Obama: Protectionist or Free-Trader?

I disagree with the following summary by Dan Drezner:

My favorite part of the speech was McCain’s take on coping with the global economy. It contained his only concrete proposal (reforming unemployment insurance) while also emphasizing their different takes on the global economy (Obama: protect old industries; McCain: prepare citizens for new industries). If my vote was based only on foreign economic policy, I’d be voting for McCain and it wouldn’t be a close call.

A lot of people on the right (like Drezner) seem to think Obama is a protectionist. A lot of people on the left think he's a free-trader. Likely, he's somewhere in between - he will try to "protect old industries," but not through subsidies, but through somewhat slightly stronger labor and environmental protections in free trade agreements. Also, I feel like Obama emphasizes creating new jobs in new industries as much as McCain does.

A Suprising Truth

This one:

Of Sarah Palin I know nothing except her lack of grace. She lashed into Barack Obama after a week in which he was the only public figure to defend her against the press, or at least to excoriate those who had focused on her daughter. She might have started with a thank you.

100% True Statements

Michael Kinsley:

The whole "experience" debate is silly. Under our system of government, there is only one job that gives you both executive and foreign-policy experience, and that's the one McCain and Obama are running for. Nevertheless, it's a hardy perennial: If your opponent is a governor, you accuse him or her of lacking foreign-policy experience. If he or she is a member of Congress, you say this person has never run anything. And if, by any chance, your opponent has done both, you say that he or she is a "professional politician."

+1 to David Brooks

I was going to quote David Brooks' column today, but then I realized my quote was going to be everything but the first paragraph. So read the whole thing. It's the best version of the "Goodbye to All That" thesis about Obama I've read.

The American Wanderer

Just wanted to spotlight this good piece on Obama and rootlessness from the New York Times. An interesting snippet:

But many presidents are shallow-rooted trees, even if they’re rarely perceived as drifters; far more often, “transplant,” with its connotation of re-rooting, is the unthreatening label they take on.

Ronald Reagan grew up in Tampico, Ill., wandered to Iowa and fell in as an announcer with the Chicago Cubs before heading to California. There he built one of the more enduring political personas of the 20th century. George W. Bush, Texas twang though he boasts, attended a blue-blood prep school in Massachusetts and summered in Maine, where the waters are chilly and the culture tight-lipped. Dwight Eisenhower was born in Texas, moved to Kansas and came to call Pennsylvania home. Herbert Hoover spent his 20s laboring in the outback of Australia and then China. Teddy Roosevelt strapped on a six-shooter and moved to the Dakotas, the better to fashion an image as the “cowboy” president, even though he was as New York as they come. Abraham Lincoln, the prototypical Illinoisan, was born in Kentucky and grew up impoverished in Indiana. He moved often as an adult, a loner before fate set him right.

Obama and Race

I've done a lot of reading on the subject in the past few hours. I don't know how much it will affect his electoral prospects (although it certainly will) or how it will affect his presidency. I feel like a lot of people haven't thought about that second question, which Matt Bai muses on in the NYT:

Should they win in November, Obama and these new advisers will confront an unfamiliar conundrum in American politics, which is how to be president of the United States and, by default, the most powerful voice in black America at the same time. Several black operatives and politicians with whom I spoke worried, eloquently, that an Obama presidency might actually leave black Americans less well represented in Washington rather than more so — that, in fact, the end of black politics, if that is what we are witnessing, might also mean the precipitous decline of black influence.

The argument here is that a President Obama, closely watched for signs of parochialism or racial resentment, would have less maneuvering room to champion spending on the urban poor, say, or to challenge racial injustice.

The entire article is interesting and paints a nice series of portraits of various black politicians. However, like Ta-Nehisi Coates says, the title (Is Obama the end of black politics?) is stupid. I don't buy the Freudian stuff, though.

Then, New York has a very good package on Obama and Race, starting with this Patricia Williams piece. It basically argues that the national conversation about race is stunted and awkward because blacks and whites don't see the conversation starting in the same places. Money quote:

[B]lacks and whites tend to differ in their very definition of racism. Some years ago, researchers conducting a study for the Diversity Project, at UC Berkeley’s Institute for the Study of Social Change, asked black and white college students about their perceptions of racism on a given campus. White students tended to say there was none, but blacks and Native Americans said it was everywhere. In fact, the study documented an interesting phenomenon: As Diversity Project sociologist Troy Duster put it, “White students see diversity as a potential source of ‘individual enhancement,’ ” while African-American students were more likely to see the goal as “institutional change.”

