Meacham Repeats ‘Center-Right’ Myth, Says Progressives Won’t Care If Obama Breaks Pledges
Meacham Repeats ‘Center-Right’ Myth, Says Progressives Won’t Care If Obama Breaks Pledges
On October 18, Newsweek ran a cover story titled “America the Conservative” by Jon Meacham, in which Meacham argued:
Should Obama win, he will have to govern a nation that is more instinctively conservative than it is liberal – a perennial reality that past Democratic presidents have ignored at their peril.
Yesterday, in an interview with PBS’s Charlie Rose, Meacham again reiterated that America is “center-right.” Meacham suggested that progressives should not stake too much in Obama’s progressive agenda and that they’ll forgive him out of “faith” if he tacks to the right:
MEACHAM: I think progressives should be very careful feeling that the millennium is about to come, and you know, disease will be gone by Saturday and poverty by Monday. (Laughter)
This is a very practical man and I think that he’s a lot like Ronald Reagan in that it’s quite possible his core believers have such faith in him that they’ll forgive him his compromises, that — Reagan could raise taxes, Reagan could sign liberal abortion bills. Reagan could do all that, Reagan could grow government by 6 or 7 percent — and still be this figure. It’s just this side of possible that Obama will be able to govern what I believe is largely a center-right country.
Watch it:
As ThinkProgress has noted repeatedly, the country is not “center-right,” despite what the cover of Newsweek said last month. In fact, the center of the country favors progressive legislation like raising the minimum wage and providing universal health care, as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) explained yesterday.
Based on the solidarity of progressives regarding past feuds over FISA legislation, for example, it’s highly unlikely liberal activists will just “forgive” Obama if he relents on his progressive agenda.
Meacham admitted that his article about conservatism was “probably going to look dumb, or at least out of step, for many months to come.” Apparently, he is happy making the same “dumb” argument well after Obama mustered the largest electoral victory ever on the most progressive agenda in 15 years.
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I would bet the right would keep claiming the Titanic was not sinking even as the water was up to their necks. The country has spoken and we want a progressive president and congress. The right wing is welcome to come along and work with us to once again have a country that cares for its neighbors and environment rather than showering the rich with more and more at the peril of everyone. Next, the courts and maybe even the media to become honestly ‘fair and balanced’. Hey, I can dream.
November 6th, 2008 at 8:51 pmWe are not a far left country just like we are not a far right country. We are a center LEFT country, as the country showed by sweeping the left to power by electing a lot of center-left dems.
November 6th, 2008 at 8:53 pmThey gloss over how many pledges Bush broke.
November 6th, 2008 at 8:53 pmI watched CR and I almost fell out of bed listening to Meacham. He is so sanctimonious and smug–my subscription to Newsweek is up for renewal and I am going to take a pass this time–if I want a steady diet of is theological interpretation, I’d get a subscription to The Catholic Observer.
Meacham is just very tiresome and not very inspiring.
November 6th, 2008 at 8:54 pmAs he holds his hands over his ears and chants nah nah nah nah
November 6th, 2008 at 9:00 pmMeacham’s an idiot…the prime reason I quit a 30+ year subscription to Newsweek.
November 6th, 2008 at 9:05 pmI dont know where this imaginary center needle exists or the need to place a compass rose over it but I wish they would stop using it to decide, ideologically, what group-think group people belong in.
Its inane.
November 6th, 2008 at 9:05 pmThe progressive community is going to be either Obama’s greatest allies or his greatest detractors . He would be foolish not to work with us as we are far more politically activist then the supposed moderates , who are by now tuned back into the sporting events on TV .
November 6th, 2008 at 9:08 pmPassion is likely to be viewed as a tad fanatical ,moderate is anything but .The democrats have tried the moderate approach over the last 2 years and it has resulted in lower approval ratings than the most unpopular president’s in American history !
Got passion ?
The American people are like the expecting couples in the VW commercials with Brooke Shields.
No matter what the message is from the people, it never changes the script for the talking heads.
November 6th, 2008 at 9:23 pmObama, being the constitutional scholar he is, will govern the way he ran his campaign.
He has the gifted ability to give back the energy he receives while on stage back to the people. This is who he is and how he will govern.
