Obama starting out tough militarily is akin to his strategy of apprearing centrist.

[Bonobo]

Think about it. Obama has been all about readjusting everyone's expectations from the very beginning.

On the one hand, Clinton, along with Hillary, was expected to rule from the left. In that sense, he not only telegraphed his intentions and allowed himself to be labeled and pigeonholed while empowering the opposition.

Obama has learned from this. By incurring the wrath of the most vociferous and cartoonish of the "left", he has earned himself a position where he can be as liberal as he wants to be while still maintaining the illusion of centrism. All. About. Expectations.

Similarly, he can always move away from militarism and sweeten up his foreign policy with some honey later, but ONLY after cementing a reputation as a person willing to throw a hard punch.

It is a shame that many seem to have lost the ability to see the complexity of his strategy, but I truly believe that is what we are looking at.

[AtomicKitten]

1. Obama's choices, nominations and appointments, are complex.

Although I was taken aback by his national security/foreign policy choices (with the exception of Rice and Panetta), I realize he intends to speak softly and point to his rather hawkish foreign policy team standing behind him and ask "have you seen their work?"

President Obama's big picture is just starting to unfold. He definitely appears in charge. I hope he moves rapidly towards peace.

[DeltaLitProf]

2. I agree with you on one thing

The militarism and the centrism are both analogous. He sincerely believes in both.

[Clio the Leo]

3. He's already dripping honey.....

.... onto Al-Arabiya TV. ;)

But otherwise, I believe you're analysis is spot on.

[scarletwoman]

4. How nice that only a few tribal villagers in Pakistan have to die so he can get his militarist cred.

Fuck this shit. Quit fucking bombing people, period.

sw

[Bonobo]

5. How nice...

That a person can imagine that things are so simple.

I'm fairly sure they are not.

[scarletwoman]

7. No, really. It's not that hard to not kill people. It's the constantly making excuses for killing

people that's complicated.

sw

[Vattel]

9. well-said

[scarletwoman]

11. Thank you. (nt)

[PurityOfEssence]

6. He might just be what he's acting like

The endless chirping that he's really a progressive is slowly being drowned out by those who say he's a centrist and get used to it.

It's fine; if one selectively cites his words, he can be portrayed as a pacifist or a hard-nosed utilitarian war proponent. What matters is what he does.

So many people are so convinced that he's just deceiving "them", but the them changes depending on the convinced person's perspective. Moderates are firmly convinced that he's just making vague leftist mouthings to sucker us as he steers a steady third-way course right down the middle. Somewhat-to-the-right-of-center Democrats are firmly convinced he's taking us both for a ride.

At least a larger group of the stalwarts are actually copping to the fairly obvious (and well-telegraphed) centrism plus.

The obvious dynamic here is that many are going to be disappointed. Still, with approval ratings as high as they are, he can lose some significant hearts and still be way in the plus column.

Whatever.

There's something endlessly creepy about so many people giggling subversively at how cool it is that he's playing games. I wonder how cool it'll seem when they realize that they're actually the "them".

Hey, he's a bit right-of-center; we could do a lot worse, and we basically did for the last 28 years.

[xchrom]

8. what? nt

[Bonobo]

10. Nice post!