Don’t you want a leader who has the ability to listen and learn as well as back up his own decisions? We certainly value civil debate here on Skull Sessions and TIME magazine’s Joel Klein just laid out a great example of when David Petraeus briefed Obama on the war… despite their disagreements, Obama asserted himself WHILE respectfully taking in what Petraeus had to say:
A “spirited” conversation ensued, one person who was in the room told me. “It wasn’t a perfunctory recitation of talking points. They were arguing their respective positions, in a respectful way.” The other two Senators — Chuck Hagel and Jack Reed — told Petraeus they agreed with Obama. According to both Obama and Petraeus, the meeting — which lasted twice as long as the usual congressional briefing — ended agreeably. Petraeus said he understood that Obama’s perspective was, necessarily, going to be more strategic. Obama said that the timetable obviously would have to be flexible.
Barack Obama has prospered in this presidential campaign because of the steadiness of his temperament and the judicious quality of his decision-making. They are his best-known qualities.
And he not only speaks with inelligence, he speaks to us like adults! Do you remember Obama’s big speech on race? It was an inspired response to Jeremiah Wright and pretty much put the issue to rest for all reasonable people. Here is how Obama described it:
“My gut was telling me that this was a teachable moment and that if I tried to do the usual political damage control instead of talking to the American people like … they were adults and could understand the complexities of race, I would be not only doing damage to the campaign but missing an important opportunity for leadership.”
And if you’ve known me or watched the video Skull Sessions, you know that I strongly believe we need a Manhattan Project-like effort to combat global warming and wean us from oil over time… and it couldn’t excite me more to see Obama talking about that as his #1 priority!
He wants to launch an “Apollo project” to build a new alternative-energy economy. His rationale for doing so includes some hard truths about the current economic mess: “The engine of economic growth for the past 20 years is not going to be there for the next 20. That was consumer spending. Basically, we turbocharged this economy based on cheap credit.” But the days of easy credit are over, Obama said, “because there is too much deleveraging taking place, too much debt.” A new economic turbocharger is going to have to be found, and “there is no better potential driver that pervades all aspects of our economy than a new energy economy … That’s going to be my No. 1 priority when I get into office.”
Most of all, what a President should be able to do is inspire the nation to do great things. Now, more than ever, we need that leader! Klein puts it quite well to finish up his article:
If he wins, however, there will be a different challenge. He will have to return, full force, to the inspiration business. The public will have to be mobilized to face the fearsome new economic realities. He will also have to deliver bad news, to transform crises into “teachable moments.” He will have to effect a major change in our political life: to get the public and the media to think about long-term solutions rather than short-term balms. Obama has given some strong indications that he will be able to do this, having remained levelheaded through a season of political insanity. His has been a remarkable campaign, as smoothly run as any I’ve seen in nine presidential cycles. Even more remarkable, Obama has made race — that perennial, gaping American wound — an afterthought. He has done this by introducing a quality to American politics that we haven’t seen in quite some time: maturity. He is undoubtedly as ego-driven as everyone else seeking the highest office — perhaps more so, given his race, his name and his lack of experience. But he has not been childishly egomaniacal, in contrast to our recent baby-boomer Presidents — or petulant, in contrast to his opponent. He does not seem needy. He seems a grown-up, in a nation that badly needs some adult supervision.
In light of the myriad of recent endorsements of conservatives for Obama (Obamacons), with a main reason being Sarah Palin, one has to wonder what the future of the Republican Party holds. Is it going to be a James Dobson religious rightwho deny Democratic voters (even republican ones) communion or a more moderate and fiscally conservative Colin Powell-like party?
Max Blumenthal makes a great case for this. Here’s an example of how James Dobson helped cost McCain the election by essentially forcing him to nominate someone like Sarah Palin:
Powell might well have supported McCain’s bid for the presidency had things turned out differently. McCain yearned to select his friend, the turncoat Democrat, Sen. Joseph Lieberman, as his running mate. Lieberman, who shared Powell’s positions on domestic policy, would have made the Republican ticket the most moderate since the pre-Goldwater era. But opposition from the Christian right―especially from Dobson―threatened a fight on the floor of the Republican convention, rendering the Lieberman option impossible. And so McCain chose Sarah Palin.
And it makes you wonder if they’re going to put her up as president against Obama in 2012. That will be great for the Democrats, I predict, but bad for the country as a whole.
We need change - not another Clinton. Senator Obama may not be able to deliver it, but hope can be just as powerful and he has successfully harnessed that. America needs a regime change to restore its standing in the world, and Barack Obama seems to be the best option.
Andrew Sullivan is more lucid in his thoughts, so if you’d like to read why he, as a conservative, supports Obama, I recommend - Goodbye to All That: Why Obama Matters.
One of my favorite tech shows, net@night had a semi-political show this week… and they tacitly supported Skull Sessions by favoring civil debate and being well informed!
