My first issue came yesterday compliments of Freddy. A subscription to this hallowed book review was Freddy's October birthday present. I am so thankful because this is a GREAT publication.
I admit I was confused in that I thought this was the same thing as the NY Times book review that I read regularly online. But no, it's not the same thing.
This is the premier book review in the country. Now I can say that I am REALLy keeping up with the publishing world.
Here is what I like about my inaugural issue.
There are 3 pieces on Robert Frost. I have long wanted to study his poetry.
There is an article by George Soros on the current economic crisis.
There is an article by James McPherson reviewing two books on Lincoln and racial and ethnic pluralism.
There is other marvelous stuff as well. I look forward to spending considerable time with this publication as it comes in.
Thanks, Freddy, for such a tremendous gift.
Friday, November 21, 2008
Alert! President-Elect Speaks in Complete Sentences
This is just shocking! Shocking I tell you….just shocking! (This is from my friend Paul Durantini who lives in Los Angeles)
Obama's Use of Complete Sentences Stirs Controversy
In the first two weeks since the election, President-elect Barack Obama has broken with a tradition established over the past eight years through his controversial use of complete sentences, political observers say.
Millions of Americans who watched Mr. Obama's appearance on CBS' "Sixty Minutes" on Sunday witnessed the president-elect's unorthodox verbal tick, which had Mr. Obama employing grammatically correct sentences virtually every time he opened his mouth.
But Mr. Obama's decision to use complete sentences in his public pronouncements carries with it certain risks, since after the last eight years many Americans may find his odd speaking style jarring.
According to presidential historian Davis Logsdon of the University of Minnesota, some Americans might find it "alienating" to have a President who speaks English as if it were his first language.
"Every time Obama opens his mouth, his subjects and verbs are in agreement," says Mr. Logsdon. "If he keeps it up, he is running the risk of sounding like an elitist."
The historian said that if Mr. Obama insists on using complete sentences in his speeches, the public may find itself saying, "Okay, subject, predicate, subject predicate - we get it, stop showing off."
The President-elect's stubborn insistence on using complete sentences has already attracted a rebuke from one of his harshest critics, Gov. Sarah Palin of Alaska.
"Talking with complete sentences there and also too talking in a way that ordinary Americans like Joe the Plumber and Tito the Builder can't really do there, I think needing to do that isn't tapping into what Americans are needing also," she said.
Obama's Use of Complete Sentences Stirs Controversy
In the first two weeks since the election, President-elect Barack Obama has broken with a tradition established over the past eight years through his controversial use of complete sentences, political observers say.
Millions of Americans who watched Mr. Obama's appearance on CBS' "Sixty Minutes" on Sunday witnessed the president-elect's unorthodox verbal tick, which had Mr. Obama employing grammatically correct sentences virtually every time he opened his mouth.
But Mr. Obama's decision to use complete sentences in his public pronouncements carries with it certain risks, since after the last eight years many Americans may find his odd speaking style jarring.
According to presidential historian Davis Logsdon of the University of Minnesota, some Americans might find it "alienating" to have a President who speaks English as if it were his first language.
"Every time Obama opens his mouth, his subjects and verbs are in agreement," says Mr. Logsdon. "If he keeps it up, he is running the risk of sounding like an elitist."
The historian said that if Mr. Obama insists on using complete sentences in his speeches, the public may find itself saying, "Okay, subject, predicate, subject predicate - we get it, stop showing off."
The President-elect's stubborn insistence on using complete sentences has already attracted a rebuke from one of his harshest critics, Gov. Sarah Palin of Alaska.
"Talking with complete sentences there and also too talking in a way that ordinary Americans like Joe the Plumber and Tito the Builder can't really do there, I think needing to do that isn't tapping into what Americans are needing also," she said.
Tuesday, November 18, 2008
The New King of Poker (from Time magazine)
Back in July, nearly 7,000 players gathered in Las Vegas for the 2008 World Series of Poker's championship event — a $10,000 buy-in elimination tournament known as the most lucrative and prestigious event in professional poker. Last week, after a 117-day recess, 22-year-old Danish pro Peter Eastgate captured the title, defeating 27-year-old Russian Ivan Demidov by turning a straight on the final hand to beat Demidov's two pairs. Eastgate, the youngest main event champion in history, earned $9.1 million for his efforts—the second largest prize the tournament has ever doled out. On his way back to Europe, he caught up with TIME for a brief phone interview.
How have you been celebrating?
In the immediate hours after the win, I celebrated with my friends and family. But we kept it pretty calm and relaxing because I was kind of exhausted after playing 18 hours of poker over two days.
How did you manage to maintain your composure and focus with so many cameras in your face and so much money on the line?
The money on the line was my motivation. It was what kept me focused.
It didn't make you nervous?
No.
This year, for the first time, there was a four-month delay before the final table was played. How did you use that period to strategize and prepare?
I didn't do that much preparation for my opponents. I got the information that I could collect about the other guys. I tried to search for information online and watched the ESPN tapes. But you're really not getting that much out of that kind of information. It's really about being prepared mentally for playing for a lot of money and a prestigious title. You have three or four months, and mentally, I just got into the right mindset so that I wasn't nervous at the final table.
Did you come in with a strategy or did you plan on taking cues from your opponents and adjusting?
I didn't have any kind of real preset strategy. I wanted to see how they played, and combat it the best way I could.
In your path through the tournament, were there one or two key hands/moments that got you on track?
I had a lot of major hands. Obviously there was the hand with Tiffany Michelle. [With 18 players remaining, Eastgate won a pot of nearly 10 million chips holding a pair of aces against Michelle's ace and jack.] There was the hand with Dennis Phillips at the final table on the K-2-2 flop. [With six players remaining, Phillips bet 7 million and Eastgate, holding pocket aces, moved all-in for 22 million. Phillips folded, giving Eastgate the chip lead.] You have also some of the folds that you don't see on the ESPN tapes, and situations where I made the right folds and my opponent didn't show me their hands. When I talked to the other guys after, they told me I had made the correct fold. So there are a lot of key points. But basically, folding at the right time and getting good setups at the right time is key, as well as big hands you win.
Who was the toughest player you went up against? Any big-name pros, or was it someone you just had trouble reading throughout the tournament?
Ivan [Demidov, the runner-up] was one of the toughest players. He played a very good final table as well; he's a really tough player. There are a lot of tough guys. Later on in the tournament, there were so many really solid players, and very few bad players.
So what's your background in poker?
I've been playing about two years professionally. More than four years total.
That's a pretty steep learning curve. How did you reach the top so fast?
For the first two years, I played poker as a hobby. I was very fascinated by the game. I put a lot of hours and hands into it. But I didn't get into poker with a serious approach, which means reading books, reading online forums, learning all the fundamentals before you start off. I kind of just learned by doing.
What do you consider your biggest strength?