When the white students were asked to give illustrations that substantiated their positions, they spoke of their own experiences and of personal intentions. “Last night, I had dinner with a black friend,” they might offer. Or, “I have a black roommate, and we get along”; “I play basketball with a couple of black guys”; “I’ve never used a racist epithet”; “I treat everyone the same.”

The black students cited instances of relative privilege, things that were more structural, institutional, atmospheric. “The campus police are always stopping us”; “I get followed around in stores”; “Most of the white students don’t have to think twice about how much it costs to take prep classes for the LSAT or to spend spring break skiing in Aspen or partying in Cancún.”

They follow this up with a piece on the "Obama Kids," and one on the politics of Obama's marriage, which contains this absurdity:

Outside a Subway in Atlanta, a bunch of white kids parse Obama’s lineage, at least the fanciful one that they learned about on the Internet. “It’s such a crock that Obama keeps saying he’s going to be the first black president,” says one of them. “He’s half-white, first of all, plus 44 percent Muslim, and only 6 percent African.”

What. The. Fuck.

Meanwhile, John Heilemann continues his election-long hot streak with a piece on race preventing Obama from doing better in the polls. He is able to state the obvious:

Obama, after all, isn’t having trouble with African-American voters or Hispanic voters or young voters. Where he’s lagging is among white voters, and with older ones in particular. Call me crazy, but isn’t it possible, just possible, that Obama’s lead is being inhibited by the fact that he is, you know, black?

It also contains this nugget, which is probably bad news for Obama:

In October, Obama’s former pastor, Wright, will publish a new book and hit the road to promote it, an occasion that might well place the topic of Obama’s blackness (along with his patriotism and his candor about what he heard in the pews in all those years at Trinity Church) squarely at the center of the national debate. How Obama handles that moment may determine whether he becomes the next occupant of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

This thought also makes sense, unfortunately for Obama:

For many Democrats, Obama’s eventual residence there has long seemed a foregone conclusion. But cast your mind forward twenty years and imagine looking back on this election. Would it really seem strange from that vantage point if the first black major-party nominee—a guy with a thin résumé, no foreign-policy credentials in an era scarred by terrorism, a background alien to much of Wonder Bread America, and the full name Barack Hussein Obama—lost? No, it would seem inevitable.

Could Clark come back?

Everyone thought Wes Clark's VP chances were squadoosh after his comments about McCain's military service. But here's Nate Silver backing him, citing the Georgia conflict, which, in theory, helps McCain be refocusing the debate on foreign policy as a reason to pick a general. But why not avoid the awkwardness by picking a more obscure military man who didn't put his foot in his mouth? Eric Shinseki, perhaps? Or James Jones?

MLK in Berlin

Via the useful History News Network, this from a Chicago Tribune op-ed by a U of Chicago History Professor:

There are many photographs of Kennedy's 1963 speech at the Brandenburg Gate and of Kennedy gazing over the wall into East Berlin. King did more than look: He went. Invited by an East German church official, King was determined to speak directly to East Berliners. The U.S. State Department was equally determined that he would not. The American embassy confiscated King's passport and recalled his German guide and translator. Undeterred, King went to the wall. King had just been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize; surely someone would recognize him at Checkpoint Charlie? But his face was not enough for the East Germans. Informed that he had to prove his identity, King flashed his American Express Card.

Yes, but does he like Asian Girls?

Ezra Klein thinks Evan Bayh will be Obama's VP pick:

But my hunch now is that it'll be Evan Bayh, if for no other reason than Evan Bayh is the single whitest man in America, and I have a feeling that the Obama campaign wants America's Whitest Man in some pictures these days.

I dispute that Evan Bayh is the single whitest man in America. For evidence, I will consult the holy bible of whiteness.

From looking at his Wikipedia page and general knowledge/guesswork, I bet Evan Bayh likes:

#1 Coffee
#4 Assissts
#5 Farmer's Markets
#7 Diversity
#8 Barack Obama
#12 Non-profits
#16 Gifted children
#35 The Daily Show
#36 Breakfast Places
#44 Public Radio
#46 Sunday NYT
#53 Dogs
#56 Lawyers
#62 Knowing what's best for poor people
#64 Recycling
#81 Graduate School
#84 T-Shirts
#86 Shorts
#88 Having Gay Friends
#92 Book Deals
#94 Free Healthcare
#99 Grammar
#101 Being Offended
#105 Unpaid Internships
#106 Facebook

While this is an impressive display of whiteness, I feel that I, for one, am much whiter than Evan Bayh.

