Obama is remaking his administration, as is detailed in John Heilemann’s big piece in New York magazine.
Judging the ultimate political impact of this endeavor will be impossible until November 2012. But contrary to the feral howling on the left or the applause of many Beltway tapioca centrists, the objective here has less to do with tacking to the center than with finding a way back home. What Obama seeks is to reconnect with the essence of why he was elected, to reanimate the unifying, postpartisan, pragmatic yet visionary persona that inspired so many in the first place. “What he wants,” says one of his friends, “is to be Barack Obama again.”
I’m not sure exactly what that means. Perhaps it means that something was lost by following Rahm Emanuel’s “frenetic, transactional, shambolic style” of governance. I think that’s part of it. I know many on the left were more disappointed by their perception of a lack of fighting spirit than by the actual legislative product. Obama may have known that a public option was a non-starter in March 2009 and kept hope alive mainly as a negotiating tool, but it looked like he was giving it up without a fight. It would have been easier to swallow the final compromise if we thought the president had done his best to do better. The president would probably argue that he did do the best he could, and that is most likely true. But he chose to act like his bill was exactly what he wanted instead of act like something better is required. To be clear, that’s a decision about what role to play, to ‘act out,’ for the public. Obama prefers to spare us flamboyant theatrics. He figures out what he can get and then tries to tell us that what we can get is great. That’s understandable, but it isn’t true. And it isn’t inspiring. And it has the unfortunate side effect of ceding part of the rhetorical battlefield to the Republicans. When we have to settle for a really shitty health-care bill because we have a bunch of dicks like Joe Lieberman, Ben Nelson, and Blanche Lincoln in our party, we have a hard time selling it as a great accomplishment. The bill isn’t perceived for what it is (a big compromise) because the president acted like he got what he wanted. That is why the Republicans can plausibly talk about repealing it. Part of the problem can be seen here.
Just as in 2004, today, in 2011, the left can’t make sense of it all. So the only way they can frame this contemporary American insanity is either by blaming it all on the oligarchs who exploit this latent spite, as if taking the oligarch funding out of the equation would solve it all…or, when getting too close to facing the awful possibility that maybe a lot of Americans are just contemptible jerks in dead-ender lives, the left retreats into the safe, comforting irony of Jon Stewart, where it’s stored away as just another zinger that requires no serious thought, no painful analysis.
Here is my article that tries to get the left to finally face the truth about American voters as they really are—to consider the possibility that maybe a huge bloc of American voters are worse than merely “irrational.” What if there’s not much to like about them at all? Or more importantly, why the hell do we need to like them; why is “likable” even a factor?
There’s a limit to how great and inspiring a leader can be when his flock is filled with contemptible jerks who are getting yanked around by oligarch-funded media. Yeah, it’s never a good idea to blame the people. Always blame the politicians. Except the politicians who acted with the least honesty, charity, and principle over the last two years were rewarded for it with a stamp of approval from the voters. Obama does appeal to our better angels. But, maybe there are just a lot more devils than angels in this country.
Ultimately, this is still a battle between hope and fear. I never saw Rahm Emanuel as the devil, but he sure wasn’t an angel, and he didn’t inspire hope. If we’re talking thematics, the president does need to soar a little. He can’t be down in the muck with the Palins and Limbaughs. His legislative priorities are not going to fly on eagle’s wings with the Republicans in charge of the House, so it’s going to be more about finally trying to “change how Washington works.”
For Obama, the next two years will in part be about attempting to lower the temperature, to leach the toxins from the system. And in that pursuit, divided government might, paradoxically, prove to be his friend. Having achieved so much in the past two years, much of Obama’s agenda now is to protect those accomplishments—both in the short term and in the long term, by winning reelection—and playing defense is inherently less provocative than playing offense. And the areas in which Obama will take the initiative are ones where common ground may well exist with the opposition: curbing the deficit, education reform, free trade, and possibly tax reform.
The questions are, will the left put up with this milquetoast agenda, and will anything leach the toxins out of this system? I’m not very optimistic on either score. For things to really improve, we’d have to be better people.
You say “To be clear, that’s a decision about what role to play, to ‘act out,’ for the public. Obama prefers to spare us flamboyant theatrics. He figures out what he can get and then tries to tell us that what we can get is great.”
What he is trying to do is buy a rug by setting the final price. That means that when the bargaining begins he is already in a bad place, and negotiates to a worse one. Has this man never bought something from a seller in the bazaar? I would never send him to get anything except at an American store. And he is supposed to be a smart lawyer. What kind of lawyer does not know the bargaining approach?
one who has never really practiced law. which he hasn’t. but that’s beside the point- supposedly he’s got people on staff to handle the messy details of bargaining- rahm, reid, pelosi- let them strike the deal.
