Constructive Criticism

While I tend to think that the current framework for a deal is at least good enough that it should be passed if the alternative is passing nothing, I also agree with the criticism that Obama's harsh words for liberals at the end of his press conference last night were a pointless and counterproductive venting of personal frustration that is somewhat undeserved by the left anyway. But I think the left has been rather pointless and counterproductive in the way we treat Obama, and I do mean that from a strategic point of view.

When Obama makes some compromise with Republicans, we tend to say of him the following sorts of things: He has betrayed us. He's just a corporate shill after all. He doesn't actually have anything he really believes in. He's not much of a liberal after all. Etc, etc. And Hillary supporters love to mock we Obama supporters for having believed, you know, that the sky would open and the light would come down, etc.

But I at least never believed that. I knew that there was essentially no policy daylight between Obama and Clinton (and Hillary supporters should remember that now!). I supported Obama mainly because I thought he would have a better chance of winning. The entire point of "change we can believe in" was that this time, we'd actually be getting someone who would get the change done. And what we have gotten are a series of incremental measures each of which changes the country for the good in a non-negligible way, but a smaller way than could have been. Is Obama a "liberal"? Not the way I am. Is he more liberal than any President since at least Lyndon Johnson? Definitely. Is he more liberal than any Democratic nominee since at least McGovern if not Humphrey or Johnson himself? Again, yes. He is what I call an idealistic pragmatist, one who believes that the country can and should be made better but that the way to do this is by taking what you can, compromise, deal-making, politicking. He has always advertised himself as this. Yeah, maybe he was naive about how well he could get Republican support, but remember, he has needed Republican support (or Lieberman support, which is almost as bad) every day of his Presidency. And honestly, if it had worked, if the current culture of total obstruction had not taken total hold of the Republican caucus, if he had managed to be successful in his overtones toward them, we'd be in much, much better shape today.

So what should liberals say when Obama makes a disappointing deal with Republicans? We should say this: Look, Barack, we know you're trying and that your heart is in (approximately) the right place, and that you believe very strongly in the art of the possible. But this deal is not acceptable. You need leverage to drive a harder bargain from Republicans, well here it is: we can't support this current package. Improve it enough, maybe we will. If this position means that the whole deal falls apart, feel free to blame us; we're mainly from safe enough districts that we don't lose our elections because of it.

If, instead, we make criticisms like "Obama is just a tool of our corporate overlords" (which I've seen recently popping up on DailyKos), he has little or no incentive to cooperate with us. It's an irrational criticism. It is unlikely, given the fact that he's compiled the best domestic-policy record of any liberal President since LBJ, that there's very much he could do to placate it. And yeah, we have nowhere else to go; it's just true. So he has no particular incentive to cooperate with us. If we make it clear that we are not personally abandoning him, but that we are going to hold him to a high standard and in doing so we are going to strengthen his hand toward the Republicans with whom he must negotiate, then he does have an incentive to work with us. So there's plenty of blame to go around, but part of it lies with those Obama was criticizing.