There is no dearth of criticism from center-left journalists in a similar vein to my remarks of yesterday. In his most recent column, Richard Cohen:
Where is Casey Stengel when we need him? In 1962, as the manager of the brand new and determinedly hapless New York Mets — 40 wins, 120 losses — he looked up and down his bench one dismal day and wondered, “Can’t anybody here play this game?†That phrase kept coming at me recently as I watched the impressively inept performance of the Obama administration in both foreign and domestic policy. On a given day, this administration makes the ’62 Mets look good.
On one level, it would be reassuring — and much more credible — if the White House admitted that Obama is more in the loop than he has let on. On another level, it would be disconcerting: Is it better that he didn’t know about his administration’s missteps — or that he knew about them and didn’t stop them?
Or that he fomented them.
The center-right is not being left behind. Bret Stephens presents a lengthy list of quotations which create an impression of a White House uninterested in the process of governing but vitally interesting in holding the reins of power for its own sake. I don’t believe that’s an impression that the Obama Administration should wish to convey. Even at the expense of acknowledging what the president does, indeed, know and that he has actually made some mistakes.
Generally I think criticiam of Presidents for taking leisure are cheap shots, and I still feel that way regarding Obama’s golfing. But putting all the pieces together- the focus on campaigning over governing, the failures on many policy initiatives, the “leading from behind”, the claim that he learns about bad news from the newspapers, there is a disturbing pattern of disengagement.
I’m reminded of one of the rare stories I read before the 2008 election where a colleague from his days at the Harvard Review said that he was the kind of guy who didn’t actually do very much but always managed to show up to get credit when things went well. Unfortunately he is now playing at a level where things don’t go well with absentee leaders.
@Dave Schuler
This criticism is really not that surprising. You, Richard Cohen, Dana Milbank, and Bret Stephens are right-wing hacks. You all are racists, and you hate that there is a black man running the White’s House.
Your post about pre-Civil War furniture was code to let your fellow racists know you are still one of them.
/SARCASM OFF
While I agree with Cstanley, that criticizing a POTUS’s leisure time is petty (cheap shot). It, nonetheless, becomes of more noteworthy consideration when leisure time diverts work time, so much of the time. When looking at Obama’s leisure time activities, he seems to be golfing more than leading — a pattern seen throughout his presidency, no matter what problems were sitting on his duty plate.
Relevant to this, is how GWB was mocked, derided and photographed with uncomplimentary ‘cheap shots’ attached, during the first term of his presidency. It seems almost surreal, though, that Obama’s game-playing, at the end of one year, surpassed, dwarfing the number of games Bush ever preoccupied himself in all 8 years of being at the country’s helm. That’s quite a record, IMO, and deserves at least mild critical analysis.
Continuing with thoughts of ‘patterns’ foretelling the future…. When Obama attained the title of first AA President of the Harvard Law Review, it was notfollowed by any exemplary contributions to that position. In fact, his tenure was light-weight and unremarkable — similar to his presidency –as he was said to have only edited, not published a single article of his own in the law journal. In fact the ‘special writing assignment,’ he qualified for being an affirmative action candidate, and was credited for delivering him the votes to step into the journal’s historical 1st AA President position, has never been found — lost in the vagary of Obama’s earlier life.
It’s just too bad that Obama’s past could not have been more thoroughly scrubbed, before the 2008 election.