I'm pretty good at looking at the psychological aspects of the game. You need to consider what your opponent is thinking. You should always try to get into your opponent's mindset, and if you can get a regular idea about how he's thinking, you have a huge edge in the match, because you're always one step ahead of him. You're thinking how he's thinking.
It sounds like you have more of an intuitive approach to making decisions than a math-based one.
Yeah, kind of.
You're a 22-year-old who's come into $9 million. What luxuries are you're going to indulge in?
I'll be traveling a lot and eating well. I feel very good about being able to treat my family and friends very good. I don't know what things I'll be buying specifically. But I look forward to treating my friends and family very well.
How have you been celebrating?
In the immediate hours after the win, I celebrated with my friends and family. But we kept it pretty calm and relaxing because I was kind of exhausted after playing 18 hours of poker over two days.
How did you manage to maintain your composure and focus with so many cameras in your face and so much money on the line?
The money on the line was my motivation. It was what kept me focused.
It didn't make you nervous?
No.
This year, for the first time, there was a four-month delay before the final table was played. How did you use that period to strategize and prepare?
I didn't do that much preparation for my opponents. I got the information that I could collect about the other guys. I tried to search for information online and watched the ESPN tapes. But you're really not getting that much out of that kind of information. It's really about being prepared mentally for playing for a lot of money and a prestigious title. You have three or four months, and mentally, I just got into the right mindset so that I wasn't nervous at the final table.
Did you come in with a strategy or did you plan on taking cues from your opponents and adjusting?
I didn't have any kind of real preset strategy. I wanted to see how they played, and combat it the best way I could.
In your path through the tournament, were there one or two key hands/moments that got you on track?
I had a lot of major hands. Obviously there was the hand with Tiffany Michelle. [With 18 players remaining, Eastgate won a pot of nearly 10 million chips holding a pair of aces against Michelle's ace and jack.] There was the hand with Dennis Phillips at the final table on the K-2-2 flop. [With six players remaining, Phillips bet 7 million and Eastgate, holding pocket aces, moved all-in for 22 million. Phillips folded, giving Eastgate the chip lead.] You have also some of the folds that you don't see on the ESPN tapes, and situations where I made the right folds and my opponent didn't show me their hands. When I talked to the other guys after, they told me I had made the correct fold. So there are a lot of key points. But basically, folding at the right time and getting good setups at the right time is key, as well as big hands you win.
Who was the toughest player you went up against? Any big-name pros, or was it someone you just had trouble reading throughout the tournament?
Ivan [Demidov, the runner-up] was one of the toughest players. He played a very good final table as well; he's a really tough player. There are a lot of tough guys. Later on in the tournament, there were so many really solid players, and very few bad players.
So what's your background in poker?
I've been playing about two years professionally. More than four years total.
That's a pretty steep learning curve. How did you reach the top so fast?
For the first two years, I played poker as a hobby. I was very fascinated by the game. I put a lot of hours and hands into it. But I didn't get into poker with a serious approach, which means reading books, reading online forums, learning all the fundamentals before you start off. I kind of just learned by doing.
What do you consider your biggest strength?
I'm pretty good at looking at the psychological aspects of the game. You need to consider what your opponent is thinking. You should always try to get into your opponent's mindset, and if you can get a regular idea about how he's thinking, you have a huge edge in the match, because you're always one step ahead of him. You're thinking how he's thinking.
It sounds like you have more of an intuitive approach to making decisions than a math-based one.
Yeah, kind of.
You're a 22-year-old who's come into $9 million. What luxuries are you're going to indulge in?
I'll be traveling a lot and eating well. I feel very good about being able to treat my family and friends very good. I don't know what things I'll be buying specifically. But I look forward to treating my friends and family very well.
Monday, November 17, 2008
The New Liberal Order
This article by Peter Beinart, editor of The New Republic, explains well the historical perspective on the coming Obama administration and the chance for a new and long-awaited progressive movement. It is perfectly symbolic that the death and rebirth of American liberalism began in the same place in Chicago.
The New Liberal Order
By Peter Beinart Thursday, Nov. 13, 2008
The death and rebirth of American liberalism both began with flags in Grant Park. On Aug. 28, 1968, 10,000 people gathered there to protest the Democratic Convention taking place a few blocks away, which was about to nominate Lyndon Johnson's Vice President, Hubert Humphrey, thus implicitly ratifying the hated Vietnam War. Chicago mayor Richard Daley had warned the protesters not to disrupt his city and denied them permits to assemble, but they came anyway. All afternoon, the protesters chanted and the police hovered, until about 3:30, when someone climbed a flagpole and began lowering the American flag.
Police went to arrest the offender and were pelted with eggs, chunks of concrete and balloons filled with paint and urine. The police responded by charging into the crowd, clubbing bystanders and yelling "Kill! Kill!" in what one report later termed a "police riot." Across the country, Americans watching on television gave their verdict: Serves the damn hippies right. Democrats, who had won seven of the previous nine presidential elections, went on to lose seven of the next 10.
Forty years later, happy liberals mobbed Grant Park, invited by another mayor named Richard Daley, to celebrate Barack Obama's election. This time the flags flew proudly at full mast, and the police were there to protect the crowd, not threaten it. Once again, Americans watched on television, and this time they didn't seethe. They wept. (See pictures of Obama's Grant Park celebrations.)
The distance between those two Grant Park scenes says a lot about how American liberalism fell, and why in the Obama era it could become — once again — America's ruling creed. The coalition that carried Obama to victory is every bit as sturdy as America's last two dominant political coalitions: the ones that elected Franklin Roosevelt and Ronald Reagan. And the Obama majority is sturdy for one overriding reason: liberalism, which average Americans once associated with upheaval, now promises stability instead.
The Search for Order In America, political majorities live or die at the intersection of two public yearnings: for freedom and for order. A century ago, in the Progressive Era, modern American liberalism was born, in historian Robert Wiebe's words, as a "search for order." America's giant industrial monopolies, the progressives believed, were turning capitalism into a jungle, a wild and lawless place where only the strong and savage survived. By the time Roosevelt took office during the Great Depression, the entire ecosystem appeared to be in a death spiral, with Americans crying out for government to take control. F.D.R. did — juicing the economy with unprecedented amounts of government cash, creating new protections for the unemployed and the elderly, and imposing rules for how industry was to behave. Conservatives wailed that economic freedom was under assault, but most ordinary Americans thanked God that Washington was securing their bank deposits, helping labor unions boost their wages, giving them a pension when they retired and pumping money into the economy to make sure it never fell into depression again. They didn't feel unfree; they felt secure. For three and a half decades, from the mid-1930s through the '60s, government imposed order on the market. The jungle of American capitalism became a well-tended garden, a safe and pleasant place for ordinary folks to stroll. Americans responded by voting for F.D.R.-style liberalism — which even most Republican politicians came to accept — in election after election. (Read a TIME cover story on F.D.R.)