Who do think has been doing the heavy lifting? Pelosi and Reid. Obama gets involved at the “Is this your final answer?” stage. The problems are in the caucuses.
That’s too pat. Obama also should be setting the agenda, and putting out the frame of reference. In the HCR, he finally figured this out. He began by letting that piece of crap Baucus set the agenda. After Baucus fucked us over for 6 months, Obama finally set up the frame, and did not push it.
The saying is “the president proposes, and congress disposes”. Obama needs to propose.
Obama’s biggest issue has and still is the unity of the Democrats in Congress. Between showboaters like Ben Nelson and Heath Shuler and sellouts like Mike Ross and Joe Lieberman, Obama is going to continue to have a weak hand in negotiations. And will depend on whatever GOP disunity appears to carry the day on moving forward. I believe the cliche is “weak tea”.
Like most progressives, I find this return to post-partisanship extremely distressing. I think there is merit to the idea that things are different now that the GOP has the house, and hence “skin in the game” and more be more amenable to achieving the compromise and consensus necessary to keep the government wheels turning. But if you want to “change how washington works” you have to, you know, actually change how washington works. Which means reforming our political and electoral institutions- no easy task. Just hoping that everyone is going to start acting differently, even when the same corrupt incentives remain is naive.
Stop blaming Rahm or anybody else for the tragedies. It’s always someone else’s fault for the bad (Bush, Republicans, Rahm, Geithner, BP, pick a card) and Obama’s credit for the good (Mountaintop removal being stopped and that list that you wave around like Neville Chamberlain). Obama was, is, and will be governing exactly as he sees fit due to his Reaganite beliefs. This isn’t about how he’s positioning himself now; it’s about the smiling brown mask falling off and revealing who he really is. Indeed, he is free now “to be Barack Obama again,” and not the Democrat we were sold.
Obama did give up the public option without a fight. No, let me correct that: he sold it out to his bankrolling corporate interests in that notoriously infamous backroom deal that you never mention. That deal was exactly what he wanted. He didn’t “act” like the bill was exactly like he wanted.
Also, Obama “acts out” all the time–AGAINST LIBERALS. He’s not this Mr. Spock, unemotional character you keep selling us. He is extremely emotional–against anyone who sees him for who he really is. And then he comes out with the hyperemotional name-calling against the people whom he said on the campaign should keep his feet to the fire.
He cedes the battle to Republicans because he is a Republican, not because of the media landscape, obstruction, Rahm or whatever excuse you have that day. Just because he isn’t a fire-breathing teabagger doesn’t mean that he doesn’t hold the “moderate” old-school Republican beliefs of yesteryear very dear.
Finally, you admit that the “health-care” bill is shitty. Progress! Last week, it was outstanding progressive progress. Also, those dicks you talk about in the senate who supposedly impeded Obama’s true desires, are the same dicks whom Obama campaigned for, gave cash to, and/or otherwise were shielded from accountability by Obama.
In my estimation, Obama is the Chief Jerk. He’s at the center of this horror show. But just last week, you praised Obama for placing himself in the center and not being too-this or too-that. Tepid and milquetoast was de rigeur last week, now it’s bad. This is why I call your analyses schizophrenic. It goes back and forth faster than anything at the Australian Open.
Rahm didn’t inspire hope because Obama wanted to throw cold water on all that campaign “Hope” shit. They probably laughed about it in the WH while drinking that fine booze. Rahm did his job as Obama planned him to. Rahm wasn’t an aberration. Stop kidding us and yourself.
The Left–the “Professional Left,” such as you, at least–will put up with it because Obama has positioned himself as “The Best We Got.”TM And those black people who voted for him and still stand behind him as a unified bloc, many don’t really follow politics but are simply into tribalism (He’s one of us, so he has my vote!) still don’t know no better. I am so ashamed.
Obama is a scorpion that has finally shed that useless frog suit.
Delonjo, that’s quite an indictment. But what’s up with the “smiling brown mask” and the “black people who…don’t really follow politics but are simply into tribalism”?
In the “world as it is” (to use an old organizing phrase), who would you rather have had as president over the past two years? And what agenda would that person have accomplished that Obama didn’t—with the understanding that you needed Ben Nelson, Joe Lieberman, et al, to pass anything through the Senate?
seriously booman, who cares? it’s all theatre anyway, and totally irrelevant to what’s really going on in this country. People are losing their homes, their retirement, their incomes (to name just a few), and the buzz is how Chuck Schumer’s gonna sit with Tom Coburn. because, ya know, that will help accomplish absolutely nothing. Now if they wheeled Gabrielle Giffords in on a gurney and made Coburn sit with THAT, we might be getting somewhere.
like you say in the post directly above this, the democrats don’t even have the votes to the enable them to govern in the majority. It’s a useless party, just like the republicans: one exists to destroy, the other exists to watch the destruction. One comes up with insane ideas, the other implements them.
