Reverse That Reversal!
Posted on July 2nd, 2008
by Daniel Larison |
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In recent days, more than 7,000 Obama supporters have organized on a social networking site on Mr. Obama’s own campaign Web site. They are calling on Mr. Obama to reverse his decision to endorse legislation supported by President Bush to expand the government’s domestic spying powers while also providing legal protection to the telecommunication companies that worked with the National Security Agency’s domestic wiretapping program after the Sept. 11 attacks. ~The New York Times
Of course, if Obama did reverse himself for a second time on the same issue, he would appear to be even more supine and susceptible to political pressure than he already does. It would be like his Jerusalem two-step (undivided, yet partitioned!)all over again, which could be used quite effectively to attack his judgement. Of all the recent reversals and maneuverings, the flip on FISA legislation is the most outrageous, because the policy he has now endorsed is one of the worst of the Bush administration, and it is the one that erases one of the few differences between him and McCain on matters of national security. What is probably equally troubling from the perspective of these Obama supporters is that it seems to confirm everything that his progressive critics said against Obama to be true: his talk of unity and the “post-partisan” persona were the pretexts for capitulation to their political opponents.
In this narrow sense, Ed Kilgore makes sense when he wonders what all the fuss has been about:
Third of all, it amazes me that anyone should be surprised by Barack Obama’s willingness on occasion to stray from Democratic Party orthodoxy or from strict down-the-line partisanship. It has been an important part of his political persona from day one. And those who accuse him of cynicism for expressing heretical thoughts on FISA or gun control or the death penalty now are perhaps the real cynics, who somehow thought he didn’t really mean all his early talk about transpartisan politics or overcoming the stale debates of past decades.
Some of us supposed that his talk of unity and bipartisan cooperation was sincere, which is why I thought it was terrible. As I said more than once, most of the great policy debacles of recent years have been bipartisan achievements of collaboration of the two parties against the rest of the country. Then again, that is what bipartisanship has always meant: yielding to the “centrist” consensus position, which tends to include a combination of the worst of both parties’ bad ideas. Far from “overcoming” stale debates, as Greenwald has observed, Obama has been embracing narratives that portray his own supporters and people like them as the problem.
As I have also been trying to stress for some time, the question is not whether Obama will stray from Democratic Party orthodoxy (he usually doesn’t, in fact), but whether he will ever take a position that would force him to confront powerful interests. Having won the nomination, he has probably calculated that his progressive backers will not break with him now and will have nowhere to go (the fear of electing McCain is too powerful for most of them to permit protest voting), so he has positioned himself to avoid confronting either executive power or corporate interests more than he must. He will not yield to his supporters’ demands on this, because I expect he does not see them as a threat to his political advancement, and he will be lauded by “mainstream” columnists for rebuffing the left and showing that he is “responsible” and, yes, “serious.”
P.S. Russ Feingold explains why the surveillance program itself is dangerous.
Update: Even Kos, not usually one to let important principles impede Democratic electoral success, gets it:
First, he reversed course and capitulated on FISA, not just turning back on the Constitution, but on the whole concept of “leadership”. Personally, I like to see presidents who 1) lead, and 2) uphold their promises to protect the Constitution.
It is interesting that some of those Obama supporters who screamed loudest that he must not “appease” the Clintons and thereby show weakness have been calm and unfazed, to put it mildly, by a real demonstration of weakness and surrender on an issue of fundamental constitutional protections. This seems to make anti-Clintonism into a high principle that must not be compromised, while constitutional liberty is something that can be infringed and abused to give a candidate some sort of “credibility” on national security. These are fairly odd priorities.
Filed under: politics
I want to stress that Obama’s most serious problem isn’t that he has strayed from Democratic/progressive orthodoxy. Anyone who expected him to agree with the Left down the line was fooling himself and just plain not listening to Obama’s words. The problem is that he strayed on FISA, which is one of the worst possible places he could have done it. If he comes out tomorrow and says he was just joshing about wanting to get out of Iraq, that would be the only thing I would find more devastating. The FISA compromise is deeply invidious, progressives get that instinctually (thanks, Russ Feingold!), and this was bound to demoralize his most spirited supporters.
Well, yes. I don’t think we disagree on this at all. That is why the flip on FISA is so damning and why I think it reveals a great deal about his overall m.o..
” If he comes out tomorrow and says he was just joshing about wanting to get out of Iraq, that would be the only thing I would find more devastating.”
Now this is just simply bizarre. Obama has said, repeatedly and consistently, that we will let facts on the ground guide his decision in this area, that he holds open the option of recommitting troops to Iraq to prevent genocide/humanitarian disaster, that he would not committ to having all troops out by 2013, that he would keep a “counter-terrorist strike force” in Iraq, etc. He has been saying such things for a very, very long time, so why this would strike anyone as some kind of thunderbolt from above is bizarre. He will greatly temper his previous anti-war sentiment in an effort to appear more centrist and mainstream. After all, what else is an antiwar voter to do, vote McCain? Nader? Barr? Please. The man knows his supporters better than they know themselves.
It would be devestating only if you have been under the impression that all of that is simply a smokescreen to avoid getting pegged as the second coming of George McGovern. If that was the case, his reversal on the FISA legislation should have clued you in that Obama is somewhat less than comitted to repudiating GWB and all his works, and is quite in favor of certain aspects of the current course of events. Even if, in his heart of hearts, he is committed to a full withdrawal, is there anything in Obama’s behavior as of late that would lead you to beleive that he would be willing to take such a political risk? The easiest course available is the one that Obama invariably takes. So it goes with FISA, so it will go with Iraq.
