In two impressive columns, last week and this week, Charles Krauthammer has chronicled a large number (but not all) of Obama’s reversals of field, changes of direction, modifications of principle, etc., on major issues.
- In the fall, he opposed retroactive immunity for telecom companies who assisted in anti-terrorist monitoring, even threatening to filibuster. Now he supports it.
- In the fall, he trashed NAFTA. Now he calls his previous opposition “overheated” and supports it.
- In the fall he promised to meet with the likes of Iran’s Mahmoud Ahmadinejad “without preconditions.” Now there will be “preparations,” and he may not meet with Ahmadinejad anyway.
- In the fall he promised to accept public financing and abide by spending limits if the Republicans would. Now he has abandoned that pledge and continues to raise tons of unaccountable cash in record amounts.
- In the fall he was no more able to disown Rev. Wright than his own grandmother, but then he ditched both of them, dissing the former as “a typical white person” and proclaiming, much like
RickLouie the Gendarme in the presence of gambling in Casablanca, that, after 20 years of listening to Rev. Wright, he was shocked by what he had just heard. - In the fall he told the Chicago Tribune that he thought the Washington, D.C., gun ban was constitutional. Now he supports the Supreme Court’s decision that it was not, forcing his campaign spokesman to admit that Obama’s earlier support for the constitutionality of the gun ban was “inartful.” (DISCRIMINATIONS definition: an “inartful” statement is one supporting a previous commitment that is no longer convenient.)
- And here’s a flip-flop not mentioned in either of Krauthammer’s columns: In the fall, and before, Obama has always supported civil unions but opposed same sex marriage, believing marriage is between a man and a woman. Now he supports the California Supreme Court’s decision that his former view of marriage is unconstitutional, and he opposes the California initiative that would re-establish the view that he formerly held, describing it (the initiative and presumably its definition of marriage) as “divisive and discriminatory.”
- In the fall Obama promised to begin withdrawing troops from Iraq “immediately” and to be altogether out in 16 months. Now he is “refining” that position. Indeed, he now even refers to his long-held support for immediate withdrawal as his “original position,” which reminds me of a man referring to his “first wife” … while he’s still ostensibly married to her.
Obama, of course, has always been right, and remains so even when he jettisons unpopular people and positions for new, more popular ones. He’s like General McClellan, who explained (as discussed here) after one of his retreats that he wasn’t retreating but merely “changing his base,” to the delight of his adversaries.
The spirits of the Confederate soldiers were good. Northern newspapers had reported McClellan’s description of his withdrawal to the James as a “change of base,” and when the story got to the men, they would loudly laugh at the loser of a dog fight and call out: “Look at him changing his base!”
As Obama continues to “refine” his various “inartful” positions, always with great eloquence, he is well on his way to becoming the presidential candidate with the most, er, flexibile principles and policy commitments since … John Kerry and his voting for before voting against.
UPDATE
A New York Times editorial discusses a few of these and several other examples of the New Obama throwing the Old Obama (that is, the one from six months ago; there’s no Obama of any significance older than that) under the bus, and is not pleased.
We are not shocked when a candidate moves to the center for the general election. But Mr. Obama’s shifts are striking because he was the candidate who proposed to change the face of politics, the man of passionate convictions who did not play old political games.
In other words, the Times’s editors have finally noticed a few glaring disjunctions that others have long seen, such as a passive (at best) consumer of Rev.Wright’s anti-American passions promising to bring us together; a politician who has never strayed from the left wing of his party promising to bring us bi-partisanship; a bi-racial candidate saying
There’s not a black America and white America and Latino America and Asian America; there’s the United States of America
even as he continues his past support for preferential treatment of black and Hispanic Americans at the expense of white and Asian Americans.
I could, and in the future no doubt will, go on.
It was Louie, the gendarme, not Rick, who was “shocked” at the gambling.
NYT shocked? Irrelevant. They’ll still back Obama because he’s the Democrat and only because he’s the Democrat. They’re hoping they can get all their “shock” out now before too many people start paying attention.
There’s no “shock” to be had. Let’s look at the first topic on the list.
>>>”In the fall, he opposed retroactive immunity for telecom companies who assisted in anti-terrorist monitoring, even threatening to filibuster. Now he supports it.”
