Thursday, August 07, 2008

No Clue on Obama

From David Brooks of the NYT:

But then there is his ruthless political side, which I’m seeing more and more of. His Iraq statements are a sign of his thoroughly political nature. When the surge was being considered, he went on TV again and again and said the additional troops would not reduce violence. Today, he could just admit he was wrong. But, of course, it is an iron rule of politics that no politician — not Bush, not Obama — can ever admit a mistake. So Obama goes on TV and says he always predicted that the surge would reduce violence. In America it’s better to be seen as a confident liar than as someone who once got something wrong. And he rewrites his position with such confidence and bald-facedness it’s sort of scary.

I have to admit I used to have a sense of what kind of president Obama would make.

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