Perhaps a bit early in the morning for this, but the reading can be divided into easily digestible chunks. New York magazine devotes its current issue to “The Obama History Project“:
… Over the past few weeks, New York asked more than 50 historians to respond to a broad questionnaire about how Obama and his administration will be viewed 20 years from now. After the day-to-day crises and flare-ups and legislative brinkmanship are forgotten, what will we remember? What, and who, will have mattered most? What small piece of legislation (or executive inaction) will be seen by future generations as more consequential than today’s dominant news stories? What did Obama miss about America? What did we (what will we) miss about him?
Almost every respondent wrote that the fact of his being the first black president will loom large in the historical narrative — though they disagreed in interesting ways. Many predict that what will last is the symbolism of a nonwhite First Family; others, the antagonism Obama’s blackness provoked; still others, the way his racial self-consciousness constrained him. A few suggested that we will care a great deal less about his race generations from now — just as John F. Kennedy’s Catholicism hardly matters to current students of history. Across the board, Obamacare was recognized as a historic triumph (though one historian predicted that, with its market exchanges, it may in retrospect be seen as illiberal and mark the beginning of the privatization of public health care). A surprising number of respondents argued that his rescue of the economy will be judged more significant than is presently acknowledged, however lackluster the recovery has felt. There was more attention paid to China than isis (Obama’s foreign policy received the most divergent assessments), and considerable credit was given to the absence of a major war or terrorist attack, along with a more negative assessment of its price — the expansion of the security state, drones and all. The contributors tilted liberal — that’s academia, no surprise — but we made an effort to create at least a little balance with conservative historians. Their responses often echoed those from the far left: that a president elected on a promise to unite the country instead extended the power of his office in alarming, unprecedented ways. Here, we have published a small fraction of the answers we found most thought-provoking, along with essays by Jonathan Chait, our national-affairs columnist, and Christopher Caldwell, whom we borrowed from The Weekly Standard. A full version of all the historians’ answers can be found here…
***********
Apart from arguing about the arguments (and when the best one can find for the prosecution is The Weekly Standard, that’s an indictment on its own), what’s on the agenda for the day?
raven
Revenge for the bigfoot last night?
Anne Laurie
@raven: Nah, just wanted to post a link before I went to bed… and before a new day’s news busied things up too much around here!
There’s a lot of stuff in those questionnaires & I hope at least a few people will find them worth reading (agree or not). So far I find Annette Gordon-Reed’s take most interesting… but then, I loved The Hemingses of Monticello.
‘Night, all…
raven
@Anne Laurie: Peace out!
raven
Need a lecture on Obama not saying “Muslim Extremism”? Joe has it.
OzarkHillbilly
Heading for STL today so NFL. I’ll have to try and get back to the pre-histories later.
Mustang Bobby
There’s a dense fog advisory up for Miami-Dade County this morning. There’s also a lot of condensation in the atmosphere at ground level.
OzarkHillbilly
Nascar’s Kurt Busch tells court ex-girlfriend is international assassin
You want to, you know you do. Go ahead, I won’t tell anyone.
Mustang Bobby
@OzarkHillbilly: “On our next episode of ‘Covert Affairs’…”
OzarkHillbilly
@Mustang Bobby: Heh…
And it looks like I won’t be going to STL today. Went downstairs and started putting my lunch together. Th wife looks at me and says, “What are you doing?”
“Getting my lunch.” says I.
“I have a Drs. appointment.”
“Oh. Yeah. I forgot.”
I would spend more time driving around town than I would working. Not worth it.
Abo gato
Today will be an interesting day for me. I have worked for gigantico company now for 37 years. Said company is going through a nationwide re-org in how we do things. I am in an office where many have already left for other places as they were in their 40’s or so and have many more years to go. The ones who remain are mostly in their 50’s and were hoping for a severance package prior to retiring and getting their pension. (Bear with me as the tale is a bit long). Christmas week I got a sinus infection and treated OTC. New Year’s week my lymph nodes on the right side of my neck were swollen, bruised and it hurt. Went to the doc who prescribed a reducing dose of steroids, with the caveat that aggression could be a side effect. Got on that 10 day ritual last Friday. Today is day 5. Sunday night woke up at 2:30 and was wack all day Monday. Tuesday woke up at 3:30 and was better. This morning woke up at 2:00.
SO, today a big VP of gigantico is coming to our office. Purportedly to try to soothe nerves and, or, provide answers to many questions. My boss was in town yesterday to do my year end review. I go to Austin next week to do the final reviews on the people who work under me.