Disappointment generating machine, indeed. Will it affect most liberal/progressive voters from pulling the lever for Obama? Of course not. So a few Kos kids withhold donations as a matter of principle: Obama has his army of small doners locked in, and can generate more than enough revenue to run an aggressive campaign in the deepest red states, while McCain struggles with his paltry 84 mil in public funds.
In Obama’s defense, I’m not sure he really had any other choice than to flip on FISA. Had he opposed the “compromise,” the airwaves, newspapers and Internet would have been filled with GOP operatives screaming about how this showed he was weak on terror. It would have played directly to McCain’s biggest strength, his military service, as well as straight into the old saw about the Democrats being weak on security. Yes, the flip ticked off many on the left, but as Daniel noted, what are they going to do, vote for McCain?
‘ Obama’s defense, I’m not sure he really had any other choice than to flip on FISA.”
Agreed. I’m glad both parties could come together in a bipartisan manner to eviscerate the 4th amendment and hand large telecoms an early Christmas present/get out of jail & lawsuit free card. Poor Sen. Obama, he just had no *choice* in the matter, lest those mean ol’ Republicans say bad things about him. Come 2009, Obama is, of course, going to have no choice than to maintain a largeish number of troops in Iraq. His hands are tied, don’t you see?
And that’s the real point of this entire discussion, or I hope it is. There was a saying that Pat Buchanan had during the 2000 campaign: Gore is against us, and Bush won’t fight. Or words to that effect. The same applies today: McCain is against us, and Obama won’t fight. The Edwards-Clinton critique of Obama’s weakness ( remember “the sky will open, light will come down and we will all agree…”?) has been more or less vindicated. The “unity” theme wasn’t Kumbaya-ish, but it did betray a love of consensus almost for its own sake. Amusingly, Obama’s riffs on toughness from The Untouchables show that he is willing to fight for his own victory, but he won’t jeopardise that goal to stand up for something as fundamental as constitutional protections.
Speaking as someone out on the Far Left: I never had a whole lot of faith in Obama as a politician. I took it for granted that, at some point during the campaign, he’d end up revealing that this “unity” stuff meant compromising with the worst parts of the Republican agenda (because it seems the worst parts are the agenda).
But the main reason I supported Obama over Clinton is that Clinton, and her DLC allies, had spent 14 years running away from the Dukakis-in-a-Tank meme: too scared of appearing weak to ever fight against anything. This was a disastrous policy which enabled the worst excesses of the Bush administration. Even if there really wasn’t much difference between Obama and Clinton on policy matters, I thought there was a significant difference between their styles: that Obama’s handlers understood the importance of defying the worst accusations hurled at them by crazy right wing dopes. (The Philadelphia speech on race relations, for example, was not perfect - but it was much braver and more admirable than his throwing Wright under the bus several weeks later.)
Instead, instantly after winning the nomination, Obama has moved repeatedly to throw his more passionate supporters overboard. His denunciation of Clark (whatever one thinks of Clark’s prudence in making such comments) is despicable. HIs rush to embrace FISA is downright horrendous.
I had very few illusions about Obama, but it sounds like he managed to shatter even those. All I wanted was someone who, when attacked, would stand up straight and hit back. I guess that is too much to expect.
Sadly, though, when *he* is attacked he does fight back, but when any of his associates, advisors, surrogates or supporters are under fire he cuts them loose. What I think you may have also wanted is someone who would fight back against attacks on the entire party and on your views. They, like his associates and surrogates, are expendable and will apparently be cast aside when necessary for the greater good of Obama’s success. I understand that there is always going to be some of this in politics, but there has been entirely too much of it in this campaign.
Then again, McCain treats the GOP and conservatives in much the same way, which is how he built up his reputation as a “maverick” with and through the media: they are useful to him as foils for his own posturing as an “independent-minded” politician, but they are not worth fighting for when under attack from the other side.
“Poor Sen. Obama, he just had no *choice* in the matter, lest those mean ol’ Republicans say bad things about him.”
Pretty much. This is what you do when you’re the front runner: lots of ducking, weaving and avoiding giving the other guy any ammo. Should McCain close the gap in polling, then you’ll see the milquetoast routine go by the wayside.
But the reversals *are* giving McCain ammunition that he is using and will keep using to undermine confidence in Obama and raise questions about his trustworthiness.
“But the reversals *are* giving McCain ammunition that he is using and will keep using to undermine confidence in Obama and raise questions about his trustworthiness.”
Yes, this is true, but it also just reinforces the notion that Obama is not beholden to the far left, and so it undermines any actual criticism of Obama’s policies themselves. And of course it makes McCain incredibly vulnerable on his own, much more serious changes in policy stances. So I don’t see how McCain wins much without losing more back. Except to the degree that the press has McCain’s back on virtually all things anyway.
And regarding the FISA bill, it’s guaranteed to pass with or without Obama’s vote, agreed? So what exactly is gained by Obama’s opposing it, other than giving McCain further ammunition to portray Obama as weak on terror, which is McCain’s only real strong point in the polls?
Ask yourself the next question: which candidate, once elected, is more likely to scale back FISA, both in practical use, and even amending the law, such that it really does respect the 4th Amendment? In one respect, passing FISA actually makes it MORE important to elect Obama, because only he has any inclination to use the power of the Presidency to repect the 4th Amendment and modify FISA. He certainly can’t do that now from his position in the senate, but as President he could. Right?
“But the reversals *are* giving McCain ammunition that he is using and will keep using to undermine confidence in Obama and raise questions about his trustworthiness.”
Perhaps, but given McCain’s own reversals, he’s hardly in a position to draw a lot of attention to Obama’s turnarounds. Whichever route Obama took, he was going to get some criticism, but being accused of flip-flopping by a flip-flopper is a lot less effective than being accused of being soft on terror by a veteran.