Who forwarded you “we the spiteful”? I got it from a friend this AM and immediately sent it to atrios. It’s such a pitch perfect portrait of our fellow Americans.
“Being Barack Obama again” would mean going back to being a candidate again without the inconvenience of winning. I get really sick of hearing how he won on his “postpartisan, unifying vision”. There’s just as much reason to think he won on his inspirational, aspirational speeches, his promises of deep change, and an opposition consisting of The Dirty Old Man and the Bimbo. You can’ be convincingly aspirational anymore once you’re president and your accomplishments satisfy no one.
It seems ironic that Obama and his Chicago bunch seem to have never taken the maxim of the town’s patron saint, Daniel Burnham, to heart. So they made little plans, and sure enough, they did not have magic to stir anyone’s blood. The real question for 2012 is, will Obama win back the activist base in the perennial absence of any other viable choice, or will the current wave of stay-at-home chic prevail? It’s unthinkable that an ambitious jellyfish like Romney or a snake-oil peddler like the Huckster could beat out someone as capable and intelligent as Obama. But no more unthinkable than the thought of crazycakes like Bachman, Rubio, and Mike Lee polluting the august halls of Congress.
Obama will win if he takes this opportunity to fight for big plans and big visions, and let the House majority snipe at them and shoot them down. Show Americans what they lost by buying into GOP/teabagger bullshit. But so far, all we’re hearing sounds like doubling down on “bipartisanship” and “cooperation”. Obama lost Congress through his version of pragmatism. He got a lot done, but it didn’t save his majority. He ended up losing by winning. Now’s the time to reverse the strategy by fighting for real change and blaming the House majority for killing it off.
Have I not been screaming the first paragraph over and over again for a year?
Still I was in a discussion on this at TPM some months ago and it was pointed out to me that it’s clear reading his books he does believe what he said about working together, it’s his very reason for politics so even when it fails or maybe because it’s failed, he can’t give it up without removing his own political heart so to speak.
Oh, and apparently he’s asking advice from Matt Dowd now.
Also I have long since pointed out that Obama was losing with his style of campaigning until the economic collapse.
Raptor, correct me if I’m wrong, but my recollection is that except for the typical (and temporary) post-convention “bounce” in the polls that McCain got, Obama was ahead in the polls all fall, yes?
Oops, did it again! MNPundit, not Raptor. My apologies.
I think that’s right. He really sees the biggest American problem as divisiveness, and himself as the Unifier. He may be right about the problem long-term, but that doesn’t make for effective politics.
I was watching an interview with Christopher Hitchens the other night where he defended the utility of hate — his feelings about Henry Kissinger being an example. Hate makes sense sometimes, because “there is evil in the world”. That seems to be what Obama can’t bring himself to face up to.
DaveW, I don’t know what Obama sees as the biggest problem in America these days. (My own sense is that his primary ambition as president is to be remembered as one who shifted the tide towards liberalism the way Reagan did for conservatism.)
But if the question is how to confront evil in the world, there’s a longstanding, well-developed strain of progressivism that argues that confronting evil with hate only helps the haters. Better to confront evil with love is what Martin Luther King said. Better to confront it with reason, facts and trust in the long-term (not short-term) good judgment of the citizens is what Justice Louis Brandeis said.
Based on the outcry in response to Obama’s unpremeditated (and, in my view, quite appropriate) use of the adverb “stupidly” to describe the actions of the police officer who arrested Prof. Gates in his own home, I wouldn’t be at all surprised if Obama decided long ago that there was no advantage for an African-American politician who aspired to national office in being seen as someone motivated by hate.
I’m not advocating that Obama become hateful. I do think he has to recognize that there is real evil in the world, and that America’s share of it resides disproportionately in the Republican Party. Lack of hate can be as crippling as too much of it.
Thanks for the response. All I’m suggesting is that it’s extremely likely that Obama—who is, after all, a black man living in the United States, one who consciously embraced the African-American community and legacy of the civil rights movement, one whose early political activities included opposing nuclear weapons in the Reagan years—both recognizes there is real evil in the world and has made some conscious choices (both as president and throughout his adult life) about how he can best confront it.
Now, having said that, I don’t agree with all his choices (though I do agree with many). I do think it’s counterproductive at best for those of us on the left to assume that because Obama’s actions are different from what we might like them to be that therefore he doesn’t recognize evil, or the nature of his opposition.