More on Picking Your President

While I'm loathe to do so, because we so rarely disagree, I have to take issue with Cassandra's characterization of the Sullivan piece in the Atlantic.  While I am personally deeply torn as to whether Obama or Clinton would be the better choice for President, I do think that Sullivan's principal contention - namely that putting another Clinton in the White House will simply stamp our collective passport for a minimum of four more years of the petty political bickering on the part of the various political operatives cum talking heads - is a veritable certainly.

Where I do agree wholeheartedly with Cassandra is with respect to this silly notion that we should be electing someone who "looks Presidential" or with whom we'd like to "have a beer." I also agree that it is somewhat offensive to imply (though, in his defense, I don't actually think Sullivan meant it in this way) that by simply electing an African-American, we can somehow, in one stoke, change the trajectory of our foreign policy, without really getting down to the nitty-gritty (read: boring stuff, at least to those who think looking Presidential is the number one qualification for the Presidency) of his policy prescriptions.

But I do think that right or wrong, we have proven ourselves incapable as a nation of getting past all the Vietnam / Baby-Boomer baggage. I think that eventually time will do it, as the principal actors and their followers in the electorate will ultimately just age out of their positions of political and economic influence. That being said, I think there is a persuasive case to be made that Obama could hasten this transition along, as could anyone, quite frankly, who hasn't thrown in, either by word or by deed, with one camp or the other.

Where I would tend to differ with Sullivan is whether or not Obama could actually deliver on this mandate. If this session of Congress has proven anything its:

a) that the Republican minority is very good at generally refusing to negotiate and is much more successful at sticking to first principals, even if they are unpopular,

b) without substantial majorities (which don't appear to be forthcoming any time soon given the laughable degree of gerrymandering in House districts and the counter-majoritarian structural deficiencies in the Senate) you don't really have a hope of enacting a comprehensive agenda, and

c) the vocal elements of the Left don't seem to get point b

I'm not sure any degree of Hope/Uniter not a Divider/National Dialog/Agent of Change talk is really going to move the needle. There are many, many examples of issues with strong national support (getting our of Iraq, however wise or unwise that might be, and stricter gun control laws, just to name a few) which go nowhere even with leaders willing that champion the cause.

But I do think that Obama will be harder to attack on the traditional political axes of hypocrisy or pandering, and he will certainly be better positioned to take the high ground when he is attacked by the talking heads on the Right and the Left. Whether that's enough to really move the needle on the overall polarization issues (and, for me, the real issue, whether his policies are actually right for the nation) is difficult to say.