The righties can put what ever label they want on it… no one cares.
November 6th, 2008 at 9:25 pmWTF is Meacham and why should we give a damn what that eedjit/flack says?
Cheers,
November 6th, 2008 at 9:27 pmMeacham has proven himself to be corporate to the core.
November 6th, 2008 at 9:29 pmIt’s time for a series of articles to define what liberal and conservative really mean.
OT:
kgoradio.com
Ray Taliaferro – 1am – 5am pacific.
Call in or email your favorite poem or self made poem.
Kgo in SF is not nationally syndicated but heard all over the US and around the world, especially this time of the night, via internet.
November 6th, 2008 at 9:50 pmThey wish.
So when do these people stop making sh*t up out of thin air?
November 6th, 2008 at 10:06 pmwhen bush leaves i hope he
takes his pundits with him.
i’m so sick of these mountebanks…
*
November 6th, 2008 at 10:06 pmWhy do these people insist on pigeon-holing everybody and everything?
November 6th, 2008 at 10:12 pmMeacham does not understand the first thing about liberals.
November 6th, 2008 at 10:14 pmDidn’t you catch how worthless this guy was the first time? He said conservatism is: “(T)o be conservative is…to be driven by a fundamental human impulse to preserve what one has and loves.” In other words, he’s an idiot.
November 6th, 2008 at 10:16 pmOur human impulse is to progress. We build things, we invent things like teevees, cars, planes, engines spaceships, sattelites, politics etc etc. Progress is, then, something we love and want to preserve.
Meachams directional center-left, center-right, argument, as well, has become moot by his own defintion of conservatism.
November 6th, 2008 at 10:37 pmIf Meacham doesnt want progress then he can give up all his modern conveniences and move back to some cave and wash his animal skin clothes in the river. Better yet he can preserve his ‘conservatism’ by forgetting how to wear clothes or read and write and draw caveman pics on the walls.
November 6th, 2008 at 10:40 pmTypical Republicans. The facts demonstrate clearly that their wishes are not in the majority. How do they react to that? By going around saying their wishes are in the majority.
November 6th, 2008 at 10:42 pmSomeone needs to give these guys a liberal enema.
They’ve been swimming in the neocon koolaid for so long, for them nothing else exists. Like reality.
November 6th, 2008 at 10:57 pmIf you can’t beat him, then reposition him, and never let the truth get in the way of a good story.
November 6th, 2008 at 10:58 pm______
freeman Says:
The progressive community is going to be either Obama’s greatest allies or his greatest detractors . He would be foolish not to work with us as we are far more politically activist then the supposed moderates , who are by now tuned back into the sporting events on TV .
Passion is likely to be viewed as a tad fanatical ,moderate is anything but .The democrats have tried the moderate approach over the last 2 years and it has resulted in lower approval ratings than the most unpopular president’s in American history !
Got passion ?
November 6th, 2008 at 9:08 pm
______
What kind of standing does Dr. Marc Lamont Hill have among liberals? He believes Obama will be a centrist president.
November 6th, 2008 at 11:09 pmPrairie Sunshine Says:
Meacham’s an idiot…the prime reason I quit a 30+ year subscription to Newsweek.
*
i pray to god
others follow your lead.
^
November 6th, 2008 at 11:41 pm.
Liberals and Progressives want their middle back and it seems these (R)epubliCONS won’t give it up without a fight…
… So, just what did they succeed at by hijacking America, again?
.
November 7th, 2008 at 1:03 amif this is the currency they need to get the social conservative nitwits in the soft-cookie dough center of the US on the obama change bus, then by all means.
i mean, who really cares??? it’s pretty clear these pundits are simply trying to bring the right wing into the fold… so if they do it under the guise of “center-right” rhetoric [i.e., lies] and unsubstantiated comparisons to right-wing conservatives [like reagan]. then whatev!
as long as is keeps them from their hissing and booing [and assassination attempts] then all’s well that ends well.
November 7th, 2008 at 1:40 amThese republican mouths are trying to reaquire the attention of their flock.
Since Obama beat the republican challenger, McCain. Of course Obama must Govern the country like a rebulican.
So Win GW won, why didn’t he govern like a progressive?
