NYT: Obama In The Senate
When I saw the title of this piece, my heart sank and I thought: well, there it is. The title strongly suggests that a careful examination of Obama's Senate record is going to show lots of star power, but little of actual substance. Given all the unfair, uncivil and just plain dopey criticisms of Obama flying around, I've found myself getting more and more defensive on his behalf; but I'm open to new information and reasonable criticisms. And this is the kind of criticism that seems prima facie plausible.
However what the NYT article actually indicates is that Obama's record in the Senate is quite admirable. Eschewing flash and grandstanding, he seems to have set out to understand the Senate and build a firm foundation for future action. Those looking for fireworks (similar to: smoke and mirrors) will be disappointed by his record. But for those who are impressed by careful, reasonable, yeoman-like efforts, punctuated by leadership on at least one extremely important bill (the ethics bill), Obama's record looks downright inspiring.
In fact, there isn't really much that'd I'd classify as negative in the story (though some would classify more of it that way). And the most negative comment in the story comes from Lindsay Graham, so, hey, that's another positive in my book.
When I saw the title of this piece, my heart sank and I thought: well, there it is. The title strongly suggests that a careful examination of Obama's Senate record is going to show lots of star power, but little of actual substance. Given all the unfair, uncivil and just plain dopey criticisms of Obama flying around, I've found myself getting more and more defensive on his behalf; but I'm open to new information and reasonable criticisms. And this is the kind of criticism that seems prima facie plausible.
However what the NYT article actually indicates is that Obama's record in the Senate is quite admirable. Eschewing flash and grandstanding, he seems to have set out to understand the Senate and build a firm foundation for future action. Those looking for fireworks (similar to: smoke and mirrors) will be disappointed by his record. But for those who are impressed by careful, reasonable, yeoman-like efforts, punctuated by leadership on at least one extremely important bill (the ethics bill), Obama's record looks downright inspiring.
In fact, there isn't really much that'd I'd classify as negative in the story (though some would classify more of it that way). And the most negative comment in the story comes from Lindsay Graham, so, hey, that's another positive in my book.
posted by Winston Smith at
10:00 AM
3 Comments:
B-b-b-but a Republican in Illinois said he wasn't bold. Isn't that more important!
As long as the discussion is restricted to Obama's championing of nice-sounding uncontroversial microissues, there's nothing not to like. And I suspect that's what the conversation will continue to be restricted to.
In light of this
http://proteinwisdom.com/?p=11375
this
http://philosoraptor.blogspot.com/2008/02/tnr-audacity-of-data-noam-scheiber-at.html
seems out of date, especially the comments.
Me, I'll wait for more audacious data than the NYT article, which as the Daily Kos [well, actually the Obama campaign itself] will tell you, was a "hit piece" anyway.
http://openthread.dailykos.com/storyonly/2008/3/10/74347/9339/502/473422
His voting record in his first year in Washington, according to the annual rankings by National Journal, was more liberal than 82.5 percent of the Senate (compared with, for example, Mrs. Clinton’s 79.8 percent that year).
These numbers may be some kind of averaging of ties, but it cracks me up to think that someone could be more liberal than 82.5% of the 100-member Senate.
Post a Comment
Subscribe to Post Comments [Atom]
<< Home