By the beginning of the 1960s, though, liberalism was becoming a victim of its own success. The post-World War II economic boom flooded America's colleges with the children of a rising middle class, and it was those children, who had never experienced life on an economic knife-edge, who began to question the status quo, the tidy, orderly society F.D.R. had built. For blacks in the South, they noted, order meant racial apartheid. For many women, it meant confinement to the home. For everyone, it meant stifling conformity, a society suffocated by rules about how people should dress, pray, imbibe and love. In 1962, Students for a Democratic Society spoke for what would become a new, baby-boom generation "bred in at least modest comfort," which wanted less order and more freedom. And it was this movement for racial, sexual and cultural liberation that bled into the movement against Vietnam and assembled in August 1968 in Grant Park.
Traditional liberalism died there because Americans — who had once associated it with order — came to associate it with disorder instead. For a vast swath of the white working class, racial freedom came to mean riots and crime; sexual freedom came to mean divorce; and cultural freedom came to mean disrespect for family, church and flag. Richard Nixon and later Reagan won the presidency by promising a new order: not economic but cultural, not the taming of the market but the taming of the street.
The Receding RightFlash forward to the evening of Nov. 4, and you can see why liberalism has sprung back to life. Ideologically, the crowds who assembled to hear Obama on election night were linear descendants of those egg throwers four decades before. They too believe in racial equality, gay rights, feminism, civil liberties and people's right to follow their own star. But 40 years later, those ideas no longer seem disorderly. Crime is down and riots nonexistent; feminism is so mainstream that even Sarah Palin embraces the term; Chicago mayor Richard Daley, son of the man who told police to bash heads, marches in gay-rights parades. Culturally, liberalism isn't that scary anymore. Younger Americans — who voted overwhelmingly for Obama — largely embrace the legacy of the '60s, and yet they constitute one of the most obedient, least rebellious generations in memory. The culture war is ending because cultural freedom and cultural order — the two forces that faced off in Chicago in 1968 — have turned out to be reconcilable after all.
The disorder that panics Americans now is not cultural but economic. If liberalism collapsed in the 1960s because its bid for cultural freedom became associated with cultural disorder, conservatism has collapsed today because its bid for economic freedom has become associated with economic disorder. When Reagan took power in 1981, he vowed to restore the economic liberty that a half-century of F.D.R.-style government intrusion had stifled. American capitalism had become so thoroughly domesticated, he argued, that it lost its capacity for dynamic growth. For a time, a majority of Americans agreed. Taxes and regulations were cut and cut again, and for the most part, the economic pie grew. In the 1980s and '90s, the garden of American capitalism became a pretty energetic place. But it became a scarier place too. In the newly deregulated American economy, fewer people had job security or fixed-benefit pensions or reliable health care. Some got rich, but a lot went bankrupt, mostly because of health-care costs. As Yale University political scientist Jacob Hacker has noted, Americans today experience far-more-violent swings in household income than did their parents a generation ago. (See pictures of the 1958 recession.)
Starting in the 1990s, average Americans began deciding that the conservative economic agenda was a bit like the liberal cultural agenda of the 1960s: less liberating than frightening. When the Gingrich Republicans tried to slash Medicare, the public turned on them en masse. A decade later, when George W. Bush tried to partially privatize Social Security, Americans rebelled once again. In 2005 a Pew Research Center survey identified a new group of voters that it called "pro-government conservatives." They were culturally conservative and hawkish on foreign policy, and they overwhelmingly supported Bush in 2004. But by large majorities, they endorsed government regulation and government spending. They didn't want to unleash the free market; they wanted to rein it in.
Those voters were a time bomb in the Republican coalition, which detonated on Nov. 4. John McCain's promises to cut taxes, cut spending and get government out of the way left them cold. Among the almost half of voters who said they were "very worried" that the economic crisis would hurt their family, Obama beat McCain by 26 points. (See pictures of Obama's campaign.)
The public mood on economics today is a lot like the public mood on culture 40 years ago: Americans want government to impose law and order — to keep their 401(k)s from going down, to keep their health-care premiums from going up, to keep their jobs from going overseas — and they don't much care whose heads Washington has to bash to do it.
Seizing the MomentThat is both Obama's great challenge and his great opportunity. If he can do what F.D.R. did — make American capitalism stabler and less savage — he will establish a Democratic majority that dominates U.S. politics for a generation. And despite the daunting problems he inherits, he's got an excellent chance. For one thing, taking aggressive action to stimulate the economy, regulate the financial industry and shore up the American welfare state won't divide his political coalition; it will divide the other side. On domestic economics, Democrats up and down the class ladder mostly agree. Even among Democratic Party economists, the divide that existed during the Clinton years between deficit hawks like Robert Rubin and free spenders like Robert Reich has largely evaporated, as everyone has embraced a bigger government role. Today it's Republicans who — though more unified on cultural issues — are split badly between upscale business types who want government out of the way and pro-government conservatives who want Washington's help. If Obama moves forcefully to restore economic order, the Wall Street Journal will squawk about creeping socialism, as it did in F.D.R.'s day, but many downscale Republicans will cheer. It's these working-class Reagan Democrats who could become tomorrow's Obama Republicans — a key component of a new liberal majority — if he alleviates their economic fears. See pictures of former Presidents Clinton and Bush.
Obama doesn't have to turn the economy around overnight. After all, Roosevelt hadn't ended the Depression by 1936. Obama just needs modest economic improvement by the time he starts running for re-election and an image as someone relentlessly focused on fixing America's economic woes. In allocating his time in his first months as President, he should remember what voters told exit pollsters they cared about most — 63% said the economy. (No other issue even exceeded 10%.)
In politics, crisis often brings opportunity. If Obama restores some measure of economic order, kick-starting U.S. capitalism and softening its hard edges, and if he develops the kind of personal rapport with ordinary Americans that F.D.R. and Reagan had — and he has the communication skills to do it — liberals will probably hold sway in Washington until Sasha and Malia have kids. As that happens, the arguments that have framed economic debate in recent times — for large upper-income tax cuts or the partial privatization of Social Security and Medicare — will fade into irrelevance. In an era of liberal hegemony, they will seem as archaic as defending the welfare system became when conservatives were on top.
A New ConsensusThere are fault lines in the Obama coalition, to be sure. In a two-party system, it's impossible to construct a majority without bringing together people who disagree on big things. But Obama's majority is at least as cohesive as Reagan's or F.D.R.'s. The cultural issues that have long divided Democrats — gay marriage, gun control, abortion — are receding in importance as a post-'60s generation grows to adulthood. Foreign policy doesn't divide Democrats as bitterly as it used to either because, in the wake of Iraq, once-hawkish working-class whites have grown more skeptical of military force. In 2004, 22% of voters told exit pollsters that "moral values" were their top priority, and 19% said terrorism. This year terrorism got 9%, and no social issues even made the list.
