WASHINGTON, Dec. 1, 2008
Liberals Hope To Push Obama Left
Democratic Base Pressuring President-Elect To Come Through On Campaign Promises; Frustration With Cabinet Picks Surfaces
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President-elect Barack Obama stands with Secretary of State-designate Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-N.Y., right, and Vice President-elect Joe Biden, left, at a news conference about his new cabinet appointments, in Chicago, Monday, Dec. 1, 2008. (AP Photo/Charles Dharapak)
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In-Depth Obama's Cabinet The latest names and status of posts within Obama's new administration.
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Photo Essay Accepting The Mantle President-elect Barack Obama addresses the nation and the world after his victory.
The president-elect drew plenty of support from moderates, but the liberal side of the Democratic Party followed him most resoundingly: labor unions, influential Internet blogs and legions of grassroots volunteers. He won almost 90 percent of the liberal vote, more than the previous two Democratic presidential nominees, John Kerry or Al Gore.
Now the same millions of left-leaning voters who worked relentlessly to get Obama elected want results. That means ending the war in Iraq, ushering in universal health care, halting harsh interrogation tactics against suspected terrorists, making it easier to form unions and aggressively tackling global warming.
"We'll see," said Eli Pariser, executive director of the liberal powerhouse Moveon.org, about what Obama will deliver. "If they turn out to be all disappointments, we'll have a good three years to storm the gates at the White House."
Already, the liberal blogosphere is showing its influence.
John Brennan, Obama's top pick to head the CIA, suddenly withdrew his name from consideration under pressure this past week. His potential appointment had raised a firestorm among liberal blogs that associate him with the Bush administration's interrogation, detention and rendition policies. Within hours, blogs that raised concerns about Brennan's career claimed victory about their successful exercise in free speech.
The debt is starting to come due on Obama's promise of "change we can believe in." Except he meant "we" in a broader sense.
He promised to lead with a bipartisan spirit, the kind that could unify a country and allow him to get deals through Congress. From the moment he won, he implored people: "Let us resist the temptation to fall back on the same partisanship."
And then he set out to take his own advice.
Obama's courting of Republicans - for ideas, legislative support, and potential roles in his Cabinet - is drawing cautious attention from the liberal base of his Democratic Party. The concern, to the degree that it exists this soon, is that Obama's emphasis on governing from the center may undermine the left.
He still pledges to wind down the war in Iraq, but everything comes second to fixing the staggering economy right now. He has stood up in defense for Sen. Joe Lieberman, a virtual Democratic outcast these days, and sought help from his Republican presidential foe, Sen. John McCain.
Obama is building a government with several Clinton administration faces, a move that has underwhelmed some liberal voices who are eager for a more dramatic sense of change.
In one posting that seemed to echo in the Internet community, liberal blogger Chris Bowers wrote, "I feel incredibly frustrated. ... Isn't there ever a point when we can get an actual Democratic administration? Why isn't there a single member of Obama's Cabinet who will be advising him from the left?"
Christopher Hayes, the Washington-based editor of The Nation, offered his own lament about a lack of progressive candidates for prominent leadership spots. He said the left has been right about Iraq, financial deregulation and global warming, and yet "no one who comes from the part of American political and intellectual life that has given birth to all of these ideas is anywhere to be found within miles of the Obama Cabinet so far."
Obama pushed back a bit this past week, saying his advisers will blend "experience with fresh thinking."
Of course, he is not done picking his Cabinet, let alone occupying the Oval Office yet. Any rumblings of discontent at this point show that expectations for Obama are enormous within his party. Labor unions and liberal groups spent big money and knocked on countless doors to help get Obama elected.
The undercurrent of concern is not that Obama, granted the title of most liberal senator in one prominent ranking, will suddenly abandon the people who helped elect him or change course on core causes. Rather, it is that liberal side of his party may have to wait longer for victories, and accept smaller ones.
That is the reality of governance right now.
"I think he's moving center-left, rather than left-center. It's fair to call him pragmatic," said Paul Light, a public policy professor and presidential historian at New York University. "I think labor is going to get a lot from him. I think his liberal supporters are going to get a lot from him. But they're going to be disappointed if they want all liberal all the time."
The economy is in such remarkably dreadful shape that Obama may get a pass on other matters while he tries to fix that one.
An early test will be how Obama's team works with congressional leaders and appropriations committee chairmen on his first priority, a massive bill to stimulate the economy. If Democrats go too far left on it, they may lose some conservative members of their own caucus and give Obama some fits.
The left could get early legislative victories on expanded health care for children from poor families, and looser restrictions on federally funded embryonic stem cell research. Obama's stimulus plan is bound to include spending and jobs supported by labor.
As for the anxious anti-war crowd, which helped propel Obama's campaign in its early days, Obama adviser David Axelrod said the new president will not renege on winding down the conflict in Iraq.
Obama says the challenges are simply too huge for the politics of labels; Democrats and Republicans must work together. Pragmatism rules.
"I think what the American people want more than anything is just common sense, smart government," he said. "They don't want ideology."
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See all 49 CommentsHave you looked at the other side of the coin?
Cutting and running in Iraq means the US will not be trusted to come to anybody''s aid so you might as well start making concessions to the militant Muslims. Ban women from universities, no more pork products, etc.
It depends on your description of universal health care. It could end up like bad military medicine where you are a number and never see the same doctor twice. Doctors might have to be conscripted to work in such a system and many might abandon the profession, leaving huge shortages.
Playing good cop only with suspected terrorists is an open invitation to attacks within the US.
Secondary boycotts and other tactics to unionize workplaces can lead to the enforced mediocrity of union rules, demarcation disputes, a lowering of productivity meaning the US further loses its competitive edge.
