Landscaping 2012: The Values Referendum

“Republicans have to nominate someone better than the person they want to defeat. If they get so adamant that they will only support a candidate that believes everything on their checklist, they will re-elect Obama.”--Mike Huckabee

A first: I quote Mike Huckabee in all seriousness, because I think he's right. And because I want to make the point that the same--admittedly oversimplified, but pertinent-- lesson applies to liberals. And you can quote me.

Democrats have to believe that their candidate is better than the person they want to defeat. If they get so adamant that they will only support a candidate who promises everything on their checklist, they will elect  ________________(Michele Bachmann, Rick Perry, Mitt Romney, Sarah Palin, etc.) - Nance

I have been catching some flack on the blog pages of my friends lately. In fact, all my liberal friends who have blog pages have been catching flack from their friends; there's no opinion so elevated, so reasonable, so obvious that it won't be attacked. Everybody is pissed at the president. Everybody is scared. Everybody is losing sight of the larger picture. Everybody is seriously about to hand 2012 to the tea party.

And, before you jump straight to the Comments to swing at my head, I assure you I've long been listening carefully.  And reading prodigiously (I promise I won't quote you, here; I'll stick to people who get paid to be quoted).

“That the nation’s first black president defends separate but equal in the context of same-gender intimacy is bitterly ironic.” - Randall Kennedy, The Persistence of The Color Line.

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It would have been a defining issue for the President to use to show whose side he’s on (the middle and working class) and whose side the Republicans are on (not the middle and working class). 

It makes him look weak — Republicans got everything they wanted. And when a President looks weak, he is weak. - Robert Reich

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The president of the United States is supposed to salve our frustrations, not meekly bemoan his own.

Shouldn’t he or someone in his inner circle have foreseen the potential for events unfolding in such a humiliating fashion and made sure to avoid it? Apparently no one did, and that suggests a deficit of smarts by almost any definition of that ludicrously imprecise term. - Frank Bruni, NYTimes Sunday Review Opinion Pages.

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Does Obama have an environmental bottom line? I cannot discern it. - Bill Snape, Center for Biological Diversity

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The squabble began with President Obama looking petty and partisan and ended with House Speaker John Boehner looking churlish and disrespectful. If the two had gotten together to figure out how to make Americans think even less of Washington politicians, they couldn’t have done much better. - Ruth Marcus, TheWP

I'll even quote Yul Brenner from "The King And I" (and not for the last time in this series of posts), "Et cet-e-RAH, et cet-e-RAH, et cet-e-RAH!" I get it. And I don't have to read to learn that Mr. Obama has disappointed; I can ask me. When I do, what I keep hearing is, "Dang it, Mr. O, sir, stop acting like yourself and start acting like ___________(insert cariacatured Democratic hero, without examining record fully).

It's a long way to November, 2012, and a lot can change, but so far this race boils down to values. I wish that weren't the case; I would much rather it be about choosing between specific proposals to solve problems that we all recognize and can agree on. Instead, to this point, finding someone who agrees with you on the problems is almost as hard as finding someone who agrees with you on which solutions to try. And there's an obvious reason for that. We've never been in this particular, ugly situation before (economy, energy, population, climate, security and the rule of law--all on the line globally) and, in our stress, we face a threat that all systems face under extreme pressure: that we will disintegrate rather than cope.

This presidential campaign is shaping up to be about vague, broad-brushed polarities. Ideology vs. pragmatism. Theistic government vs. humanistic government. Science vs. faith. Inclusivity vs. exclusivity. Rigidity vs. adaptability. Compromise vs. contest. President Obama didn't expect this; he gave the American people too much credit for levelheadedness. He still seems to be shaking his head over it. Maybe he figured, if we were smart enough as a country to know we needed him in '08, we're smart enough to see through the smoke screens of politics. I wish we were. I mean to be.

What I see is that, puzzled as he is, out-maneuvered as he may be when both his friends and his enemies take aim at him, the President consistently chooses the option that permits functional government...as if, as long as one side chooses functionality, the other will eventually recover good sense and get to work with him...as if his critics in Congress actually desired a working government. The alternative, that he take the equivalent opposite position from the right wing extremists, invites the unthinkable. Think about that.

Obama's moves indicate a willingness to play chess, not fling the board at the opponent and stalk out. The Left is angry because they want him to know how to win in one swift, devastating move, but our government is about checks and balances, not checkmate. It's designed to put differences to work for the sake of national well-being through a process of negotiation and compromise. It's worked before, even in bad times, because those who were charged to govern were willing to do so. What option is there for a sitting president who values America than that he do his best to finesse the game?

Given that, my choice is clear and obvious. I'm pulling for the guy who's trying to pull us together into a government that works. I think that Obama's commitment to serviceable government  makes him better than those who'll see it all brought down to ashes if that's the only way to win. Maybe that's a value that Independents, Democrats, and Progressives can agree on. That's the value I plan to work for and vote for.

[Landscaping 2012 will be a series of posts over the next fifteen months. For those of you who hate politics and want to avoid it, I'll make it easier for you by labeling posts that way. When there's no label, there'll be the randomness that usually marks this blog.]