The biggest potential land mine in the Obama coalition isn't the culture war or foreign policy; it's nationalism. On a range of issues, from global warming to immigration to trade to torture, college-educated liberals want to integrate more deeply America's economy, society and values with the rest of the world's. They want to make it easier for people and goods to legally cross America's borders, and they want global rules that govern how much America can pollute the atmosphere and how it conducts the war on terrorism. They believe that ceding some sovereignty is essential to making America prosperous, decent and safe. When it comes to free trade, immigration and multilateralism, though, downscale Democrats are more skeptical. In the future, the old struggle between freedom and order may play itself out on a global scale, as liberal internationalists try to establish new rules for a more interconnected planet and working-class nationalists protest that foreign bureaucrats threaten America's freedom.
But that's in the future. If Obama begins restoring order to the economy, Democrats will reap the rewards for a long time. Forty years ago, liberalism looked like the problem in a nation spinning out of control. Today a new version of it may be the solution. It's a very different day in Grant Park.
The New Liberal Order
By Peter Beinart Thursday, Nov. 13, 2008
The death and rebirth of American liberalism both began with flags in Grant Park. On Aug. 28, 1968, 10,000 people gathered there to protest the Democratic Convention taking place a few blocks away, which was about to nominate Lyndon Johnson's Vice President, Hubert Humphrey, thus implicitly ratifying the hated Vietnam War. Chicago mayor Richard Daley had warned the protesters not to disrupt his city and denied them permits to assemble, but they came anyway. All afternoon, the protesters chanted and the police hovered, until about 3:30, when someone climbed a flagpole and began lowering the American flag.
Police went to arrest the offender and were pelted with eggs, chunks of concrete and balloons filled with paint and urine. The police responded by charging into the crowd, clubbing bystanders and yelling "Kill! Kill!" in what one report later termed a "police riot." Across the country, Americans watching on television gave their verdict: Serves the damn hippies right. Democrats, who had won seven of the previous nine presidential elections, went on to lose seven of the next 10.
Forty years later, happy liberals mobbed Grant Park, invited by another mayor named Richard Daley, to celebrate Barack Obama's election. This time the flags flew proudly at full mast, and the police were there to protect the crowd, not threaten it. Once again, Americans watched on television, and this time they didn't seethe. They wept. (See pictures of Obama's Grant Park celebrations.)
The distance between those two Grant Park scenes says a lot about how American liberalism fell, and why in the Obama era it could become — once again — America's ruling creed. The coalition that carried Obama to victory is every bit as sturdy as America's last two dominant political coalitions: the ones that elected Franklin Roosevelt and Ronald Reagan. And the Obama majority is sturdy for one overriding reason: liberalism, which average Americans once associated with upheaval, now promises stability instead.
The Search for Order In America, political majorities live or die at the intersection of two public yearnings: for freedom and for order. A century ago, in the Progressive Era, modern American liberalism was born, in historian Robert Wiebe's words, as a "search for order." America's giant industrial monopolies, the progressives believed, were turning capitalism into a jungle, a wild and lawless place where only the strong and savage survived. By the time Roosevelt took office during the Great Depression, the entire ecosystem appeared to be in a death spiral, with Americans crying out for government to take control. F.D.R. did — juicing the economy with unprecedented amounts of government cash, creating new protections for the unemployed and the elderly, and imposing rules for how industry was to behave. Conservatives wailed that economic freedom was under assault, but most ordinary Americans thanked God that Washington was securing their bank deposits, helping labor unions boost their wages, giving them a pension when they retired and pumping money into the economy to make sure it never fell into depression again. They didn't feel unfree; they felt secure. For three and a half decades, from the mid-1930s through the '60s, government imposed order on the market. The jungle of American capitalism became a well-tended garden, a safe and pleasant place for ordinary folks to stroll. Americans responded by voting for F.D.R.-style liberalism — which even most Republican politicians came to accept — in election after election. (Read a TIME cover story on F.D.R.)
By the beginning of the 1960s, though, liberalism was becoming a victim of its own success. The post-World War II economic boom flooded America's colleges with the children of a rising middle class, and it was those children, who had never experienced life on an economic knife-edge, who began to question the status quo, the tidy, orderly society F.D.R. had built. For blacks in the South, they noted, order meant racial apartheid. For many women, it meant confinement to the home. For everyone, it meant stifling conformity, a society suffocated by rules about how people should dress, pray, imbibe and love. In 1962, Students for a Democratic Society spoke for what would become a new, baby-boom generation "bred in at least modest comfort," which wanted less order and more freedom. And it was this movement for racial, sexual and cultural liberation that bled into the movement against Vietnam and assembled in August 1968 in Grant Park.
Traditional liberalism died there because Americans — who had once associated it with order — came to associate it with disorder instead. For a vast swath of the white working class, racial freedom came to mean riots and crime; sexual freedom came to mean divorce; and cultural freedom came to mean disrespect for family, church and flag. Richard Nixon and later Reagan won the presidency by promising a new order: not economic but cultural, not the taming of the market but the taming of the street.
The Receding RightFlash forward to the evening of Nov. 4, and you can see why liberalism has sprung back to life. Ideologically, the crowds who assembled to hear Obama on election night were linear descendants of those egg throwers four decades before. They too believe in racial equality, gay rights, feminism, civil liberties and people's right to follow their own star. But 40 years later, those ideas no longer seem disorderly. Crime is down and riots nonexistent; feminism is so mainstream that even Sarah Palin embraces the term; Chicago mayor Richard Daley, son of the man who told police to bash heads, marches in gay-rights parades. Culturally, liberalism isn't that scary anymore. Younger Americans — who voted overwhelmingly for Obama — largely embrace the legacy of the '60s, and yet they constitute one of the most obedient, least rebellious generations in memory. The culture war is ending because cultural freedom and cultural order — the two forces that faced off in Chicago in 1968 — have turned out to be reconcilable after all.
The disorder that panics Americans now is not cultural but economic. If liberalism collapsed in the 1960s because its bid for cultural freedom became associated with cultural disorder, conservatism has collapsed today because its bid for economic freedom has become associated with economic disorder. When Reagan took power in 1981, he vowed to restore the economic liberty that a half-century of F.D.R.-style government intrusion had stifled. American capitalism had become so thoroughly domesticated, he argued, that it lost its capacity for dynamic growth. For a time, a majority of Americans agreed. Taxes and regulations were cut and cut again, and for the most part, the economic pie grew. In the 1980s and '90s, the garden of American capitalism became a pretty energetic place. But it became a scarier place too. In the newly deregulated American economy, fewer people had job security or fixed-benefit pensions or reliable health care. Some got rich, but a lot went bankrupt, mostly because of health-care costs. As Yale University political scientist Jacob Hacker has noted, Americans today experience far-more-violent swings in household income than did their parents a generation ago. (See pictures of the 1958 recession.)