The Real McCain and Reluctant Muslinging

Reading this New York magazine piece on the campaign made me think two things:

1. It's fully possible McCain did want to keep the campaign as civil as possible - right up until the point he realized that if that happened, Obama was going to kick his ass. I'm guessing most politicians don't really want to call their opponents traitorous child molesters, but are willing to do so when strategists tell them it's the only way they can win the campaign.
2. Lately, some journalists, perhaps egged on by John Weaver and Mike Murphy, two McCain advisers from 2000, have been claiming the McCain that is sliming Obama isn't the "real" McCain. I'm sure this is true. What's equally true is that the 2000 version of McCain - "The Maverick" - wasn't real either. Both are just creations of the strategists running the campaign. There's elements of truth and elements of fiction in both, and there are elements of truth and elements of fiction in how Obama is presented by his campaign.
   

Racist? No. Stupid? Yes.

Considering the Wall Street Journal already posed the question, I might as well provide an answer. John McCain is stupid. Ok, he's not, but his campaign's "Celeb" ad is. But it's not racist. As a reader wrote to The Daily Dish:

All of those other individuals are famous for something - there is substance behind their celebrity. Britney and Paris are paper-thin and without any substance whatsoever. That's the comparison McCain was going for - trying to allege that Barack Obama is without substance, a celebrity for celebrity's sake.

The McCain campaign was saying Obama is like Paris and Britney, not that he was fucking them. Nonetheless, the concept of the ad is stupid for numerous reasons: Obama transparently has some substance, McCain is also a celebrity, it reeks of just a stupid, desperate attack.

Right now, the McCain campaign is just flailing about in the dark, it seems.

Obama's charisma

You could do what Andrew Ferguson says:

Anyone who wants to understand Barack Obama would do well to stay away from the radio and the TV. Obama is a theatrical presence. That's what it means to be "charismatic": To an unnerving degree his appeal relies on sight and sound rather than sense. Better, in my opinion, to stick to the printed word. On paper (or the computer screen) his words can be thought about and chewed over. You can understand him at your own pace, undistracted by that rich baritone, the regal bearing, the excellent drape of his Burberry suits.

Or you could be like me and recreate Obama's voice in your mind whenever you read something he says in the paper. It makes it so much cooler.

Wishes come true, Judis on McCain, and Samantha Power

As I previously hoped, the United States is making a shift in policy in Iran, adopting a position similar to the one we took against North Korea.

From The Guardian:

That dreaded spectre appears to be receding for now. A "second North Korea" remains the preferred model for the US state department and the European allies – meaning talks leading to voluntary disarmament in return for security, aid and normalisation. This is just the sort of multilateral "soft power" horsetrading Cheney & Co cannot abide.

I also liked this quote:

But former Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry spoke for many people around the world when he described the US decision to talk as "the most welcome flip-flop in recent diplomatic history".

The US is also looking at opening up a mini-Embassy in Iran.

The big question is whether or not a President McCain would continue to talk to Iran. His rhetoric indicates otherwise, but his rhetoric also indicates that Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is in charge of Iran's foreign policy when he isn't, so McCain's rhetoric really can't be trusted. But at the same time, John Judis thinks McCain has thrown off the yolk of realism and is now a pure neocon.

The Judis article includes this gem:

Like Bush, McCain looked into Putin's soul, but, where Bush saw a man "deeply committed to his country," McCain saw only devilry: "I looked into Putin's eyes and saw three things: a K and a G and a B." McCain has repeatedly displayed his contempt for the Russian. He has called Putin a "spoiled child" who exhibits "aberrational" behavior and a "totalitarian dictator who ... is trying to revert [to] the old Russian Empire." And he continues to see Russia entirely through the prism of Putin, dismissing his successor, Dmitry Medvedev, as "Putin's puppet."

He does realize he's going to have to talk to Medvedev once's he in office, right? Right?

Another IR note - Obama basically has a mini-State Dept. working for him. I'm glad to see that Samantha Power is still in contact with the campaign - A Problem From Hell is one of my favorite IR books. Also, it leaves open the possibility of having both an Undersecretary of State Power and an Undersecretary of State Slaughter simultaneously - a dream first expressed by Matt Yglesias, I believe.

Frank Rich overestimates kids

While I enjoyed Frank Rich's column today - IMHO, he's the 2nd best columnist the NYT has, only behind David Brooks - I think he's overestimating the kids at his screening of Wall-E when he says the following:

They seemed to instinctually understand what “Wall-E” was saying; they didn’t pepper their chaperones with questions along the way. At the end they clapped their small hands. What they applauded was not some banal cartoonish triumph of good over evil but a gentle, if unmistakable, summons to remake the world before time runs out.

My guess is the kids were more mesmerized by the movie's stunning visuals than by its deep moral questions. Also, most kids above the age of say, 4, know not to ask their parents questions during the movie. The mini-van ride home is a different story, however.