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In his Sunday column, Andrew Sullivan says that Barack Obama is an instinctual and temperamental conservative, that he obeys the Constitution, and that he "likes the system; he just wants to make it work for more people."
Andrew goes on:
The question buzzing around Washington's chattering classes is the following: is the actual historical moment that Obama inherited -- unforeseen in its scope and danger this time last year -- the right moment for these instincts? Are his caution and delegation a liability in a period of a dysfunctional Congress, a near-psychotic Republican party and a potentially lethal global depression?
After a period in which the American executive claimed vast powers and institutionalised torture and abuse of suspected terrorists, is it enough simply to forget and forgive the past and try to glue onto the existing system more checks and balances and decency? Is the conservatism we sought, in other words, adequate to the radicalism that may now be required?
I've been pleased by the Obama Administration's foreign policy insofar as it's been more conservative and prudent than its predecessor. On domestic matters, however, I must disagree with my colleague's assessment. President Obama's agenda is nothing if not ambitious, whether measured by the number of major issues he hopes to address or their unprecedented cost.
As Andrew himself writes later in the same column:
The more you observe, the clearer it is that Obama is working on an eight-year time cycle. He wants deep structural change, not swift superficial grandstanding and conflict. He is taking his time and keeping his cool. The question is whether a volatile electorate in a terrible economic time will be patient enough to wait.
A president engaged in a calculated attempt to make deep structural changes to the nation's public policy may be right or wrong, but he isn't engaged in a conservative project, nor is he an instinctual conservative -- rather, he is an instinctual progressive whose political strategy is cautious and methodical. I happen to think we should resist his agenda. Others support it. Either way, there should be no illusion that he seeks a permanent and substantial increase in the size and scope of the federal government.
I also want to take issue with this:
I learnt long ago not to underestimate Obama's strategic skills and persistence. The drawn-out stimulus spending might actually help to prop up the economy in the coming months -- and it's utopian to believe that any Congress would have borrowed even more money this winter after Bush's $700 billion banking bailout and the vast projected deficits of the future.
The word I'd use for borrowing more money at this point would be dystopian.
"I happen to think we should resist his agenda."
My dear Conor, if you will permit a question: Which parts of his agenda, generally speaking? How ought they be resisted? And why?
he "likes the system; he just wants to make it work for more people."
I wholeheartedly agree with this statement after following him for 5 years and seeing the PBS or CSPAN indepth candidate bio covering his formative years and movements @ Harvard.
He is Reagan Republican with a beating heart.
This is our best opportunity to test drive the ideals of our Constitution. I don't know that we will see this chance again in our lifetime. We would be wise to give his administration 8 years.
...and even wiser to give his better half 8 years after his. LOL.