Starting in the 1990s, average Americans began deciding that the conservative economic agenda was a bit like the liberal cultural agenda of the 1960s: less liberating than frightening. When the Gingrich Republicans tried to slash Medicare, the public turned on them en masse. A decade later, when George W. Bush tried to partially privatize Social Security, Americans rebelled once again. In 2005 a Pew Research Center survey identified a new group of voters that it called "pro-government conservatives." They were culturally conservative and hawkish on foreign policy, and they overwhelmingly supported Bush in 2004. But by large majorities, they endorsed government regulation and government spending. They didn't want to unleash the free market; they wanted to rein it in.
Those voters were a time bomb in the Republican coalition, which detonated on Nov. 4. John McCain's promises to cut taxes, cut spending and get government out of the way left them cold. Among the almost half of voters who said they were "very worried" that the economic crisis would hurt their family, Obama beat McCain by 26 points. (See pictures of Obama's campaign.)
The public mood on economics today is a lot like the public mood on culture 40 years ago: Americans want government to impose law and order — to keep their 401(k)s from going down, to keep their health-care premiums from going up, to keep their jobs from going overseas — and they don't much care whose heads Washington has to bash to do it.
Seizing the MomentThat is both Obama's great challenge and his great opportunity. If he can do what F.D.R. did — make American capitalism stabler and less savage — he will establish a Democratic majority that dominates U.S. politics for a generation. And despite the daunting problems he inherits, he's got an excellent chance. For one thing, taking aggressive action to stimulate the economy, regulate the financial industry and shore up the American welfare state won't divide his political coalition; it will divide the other side. On domestic economics, Democrats up and down the class ladder mostly agree. Even among Democratic Party economists, the divide that existed during the Clinton years between deficit hawks like Robert Rubin and free spenders like Robert Reich has largely evaporated, as everyone has embraced a bigger government role. Today it's Republicans who — though more unified on cultural issues — are split badly between upscale business types who want government out of the way and pro-government conservatives who want Washington's help. If Obama moves forcefully to restore economic order, the Wall Street Journal will squawk about creeping socialism, as it did in F.D.R.'s day, but many downscale Republicans will cheer. It's these working-class Reagan Democrats who could become tomorrow's Obama Republicans — a key component of a new liberal majority — if he alleviates their economic fears. See pictures of former Presidents Clinton and Bush.
Obama doesn't have to turn the economy around overnight. After all, Roosevelt hadn't ended the Depression by 1936. Obama just needs modest economic improvement by the time he starts running for re-election and an image as someone relentlessly focused on fixing America's economic woes. In allocating his time in his first months as President, he should remember what voters told exit pollsters they cared about most — 63% said the economy. (No other issue even exceeded 10%.)
In politics, crisis often brings opportunity. If Obama restores some measure of economic order, kick-starting U.S. capitalism and softening its hard edges, and if he develops the kind of personal rapport with ordinary Americans that F.D.R. and Reagan had — and he has the communication skills to do it — liberals will probably hold sway in Washington until Sasha and Malia have kids. As that happens, the arguments that have framed economic debate in recent times — for large upper-income tax cuts or the partial privatization of Social Security and Medicare — will fade into irrelevance. In an era of liberal hegemony, they will seem as archaic as defending the welfare system became when conservatives were on top.
A New ConsensusThere are fault lines in the Obama coalition, to be sure. In a two-party system, it's impossible to construct a majority without bringing together people who disagree on big things. But Obama's majority is at least as cohesive as Reagan's or F.D.R.'s. The cultural issues that have long divided Democrats — gay marriage, gun control, abortion — are receding in importance as a post-'60s generation grows to adulthood. Foreign policy doesn't divide Democrats as bitterly as it used to either because, in the wake of Iraq, once-hawkish working-class whites have grown more skeptical of military force. In 2004, 22% of voters told exit pollsters that "moral values" were their top priority, and 19% said terrorism. This year terrorism got 9%, and no social issues even made the list.
The biggest potential land mine in the Obama coalition isn't the culture war or foreign policy; it's nationalism. On a range of issues, from global warming to immigration to trade to torture, college-educated liberals want to integrate more deeply America's economy, society and values with the rest of the world's. They want to make it easier for people and goods to legally cross America's borders, and they want global rules that govern how much America can pollute the atmosphere and how it conducts the war on terrorism. They believe that ceding some sovereignty is essential to making America prosperous, decent and safe. When it comes to free trade, immigration and multilateralism, though, downscale Democrats are more skeptical. In the future, the old struggle between freedom and order may play itself out on a global scale, as liberal internationalists try to establish new rules for a more interconnected planet and working-class nationalists protest that foreign bureaucrats threaten America's freedom.
But that's in the future. If Obama begins restoring order to the economy, Democrats will reap the rewards for a long time. Forty years ago, liberalism looked like the problem in a nation spinning out of control. Today a new version of it may be the solution. It's a very different day in Grant Park.
Saturday, November 15, 2008
For Obama and Family, a Personal Transition
BY Peter Baker
New York Times, November 13, 2008
CHICAGO — A couple of weeks ago, Barack Obama headed to the Hyde Park Hair Salon for a trim. He greeted the staff and other customers and plopped down in the same chair in front of the same barber who has cut his hair for the last 14 years.
But when he wanted a trim this week, the Secret Service took one look at the shop’s large plate-glass windows and the gawking tourists eager for a glimpse of the president-elect and the plan quickly changed. If Mr. Obama could no longer come to the barber, the barber would come to him and cut his hair at a friend’s apartment.
Life for the newly chosen president and his family has changed forever. Even the constraints and security of the campaign trail do not compare to the bubble that has enveloped him in the 10 days since his election. Renegade, as the Secret Service calls him, now lives within the strict limits that come with the most powerful office on the planet.
He has chosen to spend this interval before his Jan. 20 inauguration at his home in Hyde Park, which has in some ways been transformed into a secure fortress for his protection. After two years of daily speeches and rallies, he has retreated into an almost hermitlike seclusion, largely hidden from public view and spotted only when he drops his two daughters off for school or goes for a workout at the gymnasium in a friend’s apartment building.
“This is a tremendous personal transition, as well, far beyond what anyone could imagine,” said Alexi Giannoulias, the Illinois state treasurer and a close friend. “Little things, like going to the gym, going to the movies, going to dinner with his wife, none of that will ever be the same again. Things that we take for granted.”
Mr. Obama is putting off the change as much as he can by remaining in Chicago during the transition. “I am not going to be spending too much time in Washington over the next several weeks,” he told someone in a telephone conversation overheard by reporters on his chartered plane heading back to Chicago after a White House visit on Monday.
