Left lacks leverage to stop Obama's rightward tack

[BridgeTheGap]

WASHINGTON - Appeal to the party's base, secure the nomination, then tack back to the center for the general election. It's a time-honored tradition in American presidential politics. And in the past few weeks, Barack Obama, far more than John McCain, has made such maneuvers a nearly daily feature of his campaign.

Time to unilaterally renegotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), the agreement that many working Americans believe threatens or has already cost them their jobs? Not so fast, Senator Obama now says. No death penalty for child rapists? The Supreme Court got that one wrong, he says. And on the court's historic assertion of an individual's right to bear arms, Obama signaled approval.

Perhaps his most risky move has been to backtrack on a promise to oppose a government-surveillance bill, the so-called FISA legislation (named after the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978), which provides retroactive immunity for phone companies that have helped the Bush administration in its warrantless wiretapping program.

On Thursday, the longtime Iraq war opponent showed new flexibility on his plan to withdraw troops within 16 months, saying that he could refine his policies after he visits the country later this summer.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/csm/20080708/ts_csm/acentrist

[bunnies]

1. If I hear these damned lies one more time...

I think my heads going to explode. :nuke:

[Johonny]

15. I know

Just a few weeks ago Obama was suppose to be the most liberal person in the senate, today he's becoming too conservative for liberal voters. I wish the right could decide on 1 lie and stick to it.

[NattPang]

2. Full PR program by the media

to further depress
Obama's fundraising,
volunteers, and support.

The headline is meant
to instigate ire from the base,
and capitalize to increase support
for John McCain; the media's candidate.

The media is good at this.

[dionysus]

19. is that haiku?

[DJ13]

3. a time-honored tradition in American presidential politics

......and what great Presidents we get after being lied to!

When will we learn that we should expect honesty from anyone running for political office instead of blindly accepting these lies just to win?

[Eric J in MN]

6. What do you want liberals to do? NT

NT

[DJ13]

9. Obama doesnt need to move to the middle

We liberals need to stop being afraid that the voters will reject our policies, as evidenced by Obama's subtle shift.

In case no one has been paying attention, the voters are willing to embrace more liberalism after getting screwed over for the last 30 years by moderates and conservatives.

Obama was was already beating McCain in most every poll before tracking towards the center...even with his liberal ideals intact.

If we really think now is the time for change, dont water down the message of change by becoming nearly the same thing we supposedly want to change away from.

Stop being afraid to BE liberal.

[Median Democrat]

14. "Obama's Subtle Shift" - Personal Responsibility IS a liberal value

The shift is so subtle that it often boils down to one issue, FISA. The other issues such as personal responsibility? Since when the hell did that become a conservative value? Talk about allowing the right to define us. I would think that responsibility is a freakin LIBERAL value, not a conservative one. Does Bush & Co. make you think personal responsibility?

For goodness sakes, talk about buying into MSM non-sense. Many, many liberals leaders and activists have preached personal responsibility.

[Median Democrat]

11. Who Is Lying? Obama or McCain?

Also, how is Obama moving to the center? I understand the FISA issue. Anything else? Medical care? No change. Iraq? No change. Repeal tax cuts? No change. Appoint Judges who will uphold Roe v. Wade? No change. Where is this evidence of a dramatic rightward shift?

[NattPang]

12. But they said.

[question everything]

17. Agree. Obama was never the real "lefty" like, say, Kucinich

or even Feingold.

We all knew it, that there was not much of a difference between Hillary's and Obama's policies. It was all about style and baggage (or lack of it).

Yes, he had the label of the most liberal senator.. based on what? On barely two years?

About judges that will uphold Roe v. Wade, now here I am concerned as, apparently, he is moving to the "center" as was recently reported here.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=102&topic_id=3381031

[MarjorieG]

20. Less concern with compass directions and pigeon-holing the better.

[Eric J in MN]

4. Obama said that his Iraq trip would refine his Iraq policy,

...and mainstream media writers like the one above portray it as a reversal.

But if Obama had said that his Iraq trip would have no effect on his Iraq policy, then they could call the trip a photo-op.

[truthisfreedom]

5. By Linda Feldmann. So, Linda, exactly who is it you work for?

Enquiring minds want to know!

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

7. Who writes this shit?

Whoever it was either:

a) Hasn't been paying attention.

b) Actually believed the nonsense about Obama being the "most liberal Senator."

[underpants]

8. Hold it-I thought liberals were able to control everything from schools to all the courts

maybe this writer needs to check with Hannity and the rest of his sponsors and get their story straight.

I am still waiting on "Why doesn't anyone want to run with Obama?"

[endarkenment]

10. Stop already. Stop working for the McCain campaign. Stop.

Obama was a moderate centrist Democrat when he started his campaign, while he was battling in the primaries, and yet again now that he is battling the rightwing neo-fascist McCain.

[book_worm]

13. Just knock it off.

[depakid]

16. The article simply restates what many others have been saying

and reflects the public perception that the campaign itself has created over the past 3 weeks.

I know most of you don't like hearing it- but by in large the campaign has engaged in this "strategy" seemingly by design and so should have reasonably expected these sorts of stories (as well as repeated astonishment on the part of those progressives, whose issues have been repeatedly and sometimes gratuitously been tossed aside, "nuanced" or to paraphrase Bob Herbert "twisted by clever panders."

As George Lakoff has noted REPEATEDLY over the years- politics is as much a game of creating and managing perceptions in peoples' minds as it about the fine print on the issues.

In some respects- seems to me that it's a good thing that this has happened now, as the campaign has time to respond appropriately to the feedback (as opposed to down the line). Just like it was a good thing that the Wright controversy happened when it did and is now old news.

[rox63]

18. There.is.no.rightward.tack

There never has been. :banghead:

[depakid]

21. Yep. Everybody's lying

Greenwald, Lakoff, Herbert, Krugman, Huffington, Markos, the whole lot of us.

And every single one of us wants a Republican president, too.

[KurtNYC]

22. "..me and my Obama friends, we're all misunderstood..."

(to the tune of John Mayer's "Waiting for the World to Change")

Me and my Obama friends
We're all misunderstood
Media says we stand for nothing and
There's no way we ever could
Now we see what's goin' on
With the media and those who lead it
Soon we're gonna get the means
To rise above and beat it

'til then we're waiting
Waiting on the media to change
We keep on waiting
Waiting on the media to change

It's hard to correct Fox news
When they they're broadcasting their own views
So we keep waiting
Waiting on the media to change
Now if we had the power
To bring our neighbors home from war
They would have never missed a Christmas
No more ribbons on their door
But when you trust your television
What you get is what you got
Cause when they own the information, oh
They can bend it all they want...