business was the Lily Ledbetter Equal Pay Act. He passed consumer-friendly credit card reform. He larded his stimulus package with a wish list of liberal policies. He established the principle that access to health care is a right. He’s making a stand on settlements in East Jerusalem. You can look at a long list of mostly overlooked progressive accomplishments.
His job isn’t to pass a bunch of progressive bills because that is impossible. His job is to fulfill his campaign promises to the best of his ability. He’s off to an impressive start.
Amen to this. Charles Peters, founding editor of Washington Monthly, wrote an article about Obama during the campaign. In the article, he argued for the importance of looking a politician’s record when trying to decided what he/she stands for and will do.
Peters went back to Obama’s Illinois Senate days. If you look carefully at that record, it’s hard to be too surprised with the overall direction of the Obama presidency—including this most recent statement.
One question for progressives is: how do we organize in the context of a president who is fundamentally in agreement with us on most issues, but who is dealing with the constraints imposed by the Senate?
Obama is a timid, centrist corporatist.
For all the hype over his “communication skills” and his admiration of Reagan’s style of communicating, Obama doesn’t understand that the President must lead by educating and giving the public a narrative which explains and justifies his policies or actions.
I find this weakness– this unwillingness to use the “bully pulpit” in a sophisticated way– particularly galling since he supposedly read an entire book on FDR before being sworn in.
FDR made the economic meltdown of his age into a morality play with the bankers as villains. He educated the population on banking and economic issues while informing them in colorful terms about the villains.
Obama apparently wants to make nice-nice with unrepentant Wall Streeters and totally obsructive Republicans who would rather slit his throat than look at him. I guess that he likes the bankers’ money and mysteriously can’t understand the GOP willingness to practice politics rather than Good Government.
Actually, a President must lead by putting policies into place that benefit people.
That’s a whole lot easier to accomplish if you convince the people first so that they can pressure their representatives.
I wish Obama wouldn’t give the store away before the other side even begins to make demands.
Obama is recasting the issue as not one of two sides, but multiple sides varying by energy sources and regions
Don Quixote would be jealous.
All this whining! Didn’t you mofos learn anything from the healthcare debate?
I’ve made some of these points before, but it’s time to repeat them.
In other words, the same crap we’ve been deluged with since the election from the faux-progressive “left”.