My birthday is in July and I’ll be 62. At 2 AM I realized this was my last year end and the last one I will ever have to do for my team is next week.
Yesterday I was talking to my peers and we wondered what type of bullshit was going to be tossed around today. I told them about my birthday and told the I would be happy to ask any question that they wanted to know since they all need their jobs for at least 10 years.
Sleeplessness? Check. Aggression? Could happen. I have this reckless freedom and power of having no shits to give anymore and I am thinking that the VP meeting with us managers at 9 will will be fucking awesome as I have some very pointed questions to ask and I plan to wield my power like the fucking pro-boss that I am. Woo fucking Hoo! Wish us well!
Baud
Hmmm.
ThresherK
@Mnemosyne (iPhone): (From the last thread): Mnemosyne, is that store you mentioned in New York State? I’m asking for a spouse, who is also a big Wizard of Oz fan.
OzarkHillbilly
@Abo gato: Not giving a sh!t can be fun!!!
Baud
@OzarkHillbilly:
It’s certainly less stressful.
MomSense
@Baud:
See Obama did bring the left and right together.
Mustang Bobby
@Abo gato: Good wishes.
I’m 62 now and am in the state retirement program called DROP – Deferred Retirement Option Plan. I technically retired on Sept 1 but keep working for up to five more years. Meanwhile my pension payout goes into an investment account, along with cashed-in vacation days and sick pay, so when I leave at 67 I’ll have a monthly pension check and an investment account like a 401k. I plan to find another job before I actually leave. I can’t imagine not working, even if it’s part-time for the Nature Conservancy.
I have 1,208 more working days until I actually retire. But who’s counting.
JPL
@OzarkHillbilly: The comments are great. What better way to explain bruises than invent a story explaining the injuries. What a guy!
@Abo gato: Good luck with the meeting.
Baud
@MomSense:
Do blogs imitate life or does life imitate blogs?
OzarkHillbilly
@Baud: Over the years, I’ve walked off more than one jobsite. Some foremen think carpenters are to be abused, because we abuse our bodies so much, I guess. I never had much tolerance for it. If one started screaming at me for what ever reason, I wouldn’t say a word, just pick up my tools and go home. They’d either shut up and apologize, or really wig out. The latter were the fun ones.
AnonPhenom
Caldwell’s delusional take on The Obama Legacy is a laugh riot.
And he’s suppose to be one of the Right’s ‘serious’ writers.
Baud
@OzarkHillbilly:
I used to be very deferential to my “superiors.” I learned too late in life that I shouldn’t be. I have a far shorter fuse now.
JPL
Personally, I’ll wait to see how history judges Obama.
CBS Morning news is covering the Busch/Driscoll affair. Nora did point out that Driscoll being assassin would have little to do with the domestic violence charges against Busch.
Someone has been watching to many episodes of Chuck. Didn’t Sarah leave in one outfit and return in another.
Valdivia
@Baud:
exactly!
Is it just me or doing historical assessments with two years left is a tad…premature?
Abo gato
@OzarkHillbilly: Yes it can. My rep has always been that I will candidly say things that need to be said in meetings, even back in the days when I did still need to give a few shits. Oh baby, today will be stellar!
Baud
@Valdivia:
It is premature, but I can’t say it’s an Obama-specific problem in this case.
Gene108
@Valdivia:
Better than predicting the 2016 Presidential field in 2013, like the media has done.
There is at least some data to base opinions on.
Iowa Old Lady
I never knew I was rude at meetings until two colleagues burst out laughing after I said something.
OzarkHillbilly
@Baud: I had the advantage of being a union carpenter. If times were good, I could quit a job, put my name on the out of work list, and be working again in less than a week. If times were hard, well, I was gonna get laid off pretty soon anyway.
OzarkHillbilly
@Iowa Old Lady: Rude??? I thought I was just being honest.
brantl
Anything you “borrowed” from the Weekly Standard, give it back, and don’t unwrap it.
JPL
@Valdivia: It’s not just you. It’s why I linked to the smut that Ozark mentioned.
Abo gato
@Mustang Bobby: that sounds like a very do-able plan you are on. We don’t have any options like that. Our office will be closing at some point in the future. This started in March of 2011 when we were told our lease was up in August 2015. Then things changed and changed again a few times. Don’t know when it will close now, but how fiscally responsible is it to keep our space with maybe 50 disgruntled employees for another year or so?