Aggressively tackling global warming can mean that the average person will be made to suffer for something that may or may not have any effect. There are moves to change people''s electricity meters so that they will be charged up to $2 a kilowatt hour if they use electricity at peak times, particularly for such purposes as air conditioning. $10 a gallon gasoline like some parts of Europe is another possibility.
It''s very likely you have ''dic911 nailed. The rightwing water carriers are obsessed with the strawman tactic, always wanting to be the ones to define people and situations. AKA, Lying.
Every sentence that rush, hannity, et. al., uses with the word "liberal" is a lie.
The only truth they ever offer is in fragments, to support their Big Lies.
By the way, ''dic911, if you don''t want to sound uneducated, learn spelling and sentence structure. Any 4th grade teacher would flunk you.
[Posted by wtcmedic911 at 09:10 AM : Dec 02, 2008]
you need to get out more. the general mantra from those on the right about liberals is they don''t work ... they sit at home watching jerry springer ... they''re collecting welfare indefinitely ... and they''re the cause of all the worlds problems (which of course, can only be resolved by conservatives).
[How about this... If your conservative you are logical and think things threw. if your liberal your emotional and think with your emotions. Even thou there have been studies that have proved this doesnt it sound snobbish and demeaning? ]
what studies are these? is this from the limbaugh institute ... or maybe it''s from the colter foundation ... or possibly this came from the hannity hallucinagenic study group. post the reference to this phantom study that supports your claims.
[The left will destroy this county if left to their own devices. ]
looks to me like there''s plenty of snobbery to go around.
[Posted by ghwab1949 at 07:21 PM : Dec 01, 2008]
really ... all he does is just all about him?
so ... say you have a law degree from harvard ... you''re a black man ... you were the first black president of the harvard law review ... you have an iq in the range of 120 or so.
what job do you think you could get with these credentials? what do you suppose you''d be making in a couple of years? isn''t this the thinking of one who only is looking out for himself? what did obama do when he graduated with the credentials listed above?
just because this is the way ''your'' world view appears ... meaning you''re projecting how you think of things on others ... doesn''t mean this is the way others think.
Obama keeps babbling that he is creating "change" but liberals and progressives don''t see it that way. Neocon Fascist Nazi Republicans are happy about Obama''s choices, claiming we are getting a 3rd term of the Great Emperor Bush II. They are in fact, excited that Hiliary Clinton, whom they see as a Republican in Democrat''s pants-suits, has been made Secretary of State, and Bill Gates has been kept on as Secretary of "Defense", claiming that only neocon Fascist Nazi Republicans can run the military!
If Obama is pushing "Change", he has a funny way of achieving it. When JFK took over the White House in 1960, he got rid of everyone even remotely connected with the Eisenhower era and brought in younger people with new and fresher ideas. JFK might have had a weakness with the "babes", but he knew the future of the country belonged to the young, not the fossilized policies of the ancients.
If Obama wants to compare himself as another JFK, he better read his book and talk to those who knew him!
SIG HEIL, I''LL GET MY 3RD TERM YET!!! BUSH!!!
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Posted by FloydZeppd at 07:24 AM : Dec 02, 2008
I''m not disagreeing with you, McCain has always angered a lot of conservatives, but I know way to many who really never gave McCain a thought, it was all about Bush. Bush did a lot of spending on the military, which I have no problem with. I tend to be more socially conservative as I am sick of societies idea of a "Hollywood" lifestyle. Maybe everyone wouldn''t be in sooo much debt if they didn''t go for "bling" on credit (everyone want''s the good life without paying cold, hard cash). With that said, I still liked Romney because he is a business man with a value system embracing "family". I voted for *** Devos in Michigan as well, I can''t stand Jenny Granholm, yikes!
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Posted by FloydZeppd at 07:24 AM : Dec 02, 2008
No, I don''t agree, conservatives knew that McCain was in no way like Bush. I voted for Romney in the primaries for fiscal reasons, he didn''t win. McCain seemed like the only chance in the current environment for too many. Then the financial crisis hit and I thought, "great, Romney would have had better answers for a financial crisis". Oh well, hopefully Barack stays in the center.
How dare they accuse the Messiah of not keeping his campaign promises
Posted by harp1963
I agree, I still voted for McCain, but a lot of conservatives voted for Barack winning him the election. There is no mandate for the far left and I think Barack knows this based on his cabinet picks.
Posted by MrMeatSpin at 11:14 PM
Hope it includes funding for a better education for right wing posters....
All other presidents lacking diplomantic experience have brought someone who has such a background to State%u2026 Reagan w/ Al Haig, Carter w/ Cyrus Vance. But Obama doesn%u2019t feel the need, for some reason%u2026 hmm.
And Bill%u2019s consulting for the UAE, while his wife was bashing them on the Senate floor.. basically fixing a PR debacle from the Dubai Ports deal that was much Hillary%u2019s own creation%u2026 or the other millions he%u2019s recieved from Morocco, Kazahkstan, etc%u2026 no problem there?
Any chance of controlling this loose cannon Hillary? LOL, of course not, the Clintons can%u2019t even control each-other.
The only logical explanation for this this terrible choice is the fufillment of a political deal struck during, or after the Convention- in exchange for her support, of course. Shouldn%u2019t surprise anyone who%u2019s done any real DD on this disengenuous serial opportunist Obama.
These choices betray a total lack of self-confidence from a man who knows better than anyone what a scam %u201CObamamania%u201D really is. He%u2019s clearly afraid of a political collapse following such an overblown charade.
This guy is in way, way over his head- and he knows it.
http://reaganiterepublicanresistance.blogspot.com/
Posted by wtlib at 12:16 AM : Dec 02, 2008
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Pay attention to the middle class, pay the bills (debt and deficit), reign in financial institutions, figure out where things went wrong...
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