Indeed, he was on the ground in Washington less than four hours for his tour and talk with President Bush. Mr. Obama has yet to take a vacation since the election, as he works on selecting a White House staff, building a cabinet and formulating policies. But friends and aides said he was also using this time to concentrate on his family before moving to the most famous address in the nation.
The personal considerations coincide with political calculation as well. By remaining in Chicago, it may be easier for him to avoid becoming drawn into decisions by the departing administration and may accentuate the sense of change when he returns to Washington as the new president. He will not be around, for example, for the global economic summit meeting starting Friday, nor for the lame-duck Congressional session next week.
But the trappings of his life are increasingly presidential. Although he does not yet have access to Air Force One, he now rides in an armored government limousine, complete with the war wagon and other motorcade vehicles zipping through red lights with traffic blocked. Although the Secret Service long ago set up concrete barriers around his house here, they expanded their perimeter by several blocks after the election and brought in explosive-sniffing dogs.
“It’s changed,” said Mesha Caudle, 45, who lives a block from the Obamas. “It’s a little inconvenient, just a little, when you have to go around three blocks to go one block. I don’t mind, though, because I got the president I voted for. If the price is a little inconvenience, that’s O.K.”
The Obama house, bought for $1.65 million in 2005, is a stately mansion in the middle of the racially and economically diverse Hyde Park-Kenwood area near the University of Chicago, shielded by trees, not to mention the phalanx of Secret Service agents and Chicago police officers. The neighborhood is a mix of grand homes, aging but well-tended brick houses and dilapidated buildings. Across the street, renovated condominiums start at $190,000. Just blocks away, some houses are boarded up.
Most modern presidents have had a ranch, farm or estate easily isolated from the community around it. Mr. Obama is the first since Richard M. Nixon to be elected while living in a urban neighborhood, and Mr. Nixon soon sold his New York City apartment and retreated during his presidency to exclusive getaways in Florida and California. Mr. Obama, by contrast, is expected to keep his Chicago home.
The streets around Mr. Obama’s home have been closed to outside traffic. Residents show picture identification at checkpoints as officers scan lists of pre-cleared people. The K.A.M. Isaiah Israel synagogue across the street gave the Secret Service a list of 2,000 members and regular visitors, who are checked by metal detectors before services. “It’s actually not as big a deal as it may appear,” said Linda Ross, the temple’s executive director.
A property manager trying to rent $750-a-month apartments three doors down from the Obamas said applicants, janitors and contractors all must be cleared. “The day after he made his speech in Grant Park, things changed dramatically,” said the property manager, whose boss told him not to give his name to reporters. “Before they had Chicago police around his house and it was barricaded. The day he became president-elect, they moved the barricades three blocks out.”
For Mr. Obama, it means no more casually stopping by the Medici for pastries or heading over to Valois for lunch or window shopping with the girls at 57th Street Books, at least not without elaborate preparation. He did manage to take his wife, Michelle, on Saturday night to Spiaggia, a four-star Italian restaurant in downtown Chicago, where the future president loves the wood-roasted scallops.
The Obamas have been going to Spiaggia with its lakefront view for years for what they call “date night,” including on their anniversary last month and Michelle’s birthday earlier this year. “It’s always just the two of them,” said Tony Mantuano, the chef and co-owner. “Now it’s just the two of them and 30 Secret Service agents.”
His day starts with breakfast with his daughters, aides said, and he has taken them to school a few times. For his daily workout, he uses the gymnasium at Regents Park apartment building where his friend, Mike Signator, lives. He later heads to transition offices set up in the Kluczynski Federal Building and receives daily intelligence briefings. He could be interviewing cabinet candidates, but no one will say.
“He seems to be very, very focused on the transition,” said his friend, John W. Rogers Jr. chairman of Ariel Investments, who lent office space to Mr. Obama until the federal space was available. “It doesn’t seem to have changed him at all. He’s the same relaxed, in-control, engaging Barack that he’s always been. I’ve been struck by that, that it hasn’t shifted him.”
Perhaps no one knows that kind of thing more than a man’s barber. Mr. Obama’s barber, Zariff, 44, who goes by one name, went over to Mr. Signator’s apartment on Tuesday to give Mr. Obama his usual $21 cut and said his longtime client still seemed the same. As he walked in, Zariff remembered, he called him “Mr. President,” and Mr. Obama laughed.
“He’s looking a lot more presidential now; he walks a little different,” said Zariff, who himself has become a local celebrity and is thinking about opening a shop in Washington. Mr. Obama is no longer the guy strolling around the neighborhood.
"I think he misses that a lot,” Zariff said. “But that’s the price of fame.”
New York Times, November 13, 2008
CHICAGO — A couple of weeks ago, Barack Obama headed to the Hyde Park Hair Salon for a trim. He greeted the staff and other customers and plopped down in the same chair in front of the same barber who has cut his hair for the last 14 years.
But when he wanted a trim this week, the Secret Service took one look at the shop’s large plate-glass windows and the gawking tourists eager for a glimpse of the president-elect and the plan quickly changed. If Mr. Obama could no longer come to the barber, the barber would come to him and cut his hair at a friend’s apartment.
Life for the newly chosen president and his family has changed forever. Even the constraints and security of the campaign trail do not compare to the bubble that has enveloped him in the 10 days since his election. Renegade, as the Secret Service calls him, now lives within the strict limits that come with the most powerful office on the planet.
He has chosen to spend this interval before his Jan. 20 inauguration at his home in Hyde Park, which has in some ways been transformed into a secure fortress for his protection. After two years of daily speeches and rallies, he has retreated into an almost hermitlike seclusion, largely hidden from public view and spotted only when he drops his two daughters off for school or goes for a workout at the gymnasium in a friend’s apartment building.
“This is a tremendous personal transition, as well, far beyond what anyone could imagine,” said Alexi Giannoulias, the Illinois state treasurer and a close friend. “Little things, like going to the gym, going to the movies, going to dinner with his wife, none of that will ever be the same again. Things that we take for granted.”
Mr. Obama is putting off the change as much as he can by remaining in Chicago during the transition. “I am not going to be spending too much time in Washington over the next several weeks,” he told someone in a telephone conversation overheard by reporters on his chartered plane heading back to Chicago after a White House visit on Monday.
Indeed, he was on the ground in Washington less than four hours for his tour and talk with President Bush. Mr. Obama has yet to take a vacation since the election, as he works on selecting a White House staff, building a cabinet and formulating policies. But friends and aides said he was also using this time to concentrate on his family before moving to the most famous address in the nation.
The personal considerations coincide with political calculation as well. By remaining in Chicago, it may be easier for him to avoid becoming drawn into decisions by the departing administration and may accentuate the sense of change when he returns to Washington as the new president. He will not be around, for example, for the global economic summit meeting starting Friday, nor for the lame-duck Congressional session next week.
