{"id":3304,"date":"2010-07-23T12:00:00","date_gmt":"2010-07-23T18:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.edgewiseblog.com\/mjh\/theirs\/obamas-second-act-charles-krauthammer-national-review-online\/"},"modified":"2010-07-23T12:00:00","modified_gmt":"2010-07-23T18:00:00","slug":"obamas-second-act-charles-krauthammer-national-review-online","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.edgewiseblog.com\/mjh\/theirs\/obamas-second-act-charles-krauthammer-national-review-online\/","title":{"rendered":"Obama’s Second Act – Charles Krauthammer – National Review Online"},"content":{"rendered":"

Obama\u2019s Second Act – Charles Krauthammer – National Review Online<\/a><\/p>\n

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I have a warning for Republicans: Don\u2019t underestimate Barack Obama. \u2026<\/p>\n

The net effect of 18 months of Obamaism will be to undo much of Reaganism. Both presidencies were highly ideological, grandly ambitious, and often underappreciated by their own side. In his early years as president, Reagan was bitterly attacked from his right. (Typical Washington Post headline: \u201cFor Reagan and the New Right, the Honeymoon Is Over\u201d \u2014 and that was six months into his presidency!) Obama is attacked from his left for insufficient zeal on gay rights, immigration reform, closing Guantanamo \u2014 the list is long. The critics don\u2019t understand the big picture. Obama\u2019s transformational agenda is a play in two acts.<\/font> \u2026<\/p>\n

The next burst of ideological energy \u2014 massive regulation of the energy economy, federalizing higher education, and \u201ccomprehensive\u201d immigration reform (i.e., amnesty) \u2014 will require a second mandate, meaning reelection in 2012.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s why there\u2019s so much tension between Obama and the congressional Democrats. For Obama, 2010 matters little. If the Democrats lose control of one or both houses, Obama will likely have an easier time in 2012, just as Bill Clinton used Newt Gingrich and the Republicans as his foil for his 1996 reelection campaign.<\/p>\n

Obama is down, but it\u2019s very early in the play. Like Reagan, he came here to do things. And he\u2019s done much in his first 500 days. What he has left to do, he knows, must await his next 500 days \u2014 those that come after<\/em> reelection.
So 2012 is the real prize. Obama sees far, farther than even his own partisans. Republicans underestimate him at their peril.<\/font><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Obama\u2019s Second Act – Charles Krauthammer – National Review Online<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Obama\u2019s Second Act – Charles Krauthammer – National Review Online I have a warning for Republicans: Don\u2019t underestimate Barack Obama. \u2026 The net effect of 18 months of Obamaism will be to undo much of Reaganism. Both presidencies were highly ideological, grandly ambitious, and often underappreciated by their own side. In his early years as … Continue reading Obama’s Second Act – Charles Krauthammer – National Review Online<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3304","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-theirs"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.edgewiseblog.com\/mjh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3304","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.edgewiseblog.com\/mjh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.edgewiseblog.com\/mjh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.edgewiseblog.com\/mjh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.edgewiseblog.com\/mjh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3304"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.edgewiseblog.com\/mjh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3304\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.edgewiseblog.com\/mjh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3304"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.edgewiseblog.com\/mjh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3304"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.edgewiseblog.com\/mjh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3304"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}