“If it’s taboo to talk about politics, we’re doing ourselves a disservice.” Amber MacArthur
Go to this link and either subscribe to listen in iTunes, or listen right on the web page. The good stuff is between 24:50 and 27:50.
The framers of our constitution set up a republic in order to protect against mob rule. Thus we have checks and balances not only between the three branches of government, but also between the federal government and the states. The electoral college system and the Senate make sure population centers like New York, California, and Texas don’t decide policy for the whole country and that the voice of smaller population centers is still given consideration. The two major political parties interestingly provide a good check and balance with each other. As history has shown, seldom does one party control both the legislative and executive. Rather, the opposing party usually gains control, or has a great influential minority, of the opposite branch. At this time in our history, we face a Democratic controlled executive and legislative that hasn’t been seen since the 1930’s. Many economists have argued that the length and depth of The Great Depression was made worse by this Democratic control and that the prior administrations were blamed for the lack of economic progress.
In general, as this article by Cal Thomas points out, government has failed miserably at being the solution to people’s problems. The aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, as John Stossel points out through Thomas’s article, is an example of this. We should seriously consider the benefit of a liberal agenda being pushed through by a Democratically controlled executive and legislative. Many on the left think this is exactly what the country needs. I respectfully and profoundly disagree.
Will Obama be a transformational candidate and change the electoral map forever, as Colin Powell suggests and progressives like me yearn for? Or will he simply be another “50 plus 1″ president with a slim majority, no clear mandate, and a continually divided country to lead?
We’ll see… but my money is on the guy who beat the Clintons!
On the reality of rural white voters who see Obama as “different”:
Obama’s strategists accept that there will be some number of voters — particularly white men — who will reject Obama solely because he is black. But they are betting, first, that most of these voters wouldn’t have voted for a Democrat in any event and, second, that the groundswell of black support for Obama will produce enough new African-American votes in a lot of states to offset them.
Obama on the potential of his campaign:
“If I’m able to change this,” he told me on his plane, meaning the cultural breach in our politics, “then it’s probably going to be most powerful after I’m elected, when you’re no longer in the context of day-to-day battle, and I can prove it by what I do.”
… and Obama on FOX news:
“I am convinced that if there were no Fox News, I might be two or three points higher in the polls,” Obama told me. “If I were watching Fox News, I wouldn’t vote for me, right? Because the way I’m portrayed 24/7 is as a freak! I am the latte-sipping, New York Times-reading, Volvo-driving, no-gun-owning, effete, politically correct, arrogant liberal. Who wants somebody like that?
Overall, a great read, if you’re into the nuance that makes politics interesting…
I just read a VERY interesting essay about our natural tendency to take offense to things. There have been many “indignities” in this campaign, as with every political race, and there will always be. But why? Why do we respond with a lack of reason to perceived injustice? Well, read this article for a glimpse into an answer… and enjoy the quotes below:
Humans’ sense of indignation is not just limited to violations against us. Even if you’re able-bodied, think of how offended you feel when you see another able-bodied person pull into a handicapped parking spot. Most of us will just walk on, quietly irate, but a few will yell at the driver. These moral enforcers are vital to society. Frans de Waal writes that experiments with macaques show that if you remove the individuals who perform this policing function, hostilities increase among the entire band.
The presidential candidates present us with two stark leadership approaches: the cool, slow-to-anger reserve of Barack Obama; and the aggressive, man-of-honor style of John McCain. People instinctively weigh whether a leader who’s laid back makes them worry that he won’t stand up to enemies. And they consider that a hot-headed leader may be intimidating to foes, but that he also might create more of them.
“The more attached you are to your sense of self, the more you see forces trying to attack that self. If you have a more Buddhist view, and are less attached to self, you are less likely to see offense.”
Now THIS is a great example of how businesses should contribute to the public discourse. Gap just hit it out of the park with their new ad campaign. It’s funny, it’s heartwarming and it’s incredibly important that this election be a renewal of the democratic process.
I know that every year lots of celebs and marketers do their part to “get out the vote”… but doesn’t it feel different this year? Like we’re on the cusp of something huge?
I got a kick out of this video and thought it was a great comedic example of the vitriolic and ill-informed attacks that Joel and I are trying to avoid with our Skull Sessions:
Well, here we go again. Another post, another conservative supporting Obama… and it’s not just because I agree with Christopher Buckley and Colin Powell, it’s that they articulate a variety of reasons Obama is the best choice for this country right now:
We’ve got two individuals — either one of them could be a good president. But which is the president that we need now — which is the individual that serves the needs of the nation for the next period of time.
And I come to the conclusion that because of his ability to inspire, because of the inclusive nature of his campaign, because he is reaching out all across America, because of who he is and his rhetorical abilities — and you have to take that into account — as well as his substance — he has both style and substance, he has met the standard of being a successful president, being an exceptional president.