I do swear though, that once I am out, if anyone uses the words “analytics; metrics; transparency; 6 Sigma or excellence in operations management” again to me in a serious conversation, I am going to slap them.
I am looking forward to working by making things. I make silver chains and necklaces, I love to cook, love to draw and paint and photog. Maybe some of that can bring in some scratch.
Morzer
@Abo gato:
You can finally make that movie you’ve always dreamed of: Six Degrees of Sigma Separation.
Iowa Old Lady
@OzarkHillbilly: Me too.
Also OT, but I’m listening to last night’s Chris Hayes’ show and he’s talking about Romney running again. I thought about poor Steve Benen keeping track of all Mitt’s lies last time. It nearly ground the man down. He must be horrified.
Cervantes
I’m as certain about that as I am about anything.
Raven
@Mustang Bobby: An old friend of mine works for them in LA.http://blog.nature.org/conservancy/tag/misty-herrin/
Raven
@Mustang Bobby: My boss is retiring in the fall. I’ve worked from home for 11 years and want to keep doing it but I’m not driving anywhere. Should be interesting.
MomSense
@Baud:
I don’t think I’ve had nearly enough coffee to get all Aristotelian this morning.
The Obama History Project brought to you by New York Magazine before Obama is even history and with enough conservatives to balance all those liberal historians (it is academe after all) strikes me as an exercise in a bunch of wankers proving how clever they are. If I want clever analysis with little resemblance to real life, well there are plenty of blogs to choose from.
So the answer is life imitating blogs! Definitely life imitating blogs.
stinger
@Valdivia: The media is determined to make the concept of “lame-duck President” a reality. Luckily for America, this is Obama they’re dealing with.
Cervantes
@OzarkHillbilly:
That’s bad. This is worse.
debbie
@Iowa Old Lady:
I’ve never been rude, but I’ve definitely called bullshit in many meetings. I’ve often been thanked by younger team members who were afraid to speak up. The manager made the mistake of telling us she wanted us to speak honestly and so I have. I’m sure she’s regretted that.
I’d be in a whole lot of trouble if I lost my job, but the way employees are treated is abominable. Having worked at other more humane places has made me even more outspoken.
OzarkHillbilly
@Raven: My buddy Mike is their cave biologist down in Arkansas.
Baud
@MomSense:
Sounds about right. On a more important note, how is puppeh?
Ben Cisco
All this angling to present the “narrative” on the history of the Obama presidency – a presidency that has a FULL TWO YEARS LEFT! – would be nauseating, except that the media’s been on the task of denying, marginalizing, obfuscating, and plain ol’ making up shit about it for so long that one becomes desensitized to it.
Almost as if that were the point.
Sherparick
Steve M at “No More Mr. Nice Blog” has a post about Bernie Sanders’ amendment to the Keystone Pipeline bill concerning global warming driven by humans burning fossil fuel and the politics of it. The idea is that it might put Republicans on record in Blue and Purplish states as being anti-environment http://nomoremister.blogspot.com/2015/01/republicans-will-oppose-sanders-climate.html#links But as Steve M. points out, most Republicans running in these states, including even Mark Kirk in Illinois, are not likely to be hurt by this amendment. And sadly, I won’t be surprised to see at least 4 Democrats vote against it (Tester, Heitkamp, Donnelly, and Manchin). In the 1970s, politicians were scared being attacked as “anti-environment.” Unfortunately, not any more. The Greens need to learn from the NRA about how to reach out to people in districts and states and get motivated to vote on this single issue in both primaries and general elections so that some of these turkeys lose. But right now, it seems better to be on the right side of the Koch brothers and Rupert Murdoch and his Saudi Prince partner.
bemused
@Iowa Old Lady:
Maddow recalled last night, after Mitt’s 2012 loss, reporter asks him if he would run again. Mitt answered no, eleven times. Tagg Romney said his father wanted to be president less than anyone he’d met. Dad had no desire. If he could have found someone to take his place he would have been ecstatic to step aside.
I wonder how soon after 2012 the family changed their minds.
Keith G
@Ben Cisco: I guess one could view it that way, but it seems to me just a bit paranoid in nature.
It also seems to me that this is a natural time to write such pieces. The Obama administration is at that point where it’s virtually impossible to create and advance large programmatic initiatives.
For that, one needs to have a sympathetic Congress. That is not to say that the president is powerless. There are so many ways that the president can act to affect the process of governance that no president can be seen as totally powerless and Obama is currently showing more than a bit of joy and skill displaying how he can use the power he has left in very interesting and useful ways.