But the trappings of his life are increasingly presidential. Although he does not yet have access to Air Force One, he now rides in an armored government limousine, complete with the war wagon and other motorcade vehicles zipping through red lights with traffic blocked. Although the Secret Service long ago set up concrete barriers around his house here, they expanded their perimeter by several blocks after the election and brought in explosive-sniffing dogs.
“It’s changed,” said Mesha Caudle, 45, who lives a block from the Obamas. “It’s a little inconvenient, just a little, when you have to go around three blocks to go one block. I don’t mind, though, because I got the president I voted for. If the price is a little inconvenience, that’s O.K.”
The Obama house, bought for $1.65 million in 2005, is a stately mansion in the middle of the racially and economically diverse Hyde Park-Kenwood area near the University of Chicago, shielded by trees, not to mention the phalanx of Secret Service agents and Chicago police officers. The neighborhood is a mix of grand homes, aging but well-tended brick houses and dilapidated buildings. Across the street, renovated condominiums start at $190,000. Just blocks away, some houses are boarded up.
Most modern presidents have had a ranch, farm or estate easily isolated from the community around it. Mr. Obama is the first since Richard M. Nixon to be elected while living in a urban neighborhood, and Mr. Nixon soon sold his New York City apartment and retreated during his presidency to exclusive getaways in Florida and California. Mr. Obama, by contrast, is expected to keep his Chicago home.
The streets around Mr. Obama’s home have been closed to outside traffic. Residents show picture identification at checkpoints as officers scan lists of pre-cleared people. The K.A.M. Isaiah Israel synagogue across the street gave the Secret Service a list of 2,000 members and regular visitors, who are checked by metal detectors before services. “It’s actually not as big a deal as it may appear,” said Linda Ross, the temple’s executive director.
A property manager trying to rent $750-a-month apartments three doors down from the Obamas said applicants, janitors and contractors all must be cleared. “The day after he made his speech in Grant Park, things changed dramatically,” said the property manager, whose boss told him not to give his name to reporters. “Before they had Chicago police around his house and it was barricaded. The day he became president-elect, they moved the barricades three blocks out.”
For Mr. Obama, it means no more casually stopping by the Medici for pastries or heading over to Valois for lunch or window shopping with the girls at 57th Street Books, at least not without elaborate preparation. He did manage to take his wife, Michelle, on Saturday night to Spiaggia, a four-star Italian restaurant in downtown Chicago, where the future president loves the wood-roasted scallops.
The Obamas have been going to Spiaggia with its lakefront view for years for what they call “date night,” including on their anniversary last month and Michelle’s birthday earlier this year. “It’s always just the two of them,” said Tony Mantuano, the chef and co-owner. “Now it’s just the two of them and 30 Secret Service agents.”
His day starts with breakfast with his daughters, aides said, and he has taken them to school a few times. For his daily workout, he uses the gymnasium at Regents Park apartment building where his friend, Mike Signator, lives. He later heads to transition offices set up in the Kluczynski Federal Building and receives daily intelligence briefings. He could be interviewing cabinet candidates, but no one will say.
“He seems to be very, very focused on the transition,” said his friend, John W. Rogers Jr. chairman of Ariel Investments, who lent office space to Mr. Obama until the federal space was available. “It doesn’t seem to have changed him at all. He’s the same relaxed, in-control, engaging Barack that he’s always been. I’ve been struck by that, that it hasn’t shifted him.”
Perhaps no one knows that kind of thing more than a man’s barber. Mr. Obama’s barber, Zariff, 44, who goes by one name, went over to Mr. Signator’s apartment on Tuesday to give Mr. Obama his usual $21 cut and said his longtime client still seemed the same. As he walked in, Zariff remembered, he called him “Mr. President,” and Mr. Obama laughed.
“He’s looking a lot more presidential now; he walks a little different,” said Zariff, who himself has become a local celebrity and is thinking about opening a shop in Washington. Mr. Obama is no longer the guy strolling around the neighborhood.
"I think he misses that a lot,” Zariff said. “But that’s the price of fame.”
Friday, November 14, 2008
Sean Wilentz - Andrew Jackson
This slim volume by renowned historian Sean Wilentz will likely become THE quick one-volume reference on the life of Andrew Jackson. This issue is part of Arthur Schlesinger's series on American Presidents.
Wilentz presents a carefully nuanced portrait of Jackson, which one has to do given the enormity of the life and influence of our 7th President. It is possible to applaud Jackson's accomplishments---the first common President, the first President to champion the cause of the people (albeit propertyless white men, which was the people in his time), fighting for the people against what he called "the money power." But then we must recognize his racism, typical of his time, and his horrific Indian Removal policy, which resulted in the deaths of thousands of Native Americans.
Jackson bested Calhoun in the nullification controversey and thereby saved the Union for the time being. Lincoln found inspiration in Jackson's patriotism.
Jackson enhanced the power of the Presidency. It was under Jackson that the executive branch became the dominant branch of government.
Historians can take sides in the issue of Jackson vs J Q Adams. Both were great Americans, and I think we can appreciate both without taking sides.
I continue my Andrew Jackson reading and hope to have more to say later.
Wilentz presents a carefully nuanced portrait of Jackson, which one has to do given the enormity of the life and influence of our 7th President. It is possible to applaud Jackson's accomplishments---the first common President, the first President to champion the cause of the people (albeit propertyless white men, which was the people in his time), fighting for the people against what he called "the money power." But then we must recognize his racism, typical of his time, and his horrific Indian Removal policy, which resulted in the deaths of thousands of Native Americans.
Jackson bested Calhoun in the nullification controversey and thereby saved the Union for the time being. Lincoln found inspiration in Jackson's patriotism.
Jackson enhanced the power of the Presidency. It was under Jackson that the executive branch became the dominant branch of government.
Historians can take sides in the issue of Jackson vs J Q Adams. Both were great Americans, and I think we can appreciate both without taking sides.
I continue my Andrew Jackson reading and hope to have more to say later.
The Intellectual Bankruptcy of the Republican Party
Fareed Zakaria discusses the out-of-touch Republican Party
Zakaria: GOP bereft of ideas or trapped by wrong ones
Story Highlights
Zakaria: GOP's social program out of touch with young, diverse, tolerant electorate
Voters sensed a new world out there; McCain campaign didn't address change
Zakaria: Challenge is secure interests; create stable, peaceful, prosperous world
Editor's note: Fareed Zakaria is a foreign affairs analyst who hosts "Fareed Zakaria: GPS" on CNN at 1 p.m. ET Sundays.
Fareed Zakaria says "We need to have communication channels open."
NEW YORK (CNN) -- On the day President-elect Obama visited the White House, a new national poll suggested that the current occupant at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. is the most unpopular president since approval ratings were first measured more than six decades ago. Seventy-six percent of those questioned in a CNN/Opinion Research Corp. survey released Monday disapprove of how President Bush is handling his job. That's an all-time high in polling by CNN or Gallup dating back to World War II. CNN spoke to world affairs expert and author Fareed Zakaria to get his take on what the Republican Party should do to get back on track.CNN: If we accept that President-Elect Barack Obama and the Democrats seem to have won largely on the message of change, then why do you think Sen. John McCain and the Republicans lost?