Conservatives are very desperate. Even Murdoch’s extreme right news empire, is loosing number.
November 7th, 2008 at 3:07 am“JimboSlice Says:
We are not a far left country just like we are not a far right country. We are a center LEFT country, as the country showed by sweeping the left to power by electing a lot of center-left dems.”
The USA is a far right country in comparison to the rest of the “Western” world. There’s no way to deny that – the average republican and many democrats would be considered as fascists if they were politicians in Germany or France.
November 7th, 2008 at 3:09 amGWB, Rove, Cheney & Rumsfeld would have been arrested in 2002 for preparing a war of aggression if they had been German politicians.
Uhm… so does anyone here have a problem with that? Because these are the reasons I voted for him.
November 7th, 2008 at 8:34 amDefinite corrected needed at the end there:
Obama may have won the most “popular” votes of any candidate in history, but certainly, Reagan’s 1984 drubbing of Mondale 49-1, was a far greater “Electoral” victory.
November 7th, 2008 at 8:39 am(Oops, make that “correction“, not “corrected”.) :(
November 7th, 2008 at 8:40 amMeacham is so full of sh*t.
November 7th, 2008 at 9:36 amnew kool aid
November 7th, 2008 at 9:50 amI have always wondered what it means to label a country center-right/center-left. That seems a hedge statement and much too pat for reality. Can anyone enlighten me?
November 7th, 2008 at 9:51 amOne thing about Republicans: they NEVER LEARN ANYTHING NEW. You have Karl Rove blathering about Obama’s ‘Center Right’ campaign 2 days after calling Obama the most Liberal member of the Senate. And poor Sean Hannity is just worried to pieces that Barak was a Centerist during the campaign, but now that he has unlimited powers he will ‘revert to the Barak Obama who visited with terrorists 20 years ago.’
All the Repubs have ever learned to do is lie and throw people under busses (bye-bye, Sarah!). Perhaps is they observed & learned, and reflected the country rather than the radical nutjob evangelicals, they could regain some credibility. But that would mean admitting they were wrong, and I just can see Rove, Hannity, Bush, Cheney, Rush & O’Reilly ever doing this!
November 7th, 2008 at 9:56 amJon Meacham is that typical pundit who tells us that the American people believe what he believes. No set of facts will dissuade Mr Meacham from his contention.
Not even this fact, raised this morning by Nobel Laureate Paul Krugman:
Democrats “now have bigger majorities in both houses than the G.O.P. ever achieved in its 12-year reign.”
Mr. Meacham knows how to survive and thrive in the big media ecosystem. He serves money and power, if with a soft touch. He will continue to be rewarded with promotions, job protection and raises while more courageous journalists are punished and held back.
November 7th, 2008 at 10:05 amTo agree, I’d have to look at the outrage over Obama and the FISA vote.
The lib-rals aren’t gonna be that forgiving if Obama breaks his pledges.
November 7th, 2008 at 11:33 amGood for you. It’s important to keep after these MSM bloviators because they DO hold a lot of power. Folks tend to think if they read it in Newsweek or Time, it must be true. Meacham is one of the most self-righteous little prigs out there, and with the exception of a few columnists, he has turned Newsweek content into a subtle right-wing screed (sometimes not so subtle — Stuart Taylor’s little series on letting Administration terrorists get away with murder was perhaps the most egregious stuff I’ve ever read in the MSM — Mecham called Taylor’s writings “controversial”).
Besides, the public isn’t “left” or “right.” The average voter has no political philosophy at all beyond perhaps a few standard bromides. Voters “root” for one party or the other in the same nonsensical way they root for the Phillies or the Packers. They want stuff done, and they don’t care if Social Security or unemployment benefits are “socialistic” (they are); voters are not “conservative”; they’e PRE-servative — they want to preserve whatever pathetic little piece of the pie they’re hoarding. The “undecideds,” who in fact decide every election are the dimwittiest of all — they don’t even own any bromides & they guarantee that every campaign will be a dumbed-down version of theory and that most candidates can get away with being as dunderheaded and bellicose as John McCain & George Bush.
For Meacham to pontificate upon what “people” want is simply an exercise in his own wishful thinking and his attempt to impose his own will on the rest of us.
November 7th, 2008 at 6:41 pm