Back to the meta about this article. Now is also a favorable time to write such stories because before long the spotlight would be away from Obama and on to the group who are trying to succeed him and eventually on to the person who will succeed him.
EconWatcher
Christopher Caldwell is actually a really smart guy, multilingual and extraordinarily well read in literature and poitics. He wrote an excellent book on the impact of immigration in Europe, certainly from a conservative perspective, but so interesting that it garnered praise from the likes of Marxist Perry Anderson.
In contrast to his book (which I happen to be reading right now), his articles tend to be mostly predictable and wingnutty. His case against Obama from NY Mag is so thin you’d almost think he was taking an intentional dive. His biggest complaints seem to be the process used to enact ACA (eg, the Cornhusker kickback) and the supposed stretching of executive power (eg, immigration executive orders). Wow, that’s tough stuff, and I’m sure historians 50 and 100 years from now will weigh that heavily in assessing Obama (not). Apparently he didn’t see how Lincoln got the 13th Amendment passed in the Daniel-Day Lewis movie–or maybe he thinks Lincoln is a historical lightweight too….
I’m always on the lookout for genuinely smart conservatives, and Caldwell is one, but he’s certainly willing to look like a fool when asked to speak for the team.
Elizabelle
@EconWatcher: Ah. Christopher Caldwell.
Son in law of the late prince of darkness, Robert Novak.
And author of the seminal Atlantic article, “The Southern Captivity of the GOP”, from June 1998. (Here’s part one of that article; in three parts for online version.)
kc
@OzarkHillbilly:
Rrrriiiggght.
Betty Cracker
@bemused: Maybe Romney suspects he’s the Mormon political savior allegedly foretold by Joseph Smith — that he, Romney, is the LDS “elder” who saves the republic when the US Constitution is hanging by a thread. What are the objections of a wife or kids or misgivings of possible donors or ambitions of Rand Paul et al, when you are the White Horse? That would account for him repeatedly battering a brick wall with his noggin instead of just kicking back at one of his several palatial estates and enjoying the grandkids.
MomSense
@Baud:
She goes to the door when she has to go potty like the smartest girl in the world. She’s a total piglet and loves mealtime. She was alone yesterday for about an hour so she had to be in her crate. I didn’t hear any sound until she heard me come in and then she went nuts crying like she was in agony. As soon as I let her out she was circle dances and happy sounds. She is determined to make my son’s size 13 bean boots her own. She tries to drag them through the living room and sometimes manages to climb inside them and tumble out.
I think she is really happy because she has people constantly playing and cuddling with her. I’m completely head over heels.
Elizabelle
@MomSense: Such a sweet pup. Love hearing about her.
EconWatcher
@Elizabelle:
Not sure if that’s what you meant, but that’s an excellent article, amazingly candid and prescient coming from a member of the conservative tribe. His concluding paragraph (from 1998):
That’s why the Republicans have spent the past several months waiting for a Clinton scandal to blossom. Like the Democrats of the 1970s, they are now the party with a stake in institutional disruption and bad news. And their resemblance to the corrupt dynasty they overthrew does not stop there. Their party is now directionless, with only two skills to recommend it: first, identifying and prosecuting the excesses of its opponents; second, rigging the campaign-finance system to protect its incumbency long after it has ceased having any ideas that would justify incumbency. The Republican Party is an obsolescent one. It may continue to rule, disguised as a majority by electoral legerdemain. But it will be a long time before the party is again able to rule from a place in Americans’ hearts.
Elizabelle
@EconWatcher: Exactly. Prescient article. Some were trying to say W’s presidency disproved it (perhaps Bobo said that), but it rather hastened the process along.
Frankensteinbeck
@bemused:
2007.
@Betty Cracker:
The White Horse prophecy was always as good an explanation as anything. He’s a profoundly arrogant member of a religion so tight it might count as a cult. People run for the damnedest reasons. That he’s running again after losing in the general, which as far as I remember nobody does, lends heavy credence to that theory. Rather than wanting the presidency less, he clearly wants it more than anyone else.
Leading alternate explanation: In classic MBA CEO style he has decided that he can’t fail, he can only be failed, so he’ll keep running. His natural genius makes his victory inevitable, and last time it was the fault of… I’m guessing he’ll go with ‘incompetent tech team’, since his kind famously view engineers as unskilled labor.
Elizabelle
@Frankensteinbeck:
Maybe Romney just plain liked the attention, and he sees that the Mittlets have enough moola to live luxuriously for several generations.