Zakaria: I actually think that there were broad reasons for the resounding Republican loss and that they need to rethink their ideas before they can start winning again.
CNN: It was their ideas and not their strategy?
Zakaria: The Republican Party has become a party bereft of ideas or trapped by the wrong ones. The Reagan-Thatcher revolution of low taxes, deregulation and tight money isn't relevant to the problems of under-regulated financial products, huge deficits and a deepening recession. Add to that the Republican Party's social program is out of tune with an increasingly young, diverse and tolerant electorate.
Something similar has happened in foreign policy. Voters have seemed to sense that there is a new world out there and that the solutions presented by McCain in his campaign didn't address the change.
Don't Miss
'Fareed Zakaria: GPS'
Zakaria's new book: 'The Post-American World'
CNN: But do you really think that American voters care about foreign policy? Especially when it seems it was the economy that mattered more.
Zakaria: The economy was definitely an issue, but note that President Bush's approval ratings had plummeted to historic lows by 2005 even when the economy seemed to be on a steady course. And I do believe the vigorous unilateralism openly advocated by the administration is recognized by most Americans to have weakened the country's influence abroad. Its excessive reliance on military force has yielded few results relative to the costs. Zakaria urges Obama to 'go big' to fix economy »
At the heart of President Bush's ideology was regime change -- armed Wilsonianism. Whether in Iraq, North Korea or Iran, the basic goal was to refuse any kind of negotiation or diplomacy and instead try to overthrow the government and replace it with a democratic and friendly one. Most Americans now recognize that, however pleasant this sounds in theory, the real world is a complicated place and cannot be transformed by magic or military power.
CNN: So we need to negotiate with the enemy?
Zakaria: We need to have communication channels open. As former Secretary of State Madeline Albright said on our show, "Talking is not necessarily making nice. It is delivering tough messages and listening. I would bet that Milosevic didn't think that he was having a nice conversation with me -- or Kim Jong Il, for that matter."
Recently, even President Bush himself has seen the necessity of this. Over the past three years, he has negotiated with North Korea and Libya and even taken a tentative step with Iran; launched a high-profile peace process between the Palestinians and Israelis; and made encouraging proposals about global warming. These are all steps Bush actively opposed during his first term. He has moved in this direction out of necessity. Failure concentrates the mind.
CNN: So what would you recommend to the Republican Party?
Zakaria: They need to realize the world is changing and the old rules don't apply. They need to be innovative as Ronald Reagan was in 1980. Shouting "USA is No. 1" is cheap rhetoric, divorced from the real world. The real challenge for Washington is not to boast about America's might but to use its capacities -- military, political, intellectual -- to work with others to create a more stable, peaceful and prosperous world in which American interests and ideals will be secure.
Zakaria: GOP bereft of ideas or trapped by wrong ones
Story Highlights
Zakaria: GOP's social program out of touch with young, diverse, tolerant electorate
Voters sensed a new world out there; McCain campaign didn't address change
Zakaria: Challenge is secure interests; create stable, peaceful, prosperous world
Editor's note: Fareed Zakaria is a foreign affairs analyst who hosts "Fareed Zakaria: GPS" on CNN at 1 p.m. ET Sundays.
Fareed Zakaria says "We need to have communication channels open."
NEW YORK (CNN) -- On the day President-elect Obama visited the White House, a new national poll suggested that the current occupant at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. is the most unpopular president since approval ratings were first measured more than six decades ago. Seventy-six percent of those questioned in a CNN/Opinion Research Corp. survey released Monday disapprove of how President Bush is handling his job. That's an all-time high in polling by CNN or Gallup dating back to World War II. CNN spoke to world affairs expert and author Fareed Zakaria to get his take on what the Republican Party should do to get back on track.CNN: If we accept that President-Elect Barack Obama and the Democrats seem to have won largely on the message of change, then why do you think Sen. John McCain and the Republicans lost?
Zakaria: I actually think that there were broad reasons for the resounding Republican loss and that they need to rethink their ideas before they can start winning again.
CNN: It was their ideas and not their strategy?
Zakaria: The Republican Party has become a party bereft of ideas or trapped by the wrong ones. The Reagan-Thatcher revolution of low taxes, deregulation and tight money isn't relevant to the problems of under-regulated financial products, huge deficits and a deepening recession. Add to that the Republican Party's social program is out of tune with an increasingly young, diverse and tolerant electorate.
Something similar has happened in foreign policy. Voters have seemed to sense that there is a new world out there and that the solutions presented by McCain in his campaign didn't address the change.
Don't Miss
'Fareed Zakaria: GPS'
Zakaria's new book: 'The Post-American World'
CNN: But do you really think that American voters care about foreign policy? Especially when it seems it was the economy that mattered more.
Zakaria: The economy was definitely an issue, but note that President Bush's approval ratings had plummeted to historic lows by 2005 even when the economy seemed to be on a steady course. And I do believe the vigorous unilateralism openly advocated by the administration is recognized by most Americans to have weakened the country's influence abroad. Its excessive reliance on military force has yielded few results relative to the costs. Zakaria urges Obama to 'go big' to fix economy »
At the heart of President Bush's ideology was regime change -- armed Wilsonianism. Whether in Iraq, North Korea or Iran, the basic goal was to refuse any kind of negotiation or diplomacy and instead try to overthrow the government and replace it with a democratic and friendly one. Most Americans now recognize that, however pleasant this sounds in theory, the real world is a complicated place and cannot be transformed by magic or military power.
CNN: So we need to negotiate with the enemy?
Zakaria: We need to have communication channels open. As former Secretary of State Madeline Albright said on our show, "Talking is not necessarily making nice. It is delivering tough messages and listening. I would bet that Milosevic didn't think that he was having a nice conversation with me -- or Kim Jong Il, for that matter."
Recently, even President Bush himself has seen the necessity of this. Over the past three years, he has negotiated with North Korea and Libya and even taken a tentative step with Iran; launched a high-profile peace process between the Palestinians and Israelis; and made encouraging proposals about global warming. These are all steps Bush actively opposed during his first term. He has moved in this direction out of necessity. Failure concentrates the mind.
CNN: So what would you recommend to the Republican Party?
Zakaria: They need to realize the world is changing and the old rules don't apply. They need to be innovative as Ronald Reagan was in 1980. Shouting "USA is No. 1" is cheap rhetoric, divorced from the real world. The real challenge for Washington is not to boast about America's might but to use its capacities -- military, political, intellectual -- to work with others to create a more stable, peaceful and prosperous world in which American interests and ideals will be secure.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)