Obama 'Defining Success Down'

http://www.futureofcapitalism.com/2009/06/obama-defining-success-down

The Financial Times's Clive Crook has a scathing assessment of President Obama's performance to date. "The president has cast himself not as a leader of reform, but as a cheerleader for 'reform' – meaning anything, really, that can plausibly be called reform, however flawed. He has defined success down so far that many kinds of failure now qualify." As for his aides, "On the main domestic issues, they are not designing policy; they are working the phones, drumming up support for bills they would be deploring if they were not in the administration."

Mr. Crook seems to be criticizing Mr. Obama from the left, while the Economist, as previously noted here, has been criticizing him from the right, or free-market perspective. What's interesting is that the British press, left-wing and right-wing, seems less enthralled by Mr. Obama than does most of the American press. Perhaps it is because their owners are not regulated by him. Let's hope we aren't getting to the point in America where one needs to read the foreign press to find sharp criticism of the government. That's a pattern usually found in unfree countries.

by Editor  |  Jun 28, 2009 at 9:52 pm Related Topics:  Press receive the latest by email: subscribe to the free futureofcapitalism.com mailing list