Cervantes
@EconWatcher:
I agree, some of Caldwell’s long-form work is pretty good.
Frankensteinbeck
As for the OP, any assessment of Obama’s presidency and the politics of our time that doesn’t highlight the importance of racism is as useless and blind as any assessment that doesn’t highlight the vast, unprecedented, pathological obstructionism of the Republican Party. Especially since those two are so tightly intertwined. Use that as a first round of checking if any of these opinions are valid.
EconWatcher
Not sure if this is on topic, but I’d actually like to know the Admin’s thinking in not sending a high level person to Paris. You would think they would have at least sent Kerry, if not Biden.
Admittedly, the whole thing was a hypocritical s#!t show, with the likes of Putin and Bibi there. (I’m sure Hollande just loved it when Bibi used it as a recruitment tool, inviting French Jewish folks to make aliyah. Classic Bibi: “I’m here to show solidarity with France. By the way, this is an antisemitic hellhole unfit for Jews to live in, so y’all should just come home with me.” Nice.) On the other hand, participating in hypocritical s#!t shows is usually kind of part of the job description for statesmen.
CONGRATULATIONS!
What will Obama be remembered for? Nothing he did, I don’t think. He kept the boat afloat in good times and bad, which is what a president is supposed to do.
What he’ll be remember for is, oddly enough, what he brought out of Americans.
Exposing our “melting pot” and “post-racial society” as the total, complete sham and con job that it always was. Showing that White America hasn’t become one whit less racist since the Civil War. Showing that Americans are, in fact, awful, shitty, petty, violent people.
Betty Cracker
@CONGRATULATIONS!:
If you’re really insisting that white Americans are as racist in 2014 as they were in 1865, I urge you to immediately enroll in a remedial history class. As for the second sentence, substitute the word “humans” for “Americans” and you’ll be closer to the truth.
Matt McIrvin
@Elizabelle: The 9/11/2001 attacks were like a giant shot in the arm for the Republicans. It got them a mandate to rule and the sympathy of the entire country; it was like their myth of what the Reagan years were like, only real. If Bush had been up for reelection at the time he’d have gotten 538 electoral votes. Maybe 535.
But the effect only lasted for a few years, because there was nothing behind it but fear, anger and obligatory pieties.
Now, because of their loyal voter base, they can still sweep midterm elections in the fashion of 1994 when the people are feeling disaffected. Presidential elections are harder. I suppose we’ll see.
Keith G
@CONGRATULATIONS!:
Demonstrably false, though we are horribly far away from the point we should be on this topic.
The second sentence under the definition of ‘human being’.
Keith G
@Betty Cracker: Hello, Sister.
Elizabelle
@Matt McIrvin: Oh yeah. The luster was off GW Bush by September 1, 2001. He would have been a one-term president, but for 9/11.
Mnemosyne (iPad Mini)
@OzarkHillbilly:
Uh, if you think your ex-girlfriend is an international assassin and hired killer, why would you fight a no-contact order? Wouldn’t you want her to stay as far away as possible?
Mnemosyne (iPad Mini)
@ThresherK:
Sorry, no, opposite coast — Los Angeles (county). They do sell online, but obviously you don’t get the measuring service.
Steeplejack (phone)
Re Romney, from the Newsmax headlines you see only on the mobile site: “Zogby: Ann Says Mitt to Run as First Divorced Mormon.”
You’re welcome.
ThresherK
@Mnemosyne (iPad Mini): Oh, the California town of Monrovia, not the Cayuga County Moravia.
Thanks anyway. It was too much to hope that on our next trip to the Oz convention in central NY State that we could swing by another good fitting store.
Barry
@CONGRATULATIONS!: “What will Obama be remembered for? Nothing he did, I don’t think. He kept the boat afloat in good times and bad, which is what a president is supposed to do.”
Well, aside from Obmacare, keeping the US/world economy from actually going 100% 1930’s retro, changing immigration policy, winding down the foreign policy disasters of the GOP, no, I can’t think of anything.
“… in good times and bad…”
He inherited very bad times, and any good times are more of his making than for most presidents, IMHO.
“…which is what a president is supposed to do.”
Please check out his predecessor, and very likely the next GOP successor.
Kathleen
@Abo gato: I do wish you well. I went through a similar experience and while I’m much “poorer” financially I think emotionally and mentally and physically I made the right decisions.
Please keep us posted. Corporate hijinks are such a great source of humor and painful and scary as they can be.