Where would you put Barack Obama, on the political spectrum?
I have my own opinion, but I’d like to get yours, whoever you are—because I keep reading these “mixed signals” statements about him, here and elsewhere.
For example, the Daily Kos ran this on Monday, April 28:
(continued)
KOS: I know some people are upset that Obama "threw Daily Kos under the bus", or other such nonsense. He didn't. Here's the transcript:
WALLACE: But, Senator, if I may, I think one of the concerns that some people have is that you talk a good game about, let's be post-partisan, let's all come together -- just a couple of quick things, and I don't really want you to defend each one, I just want to speak to the larger issue...
OBAMA: No, look, I think this is fair. I would point out, though, for example, that when I voted for a tort reform measure that was fiercely opposed by the trial lawyers, I got attacked pretty hard from the left.During the Roberts -
WALLACE: John Roberts, Supreme Court.
OBAMA: John Roberts nomination, although I voted against him, I strongly defended some of my colleagues who had voted for him on the Daily Kos, and was fiercely attacked as somebody who is, you know, caving in to Republicans on these fights.
In fact, there are a lot of liberal commentators who think I'm too accommodating. So here is my philosophy. I want to do what works for the American people. And both at the state legislative level and at the federal legislative level, I have always been able to work together with Republicans to find compromise and to find common ground.
Kos pointed out that this wasn’t “dissing the Kos” and I agree. But it seemed to me that he was trying to distance himself from something he called “the left” and that he was pointing out that he wasn’t moving lock-step with the politics of “liberal commentators,” either.
So I wanted to see how some people here see him—get some comments from his huge fans, people who aren’t such huge fans, people who will support him simply because he becomes the Democratic nominee and runs against McCain.
For the sake of discussion, imagine three hypothetical presidencies and one actual one. “Left to right on the political spectrum,” where would you place President Barack Obama’s administration, as you foresee it?
Pres. Ralph Nader—Pres. Hillary Clinton—Pres. Bill Clinton.
With Nader as “the mostest leftist” and Bill C as the closest to the center, where would you place Obama’s hypothetical presidency (domestic and foreign policy initiatives he’d try to get through; domestic political transformations he’d work to realize, stuff like that.)
I know many people are going to have trouble with me placing Hillary between RN and BC. That’s okay, change the order around if you feel that I put her in the wrong place on the spectrum. The reason I put her there is her work on the health care thing in the early nineties, but if you think she’s to the right of her husband, fine, correct me.
I have Bill Clinton down on the right because—in my opinion—he ended up by being a kind of an “Eisenhower Democrat”—pragmatic politician, always afraid of losing the center, pursuing no real fundamental changes to the political structure after the health care debacle.
Nader is down the spectrum as the “true man of the left”—interested in making real and fundamental changes to the power structure in the United States. That’s always been his rhetoric as a presidential candidate, anyway.
And for the sake of finding a place for Obama on the political spectrum, let’s take the Obama, Hillary, and Nader rhetoric at face value.
Where would you place Obama?
Here are some answers I got from readers on the Kos:
Obama is:
"more to the left of Hillary, less to the left of Nader"
"just slightly left of center."
"I think he's about as left as Nader but without the anger problems."
"...it is impossible for me to place him on the spectrum you've created because I don't believe he fits. Obama to me is a progressive realist."
"Center>center-left>left. Clinton is center>center-right>right."
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Bill Prendergast is also a contributor to Dump Michele Bachmann.
