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SKY'S THE LIMIT.
So the press has latched onto this idea that President Obama is "trying to do too much at once." This, like other ideological trends in the press, isn't premised on anything concrete other than a general hostility to Obama's progressive agenda. I'm hard pressed to think of anyone arguing Bush "tried to do too much" by say invading Iraq soon after 9/11, but that's because the Beltway press had internalized conservative perspectives on basically everything, and this remains the case. Obviously it's not working, as Matthew Yglesias noted in response to Obama's education speech, "he’s not only moving forward boldly on the education front as well as on other issues, but that he’s moving forward across all major education fronts."
A word to the wise for those who think this line of argument will actually succeed at curbing Obama's ambitions: A black man who just got elected president of the United States is not going to be daunted by a bunch of talking heads telling him what he will or will not be able to do.
-- A. Serwer
COMMENTS (4)
Back in September, Obama said that a president must be capable of doing "more than one thing at a time". Six months later, our media elites still haven't figured this out.
Posted by: Darius | March 10, 2009 1:41 PM
The stupid it kills me: this line of argument is equivalent to telling Lincoln that he can’t attack Vicksburg at the same time he is running as Gettysburg is occurring, or that Sherman can’t march on Atlanta while Grant is doing his thing in Virginia, or that FDR can’t fight the war in Europe at the same time he’s fighting in the Pacific – it’s also insulting, as if Obama can’t talk and chew gum at the same time - as I said, the stupid it kills me
Posted by: derek | March 10, 2009 2:12 PM
I screamed in my car to hear Will Wilkinson of the Cato Institute propagate this meme
Posted by: Paul | March 11, 2009 7:47 AM
No - this is good advice. They are advocating a return to the overwhelmingly successful "Rose Garden" strategy of Jimmy Carter, who canceled his public appearances to focus like a laser on the Iranian hostage crisis.
Posted by: Rich | March 11, 2009 8:56 AM