Kevin Madden, a GOP veteran who was the press secretary for Mitt Romney’s presidential bid, said that “Colin Powell was a proxy for our party’s ability to persuade Democrats and independents to join a center-right coalition of ideas built around economic conservatism and a strong national defense. The endorsement is emblematic of the challenges we face as a party when it comes to winning back these voters.”
I mean, most people had not even heard of Christopher Buckley before last week, but who in their right mind doesn’t respect Colin Powell? If you go see the biopic “W” you will see that he was the one voice of reason in a Bush cabinet that beat the drum to war and he should be respected for his choice to resign as Secretary of State when he profoundly disagreed with the course of the administration.
Thank you, Secretary Powell, for giving another intelligent voice to this extraordinary movement to change our country and its’ direction in 2008. You were and continue to be a true patriot.
Ken Adelman, a “lifelong conservative Republican” who is practically, but not really, a neo-con, is also voting for Obama! for reasons of “temperment and judgement”.
David Frum, one of my favorite conservatives (for his many appearances on “Left, Right and Center”) might not actually vote for Obama, but he certainly disapproves of Palin.
This is the case for Obama on substance, which is the most important criterion. But symbolism is also a powerful force in human affairs. Imagine what people around the world would think if they saw America once again inventing the future. And imagine how Americans would feel if they saw their country once again fulfilling its founding creed of equal opportunity, if they saw that there really were no barriers in their country, not even to the highest office in the land, not even for a man with a brown face and a strange name.
Oh, and lest we forget that newspapers around the country whose endorsements went slightly in favor of Kerry (213 to 205) are coming out in droves for Obama (112 to 39 so far) and that includes many papers that were Bush in 2004.
In a real shocker, two solid Bush papers in 2004, the Houston Chronicle and Austin American-Statesman, also came out for Obama on Sunday.
First of all, I, Justin Bradshaw, am not a conservative.
I believe in progress and not in keeping things the way they are (or were).
But I respect my conservative friends for their convictions and defend their right to have them… but it’s here that I see a widening gap and a higher difficulty of my own to actually respect some “conservative” viewpoints. Let me explain:
I thought that conservative meant that you believed in small government and objectivist notions like personal responsibility and fiscal restraint. That’s what Ronald Reagan and William F Buckley believed in at least. That’s what my true conservative friends seem to stress when they talk about politics. And guess what? I hold a lot of those convictions too! I, too want a government that runs like an efficient business (minus the ruthless pursuit of profit) and I, too think people should take responsibility for themselves and not ask for handouts from the government. But I feel like over the past 6-10 years with Bush, Cheney etc that we’ve lost that Buckley/Reagan sense of conservatism. This has a name, by the way: NeoConservatism… and it’s led us into pre-emptive and misguided wars, deregulated the banking system to point of failure, and neglected our future environmental interests in favor of short term business profits. But most of all, this Bush movement has favored the social conservatives over the fiscal conservatives: We’ve been led by a guy who thinks he speaks to God and honest churchgoing people have been rallied to the Republican side in droves for fear of gays, abortion and all kinds of real and made-up issues.
It all came to a head with the nomination of Sarah Palin. McCain wasn’t getting the “evangelical” vote so he had to pick a person who would. He wasn’t getting the woman vote so he had to pick a person who would. This is a sad gimmick that isn’t going to work… because this time the true conservatives are actually standing up against it instead of blithely defending her and her lack of experience.
Now you’re probably thinking, what’s so new about this? Why write about this now? Well I believe that the pendulum is shifting to the left in this country in a big way with this election and that this is one of the biggest reasons. We’re sick of Bush and the evangelicals running our country! We’re sick of ideology and god-fearing-ness trumping intelligence and experience!
And the best part? I now get to include some very prominent Republican conservatives in this list! We already saw Ron Reagan, Jr. speak at the Democratic convention and openly support Obama. We’ve also seen Andrew Sullilvan, George Will, Kathleen Parker, David Brooks, Charles Krauthammerand more express severe doubts about Palin, and McCain. But now, praise jesus, the legacy of the greatest icon of modern conservatism change: William F. Buckley’s son, Christopher Buckeley, just endorsed Obama! If you don’t believe me, or want to know why, just read this brilliant post of his: “Sorry dad, I’m voting for Obama”.
To me, it seems like the nail in the coffin for John McCain and the NeoConservative “movement” and begs the question of my Republican friends: Which kind of conservative are you?
The former Reagan economic adviser Bruce Bartlett predicts, indeed, that the Republican primaries will turn into a Palin/Gingrich steel-cage death match
The capper cracks me up. I want to meet Christopher Buckley, he sounds like an awesome guy:
“The smart ones in the movement should get together right after the election at the Greenbrier or the Homestead, you know, where they typically have these kinds of get-togethers, and have a long dark night of the soul,” he says. “And I’ll tell you what the conference should be called: Conservatism—What the Fuck?”
If Obama wins, he will have established that being black is as relevant to your ability to do a hard job as being left-handed or ginger-haired, and he will have re-established America’s claim to be the last, best hope of Earth.
