Carol Platt Liebau: A Decent Man, But A Radical

Thursday, February 07, 2008

A Decent Man, But A Radical

There is much to like about Senator Barack Obama -- as I pointed out here.

But missing from all the quasi religious fervor surrounding the Obama candidacy is any examination of what, exactly, he stands for.

The fact is that Barack is a radical. As this piece in the Washington Post pointed out, he has the most liberal voting record in the U.S. Senate. That means he's to the left of Teddy Kennedy, Pat Leahy, and even Bernie Sanders -- the "independent" (who used to identify himself as a socialist) from Vermont.

Take abortion. Obviously, people of good conscience can disagree on the life/choice issue, but Barack actually opposed the Infants Born Alive bill in the Illinois state senate -- a stance much more radical than the typical pro-choicer. Take health care. In a recent Democratic debate, Barack conceded that "What I said was that if I were starting from scratch, if we didn't have a system in which employers had typically provided health care, I would probably go with a single-payer system." In other words, in a perfect world for Barack Obama, there would be nationalized, government-run health care.

Obviously, none of this means that he's not a nice person and an inspirational speaker. His ability to uplife and inspire people is little short of amazing -- and that's a gift in a world where, too often, politics seems like a dreary little set of arcane policy prescriptions and backroom deals.

But even nice people can be wrong -- terribly wrong -- when it comes to their policy goals, their beliefs, and their visions for America. Barack falls into that category.

4 Comments:

Blogger Bob said...

Carol,

The health care system that Obama proposes is one that the majority of Americans favor. How is that radical?

Obama's program would save us money. How is that radical?

His health care plan resembles that of the other democracies of the world. How is that radical?

10:10 AM  
Blogger Rightwingsnarkle said...

**that's the sound of crickets chirping**

4:46 AM  
Blogger Greg said...

Most Americans favor a single-payor, government run health care system?

I was unaware of that.

8:09 AM  
Blogger Bob said...

Greg,

It's true. Polls in the last year show that two thirds of Americans favor a health care system similar to other Western democracies.

A poll from about six months ago showed that among the conservative GOP, half of those polled favored universal health care.

10:54 AM  

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