It was part of a larger bill, where retroactive telecom immunity was not the ONLY problem, and certainly not the most critical. Here’s Obama:
>>>”This was not an easy call for me. I know that the FISA bill that passed the House is far from perfect. I wouldn’t have drafted the legislation like this, and it does not resolve all of the concerns that we have about President Bush’s abuse of executive power.
It grants retroactive immunity to telecommunications companies that may have violated the law by cooperating with the Bush Administration’s program of warrantless wiretapping. This potentially weakens the deterrent effect of the law and removes an important tool for the American people to demand accountability for past abuses. That’s why I support striking Title II from the bill, and will work with Chris Dodd, Jeff Bingaman and others in an effort to remove this provision in the Senate.
But I also believe that the compromise bill is far better than the Protect America Act that I voted against last year. The exclusivity provision makes it clear to any President or telecommunications company that no law supersedes the authority of the FISA court. In a dangerous world, government must have the authority to collect the intelligence we need to protect the American people. But in a free society, that authority cannot be unlimited. As I’ve said many times, an independent monitor must watch the watchers to prevent abuses and to protect the civil liberties of the American people. This compromise law assures that the FISA court has that responsibility…”
http://my.barackobama.com/page/community/post/rospars/gGxsZF
That’s an adult answer, not beholden to rigid ideology. Compromise, pragmatism and working for the common good is NOT a sign of treachery or weakness but one of congressional gridlock busting.
Of course, a war-mongering neo-con like Charles “signator of the PNAC” Krauthammer wouldn’t understand that sort of thing anyway.
–Cobra
obama says, on the one hand this and on the one hand that and what we need to do is something that will have all of the advantages of both things and none of the disadvantages of either. This is not possible. Also, error cannot be avoided. You can err on the side of finding out about what our enemies want to do, or you can err on the side of respecting their rights to privacy. Both sides have a risk. Liberals want to err on the latter side, but they lie about it and pretend that a perfect solution is possible. They pretend that their side has no risk, but it does. THe risk is that we will not find out about a planned hostile act and not prevent it and it will happen. Libs say to themselves I would rather that happened than we abused rights. But they dont want to make that explicit.
it is amusing to see obama move towards the right and begin talking like a neo con. His supporters figure he is lying and that is what he has to do to win, so they don’t mind it. But when he is in the white house, what then. a complete about face, again? will he be able to govern from the left? will the media kick in to protect him and shield his actions so that americans don’t know what is going on? will congress go along with it under pain of being called racist if they don’t? or will he just continue to adjust himself to reality?
Cobra – rather than all of the overheated rhetoric, why not simply address the real issue, one that is not germane to Obama but to any Democratic candidate? The primary process pushes Democratic candidates fairly far too the left – too far, frankly, for the bulk of the American electorate, and Obama and his advisers of course know this all too well. And I think one could praise Obama for his pragmatism and ability to compromise if all he has on his plate is a swing to the center incident to a post primary hangover. But he has more on his plate – and that is one of the most far to the left, if not the most liberal, voting records in the Senate. These moves to the center are not going to be so easy for him to pull off, because above all else, his preference for redistribution of wealth and protectionist economics is fairly manifest (never mind that those schemes rarely work).
Anita writes:
>>>”it is amusing to see obama move towards the right and begin talking like a neo con.”
No, actually we are in the midst of the RESULTS of a neo-con fueled Presidency in Bush.
Do you like these results, Anita?
willowglen writes:
>>>”But he has more on his plate – and that is one of the most far to the left, if not the most liberal, voting records in the Senate.”
You’re saying Obama’s voting record is as “liberal” (what does that actually mean?) as Sen. Russ Feingold and Sen. Bernie Sanders, who’s a declared Socialist? This is a fiction concocted by Republican operatives and a lap dog media. Would you define what’s happened in the past 8 yers with Bush and his rubber stamp GOP congress “conservative?”
Pre-emptive wars against countries who never attacked us? Record deficit spending spiraling the National Debt to $9 Trillion dollars? A direct assault upon the 4th Amendment through the Patriot Act and FISA legislation? Torture?
willowglen writes:
>>>”These moves to the center are not going to be so easy for him to pull off, because above all else, his preference for redistribution of wealth and protectionist economics is fairly manifest (never mind that those schemes rarely work).”
I believe we’re one bomb on Iran away from another Depression. That’s where this Bush Administration has led us. That you’re more concerned about Obama is stupifying.
–Cobra