Ron Brownstein from the National Journal has some very serious, very grown-up, and very serious advice for Barack Obama: if he wishes to be taken seriously by serious people, President Obama must, without fail, and at every turn, say, in as serious a way as is seriously possible, "fuck off, hippies!"
To seize that opportunity, Obama would need to overcome the objections of liberal Internet activists who are condemning as capitulation any effort to find accommodation with Republicans or the interests they represent. But outreach from Obama wouldn't be a form of altruism, much less a concession to the post-election conservative insistence that America remains a right-tilting country. Instead, it would be a hard-headed strategy for expanding his own coalition by dividing the GOP's. Systematically reaching out beyond his core supporters is Obama's best hope of advancing his policy agenda and of delivering on his overarching promise to bridge America's partisan and ideological divides.
I think most of these "liberal Internet activists" ought to be praised, as if you are man constructed out of straw it is rather remarkable that you know how to use a computer at all.
More to the point, I have no idea what the "core supporters" of Obama are saying as regards, say, taking on Chuck Hagel as Sec Def. Heck, I'm not even entirely certain that Obama's "core supporters" are in fact "liberal Internet activists." But I am pretty sure that any "split" in the GOP as regards Hagel has already pretty much occured -- as it has with any other "moderate" Obama might take on -- so Brownstein's tactical point doesn't strike me as very compelling.
Look, I don't know who Obama is going to take on for any of the important posts, and neither it seems does anyone else -- if Obama goes ahead and appoints Sean Hannity as Secretry of the Interior, then I promise to get really pissed off. "Moderate Republicans" -- a strange and exotic species nowadays, rarely seen in the wild -- don't frighten me as members of the administration. One thing we've learned about these people over the last eight years is that they are by and large useless specimens who can be easily smacked around into doing what they're told. They are not very frightening. Or even especially principled, either.
Where I will draw lines is to do with any failure on the part of Obama to dismantle as rapidly as possible the Bushite torture regime, and any failure to end the war in Iraq quickly and reponsibly. Apart from that I frankly expect to be disappointed on any number of issues, and will complain about them when they arise, but stopping the torture and death are the priorities. (I'll write up a list later on about what I really want to see from Obama and where I stand on the crucial When Can a Liberal Blog Criticize Obama issue, but this will I think do for now.)
