How do you assess President Obama's speech tonight?
You can look at it as a blueprint--and try to decide whether Obama's health care plan makes sense. I think it does, although, to be fair, I've thought that all along.
You can judge it as a political exercise. Did it help Obama's cause or hurt it? My colleague Jon Chait is skeptical, arguing that speeches don't really move public opinion. Then again, the opinions Obama needs to change were the ones from people sitting in the House of Representatives, listening to him. And, if my colleague Suzy Khimm is right, he may have succeeded there.
But there's a third way to think about the speech. You can see if was about something more than health care reform--specifically, whether it was an effort to say something broader, about how our society is organized and how we might be able to change it.
I think it was, if you listened long enough. And I liked what I heard, even if Obama said it in his typically nuanced way.
The critical passage came at the end, after Obama was done laying out all of the problems with American health care and after he was done explaining, or trying to explain, how his health care plan would solve those problems.
That's when he turned a bit more pensive and wistful--you could see this was the part of the speech he liked best--and started sounding a bit more like a preacher than a lawyer.
He invoked the spirit of Ted Kennedy, reminding people of Kennedy's determination to help the disadvantaged and marginalized. He conjured up the examples of Medicare and Social Security, noting the tough battles waged on behalf of each. And then he made his argument:
our predecessors understood that government could not, and should not, solve every problem. They understood that there are instances when the gains in security from government action are not worth the added constraints on our freedom. But they also understood that the danger of too much government is matched by the perils of too little; that without the leavening hand of wise policy, markets can crash, monopolies can stifle competition, the vulnerable can be exploited. And they knew that when any government measure, no matter how carefully crafted or beneficial, is subject to scorn; when any efforts to help people in need are attacked as un-American; when facts and reason are thrown overboard and only timidity passes for wisdom, and we can no longer even engage in a civil conversation with each other over the things that truly matter -- that at that point we don't merely lose our capacity to solve big challenges. We lose something essential about ourselves.
It's a careful statement, deferential to critics in the way Obama typically it is. But it's also a pretty clear defense of government--at a time when defending government is pretty controversial.
We saw that in August, when town hall meetings dredged up some pretty primal feelings. The protesters showing up at these events weren't simply angry about health reform. They were angry about every government program since the New Deal. Most Americans don't see things quite that way; Medicare and Social Security remain incredibly popular. But government remains unpopular in the abstract, as it has been at least since the time of Ronald Reagan.
With these final passages, I think, Obama was trying to shift that mindset--to remind people that government is already a part of our lives, and a force for good, in ways that are entirely consistent with basic notions of citizenship and shared responsibility.
To be sure, none of this will affect the outcome of the health care reform debate. But if Obama can convince Americans that govenrment works--an effort that will require action, yes, but also some words--it might shape debates in the future.
.jpg)
Print
COMMENTS (2)
"I think, Obama was trying to shift that mindset--to remind people that government is already a part of our lives, and a force for good, in ways that are entirely consistent with basic notions of citizenship and shared responsibility. To be sure, none of this will affect the outcome of the health care reform debate. But if Obama can convince Americans that government works--an effort that will require action, yes, but also some words--it might shape debates in the future."
While I can sort of appreciate Cohn's nuanced appreciation of President's nuanced speech, I am surprised at his cynicism in saying "none of this will affect the outcome of the health care reform debate". I believe it will i ... view full comment
"I think, Obama was trying to shift that mindset--to remind people that government is already a part of our lives, and a force for good, in ways that are entirely consistent with basic notions of citizenship and shared responsibility. To be sure, none of this will affect the outcome of the health care reform debate. But if Obama can convince Americans that government works--an effort that will require action, yes, but also some words--it might shape debates in the future."
While I can sort of appreciate Cohn's nuanced appreciation of President's nuanced speech, I am surprised at his cynicism in saying "none of this will affect the outcome of the health care reform debate". I believe it will in as much as it might shore up those who are feeling uncomfortable in supporting any reform having been intimidated by the angry right wing crowds and the vicious disinformation spread by Republicans. It may also affect the debate on the Hill by his lukewarm support of an idea at the very heart of Real Health care reform.
Cohn has said in his interviews before the speech, that he is a political realist so he knows that we might get a diluted public option, a co-op or neither. Even in that case if we get something like insurance reform by regulations, we should take it. He almost wears his realism as a medal. In fact it might be more useful for him to join Whitehouse staff Jarretts, DeParle, Douglass and Sebelius' PR person who have been spouting this mealymouthed nonsense about realism of political horse trading. If this was the case Obama the candidate could have saved himself some breaths by not pushing all that high minded nonsense about not accepting the "Politics as Usual" ways of Washington. May be Cohn never believed the campaign rhetoric, being the savvy political realist he is. Some of us simple minded folk did buy in his challenge "Change does not come FROM Washington, it comes TO Washington". So some of the silly idealism bound Progressives have been trying to do exactly that. May be they will succeed, if not discouraged by lack of enthusiasm about real change. May be they will fail proving that the "political realists" have been right as usual.
Here are my concerns about the substance of the speech.
President continued to repeat his very recent ritual of publicly cutting the legs of the Public Option ostensibly to court GOP votes, appease his own Stray Dogs and Health Inc. He claimed PO was only one additional feature. There may be other ideas to replace it. He has no further evidence than before that the objectives above can be achieved by any other means, yet he did not want to sell it to the American public. May be I am missing something about a political stratagem President is after.
President also failed to clearly connect the pathetic plight of many Americans to his solutions. Also did not tell them honestly the time table of when the relief will come to the blighted. Like 4 years to an exchange. 4 years from 2013? From today?
Progressives should not think PO is the only way, it is just one means. They should be open to other ideas. Mr P, have you not been open for months now? What do you have to show? Belittling the Public Option and the Progressives as extreme left who are stuck on this one idea. Is this a way to display your postparitsanship? I did not know that a compromise from Single Payer to making the Public Plan Optional is some kind of extreme left philosophy (horror of horrors some one labels him as a socialist). Do you think this approach will unite your stray dogs and right wing saboteurs to support a sham bill to put a feather in The Democratic Party cap.
Mr P we have all bought into the importance of your three core objectives and your touching empathy for 14000 losing insurance every day and hundreds dying and going bankrupt. What I do not see is your commitment to selling and pushing the only real means to get there, i.e. the Public Option. I do not see you showing clearly how you will take care of the blighted, you so eloquently described in the campaign and continue to do so, in a timely and effective (in terms of $ & c from their pockets) way. Imagine the number of people losing their insurance, 14000*1400, tens may be hundreds of thousands dying or going bankrupt while waiting for 2013.
Deferential to his critics? What pollyanna planet are you living on? I certainly don't doubt he liked the last part of his speech the best. Sermons are just so much easier to deliver than actual policy.
Deferential to his critics? What pollyanna planet are you living on? I certainly don't doubt he liked the last part of his speech the best. Sermons are just so much easier to deliver than actual policy.