http://www.tnr.com/article/95430/mr-roosevelts-blank-check
In the “Why I Don’t Credit The Über-Liberal Theory of Obama’s Insufficiency” department…
Here’s an article from just after the conclusion of the 1936 re-election of FDR as president. With only a small amount of judicious editing, it could probably be re-used in some lefty opinion mag just after this upcoming election, assuming Obama wins. It is, with only a few edits required to target the comments to more current events, the substance of what today’s purist lefty thinks about Obama.
My fave bit is this part: “Many expect Mr. Roosevelt now to swing to the right in order to conciliate as many as possible of the groups that have been fighting him so bitterly. He dearly likes to convert enemies into friends. His shrewd political instinct will naturally lead him in the direction of not alarming anyone of importance.”
As crystal ball predictions go, that one was so wrong as to be positively laughable. The re-election of Roosevelt in 1936 put the New Deal coalition firmly in control of American politics for the next three decades and reduced the defeated and chastened Republicans to “me too” policies that at best purported to offer New Deal policies cheaper and more efficiently. It was one of the most spectacular political wins for the Left in the history of the US.
If something similar ends up being the legacy of Obama, I will hardly complain.
