“Punting the Pundits” is an Open Thread. It is a selection of editorials and opinions from around the news medium and the internet blogs. The intent is to provide a forum for your reactions and opinions, not just to the opinions presented, but to what ever you find important.
Jonathan Cohn’s premise here is that Liberals are unhappy with Obama because he failed to move a more progressive agenda but the truth is Obama was not a Liberal to start. The major criticism from Liberals comes from the fact that Obama has adopted the most horrendous policies of the Bush administration as his own and expanded them, something the Obama loyalists would be screaming about if the President were McCain.
Jonathan Cohn: What Do Liberals Want From Obama?
Not surprisingly, conservatives are unhappy with President Obama. Somewhat surprisingly, liberals are too–or, at least, a lot of liberal commentators.
On July 4, Robert Kuttner spoke for many of them when he wrote, on the Huffington Post, that “we voted our hopes that events could compel Obama to govern as a progressive. We are still waiting.” Bob was primarily upset about Obama’s failure to push through a new stimulus package. But he also criticized Obama over health care (for not getting passionate about it until the last minute) and the Gulf oil disaster (for not taking a harder line on British Petroleum).
Bob is my old boss and mentor, not to mention a good friend. I share his frustrations over the policies that have (and haven’t) come out of Washington lately. But to suggest that Obama hasn’t governed as a progressive seems pretty wrong to me.
Meyerson gets it, they don’t like brown people.
Harold Meyerson: Why the GOP really wants to alter the 14th Amendment
As Lindsey Graham and his fellow Republicans explain it, their sudden turn against conferring citizenship on anyone born in the United States was prompted by the mortal threat of “anchor babies” — the children of foreigners who scurry to the States just in time to give birth to U.S. citizens.
The Republican war on the 14th Amendment’s citizenship clause is indeed directed at a mortal threat — but not to the American nation. It is the threat that Latino voting poses to the Republican Party.
By proposing to revoke the citizenship of the estimated 4 million U.S.-born children of undocumented immigrants — and, presumably, the children’s children and so on down the line — Republicans are calling for more than the creation of a permanent noncitizen caste. They are endeavoring to solve what is probably their most crippling long-term political dilemma: the racial diversification of the electorate. Not to put too fine a point on it, they are trying to preserve their political prospects as a white folks’ party in an increasingly multicolored land.
Heh. Good idea, Mo, don’t piss off the driver.
Maureen Dowd: Don’t Send In the Clones
Anyway, on one shopping expedition, I had a big fight with a roommate, no doubt over whether to get canned or frozen corn, creamed or whole kernel.
We were at a supermarket in a blighted part of D.C. My roommate got furious, stormed off in her car and left me stranded. I called my brother Kevin to come get me. On the way back to school, he offered this advice: “Never pick a fight with the guy who’s driving.”
I took that to heart, literally and metaphorically. It has spared me plenty of problems since.
The serendipity of ending up with roommates that you like, despite your differences, or can’t stand, despite your similarities, or grow to like, despite your reservations, is an experience that toughens you up and broadens you out for the rest of life.
Michael Gerson: Can Obama move beyond ‘liberal uniter’ to pragmatic centrist?
In 1980, Bill Clinton was defeated for reelection as Arkansas governor, making him the youngest ex-governor in America. According to one account, “Clinton sank into a deep funk. Wandering the streets of Little Rock, he’d stop to question strangers: ‘Why do you think I lost?’ ”
Taking the advice of his campaign consultant Dick Morris, Clinton apologized for past mistakes and transitioned to the political center. He was reelected governor two years later.
Clinton’s most astute biographer, David Maraniss, says “the central theme of Clinton’s life is the repetitive cycle of loss and recovery.” After his midterm electoral thumping in 1994, President Clinton, again advised by Morris, scaled back his ambitions, narrowly focused on middle-class tax cuts, education and the environment, and gradually restored his political fortunes.
With President Obama probably facing a political setback in November, what can we expect his response to be?
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